Published through January and February 1988, Millennium was the first event of the year, and certainly the most ambitious for the production department with one new issue every week, plus tie-ins—something that was simply not done at that time.
Written by Steve Englehart, with art by Joe Staton and Ian Gibson, Millennium was a story about choosing the New Guardians of the Universe. Everything starts with the Guardian named Herupa Hando Hu, and his Zamaron mate, Nadia Safir, as they arrived on Earth to announce to the world that they were here to select 10 persons who would become the new Guardians of the Universe, and give birth to a new race of immortals.
To do so, they ask Earth’s superheroes to collect the chosen ones that are actually living all over the world. The twist is that the Manhunters—robots used by the Guardians to police the Universe, before being replaced by the Green Lanterns—learned about that and decide to activate their sleeping agents, mostly secondary characters that were replaced by androids or humans that were mind-controlled (like in Marvel’s Secret Invasion). The Manhunters want to stop the Guardians and attack Earth.
Millennium was an 8-issue weekly event series with multiple tie-in issues published every week. Almost every DC Comics series were involved, with the exception of the “Suggested For Mature Audiences” titles like Swamp Thing, The Question, and Vigilante.
On the historical side, Millenium marked the 1st appearance of Extrano, DC’s first openly gay character, and of Jet, Celia Windward.
DC Millennium Reading Order:
DC Millennium Reading Order: Collected Edition
Millennium is clearly not a popular event at DC Comics. The 8-issue miniseries was collected in 2008 in one TPB, there is not an omnibus collecting it alongside all the tie-ins.
- Millennium
Collects Millennium #1-8.
DC Millennium Reading Order: Issue by Issue
- Millennium #1
- Firestorm Vol. 2 #67
- The Flash Vol. 2 #8
- Justice League International #9
- Outsiders #27
- Wonder Woman Vol. 2 #12
- Millennium #2
- Batman #415
- Blue Beetle Vol. 6 #20
- Legion of Super-Heroes Vol. 3 #42
- Secret Origins Vol. 2 #22
- Superman Vol. 2 #13
- Young All-Stars #8
- Millennium #3
- Adventures of Superman #436
- Booster Gold #24
- Green Lantern Corps #220
- Infinity Inc. #46
- Millennium #4
- Teen Titans Spotlight #18
- Action Comics #596
- Captain Atom #11
- Detective Comics #582
- Suicide Squad #9
- Spectre Vol. 2 #10
- Millennium #5
- Firestorm Vol. 2 #68
- The Flash Vol. 2 #9
- Wonder Woman Vol. 2 #13
- Justice League International #10
- Outsiders #28
- Millennium #6
- Superman Vol. 2 #14
- Blue Beetle Vol. 6 #21
- Legion of Super-Heroes Vol. 3 #43
- Secret Origins Vol. 2 #23
- Young All-Stars #9
- Millennium #7
- Adventures of Superman #437
- Booster Gold #25
- Green Lantern Corps #221
- Infinity Inc. #47
- Millennium #8
- Spectre Vol. 2 #11
- Teen Titans Spotlight #19
What to read after Millennium?
As promised, at the end of the Millenium event, The chosen ones become the New Guardians. This led to a new series simply titled The New Guardians that Steve Engleheart was going to write. However, he left after one issue, once he realized that he was not granted the creative liberty to write what he wanted, despite the promises that were made, his book couldn’t be as progressive as he wanted it to be. Instead, Cary Bates took over the writing.
Anyway, the 12-issue series of The New Guardians is still not collected either.
After Millenium, DC Comics kept the idea of the company-wide crossover and ended 1988 with another event, Invasion!