Fifty Two

"PANEL 1: "I'm Steel, second-stringer from the Superman books. And I am awesome."

PANEL 2: "I'm Booster Gold. I protect the past to ensure your future. And I am awesome."

PANEL 3: "I'm Ralph Dibny. I stretch and am a second-stringer on the Justice League. And I am awesome."

PANEL 4: "We're Starfire, Animal Man, and Adam Strange. And we're second-stringers from the DC universe. And we are awesome."

PANEL 5: "I'm Renee Montoya, second-stringer from the Batman books and the Batman animated series. And I am a lesbian. And also very, very awesome.""

- Linkara, 52 In 5 Panels

52 was a yearlong series published by DC Comics from May 2006 to May 2007. As the name suggests it consisted of an issue every week for an entire year, a Herculean task made easier by having four writers (Geoff Johns, Grant Morrison, Greg Rucka, and Mark Waid), one breakdown artist (Keith Giffen), and a veritable army of pencilers, inkers, colorists, and letterers. The story takes place between the events of Infinite Crisis and the One Year Later storylines of Wonder Woman, Superman, and Batman.

While Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman appear occasionally throughout the story, the main focus is on the rest of the DC Universe as it functions without its iconic heroes, devoting most of its panel time to second and third string characters, including some who had been all but abandoned at the end of The Silver Age of Comic Books. Because of the sheer number of characters to keep track of and all the continuity and decades old story lines used as the backbone of the story, 52 could be accused of veering into Continuity Porn. This is alleviated to a certain degree by the collected volumes of the series, which included creators' notes at the end of each week that tended to illuminate various parts of that week's chapter (including some of the more obscure references). DC also produced a companion book to the series that reprinted some classic issues featuring some of the major characters of the series that are not as well known (Rip Hunter, for example, had been pretty much been out of DC Comics since the 1960s, but becomes pretty important as 52 presses on), as well as more recent issues that set-up the characters for their individual stories.

While plot lines and various characters flow in and out of each other as the year goes on, there are seven main plot threads that the entire series can be boiled down to for simplicity's sake (minor spoilers ahead):
 * Booster Gold's attempts to become the next big name superhero in the absence of Superman begin to unravel as newcomer Supernova captures the public's attention. Meanwhile, Skeets begins to suffer from continual temporal distortions, forcing Booster to turn to Rip Hunter (the time traveling hero) for help.
 * Ralph Dibny, still reeling from the events of Identity Crisis, begins to investigate a Kryptonian cult devoted to resurrection (most importantly, the resurrection of the recently deceased Conner Kent) that appears to have an interest in his dead wife, Sue. After busting up one of its rituals, Ralph begins his own journey to resurrect Sue with the help of the Helm of Nabu.
 * The strained relationship between John Henry Irons (Steel) and his niece Natasha eventually drives her to join Lex Luthor's Everyman Project, a program that promises to awake latent metahuman genes at whatever price Luthor deems fit. However, Irons soon discovers that the artificial metagenes come at a serious price, and Lex's paranoia of Supernova has led him to try to get the treatment himself...
 * Renee Montoya, vacillating between alcohol and hook-ups to ease the pain over the death of her partner Crispus Allen, is recruited by The Question to investigate the expanding activities of Intergang. Their journey together becomes just as much about saving her from herself as it does the rest of the world from the newly founded Religion of Crime.
 * As Black Adam continues to rule over the nation of Kahndaq he begins a new war against crime by publicly executing any super criminal that comes within his borders. His call for a new brand of superhuman justice is answered by other nations tired of American heroes running rampant across their borders, including China and its government sanctioned superhumans The Great Ten. Things begin to change though as Black Adam begins to build his own Marvel family, who convince him to follow a less bloody path.
 * In the wake of a teleportation accident, Adam Strange, Animal Man, and Starfire must find their own way back home with limited supplies (including a lack of eyes in their pilot, Adam). Their journey not only puts them against some of the darkest forces in space, but makes them a target for the evil Lady Styx. In order to survive long enough to find someone to help them return home, they are forced to join up with Lobo, now a cardinal in an interplanetary religion of nonviolence devoted to a gigantic space dolphin.
 * Doctor Will Magnus, creator of the Metal Men, finds himself abducted to Oolong Island and forced to participate with mad super scientists to create weapons of mass destruction for Intergang and its global ambitions. His resistance to the idea is severely hampered when his psych meds are confiscated.

The major consequences of the series on The DCU as a whole is proving that the  as well as setting up some of the future storylines of some of its major characters. It also set the standard for weekly yearlong series published by DC, which has yet to be equaled by any of the other series that have followed.

Not to be confused with Action 52.

