The idea for the series stemmed from Wolfman's desire to abandon the DC Multiverse depicted in the company's comics—which he thought was unfriendly to readers—and create a single, unified DC Universe (DCU). The foundation of "Crisis on Infinite Earths" developed through a character (the Monitor) introduced in Wolfman's "The New Teen Titans" in July 1982 before the series itself started. Pérez was not the intended artist for the series, but was excited when he learned of it and called illustrating it some of the most fun he ever had.