Anti-Monitor: the anti-matter entity of Crisis on Infinite Earths
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Everything you need to know about the Anti-Monitor, the anti-matter entity that serves as the antagonist of Crisis on Infinite Earths. You will find here his origin on the moon of Qward, his twin bond with the Monitor, his real resources, and what the event costs: the death of Supergirl inside the Superman family, that of Barry Allen, then the end of a Multiverse. What follows retraces his returns after 1986 and the proper name DC gives him thirty years later. The blow-by-blow of the 1985 event is told elsewhere.
📋 Contents
- Anti-Monitor: who is this anti-matter entity
- Birth on the moon of Qward
- The Monitor, his positive-matter twin
- Powers of the Anti-Monitor: anti-matter, absorption, armies
- The death of Supergirl, the price paid by the Superman family
- Barry Allen and the anti-matter cannon
- The fall of the Anti-Monitor: Kal-L lands the final blow
- After 1986: the dividing line of the post-Crisis Superman
- The returns of the Anti-Monitor, from Sinestro to Mobius
- The Anti-Monitor on screen: Arrowverse and animated trilogy
- FAQ — Frequently asked questions
- Conclusion
Anti-Monitor: who is this anti-matter entity
The Anti-Monitor is a cosmic entity born in a universe made entirely of anti-matter. He appears in a cameo in Crisis on Infinite Earths #2, dated May 1985, and is already at work behind the scenes in #1, from April. Sources disagree on the moment he is really shown: two of them give #6, from September 1985, while another notes that he stays in the shadows until #5. Two creators are certain, Marv Wolfman and George Pérez; two sources add Jerry Ordway, the inker on the series, without explaining that choice.
His place among Superman’s enemies does not rest on a count of duels, but on a bill: he kills Supergirl, he tears down the Multiverse, and it is a Superman who finishes him off. Where a human rival from Metropolis comes back issue after issue, this entity belongs to an event, like the monster that killed the Man of Steel.
Key Facts
- Other name: Mobius, revealed in 2015 and never used in 1985
- First appearance: cameo in Crisis on Infinite Earths #2 (May 1985)
- Confirmed creators: Marv Wolfman and George Pérez
- Home world: the moon of Qward, in the anti-matter universe
Birth on the moon of Qward
The DC account goes back a very long way. Krona, an Oan scientist born on Maltus, tries to observe the birth of the universe; his experiment brings into being a Multiverse of parallel worlds, and among them a universe made entirely of anti-matter. Its age is not settled: one source speaks of thirteen billion years, another of ten.
The entity is born on the moon of Qward; Qward is the anti-matter counterpart of Oa, the world known to the Green Lanterns. That setting existed long before him: the Weaponers of Qward appear as early as Green Lantern vol. 2 #2, in September-October 1960. Two origin accounts coexist, moreover. The 1985 one has him born out of the very soil of the moon; a far later version makes him and the Monitor the two halves of a probe belonging to the Overmonitor, a concept absent from Crisis.
The Monitor, his positive-matter twin
The same cause produces two beings. On the moon of Oa the Monitor is born; on Qward’s, the Anti-Monitor. The symmetry works as a seesaw: the power of one grows as the other weakens. On the publication side, the Monitor arrives first, in the shadows as early as The New Teen Titans vol. 1 #21, from July 1982. The name “Mar Novu” given to him today is far more recent, and the sources do not settle which of the two came first.
The two brothers fight each other across the dimensional barrier for a million years. A simultaneous attack puts them both out of action: they lie inert for more than nine billion years, until a new experiment on the creation of the universe — that of the scientist whom Crisis will turn into Pariah — wakes them up.
The Monitor dies in #4, from July 1985: the Anti-Monitor has taken control of a double of Harbinger and turns her against him. The Monitor had anticipated his end and converts his death into energy to shelter Earth-1 and Earth-2, two worlds saved inside a stack of parallel Earths that his brother empties universe after universe.
Powers of the Anti-Monitor: anti-matter, absorption, armies
His main weapon carries his name: waves of anti-matter able to erase whole universes, and an anti-matter cannon that holds a central place in the story of 1985. Then comes absorption. He feeds on the energy of the positive-matter universes he destroys, and siphons off the positive matter around him.