This series provides examples of: "Ambush Bug: Hello, room service? Send up a plot and three pages of dialogue right away! The weekly grind is tearin' me apart! Fifty-two!!!"
 * Abnormal Ammo: Will Magnus eventually starts actually shooting miniature versions of his Metal Men out of a homemade gun.
 * Aborted Arc: The original Booster Gold/Skeets arc involved the duo fixing the time-stream after it had been damaged during the Infinite Crisis. However, several issues into the series, after Skeets had already noticed several discrepancies between events as they happened and as they were recorded in the future, the writers decided that this plot had been used too often by other time-travel heroes and was too generic, so they switched to an actual malevolent threat that intended to manipulate time and reality for its own gain.
 * Action Girl: Renee Montoya, Kate Kane, Starfire (once they get past Devilance), Adrianna Tomaz (Isis), Natasha Irons, and a slew of action girls from other DCU titles that appear as minor and background characters throughout the series. Mercy Graves, a character created for the Superman cartoon that was introduced into the comics, appears with Lex Luthor in almost all his appearances, but only gets one opportunity to do anything.
 * Adult Fear:
 * In the aftermath of the Infinite Crisis, the cosmic event that shattered existence, Alan Scott has to deal with the realization that his daughter died in the crisis, and no parent should ever have to outlive their children.
 * The Question has terminal lung cancer exacerbated by a lengthy smoking addiction, gradually wasting away and losing both his mental and physical faculties. Despite his history of fighting alien menaces and international conspiracies, there is nothing he can do to stop his cancer from metastasizing.
 * Affirmative Action Legacy: Renee Montoya, a Hispanic lesbian, . Katherine "Kate" Kane, a Jewish Lesbian, is introduced as the new Batwoman.
 * The Alcoholic: When the story starts, Renee Montoya can be easily located in the bottom of any bottle found near her apartment. She is busy trying to forget all that she has gone through, and creator commentary implies that she is not just on a brief bender after the death of her partner and driving off her girlfriend, but that she is actually a complete drunk. One panel, which showed her taking a pair of aspirin, was specifically drawn to give the impression that she was chewing the pills instead of just swallowing them, which turns out to be "an old drunks' trick."
 * All Star Writers: Geoff Johns, Grant Morrison, Greg Rucka, and Mark Waid!
 * Anti-Villain:
 * Black Adam, who slowly begins to deviate from his extreme policies after the growth of his Marvel Family.
 * Dr. T.O. Morrow, an unapologetic supervillain who never even tries to redeem himself, is nonetheless lonely and depressed due to the lack of recognition, or even friendship, he gets while his student, William Magnus, is celebrated and heralded.
 * Arc Number: 52, duh.
 * Arc Words: "Who are you?" and "Are you ready?" By The Question.
 * Artificial Intelligence: The Metal Men, which are a team of well-beloved superheroes created by Dr. William Magnus, one of the main characters of this series.
 * Ascended Fangirl: Eliza Harmon, who idolized the Teen Titans and all things speed. When she became Trajectory and a member of Luthor's new Infinity Inc, she never stopped hoping to eventually join the Titans, and dreamed of eventually becoming the new Kid Flash.
 * Asteroid Thicket: Turned Up to Eleven; apparently the thicket that Adam Strange, Animal Man, and Starfire are stuck in has a diameter measured in parsecs. This is handwaved with the explanation that it is not a natural asteroid field, but that comes nowhere close to explaining the sheer amount of mass that is present.
 * Author Appeal: The collected volumes make it clear which characters the writers loved most of all. Even Dan Di Dio, Editor in Chief of DC, got in on this; while Dan stayed out of much of the writing of 52 (his words, not mine), he did insist that  and had the end of the Ralph Dibny storyline rewritten. See the page quote for the results.
 * Awesome but Impractical: The Batwoman outfit comes complete with high-heels, which would make even running a difficult challenge, let alone combat and leaping from the rooftops. The writers actually recognized this and, in her later appearances in Detective Comics, her father explains that those were the only boots that could be found in the proper color, and her new footwear is considerably more practical.
 * Bad Powers, Bad People: . He has to eat a part of something in order to turn into it. Ugh.
 * Badass: Everyone. No, seriously, everyone. This series manages to make second stringers from the back pages of decades-old stories into concentrated awesome.
 * Badass Abnormal: Natasha Irons, after a fallout with her uncle, enlists in the Lex Luthor Everyman Project and gains actual superpowers, going from a human in Power Armor to a human capable of crushing Power Armor. John Henry is infected with a metagene against his will and transforms into a being composed of stainless steel, capable of deflecting bullets and hurling blobs of molten metal.
 * Badass Boast: "I'm a detective."
 * Badass Bookworm: Ralph Dibny, the Elongated Man. He has a respectable level of combat ability due to his stretching powers, but what really puts him above and beyond is his inquisitive and intellectual nature, which Hal Jordan has said is more rational than any man he has ever met, even moreso than Batman and Barry Allen.
 * Badass Normal: Renee Montoya and the Question especially, but almost every Badass Normal in the DC Universe pops up at some point. It even introduces a few new ones, inclding the new Batwoman.
 * Batman Gambit: Ralph Dibny's plan to defeat
 * Battle Discretion Shot: The climax of the Everyman storyline ends with . The next panel, after , is a wide shot of the building and the sounds of smackdown echoing across Metropolis. It is unspeakably satisfying. The creator commentary included in the trade paperback reveals that, originally, we were supposed to actually see the end of the fight, but the writers realized that nothing they could draw could possibly look as amazing as what the readers own minds would fill in.
 * Beard of Sorrow: Over the series, Ralph Dibny comes closer and closer to outright despair and insanity and, as he does so, his personal hygiene falls by the wayside. It starts as a thin brush after the Cult of Conner fiasco, but over the weeks his beard becomes thicker and longer until the final climax of his story. Here, where he asserts control and reveals his plan, he appears clean-shaven and properly dressed for the first time in weeks.
 * Belligerent Sexual Tension:
 * Renee and Kate's relationship throughout the series is just-this-side of hostile, filled with tension from their past relationship and ongoing personality conflicts. Renee herself recounts that even back when they were together they could always push each others buttons, that that was one of the things that made their relationship so passionate, but that was also a reason why they could never work as a long-term and stable couple.
 * Black Adam and Adrianna begin their courtship the same way, and the commentary in the trade-paperback recognizes that "you just know it's gonna be love when Andrea spits in Black Adam's face and lives to tell the tale."
 * Big Bad Ensemble:
 * Big Damn Heroes: Batwoman, in what was supposed to be her reveal, appears in a full-page splash panel knocking out two mutant human lion/leopard cultists as she dramatically saves both Renee Montoya and the The Question from an unpleasant turn of events (namely, being eaten by the aforementioned cultists).
 * Black Comedy: "Rain of the Supermen"
 * The Blank: One of the originals.
 * Bratty Half-Pint: While a bit old for the role, Osiris fits it pretty well.
 * Break Her Heart To Save Her: After asking her for help, Renee rudely tells Kate that this affair has nothing to do with her and that she (Renee) does not owe her anything. Kate is obviously crushed, but Renee's narration reveals that, if the Question's theories are correct and Intergang is behind everything, it is not just themselves who are in trouble, but all their friends and loved ones as well. Renee does not want to drag Kate into this.
 * Break the Haughty:
 * Booster Gold, after nearly reaching the very top of the superhero world, crashes down in ruins as Supernova steals all his glory.
 * Natasha Irons is not quite as ready for the responsibility of being a hero as she believes she is, and struggles to deal with the realization.
 * August General in Iron, who fervently believed that China's superheroes were strong on their own, was forced to allow outside help to stop 's rampage.
 * Breaking the Fourth Wall: Ambush Bug, who else? Word of God stated it was reflecting Grant Morrison's fatigue during the series.

""That's it... that's right... just do it...""
 * Brought Down to Normal: Superman recently lost all of his powers and is spending the year simply as mild-mannered reporter Clark Kent, learning to do things as we humans do them (including shaving and picking up scalding hot pots). Both he and Lois are taking the entire affair in rather good order, content to be only human, but according to Perry White his work has really suffered as of late (since he is not used to actually having to look for news) and he is on the edge of termination.
 * Buffy-Speak: "It's been three weeks since I saw Mister cryptic-I-have-no-face-but-plenty-of-attitude."
 * Butterfly of Doom: Lex Luthor kidnaps Clark Kent and gives him an experimental Truth Serum which his scientists explain is a synthetic recreation of Wonder Woman's magic lasso. Luthor then asks Clark, who broke the story about new hero Supernova, why it is that Superman is toying with Luthor by pretending to be someone else. Clark, laughing madly, informs Lex that he does not know who is under the Supernova mask, but he is absolutely certain of one thing: it is not Superman. Creator commentary in the trade-paperbacks points out that this scene, and perhaps the entire future path of DC Comics, could have gone so differently if Luthor had simply known to ask the right question.
 * The Cape: Not strictly anyone in the series, but as Black Adam softens up, he takes to wearing his cape more as symbolic gesture.
 * Captain Ethnic: The Great Ten of China. Deliberately.
 * Chekhov's Gun: At the Black Adam/Isis wedding in Week Sixteen, the Intergang bomber quotes from the Crime Bible that serves as the foundation of the Religion of Crime. The bible itself and the religion as a whole would not be featured or even named until Week Twenty-Three, when the Question and Renee Montoya infiltrate one of their occult meetings.
 * Child Soldiers: Intergang recruits and brainwashes young children to serve as footsoldiers and bombers against their enemies.
 * C-List Fodder: Good-bye
 * Comes Great Responsibility: The underlying theme of the John Henry/Natasha Irons subplot is the responsibility of those with power and the worthiness of those same people to deserve their power.
 * Continuity Nod: The series refers heavily to the immediate history of the DCU and the pasts of its characters, which set up the various plots for this series. This includes (for the different storylines):
 * Infinite Crisis for Booster Gold, Steel, Black Adam, and the Space Heroes (Animal Man, Adam Strange and Starfire), who all took part in either fighting the crisis itself or the set-up.
 * Identity Crisis for Ralph Dibny, in which his wife was murdered, he stopped being the Elongated Man, and a lot of moral ambiguity was introduced to the formerly all-good Justice League of America.
 * Gotham Central for Renee Montoya, the series which covered her involuntary outing by Two-Face, her gradual descent into alcoholism and violence, and the death of her partner, Crispus Allen.
 * The 1990's Metal Men series for Dr. William Magnus, which he describes as a delusion resulting from a psychotic break.
 * Continuity Porn: The series is largely filed with references to old and obscure stories and series.
 * Cosmic Plaything: Buddy Baker. Makes sense when you realize the one who wrote his scenes wrote his series.
 * Crisis Crossover: An unusual example of a Crisis Crossover that happens immediately after another. DC has referred to the surrounding Crisis' as chapters in a single large story beginning with Crisis on Infinite Earths, then Infinite Crisis and ending in Final Crisis.
 * Cut Lex Luthor a Check: Luthor uses the Everyman project as a legitimate means of income, but it turns out the underlying plan is all about getting powers himself and destroying Superman.
 * Darker and Edgier: Classic villain Egg Fu was transformed into the horrific and monstrous Chang Tzu, who killed a henchman because he might have once called him "Egg Fu." According to the Word of God, Morrison was begging them to retain the prehensile mustache, but he was voted down.
 * Death Is Cheap:
 * Lampshaded by Ralph Dibny when he, Hal Jordan, Green Arrow, Metamorpho, and Zauriel are breaking up the Cult of Conner, which preaches resurrection. Ralph points out that Jordan and Arrow have both been dead before, and Ralph has actually lost track of how many times Metamorpho has been deceased in the past. With all their history, who is to say that the Cult of Conner does not have a legitimate point?
 * The trope is later played with by the Genre Savvy authors, who realised that past experiences would color the perspective of any readers.  was never meant to be Killed Off for Real, it was always planned to be a deliberate trick to fool the villain, but the writers wanted to conceal that fact from the audience and they knew that comic readers would automatically view any "death" with skepticism. So, they had to find a way to actually convince readers of his death while not actually killing him, and they eventually settled on the simple and effective plan of showing his corpse. The trade paperbacks feature several rough sketches of attempts to pull this off, with panels showing his bisected body falling to the ground in several places, but this was determined to come off as hilarious instead of dramatic. The panel eventually decided upon was a half-success; fans did not actually believe   was dead, but they did believe that he was permanently out of the series.
 * Death Seeker: Renee begins the series suicidal after the events of Gotham Central and, after she is forced to kill an Intergang suicide bomber that was just a child, she begs Black Adam to kill her when he finds her "drunkenly taking pleasure with one of [his] citizens."

