serial in the Countdown to Mystery limited series for DC Comics up to the time of his death, working on stories in the hospital. Gerber died before being able to write the concluding chapter of the serial; in his honor, four separate writers (Adam Beechen, Mark Evanier, Gail Simone, and Mark Waid) provided their own conclusions to the story. In 2010, Comics Bulletin ranked Gerber's run on The Defenders first on its list of the "Top 10 1970s Marvels", while Omega the Unknown was 10th on the same list. Gerber's posthumous Man-Thing story "The Screenplay of the Living Dead Man", with art by Kevin Nowlan, originally planned as a 1980s graphic novel before being left uncompleted by the artist, was revived in the 2010s and appeared as a three-issue miniseries cover-titled The Infernal Man-Thing (early Sept.-Oct. 2012). The story was a sequel to Gerber's "Song-Cry of the Living Dead Man" in Man-Thing #12 (Dec. 1974). Death In 2007, Gerber was diagnosed with an early stage of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, and was eventually hospitalized while continuing to work. He had gotten onto the waiting list for a lung transplant at UCLA Medical Center. On February 10, 2008, Gerber died in a Las Vegas hospital from complications stemming from his condition. His final comics work was writing Countdown to Mystery: Doctor Fate for DC Comics, having briefly worked with a version of the character in 1982. At the time of his death, Gerber was separated from his wife, Margo Macleod. He had a daughter, Samantha Gerber. In fiction One of Gerber's working pen-names, Reg Everbest, was the inspiration behind the first Foolkiller's real name, which was revealed as Ross G. Everbest. Gerber used the anagrammatic Reg Everbest pseudonym for Marvel-published Hanna-Barbera stories after he was banned from Marvel by Jim Shooter. Roger Stern named the original, deceased Foolkiller "Ross G. Everbest" in The Amazing Spider-Man #225, in homage to Gerber, using Gerber's middle name as the character's first name, the middle initial restoring the anagram save for a silent e. The character's real name never appeared in the two Gerber stories, but is seen on a computer screen in the second Foolkiller's van, next to the face of the original user of that identity. The Marvel Universe villain Thundersword (by Jim Shooter, Al Milgrom and Steve Leialoha) is considered a parody of Gerber and his creation Thundarr the Barbarian. Stewart Cadwall is