Editing Animal Man (section)

====Vertigo====
After [[Jamie Delano]]'s first six issues, wherein, among other things, he killed off the central character of Buddy Baker, created the "Red" (analogous to the "Green" of [[Swamp Thing]]) and resurrected Buddy as an "animal avatar", the series became one of the charter titles of DC's new mature readers [[Vertigo Comics|Vertigo]] imprint with #57, and its ties to the DC Universe became more tenuous. Vertigo was establishing itself as a distinct "mini-universe" with its own continuity, only occasionally interacting with the continuity of the regular DC Universe. The title evolved into a more horror-themed book, with Buddy eventually becoming a non-human animal god. The superhero elements of the book were largely removed—since Buddy was reborn as a kind of animal elemental, and legally deceased, he discarded his costume, stopped associating with other heroes, and generally abandoned his crimefighting role. He co-founded the Life Power Church of Maxine to further an environmentalist message, drifting along [[U.S. Route 66]] to settle in Montana. Delano's final issue was #79, culminating in Buddy dying several more times.

Between issues #66 and #67, Delano also penned ''Animal Man'' Annual #1, focusing on Buddy's daughter Maxine. It was the third part of Vertigo's crossover event "[[The Children's Crusade (comics)|The Children's Crusade]]". This event ran across the Annuals of the five then-Vertigo titles --- ''Animal Man'', ''[[Swamp Thing]]'', ''[[Black Orchid (comics)|Black Orchid]]'', ''[[The Books of Magic]]'', and ''[[Doom Patrol]]''—book-ended by two ''Children's Crusade'' issues co-written by [[Neil Gaiman]], and starring his [[Dead Boy Detectives]].

A brief run by [[Jerry Prosser]] and Fred Harper featured a re-reborn Buddy as a white-haired [[Shamanism|shamanistic]] figure before the series was canceled after the 89th issue due to declining sales.