""Hot damn.""
 * Depending on the Artist: The series retained a single breakdown artists (Keith Giffen) for all fifty-two issues to deliberately avert this trope and maintain consistent portrayals of characters throughout the series. There were minor variances over the year (the design of Natasha Irons when she first appears with Infinity Inc does not match either her previous or later appearances, and the changing bust size of Renee Montoya and Kate Kane got a lot of criticism from internet reviewers), but these were few and far between.
 * Despair Event Horizon: There are actually many of them, each taking place in one of the independent storylines where they are turning points not just in the story, but in the lives of the characters as well. Commentary released in the trade paperback reveals that some of these scenes were specifically designed to push the envelope as far as possible in a comic book and others drew from painful personal experiences of the writers.
 * The deaths of  sends   into a deep depression and homicidal rage that dramatically affects not just him, but the entire planet.
 * When  dies,   seems to be okay, but actually has a personal crisis of faith, identity and purpose.
 * Destination Defenestration: In her introduction, Batwoman throws one of the mutant human/animal cultists out a window after she stopped Renee from shooting him.
 * Distressed Damsel: Despite Adam Strange's speech that she is a true Warrior Princess and gender equality is a fact of life out in space, the first plot-worthy event to befall the Space Heroes is when Starfire is taken prisoner by Devilance the Pursuer and the two men need to come rescue her.
 * Dream Team: The four writers. Some of the biggest names in comics working on a project that involves fan-favorite, and author-favorite, characters in an undocumented period of history in the DC Universe. They went wild, and the critics and fans ate it all up.
 * Drop the Hammer: Steel's weapon is, technological gimmicks aside, a steel-driving ground-thumping hammer.
 * Drowning My Sorrows:
 * Her partner is dead, she has driven away her girlfriend, and she has been slowly descending into violence and disassociation from everybody and everything she once held dear. When the story starts, Renee Montoya has been living inside a bottle for so long that the creator commentary implies she is a full alcoholic who might not be able to get back on her own.
 * After the Cult of Conner, as Ralph Dibny edges closer and closer to despair and insanity he begins to perpetually carry around a hip flask and frequently drinks, regardless of the situation..
 * Early-Bird Cameo: The Super Young Team are first mentioned in 52, but do not appear until Final Crisis.
 * Eldritch Abomination:
 * Eureka Moment: After Renee and the Question storm the mysterious warehouse she was hired to investigate the trail goes cold, without any clues or leads to where the alien and lasers came from or where they were going, and she has just about given up on the entire affair. The three weeks (Or was it two?) she was paid for have passed, Captain Sawyer is correct in that she is not even really a licensed P.I. and she does not owe the Question anything. Then, just as she is about to close the mental file completely, she notices an open tabloid covering a gala that the Kane family is throwing... the Kane family...
 * Evil Counterpart: Inverted. Black Adam is normally the Evil Counterpart of Captain Marvel, but in this series, he tries to turn over a new leaf and serves as one of the protagonists.
 * Evil Sorcerer:
 * Executive Meddling: While the writers were left alone for the most part, Dan Didio literally pulled rank on the issue that dealt with the end of Ralph Dibny's storyline, pretty much rewriting it himself via the authors and Keith Giffen. Ralph's conclusion is regarded as one of the highlights of the series. Of course, according to one of the writers Didio hated 52 so absolutely, he would literally walk down the halls shouting it. He decided to make the next weekly series more editorially mandated to his wishes and we got Countdown to Final Crisis as a result.
 * Eyes Do Not Belong There: Batman encounters the Ten-Eyed Men while on his journey around the world, who have an eye at the end of each finger. They were inspired by the Ten-Eyed Man, an old villain from The Silver Age of Comic Books that one of the writers remembered fondly.
 * Face Stealer: The shapeshifter Everyman needs to eat a part of something to turn into that thing. He makes numerous mentions of hairs and nails to explain his combat forms and some shapes he uses just for fun, but this does raise some questions when he begins to change into mutant animals and Giant Enemy Crabs. Just what did he eat to turn into that?
 * Faking the Dead:
 * Family-Unfriendly Death: . Creator commentary reveals that they were deliberately pushing the envelope as far as they possibly could in a comic.
 * Fan Service: Natasha was written as wearing proper welding gear in the scene of her building her own armor, but the artist drew her without proper protection and focused on her chest when she hit an air pocket. The writers were very disappointed with the change, since it not only made Natasha less sympathetic when she gets burned, but also undercut her argument with her uncle. By recklessly forging ahead without protective gear, she shows that she really is not ready for the responsibility of wielding Power Armor, and the legitimate disagreement she has with John Henry begins to become more one-sided.
 * Faux Action Girl: Starfire in the early weeks. Just after Adam Strange gives Animal Man an entire speech about how she is a true Warrior Princess, that gender-equality is old news out in space and she has no need for anybody to protect her or care for her, she is ambushed and imprisoned by Devilance the Pursuer without even a struggle and needs the two men to come and rescue her. Of course, she had been eating mind-altering fruit that degraded both her movement control and decision-making abilities; she makes up for it later on, so we can cut her some slack.
 * Fiery Redhead: "Kate Kane has the kind of beauty that leaves you breathless and the kind of temper that leaves you bruised."
 * For Science!: The Science Squad on Oolong Island.
 * Foreshadowing: This story, along with the Seven Soldiers maxi-series, sets up important plot points for Final Crisis. The scenes showing what Batman did in his year off set up a number of points which become important during Morrison's run on Batman. Rip Hunter's chalkboard in his laboratory in particular predicts events in future storylines, both here and in other stories.
 * Frickin' Laser Beams: Intergang has access to Apokoliptian and Thanagarian weapons technology, and Renee Montoya steals a very handy laser pistol from one of their warehouses.
 * Fridge Logic: In-universe, Skeets is listing off the future-crimes of Metropolis while Booster Gold explains why each of them does not satisfy his needs of a big, showy crime to get himself back on top of the fame and money game. When Skeets eventually gets to a nuclear submarine crash in Midtown Booster explains that that one is particularly useless, since who will even notice him underwater at night--wait, how is a submarine going to crash in Midtown?
 * Gambit Pileup: Ralph Dibney,, as well as Booster Gold, Rip Hunter,.
 * Genius Bruiser: John Henry Irons, doctor, metallurgical engineer, government scientist, and a six foot tall wall of muscle.
 * Genre Savvy: The authors (See Death Is Cheap above). They have spent enough time in the comics industry to realize how the fans would react before they had even written the scene.
 * Genre Shift: The initial storyline for Renee Montoya is straight out of classic detective fiction, faceless employer notwithstanding, as she is hired to surveil an abandoned and decrepit warehouse... then her surveillance discovers the nightmarish alien thing entering the warehouse and the crates of laser weaponry stored within.
 * Giant Enemy Crab: Hannibal turns into one to fight .   responds by breaking his grip - and his hand. This does raise the question, just what has Hannibal been eating?
 * Glory Hound: Booster is reckless in his search for glory.
 * The Golden Age of Comic Books: It is solidly set in the here and now, but many of its characters are classic creations of the Golden Age with the baggage that comes with them.
 * Grandfather Clause: For some a lot of fans, this is the only explanation for the inclusion of Chang Tzu (better known as Egg Fu back in the Sixties).
 * Green-Eyed Redhead: Kate Kane combines Fiery Redhead and Green Eyes into a red and green explosion.
 * Green Eyes: A necessary part of the above-mentioned trope for Kate Kane.
 * Halfway Plot Switch: The original plan for the Booster Gold/Skeets subplot involved fixing the time-stream, which had become broken during the recent crisis, and this is hinted at by the discrepancies in Skeets' history files starting in the first issue. However, the writers eventually decided that this plot was too generic and had been done far too often with other time traveling heroes, so they instead.
 * He Knows Too Much:
 * The reason Lady Styx wants the Space Heroes dead is because she believes they.
 * tries to lock Daniel Carter in a time-loop believing he saw too much in Hunter's lab, actually quoting the line.
 * He's Back: Ever since Identity Crisis Ralph has been "un-Elongated" and near-suicidal, and he verges quite close to outright insanity over the course of this series. He is perpetually carrying a flask and has let his personal hygiene fall by the wayside, but when Ralph  he is, for the first time in several weeks, clean-shaven and properly dressed while his opponent cowers and trembles.
 * Heroes Unlimited: Infinity Inc seems to have a new roster of heroes every time it is seen; this is not hyperbole, until they get their official team name and uniforms there is literally a new stable of heroes in every appearance, with only Natasha present in every incarnation. The Teen Titans themselves are trying to expand during the series, and are seen holding tryouts and gaining (and losing) new members in their various appearances.
 * Heroes Want Redheads: Renee Montoya has a long, passionate and heartbroken history with red-headed Kate Kane, and the Question himself has delirium-induced flashbacks to his love, Myra, from his own series.
 * Heroic Bastard: The Question. It is not a big part of either his character or the story, but when Renee calls him a bastard he agrees that, since he was raised in an orphanage, he most likely really is a bastard.
 * Heroic BSOD:
 * Booster Gold has a complete emotional collapse in the first issue when Skeets first begins to lapse in his historical knowledge. Not only does Martian Manhunter need to physically restrain him, but he even bloodies the nose of mild-mannered reporter Clark Kent, who was there to report on the memorial service.
 * After the Cult of Conner ceremony, Ralph Dibny is reduced to crying beneath a highway overpass, promising to "try again."
 * When Renee Montoya is forced to kill a young girl, a child, that Intergang was using as a suicide bomber she can not deal with the guilt and even begs Black Adam to kill her.
 * Heroic Sacrifice: It will bring tears to your eyes.
 * Hive Mind / Hive Queen: Lady Styx and her empire of zombies.
 * Hollywood Hype Machine: When it was announced that Batwoman would be reintroduced to The DCU in this series, and that she would be gay with a history with Renee Montoya, the media reaction was astounding. Dan Di Dio himself said that he was completely unprepared for the amount of focus and recognition, including spreading into media that is not traditionally related to or focused on comic books. With such a focus on her and her sexuality she became known as DC's most high-profile gay superhero. However, the press response was greatly out of proportion to her role in the series, which was as a supporting character spread out over fifty two issues, and after its conclusion she did not receive another starring role until her 2009 headlining of Detective Comics.
 * Hot Amazon: When Batwoman bursts to the rescue to save Renee Montoya and the Question, Renee ogles her with almost slack-jawed awe as she backhands one of the mutant human/alien creatures.

