With Jamie Delano’s departure, DC / Vertigo handed over the scripting reigns on Animal Man to Jerry Prosser. Prosser, who wasn’t as known to comics readers, took the title in a decidedly different direction. If Grant Morrison had made the title postmodern and Delano had made the title horrific, Prosser would make the title cosmic — and confusing.
Buddy Baker, who Delano had killed off in his final issue, quickly was reborn, now with hair striped white and black. Buddy became more peaceful as his friends worked with the church he had helped found. On an existential search for truth, Buddy began experiencing bizarre revelations of various higher powers. Finally battling the evil Spider Queen, Buddy realized the cliché that the truth he sought was within him. In a mystical experience, Buddy realized that everyone jointly formed the body of God — and the Soul of the World. Shortly after he defeated the Spider Queen, Annie gave birth to his second daughter, never given a name but said to be the human incarnation of the collective World Soul.
Prosser’s run concluded in late 1995 with issue #89, which was also the title’s last issue. With the title’s glory years long enough gone, few mourned its passing. Prosser’s work had been seen as confusing and as adding nothing to the title despite its inflated rhetoric.
