DC Spotlight: 4 strange 1990s detours worth reopening

Four DC side roads from the late-1990s shelf: federal metahuman surveillance, Morrison/Millar myth-tech, time-crime weirdness, and a man who comes back from death with a different power every time.

Canon status: confirmed DCU / post-Crisis continuity.

Chase was a 1998 DC ongoing series centered on Cameron Chase, a Department of Extranormal Operations agent watching the superhero world from the outside. The original run lasted ten issues, including a DC One Million special, and the core creative identity comes from Dan Curtis Johnson and J.H. Williams III. 12

Why pull it: before J.H. Williams III became a must-follow name, this book was already turning DC continuity into a procedural about secrets, surveillance, and government files.

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Canon status: confirmed DCU / post-Crisis continuity.

The original Aztek debuted in Aztek: The Ultimate Man #1 in August 1996 and was created by Grant Morrison, Mark Millar, and N. Steven Harris. DC's collection page frames the series as stories from Aztek: The Ultimate Man #1-10, with Aztek fighting in Vanity City and crossing paths with Green Lantern and the Joker. 345

Why pull it: it reads like a compressed Morrison idea engine, with a mythic superhero built for a city that barely gets used anywhere else.

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Canon status: fringe / time-paradox shelf.

The Walker Gabriel version of Chronos first appeared in Chronos #1 and was created by John Francis Moore and Paul Guinan; DC Universe Infinite lists issue #1 as released on January 7, 1998, written by Moore with pencils by Guinan. The run went through eleven numbered issues plus a DC One Million issue, and Wikipedia notes the ending has Gabriel wipe himself from history while still existing through Chronopolis logic. 678

Why pull it: it is a time-travel solo book where the continuity problem is part of the premise, not a mistake to clean up later.

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Canon status: confirmed DCU / post-Crisis continuity.

Mitch Shelley, the Resurrection Man, first appeared in Resurrection Man #1 in 1997 and was created by Dan Abnett, Andy Lanning, and Jackson Guice. DC's collected-edition page describes the core hook: Shelley can be killed, but each time he returns with a different power; Wikipedia records the original series as running until 1999 after 27 issues plus a DC One Million issue. 91011

Why pull it: the premise is brutally simple, but the series uses it as a road mystery about memory, identity, and superhero immortality.

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