"Renee Montoya: "You really are a bastard."
 * How Dare You Die on Me!: Happens in the climax of Renee's storyline, after.
 * I'm a Humanitarian:
 * Yuurd the Unknown.
 * I Just Want to Be Special:
 * Lex Luthor. He manages to convince thousands of others to do so as well.
 * Natasha Irons is special, but it takes her most of the series to realize that being special does not actually make you special. Brains she was given, but she needs to earn wisdom.
 * I've Got an X and I'm Not Afraid to Use It: "Stand Back! I've got a particle wave ray gun and bipolar disorder!"
 * In Name Only: Literally. Lex Luthor has bought the copyrights to several superhero identities and teams and has begun distributing them to the creations of his Everyman Project, giving them the names of iconic characters without any connection (personally, thematically or professionally) to their earlier incarnations. This leads to extensive friction between the new Infinity Inc and the Teen Titans and the Justice Society of America; the latter two teams knew, and in some instances fathered, the people behind the old identities and the members of the original Infinity, Inc., and they take Luthor's buying of their identities as a personal insult. Infinity, Inc., however, throws this right back at them; the Teen Titans are also not what they once were, they have lost so many members and been reformed so often that they are no more the original team than Infinity, Inc. is.
 * Insult Backfire:
 * Insult Backfire:

The Question: "Well, I was raised in an orphanage, so you're probably right.""

