Shade, The Changing Man - 1990

Shade, the Changing Man is a fictional comic book character created by Steve Ditko for DC Comics in 1977. The character was later adapted by Peter Milligan and became one of the first Vertigo titles. In 1990, the title and character were revived and revamped by Peter Milligan and Chris Bachalo. Coming at a time when DC were in the midst of the so-called "British Invasion" of creators, Shade was one of the last to debut in the first wave after Neil Gaiman's Sandman, and Grant Morrison's Animal Man. This new series used some of the same names and concepts from the original, but these were few and far between; Rac Shade was now a lovelorn poet sent to Earth to stop a growing tide of madness from consuming the planet, while his M-Vest was now a Madness-Vest that he could use to warp reality. The comic still took place in the DC universe - John Constantine turned up for a three-issue story arc, Death of The Endless appeared in a subtle cameo in issue 50 and Shade appeared with a group of other Vertigo characters in 1999's Totems - and the original series was rationalised as being a story that Shade made up to amuse himself while travelling to Earth. However, this did not explain how the original Shade could work with the Suicide Squad.