The rest follows the cosmic scale: superhuman strength and stamina, invulnerability, immortality, size-changing — he most often appears colossal — and dimensional travel. Nothing to do with the Kryptonian skin of the Man of Steel, which has flaws of its own.
Not all of his resources are physical. He has subdued Qward, raised the Thunderers and shaped his Shadow Demons out of the elite of those warriors; the Weaponers, for their part, are a dissident faction born later. He also takes mental control of Harbinger, and his energy can serve others: in Blackest Night, he is forcibly turned into the power battery of the corps of the dead.
The death of Supergirl, the price paid by the Superman family
The seventh issue, dated October 1985, is the one that makes the Anti-Monitor an enemy of Superman. Kara Zor-El has her cousin and the other heroes evacuated by Doctor Light, then faces the entity alone; Light’s return breaks her concentration, and the fatal blow lands.
What comes next is unusual for the time: a public funeral, a eulogy delivered by Batgirl, and Superman carrying his cousin’s body out into space. Kara dies after twenty-six years of publication and then vanishes from continuity for close to twenty years. For the family of Krypton, it is the heaviest bill of the event, and the reason why this death is still compared to the other great passing at DC Comics.
Barry Allen and the anti-matter cannon
The next issue, dated November 1985, costs a second hero. Captured, the Flash of the day, Barry Allen, escapes and turns the power of the anti-matter cannon back in on itself: the machine is destroyed, but he comes apart in the time stream. Nothing is left but his costume and his ring, and he will not come back for twenty-three years.
For the entity, this is the first real loss: his siege weapon against the positive-matter universes is out of service. The Anti-Monitor pursues no one in particular, though: he erases whatever stands in front of him — which is what sets him apart from an opponent such as a cold intelligence that picks its targets.
The fall of the Anti-Monitor: Kal-L lands the final blow
The entity follows its logic to the end: it absorbs its anti-matter universe whole, then travels back to the origin of creation. In the twelfth and last issue, dated March 1986, it is worn down by a coalition of heroes and villains: Superboy-Prime, Alexander Luthor Jr., and the intervention of Darkseid. The final blow goes to Kal-L, the Superman of Earth-2, who hurls it into a star.
The same page sows what follows. Alexander Luthor Jr. reveals that he has saved the Lois Lane of Earth-2, then takes Kal-L, Lois and the Superboy of Earth-Prime into a sealed paradise dimension: the direct starting point of Infinite Crisis, published in 2005.
Twelve issues, from April 1985 to March 1986
After 1986: the dividing line of the post-Crisis Superman
The destruction of the Multiverse closes an era. The Man of Steel, six issues written and drawn by John Byrne and inked by Dick Giordano, rewrites Superman’s origin in 1986: ever since, people speak of the pre-Crisis and post-Crisis Superman. Without the Anti-Monitor, that dividing line does not exist.
The split can still be read when you work back through the character’s great periods or look for a way into the essential stories of the Man of Steel. The irony: by closing the Multiverse, the entity sets in motion the story that will reopen it, since the paradise dimension of 1986 leads straight into Infinite Crisis.
The returns of the Anti-Monitor, from Sinestro to Mobius
Hurled into a star, the character comes back. In August 2007, Green Lantern: Sinestro Corps Special #1 makes him the ally of Sinestro, who sees in him his “Guardian”; he then reappears in Green Lantern vol. 4 #22-25 and Green Lantern Corps vol. 2 #15-18, from October 2007 to January 2008. The final battle plays out in New York: John Stewart and Guy Gardner detonate New Warworld and the yellow battery against the entity, which Superboy-Prime finishes off. The sources consulted give no precise issue number for that killing blow.
His body then washes up on the dead planet Ryut, where Nekron locks him inside the Black Lantern Central Power Battery and uses him as an energy source. In Blackest Night #7-8, from April-May 2010, a white ring destroys the battery and brings him back to life. Nekron is not him: Nekron is his jailer.