""Hot damn.""
 * Intrepid Reporter: Since he lost his powers it seems that Clark Kent is actually not an example of the trope, and has actually been in such a reporting slump that Perry White is prepared to terminate him from the Daily Planet since he seems to be expecting stories to just fall into his lap. Once he understands that his job is on the line, however, he decides that he might as well go out with a bang. He steals a page from his wife's playbook and leaps from a window in order to attract the attention of Supernova, the newest hero in Metropolis, in order to get the first interview with the mysterious figure.
 * Invulnerable Knuckles: In Kate Kane's third panel in the series, she punches Renee Montoya across the jaw, apparently hard enough for blood to start filling in Renee's mouth. However, when she should have at least split her knuckles, if not broken her hand altogether, the following panels show no pain or damage whatsoever.
 * Ironic Hell: The Helm of Nabu shows Ralph Dibny a literal ironic hell as a lesson on what happens to sorcerers who mess up bad. Ralph also gets the chance to inflict one of these on his wife's murderer. He could not bring himself to go through with it.
 * It Gets Easier: When Renee and the Question stumble across a bloody murder scene in Kahndaq, her police instincts are yelling at her not to touch anything for fear of contaminating the crime scene. She notes that, after already committing several misdemeanors and felonies breaking into Ridge-Ferrick Holdings back in Gotham, it is getting easier and easier to ignore that part of her mind.
 * It's All About Me: Lex Luthor is utterly convinced that Supernova is Superman in disguise. Why would Superman do this? Why create a new uniform, develop new technologies to give himself new powers and cut off all contact with friends and allies? Why go to so much trouble? To toy with him.
 * It's Not You, It's My Enemies: After getting her help to look into the background of a seemingly abandoned warehouse, Renee bluntly explains to Kate that this affair has nothing to do with her and that she (Renee) does not owe her anything. This leaves Kate visible crushed, but Renee's narration reveals that if the Question is correct and Intergang really is behind everything it is not just themselves who are in trouble, but their friends and loved ones as well, and she does not want Kate to be dragged into this.
 * Jaw Breaker: After  reveals himself, he is killed this way.
 * Kick the Dog: Luthor on New Year's Eve.
 * Killed Off for Real: . Their deaths were either drawn-out and heart-wrenching  or graphic and brutal . Commentary in the trade paperbacks revealed that the authors and artists drew from personal life experiences for the more emotional deaths, whereas others were specifically designed to be as graphic as they could possibly be in a comic book.
 * Knight Templar: Black Adam genuinely believes in justice and making a better world, but personal tragedies and millennia of fruitless efforts have made him bitter, jaded and willing to go to any lengths, regardless of the blood those lengths are soaked in, to achieve his goals.
 * Lady Drunk: Renee Montoya for the first half of the series as she deals with the death of her police partner, Crispus Allen, and being left by her romantic partner, Daria Hernandez. Unlike many versions of this trope it is not played for laughs; the creator commentary published in the trade paperbacks imply that she is now an actual alcoholic. One panel, which showed her taking a pair of aspirin, was specifically drawn to give the impression that she was chewing the pills instead of just swallowing them, which turns out to be "an old drunks' trick."
 * Lady in Red: Kate Kane's first appearance is in a floor-length red party dress and, as Renee Montoya explains, "she has the kind of beauty that leaves you breathless."
 * Legacy Character:
 * Renee when.
 * Batwoman makes her first return to DCU comics continuity in several decades when Katherine "Kate" Kane is introduced.
 * Lex Luthor has bought the copyrights and trademarks to various superhero identities and teams and is using them for the products of his Everyman Project. This results in a new Infinity Inc running around and a new Nuklon, but also a new Jade.
 * Let's See You Do Better: When Booster Gold and Ralph Dibny meet, one of the very first crossovers of the separate stories, Ralph becomes almost violently angry when he remembers that Booster is from the future and, as such, should have known about his wife's murder and been able to do something about it. This leads to general contempt for Booster Gold's glory-seeking ways and overall status as a sell-out. Booster, however, is having none of it, and points out that even though he sympathizes with Ralph, he will not be lectured by a former hero who has not even put on his costume in eight months, and at least Booster is still doing something.
 * Loads and Loads of Characters: Damn near every character in the DC Universe shows up at some point. And they are awesome!
 * Lodged Blade Recycling:
 * Love At First Sight: Sort of. It turns out they already know each other, and had actually dated in the past, but in the few panels before Renee realized that Batwoman was Kate Kane, her old girlfriend, she was dumfounded and awe-struck by the dramatic, gorgeous woman who has leapt into the fray to save her life.

""Oh, god... oh, god, what have I...?""
 * Lying Creator: In the commentary for Week Seven, Mark Waid points out that not even Booster Gold would be so stupid as to pay a sham-villain by check, and people should keep reading and have some faith to see the payoff. This is never brought up again. He does it again in the commentary for Week Thirteen, where he discusses the obscured-in-shadow figure in the background of the last panel; he says that he thought he knew who the character was when he wrote the script, but Week Forty-Two showed him that it was a different character entirely. Except that the trades include occasional reprints of the original scripts, and the revelation in Week Forty-Two is exactly who the original script said it would be.
 * Mad Scientist: Intergang actually goes around the world to collect all the mad scientists it can for Oolong Island, where it lets them run free and create to their wildest and most wretched dreams.
 * Madness Mantra:
 * "Try again..."
 * "Believe in Her! Believe in Her!"
 * Male Gaze: Lobo's first action when he meets Starfire is to rip her shirt off and ogle her lustily. Her species has no nudity taboo, so she just stares him down until he gets it out of his system and offers him a bribe to give them a lift home.
 * Meaningful Name: The title of the story, which refers to, the 52 weeks in a year, and 52, when written in a certain way, forms the Greek symbol for Omega.
 * Memetic Number: 52. Not only because of the title, but also referenced by Red Tornado and it is written all over Rip Hunter's blackboard.
 * Mind Screw: Lobo is now a cardinal in an intergalactic religion of peace dedicated to the Triple Fish God. Seriously.
 * Mood Whiplash: When Black Adam and Isis are getting married, which is a joyous occasion where the heavens themselves are thundering their approval and thousands of spectators are laughing and cheering, Renee Montoya and the Question are scouring the crowd for a suicide bomber that could kill hundreds. The panels keep cutting back and forth between the characters, the joy of the wedding and the stress of the search, and Renee is eventually forced to kill the bomber to stop the explosion, which occurs superimposed over the final pronouncement that they are husband and wife. The last image of the scene, of Adam and Isis waving to the crowd, is reflected in the pool of blood coming from the dead child bomber. Later, when Adam and Isis enjoy their first night together as husband and wife, janitorial staff outside their windows are scrubbing the blood off the ground.
 * Mook Face Turn:
 * Dennis, the head scientist of Lex Luthor's Everyman Project, knew that Lex could not be trusted with superpowers..
 * Abbot, one of Bruno Mannheim's underlings, . He himself explains that he is just sick of the whole damn thing, although his later appearances in Detective Comics instead have him label himself a "true believer" of the Religion of Crime who no longer agrees with Mannheim's specific interpretation of prophecy and doctrine.
 * Morality Chain: It seems that his own personal Marvel family is all that keeps Black Adam from just going around and tearing people in half all day long.
 * Morality Pet:
 * Isis (and eventually Osiris) becomes this for Black Adam. The writers hoped to slightly deconstruct the trope with the prisons of Kahndaq, which Renee and the Question experience first hand, by showing that even if Black Adam is being made warm and fuzzy by Isis that does not instantly negate everything he has done or his impact on society.
 * The Space Dolphin is one for Lobo, convincing him to do the right thing.
 * Motivational Lie: Lobo's translator tells Lobo that Lady Styx is insulting him so that Lobo will rip her apart. He does.
 * My God, What Have I Done?:
 * In the midst of his attempts to tear down what he feels is the scam-backed Cult of Conner, which has claimed to be trying to resurrect his dead wife, Ralph Dibny is horrified to see the ceremony actually work, only for his efforts to disrupt their efforts reduce it all to ash.

""God forgive me... Mary, full of grace...""
 * Renee is forced to kill a suicide bomber that Intergang sent to disrupt the Black Adam/Isis wedding, but the bomber herself was only a young girl, a kid, and Renee begins to pray to God, begging forgiveness for what she had to do.

"Dr. Magnus: You shouldn't have taken away my meds! I told you I do crazy things without my meds!"
 * Mythology Gag: The initial issues contain numerous references to people and companies important to the history of DC Comics and its iconic characters. These include, but are not limited to, Siegel Street and Shuster Road, Fleischer Bros. Transportation, and Kane Street. The last later receives a justification; the Kane family is revealed to be a wealthy and influential family in Gotham City that owns the street in question. This also serves as another Continuity Nod; Martha Wayne, mother to Bruce Wayne, is often given the maiden name of Kane.
 * The Namesake: Fifty-two.
 * Narm: By the writers own admission, their original plans for killing  came off as hilarious instead of traumatic and they had to rewrite the scene several times in order to arrive at a scenario that had both the impact and the solemnity they wanted.
 * Naughty Nuns: Whisper A'Daire, priestess of the Religion Of Crime, whom Renee actually calls a Naughty Nun. Unfortunately, neither the "naughty" or "nun" vibe really came across on the page, something that Greg Rucka felt was just lost in the translation from script to final product.
 * Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot: The Religion of Crime uses mutating hybrid human/animal cultists as their soldiers, and even the "modern" Chang "Egg Fu" Tzu can not be described without using the terms "giant egg", "cyborg", "mutant", and "no sense of humor."
 * No Medication for Me: Averted by Magnus, who suffers from Manic/Depressive Bi-Polar disorder with delusional episodes and knows that he needs to take his medication to retain his balance. He is understandably upset when he is forcibly separated from his pills.
 * No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: The climax of the Luthor/Steel storyline, where the newly-powered Luthor shatters Steel's armor, ruptures his internal organs and laughs about how it is so easy and he feels none of Steel's own attempts to fight back.
 * Noir Episode: Renee Montoya's initial storyline revolves around her employment to surveil an abandoned warehouse by a mysterious financial backer, complete with first person narration, the only character to narrate in the series.
 * Not-So-Innocent Whistle: When Renee and Kate are verbally laying into each other in the park in Week Eleven, the Question, who has faced aliens and mutants without fear, is whistling to himself in order to avoid getting dragged into it.
 * Novelization: Written by Greg Cox, who also wrote the prose novel versions of Infinite Crisis and Countdown to Final Crisis. It leaves out Luthor's Everyman Project, the Religion of Crime, the Great Ten, Ralph's quest, the space heroes, Steel and Natasha, and Will Magnus.
 * Obfuscating Stupidity:  begins doing this once Rip Hunter gives him the lowdown on.
 * Obviously Evil:
 * Chang Tzu, the horrible giant egg mutant cyborg thing.
 * A bald guy with rather Squicky powers named ?
 * An organization called the "Religion of Crime"? Might be a good idea to steer clear of that one. One of the writers even commented that, in retrospect, it was not the best choice for a name.
 * Person of Mass Destruction: Black Adam, a man with strength on par with Superman and a Knight Templar mentality towards all things crime.
 * Phlebotinum Breakdown: Dr. Magnus cannot get his responsometer technology to work again, so his Metal Men are just lumps of inanimate matter.
 * Powered Armor: John Henry and Natasha Irons both begin the series in their iconic armor, but a theme running throughout the story is the question of whether or not they are worthy of this power, and if they can become so if they are not.
 * Private Detective: Renee Montoya is an experienced detective from the Gotham City Police Department, recently having left their employ, and the Question hires her to surveil a warehouse with the first three weeks (Or is it two?) paid in advance. Captain Maggie Sawyer, however, later reveals that she is not licensed to operate as such, and Maggie will not tolerate her investigations if they go somewhere they should not.
 * Private Eye Monologue: Renee Montoya's appearances are the only sequences narrated in the first person, and she is initially hired to investigate an abandoned warehouse.
 * Product Placement: A staple of Booster Gold's character is his constant endorsement of various commercial products, and after his various superhero activities, he will often pitch and use those products to the bystanders and media that have gathered. These same products, including Lit Beer, Big Belly Burger and Soder Cola, appear throughout the series in the background and being used by various characters.
 * Quick Nip: Ralph Dibny begins to carry around a flask after the Cult of Conner fiasco, and drinks from it throughout his various adventures.
 * Real Time: Published weekly with each issue covering a week of time.
 * Reality Ensues:  Instead of a quick and clean death from the disease, or a Heroic Sacrifice since he knows he is already dead, he slowly wastes away over weeks, becoming sickeningly gaunt and delirious, hallucinating old friends and lovers as he babbles incoherently. Ungodly godawful, but a realistic depiction of a cancerous death, with accompanying moaning and groaning which author Greg Rucka knows from personal experience.
 * "The Reason You Suck" Speech: When Ralph  he tears into him, explaining all the steps of how they got here and the familiar "stink of desperation" surrounding the whole plot. Dibny is, for the first time in several weeks, clean-shaven and properly dressed while his opponent cowers and trembles, and Dibny lets him know why.
 * Red Herring:
 * Supernova's identity, even up to the very moment of his identity reveal.
 * The number 52 appearing in several places (52 'stolen' seconds, Gotham City's 52nd street, etc.) tricking the readers into thinking they were important clues. They were not.
 * Redshirt Army: At one point two dozen of Luthor's Everymen storm out to try and help the new Justice League against some temporally displaced pirates... and get slaughtered in a panel. It also gave Mark Waid a chance to use the superhero name "Poledancer", which he had wanted to do for fifteen years.
 * Redheaded Hero: Katherine "Kate" Kane, introduced here as the new Batwoman.
 * Religion of Evil: The Religion of Crime, created by Intergang. Its leader, Bruno Mannheim, believes their dark angel is Darkseid, in a foreshadowing to Final Crisis. It gets better - their Crime Bible is presumably made of the stone used by Cain to kill Abel. Mannheim uses it to smash people's heads in.
 * Retcon: The series re-writes a large portion of the early-90's Metal Men history, which featured the Metal Men as human minds that had been transferred to, and trapped in, robotic bodies. In this series, Will Magnus, creator of the Metal Men, describes those events as a delusion he suffered after a psychotic break and the Metal Men are, and always have been, completely artificial constructs with Artificial Intelligence.
 * Roaring Rampage of Revenge: World War III.
 * Robot Buddy: Skeets, the iconic buddy with Booster Gold since the very beginning.
 * Room Full of Crazy: Rip Hunter's lab.
 * Sanity Has Advantages: Doctor Magnus really wishes his fellow mad scientists would believe him on this one.

"The Question: "We go down there, we'll die. Simple as that. It stinks and it's wrong and it hurts like hell, but there's nothing we can do for Amon right now.""
 * Sapient Cetaceans: Lobo is accompanied by an intelligent space dolphin and is a member of a church worshiping the Triple Fish God, also a space dolphin, but of large size.
 * Screw the War, We're Partying: Oolong Island's under attack from a furious, the rest of the Science Squad are desperately firing off every countermeasure they have, and what's T. O. Morrow doing? Bid-sniping Red Tornado shrapnel on EBay.
 * Senseless Sacrifice: When Renee and the Question sneak into a ceremony for the Religion of Crime, they discover Amon Tomaz, Adrianna's missing brother, and they watch him being viciously beaten for trying to escape. Witnessing the beating, Renee plans to jump down and do what she can to save him, but the Question stops her and points out that it would be a truly senseless sacrifice.

"Adam Strange: You know what we didn't need? One more disaster, one more roadblock. One more f^&*ing twist!"
 * Series Continuity Error: The Question initially hires Renee Montoya with payment in advance for three weeks of surveillance, but subsequent references to the event mention only two weeks, and then later switch back to three.
 * Seven Lines No Waiting: At first glance, the story looks bloated and overly-complicated, but its ability to mesh the individual stories into one narrative whole managed to accomplish the impressive task of avoiding Four Lines, All Waiting, and is often credited as one of the series best points.
 * Seventh-Episode Twist: Initially, the space heroes had a personal and self-contained story-arc, simply trying to get back to Earth from deep space. Then they meet Lobo, and find out about the Stygian Passover and what that entails for the continuation of life.