In 2015, Justice League vol. 2 #40 gives him a proper name, Mobius, and ties him to the Mobius Chair he occupied before Metron. Geoff Johns’s arc, drawn by Jason Fabok and Gary Frank, runs across issues 40 to 50, in 2015-2016: Mobius declares war on Darkseid there and, in #44, uses the Anti-Life Equation to merge the Flash and the Black Racer into a living weapon that he hurls through Darkseid, who dies of it. Grail beats him in #50.
The Anti-Monitor on screen: Arrowverse and animated trilogy
On television, the CW crossover Crisis on Infinite Earths adapts him in five parts, from December 2019 to January 2020. LaMonica Garrett holds both roles there, the Monitor and the Anti-Monitor, called Mobius on screen. The origin is changed: ten thousand years earlier, the Monitor wanted to witness the birth of the universe, entered the anti-matter universe by accident and thereby revealed the existence of the Multiverse to the entity.
The entity launches a wave of anti-matter that destroys universes, Earth-38 among them, and commands Shadow Demons. Its defeat is not a punch: Nash Wells, Ray Palmer, Barry Allen and Ryan Choi build a shrinking bomb that banishes it into the microverse, much like a dimensional prison. The crossover brings together three Supermen: Tyler Hoechlin for Earth-38, Brandon Routh for Earth-96 and Tom Welling for Earth-167.
In animation, the trilogy Justice League: Crisis on Infinite Earths comes out in 2024: Part One on 9 January, Part Two on 23 April, Part Three on 16 July in digital. Jeff Wamester directs, Jim Krieg writes, Ato Essandoh voices the Anti-Monitor and Jonathan Adams the Monitor.
FAQ — Frequently asked questions
Who is the Anti-Monitor?
He is a cosmic entity born in an anti-matter universe, on the moon of Qward. He appears in a cameo in Crisis on Infinite Earths #2, in May 1985, and serves as the antagonist of the whole event: his aim is to erase the positive-matter universes.
What is the Anti-Monitor’s real name?
Mobius. Watch the date: that name is set down in 2015, thirty years after the character was created, in Justice League vol. 2 #40. It is never used in Crisis on Infinite Earths in 1985.
Who kills the Anti-Monitor in Crisis on Infinite Earths?
Kal-L, the Superman of Earth-2, in #12, from March 1986: he hurls the entity into a star, after Superboy-Prime, Alexander Luthor Jr. and Darkseid have worn it down.
Is it the Anti-Monitor who kills Supergirl?
Yes, in #7, from October 1985. Kara Zor-El has Superman and the other heroes evacuated by Doctor Light, then faces the entity alone, and Light’s return breaks her concentration at the worst moment.
Anti-Monitor and Anti-Life Equation, are they the same thing?
No, and the confusion is common. The Anti-Life Equation is a concept tied to Darkseid and the New Gods. Mobius uses it in 2015 to build a weapon against Darkseid, but he does not embody it.
What is the connection between the Anti-Monitor and Darkseid?
They are two rival antagonists, not two readings of the same character: in Justice League #44, Mobius kills Darkseid. Their worlds do not blend into each other either, since Qward belongs to the anti-matter universe and Apokolips does not.
Do the three Crisis events tell the same story?
No. Crisis on Infinite Earths (1985-1986) is the story of the Anti-Monitor; Infinite Crisis (2005) revolves around Superboy-Prime and Alexander Luthor Jr.; Final Crisis puts Darkseid at the centre.
Who plays the Anti-Monitor in the Arrowverse?
LaMonica Garrett, who also holds the role of the Monitor across the five parts of the crossover broadcast from December 2019 to January 2020. The character is called Mobius there and ends up banished into the microverse. A very different version exists elsewhere, in Green Lantern: The Animated Series.
Conclusion
The Anti-Monitor is not a recurring enemy of Superman: he is the engine of a single event, and that event changed the DC universe. Remember above all that he is born on the moon of Qward as a reflection of the Monitor, that he kills Supergirl in the seventh issue, and that a Superman of Earth-2 brings him down in the last one.
The rest is a matter of dates: Mobius is a name from 2015, not from 1985, and the television crossover and the animated trilogy each rewrite his origin. For the event issue by issue, the feature devoted to Crisis on Infinite Earths takes over.