"Skeets: "It could have been worse, Daniel Carter. You could have ended up a museum janitor."
 * Sex for Solace: Renee admits to Charlie that she has a clearly defined pattern whenever it comes to severe emotional trauma, namely getting drunk and then hopping into the nearest bed she can find. The series opens with her picking up random women in an attempt to deal with the death of Crispus Allen and being left by Daria Hernandez, and the Question first approaches her just after one of her liasons. When it looks like she has gotten a handle on her emotional problems, she then needs to kill the Intergang suicide bomber to protect the Black Adam/Isis wedding and is found "drunkenly taking pleasure with one of [Black Adam's] citizens." A key point in her character arc is when she is eventually able to deal with her personal troubles emotionally, instead of running away from them through alcohol and sex.
 * Shooting Superman: Superman himself might not be able to take any bullets right now, but Black Adam steps in and takes enough to compensate. At one point, a mob even resorts to throwing rocks at him.
 * Shoot the Dog: Intergang tries to attack the Black Adam/Isis wedding with a suicide bomber that Renee tries to stop, but with the heavy crowd blocking her way Renee can not reach the brainwashed young girl before she detonates her bomb, forcing Renee to shoot and kill her to protect the massive crowd.
 * Shout-Out:
 * The concept, and title, are derived from Twenty Four.
 * There are numerous reference to Star Wars, including comparing traveling through an asteroid field to The Empire Strikes Back and telling Skeets that "I am not the droid you are looking for."
 * Booster's rant before getting killed was a reference to Daffy Duck's insane "I'm a hermit crab! It's hermit crab season!" rant, according to the Word of God.
 * "This is crazy talk. When does Sarah Connor show up to stop me from inventing Terminators?"
 * Johnny Warrawa, Australian "artist" (Read: Mechanic) has a Bender welding mask.
 * The revelation of the true nature of the powers of one of the Everyman Project:
 * In the aftermath of Week 24's Redshirt Army massacre, the pirate on the front page looks suspiciously like Captain Jack Sparrow.
 * Shown Their Work:
 * When Renee Montoya takes aspirin, the panel was specifically drawn to give the impression that she was chewing the pills instead of just swallowing them; this is apparently "an old drunks' trick."
 * During the Black Adam/Isis wedding arc, Intergang coats the shrapnel of their suicide bomb with rat poison, an anti-coagulant, which is what real bombers do to make sure that that their victims bleed out if they are not killed by the immediate blast.
 * Shut UP, Hannibal: Yes, the  metahuman Everyman is named Hannibal and yes, he is told to shut up.
 * The Silver Age of Comic Books: The series is set in the here and now, but many of its characters are original creations of the Silver Age, and a lot of the minor characters (and even some of the major characters) have not been seen since that age ended.
 * Slap Slap Kiss: In their first scene in the series, apparently their first meeting in approximately ten years, Kate Kane hits Renee, Renee goads her into trying again, and then the two of them nuzzle for a second before separating dramatically. Unlike most examples of the trope, however, this does not lead to a reconciliation or revelation.
 * Smoking Is Cool: No. No it is not. The Question explains to Renee in great detail all the problems with smoking, including what, exactly, is found within cigarettes.
 * Sociopathic Hero: Lobo.
 * Space Madness: Animal Man is told not to look out the spaceship's windows for too long because it tends to cause existential crises.
 * Spin-Off: 52 spawned two ongoing series (Booster Gold and Infinity Inc.) and several miniseries (World War III, Crime Bible: Five Lessons of Blood, Black Adam: The Dark Age, The Four Horsemen, Metal Men, and The Great Ten).
 * Stable Time Loop:
 * The Stakeout: Renee's storyline opens with her being hired by the Question to surveil an abandoned warehouse. She complains because she does not know what she is supposed to be looking for or what the circumstances of her surveillance are. She also admits to herself that, as she is only a single person without either technological or organizational backup, she is doing a bad job of it since she is tired, bored and unable to remain at the position around the clock.
 * Stuffed Into the Fridge:, much to Keith Giffen's delight.
 * Suicide Attack: Intergang tries to attack the Black Adam/Isis wedding with a brainwashed girl carrying a bomb, forcing Renee to kill her before she can detonate the device.
 * Super Serum: Gingold, the chemical extract that gives the Elongated Man his powers, plays an important role in a few crucial parts of the story.
 * Super Zeroes: Booster Gold's pallbearers. For the record: Beefeater, the Blimp, Honest Abe, Mind-Grabber Kid, Odd Man, and the Yellow Peri.
 * Super-Hero Speciation: None of witnessed products of the Everyman project are seen to have duplicate powers, despite the thousands of metahumans produced by Luthor. When Everyman himself, a shapeshifter from the project, squares off against Beast Boy of the Teen Titans, Beast Boy actually remarks there is only room for one shapeshifter.
 * Suspiciously Specific Denial:

Daniel Carter: "Uh... that's a pretty specific reference.""

"Green Lantern Alan Scott: "It's my job to set an example. I have to show we don't break like other people. We don't give in to fate.""
 * Take Up My Sword:
 * Talks Like a Simile: Renee's early narration is full of simile and metaphor as the rain lulls her to sleep like a lullaby.
 * Technical Pacifist: Batwoman forcefully objects when Renee Montoya is about to shoot one of the mutant human/animal cultists used by Intergang, but then throws him out a window instead.
 * Temporal Paradox: As the series progresses, Skeets begins to suffer greater and greater database errors as events diverge from established historical records.
 * Ten Bad Band: The Great Ten. To be fair, they are not the villains of the story, just obstructionists.
 * Big Bad / Evil Genius:
 * The Dragon: August General in Iron
 * The Brute: Socialist Red Guardsman, Immortal Man in Darkness
 * Psycho for Hire / Dark Chick: Ghost Fox Killer
 * Asian Baby Mama: Mother of Champions. Yes, her power is to give birth to superpowered babies. Not making this up here people...
 * Only Sane Man: The Accomplished Perfect Physician, Thundermind
 * Mauve Shirts: The Yeti, The Seven Deadly Brothers, The Celestial Archer, Shaolin Robot
 * Thanatos Gambit:
 * There Are No Therapists: When all the heroes who went out into space in Infinite Crisis are rescued and brought down to Australia they have all been mutated, transformed, merged or deformed in unique and disturbing ways. Original Green Lantern Alan Scott got off lighter than almost anybody else - he only lost one eye, but even the eye he still has was not originally his and his daughter Jade died during the Crisis. Steel recognizes that, physical rehabilitation aside, all these returning heroes are going to need counseling to help them deal with what happened, but Alan is adamant that that is not even an option.

""I killed a kid, Charlie.""
 * These Hands Have Killed: Renee Montoya has killed people before, in her duties as a cop and when fighting for her life against Intergang, but at the Black Adam/Isis wedding she is forced to shoot an Intergang suicide bomber that is a young girl, just a kid. Regardless of the reasons for her actions she is wracked by guilt over having killed a child and prays for forgiveness.

"Ralph Dibny: "That's where people always get me confused with Plastic Man. He's the clown. Elongated Man is the detective.""
 * Thou Shalt Not Kill: Batwoman, like Batman before her, has a very strict no-killing policy, even extending to knocking down her own teammates instead of letting them take a killing shot. Except against.
 * Throwaway Country:
 * Timeline-Altering MacGuffin: Skeets replicates the function of the original almanac and gives Booster the winning scores of sporting events in order to bet on the winner. He also has more sideline and less immediately beneficial information, like the entire sweep of future events. Oddly enough, as time goes on and his files on business dealings, superheroes and disasters become more and more inaccurate, he is never shown being anything but spot-on-accurate when it comes to gambling.
 * Timey-Wimey Ball: Rip Hunter, Booster Gold, and Skeets jump back and forth through time, altering the stream at key moments, and referring to events that have happened, will happen, and even to events which never will happen but which already happened anyway.
 * Title by Number
 * Title Drop: Every single issue worked the number "52" in somehow. Some, like Ambush Bug's outburst above, were more obvious than others.
 * Truth Serums: Played with when Lex Luthor kidnaps Clark Kent and gives him an experimental truth serum which his scientists explain is a synthetic recreation of Wonder Woman's magic lasso. He then asks Clark, who broke the story about new hero Supernova, why it is that Superman is toying with Luthor by pretending to be someone else. Clark, laughing madly, informs Lex that he does not know who is under the Supernova mask, but he is absolutely certain of one thing: it is not Superman. Creator commentary in the trade paperbacks points out that this scene, and perhaps the entire future path of DC comics, could have gone so differently if Luthor had simply known to ask the right question.
 * Twofer Token Minority: Renee Montoya, a Hispanic lesbian, and her on-again/of-again girlfriend, Kate Kane, a Jewish lesbian.
 * Underestimating Badassery: It seems like everybody, everywhere, does not give the Elongated Man the respect he deserves. His stretching abilities give him a respectable degree of combat capability, and his analytical and inquisitive mind that sets him far and away above many of those who would challenge him. Hal Jordan himself has stated that Ralph, moreso than even Batman or Barry Allen, has always been the most rational person he had ever met.

"Skeets: "It could have been worse, Daniel Carter. You could have ended up a museum janitor.""
 * Unreliable Narrator: Greg Rucka refers to John Henry Irons as an Unreliable Narrator during his hallucinatory delusions, where not even the reader is aware of what exactly is going on.
 * Unreliable Voiceover: When Renee tries to shoot the Question in Day Three of Week Two, she wonders how he managed to get away since "I know I hit him dead center." However, in the actual panel her "dead center" shots are clearly ripping two holes in his jacket next to his body. She missed.
 * Unresolved Sexual Tension:
 * Between Renee and Kate (some fans believe she held feelings for Vic too, although the reverse is more likely, considering...)
 * Animal Man and Starfire became close and she even lived with in his house for a while. During Countdown to Adventure, Buddy is even asked if he has feelings for her and does not reply. The problem with this is that Buddy is married with two kids...
 * Unstoppable Rage: during World War III
 * Violence Really Is the Answer:  It is later implied that this is the reason that   She had lost all faith in humanity and thus intended to destroy all of humanity who could do such evil.
 * Visual Pun:
 * When Sobek first appears, he is crying. A crocodile's tears.
 * When Luthor first gets his superpowers at the end of one issue, his shirt is torn in the shape of Superman's hexagonal logo. According to Word of God, it began as an accident, but went with the Stealth Pun.
 * Voluntary Shapeshifting: Changeling of the Teen Titans becomes a supporting character once Luthor's metagene project begins to become widespread, and Hannibal, code-named Everyman, gains shapeshifting powers from the project. Changeling eventually remarks that there is only room for one shapeshifter here.
 * Webcomic Time: Trying to balance narrative pacing with the core concept of each issue representing a full week in real time worked fairly well overall, but created some very strange moments, such as Animal Man apparently sitting motionless on the edge of a rock staring at  for three full months before reacting.
 * What Happened to the Mouse?: Along with Aborted Arc above, Grant Morrison indicated that there was originally supposed to be a resolution for Super-Chief, who literally fell through the clouds in the afterlife in his last appearance, but it had to be cut, though he still intends to bring him back eventually.
 * What Could Have Been:
 * According to the commentary in the trade-paperback, the Questions line "...no, really, that was smooth. No wonder the women are falling all over themselves for you. Hey, I got an idea, why don't we double date sometime!" was originally "...no, really [...] why didn't you just tell her you'd faked all your orgasms while you were at it?" Unfortunately, Greg Rucka knew from the beginning that this was not a line he would ultimately be allowed to keep in.
 * In Week Thirteen, when Ralph Dibny is breaking up the Cult of Conner, he brings along several heroes connected to either returning to life or the afterlife in order to investigate if, maybe, the Cult has a legitimate point. These heroes are Green Lantern (Hal Jordan), Green Arrow (Oliver Queen) and Metamorpho, all of whom have died and returned to life, and Zauriel, an angel who represents Heaven itself. Originally, the plan had been for Hawkwoman to be in the scene instead of Zauriel because the characters' history was heavily based on a cycle of reincarnation, but earlier in the series she had been transformed into a 20-foot tall giant, which necessitated a change.
 * Zachary Zatara, who appeared as one of the Teen Titans in Week Twenty-One, was drawn in the layouts wearing fishnet stockings as a joke and reference to his cousin, Zatanna. However, Joe Bennet, the penciler for the issue, did not know who Zatanna was and actually drew Zatara in fishnets, which almost made it to the printer without being noticed. Due to the rapid deadlines of the series, the Titans almost had a crossdressing member.
 * When Booster Gold was saving Metropolis from the meltdown of the nuclear submarine, he was originally going to give a speech reminiscent of Daffy Duck in Duck Season! Rabbit Season! Duck Season!  The scene was eventually re-written because the writers felt it would have been too blatant a hint as to the truth behind the story.
 * What Do You Mean It's Not Heinous?

"The Question: "Elf needs food badly.""
 * What Measure Is a Non-Human?: Subverted. Renee is ready to kill one of the mutating human/animal cultists used by Intergang when Batwoman, like her namesake, knocks her down rather than let her get in a killing shot, even against one of these nonhuman animals.
 * What the Hell, Hero?: Bea is rather disgusted that Booster Gold seems to have forgotten the sacrifice of the Blue Beetle and gone back to his glory-seeking ways, and Ralph feels personally betrayed that Booster did not warn him on his wife's death. This is all magnified when it comes out that Booster has actually staged some of his heroic acts with paid actors.
 * When All You Have Is a Hammer: When facing a crazed being with near Physical God power levels after their most powerful weapon has been stolen before it could even be used, what advice does John give Natasha? "Grab your hammer."
 * Who Is This Guy Again?: Bea, though an important (if minor) character, never appears in costume, is never addressed by her superhero name, nor is her last name spoken. Though she provides emotional support for Ralph Dibny and a moral center for Booster Gold, identifying who she is in the larger DC Universe is not made easy.
 * Wizard Needs Food Badly:

"Renee Montoya: "...Just a kid..."
 * World War III: The 50th week in the book, World War III is a week long war which boils down to . Eventually a spinoff comic was written detailing it better (reviews were mixed, though).
 * Would Hurt a Child: Intergang has absolutely no problems with sending out children as suicide bombers.
 * Wouldn't Hurt a Child: When trying to stop the attack on the Black Adam/Isis wedding, Renee is horrified to discover that the Inergang suicide bomber is a little girl, only a child. This makes Renee's subsequent actions even harder.

The Question: "Renee, you didn't have a choice."

Renee Montoya: "Tell her that.""

""Tell her that.""
 * Wrong Genre Savvy: Renee Montoya. Her years on the Gotham City Police Department have taught her much about surveillance and the seedy underbelly of Gotham, and she is not even that surprised to fall down a hidden trap door after she enters the building...and then she discovers the nightmarish alien monster and crates full of laser weaponry.
 * Yank the Dog's Chain: Poor, poor . He just cannot have a happy ending...
 * Yellow Peril: The Great Ten. While most of them are merely patriotic to China,  is one of the Big Bads of the story and August-General-In-Iron is pretty xenophobic about anyone who isn't Chinese.
 * You Did Everything You Could: The Question tries to console Renee after she was forced to kill a child to prevent a suicide bombing by pointing out that she did not have a choice, that it was pull the trigger or watch hundreds, possibly thousands, of people die.