October was a fun one, with the four ongoing Super-titles each starting a new storyline and a new direction. Also this month, I’m bringing in a new feature, the Superman Stuff Book o’ the Month! Each month, I’ll start my roundup with the review of what I consider to be the best Superman-related comic of the past 30 days. This will soon become the most coveted award in all of modern comics, and everyone will be salivating for the day that Action Comics #1 enters the public domain because otherwise, how will any publisher other than DC have even a prayer of capturing this title? Anyhoo, let’s start with…

OCTOBER 2026 SUPERMAN STUFF BOOK O’ THE MONTH
Superman #43
Title: Night Shift Part One
Writer: Joshua Williamson
Art & Main Cover: Xermanico

Have you ever heard someone refer to a single issue of an ongoing comic as a “perfect jumping-on point”? Most of the time, that’s hyperbole, but Superman #43 is ALMOST 100 percent what they mean by that. Superman has been gone from Metropolis for far too long, first with the whole DC KO contest, then his time-travel adventure, and finally the Kingdom of Zod crossover that took up the last two months. This issue, Joshua Williamson kicks things off with a simple – and organic – recap of what’s been going on and what the current status quo of the title is. We start off with Clark and Lois in her office, telling us that he’s coming back after an absence and reminding (or informing) readers that she’s now the Editor-in-Chief of the Daily Planet since Perry White is the mayor of Metropolis. Deck-clearing out of the way, we start the story the way thousands of excellent Superman stories have begun in the past: with Clark Kent being given an assignment.

A good chunk of this issue’s middle split the difference between Clark and Jimmy doing their job and investigating a rash of missing persons in Southside Heights, the area of Metropolis that’s trying to shake its previous branding of “Suicide Slum.” As they go about their job we get reacquainted with old friends like Bibbo Bibbowski and Cat Grant, both of whom are a bit different from who they were if you remember their early appearances in the late 80s and early 90s, but whose evolution is logical and doesn’t sacrifice the heart of who these characters are. Cat in particular has undergone a very interesting transition, with Williamson using the character’s most famous trauma to explain a shift away from the somewhat vapid gossip columnist she used to be to a journalist with a bit more agency. I don’t want to say that she’s shaping herself into another Lois Lane, but if Lois’s move to the EIC’s office is a permanent one (as permanent as anything is in ongoing comics, anyway) having another hard-hitting investigator on the Planet payroll is a good strategic move for storytelling purposes.

The one instance where this issue doesn’t QUITE fit the “perfect jumping-on” point is with this arc’s returning guest star: Marilyn Moonlight. We see her working with Cat to help uncover the secret of the missing people (which leads to a pretty nifty surprise villain), but we don’t really get anything about who she is or why Cat should trust her. Sure, longtime readers already get that, but if I’m a newbie picking up this issue, she’s going to leave me curious.

Then again, “curious” isn’t a bad thing. “Curious” is the kind of thing that will have people coming back to read the next issue, and ultimately, isn’t that the goal of any ongoing comic book? This issue is, if not a grand slam, at least an in-the-park home run, and that still counts on the scoreboard.

And now, the rest of the roundup…

Absolute Superman #24
Title: Steel (Get Brainiac Part Three)
Writer: Jason Aaron
Art: Juan Ferreyra
Main Cover: Rafa Sandoval

Reading through this issue, I was actually quite surprised to get to the title page at the end and see a reminder that we’re actually in the middle of a storyline, because “Steel” is a perfect self-contained downbeat of an issue. As Clark continues to help set the world right from his base in Smallville, John Henry Irons joins him in his mission. The issue is mostly a narration from John Henry, telling his mother about his new position as Superman’s partner. But the great thing about it is the way we get a glimpse of how the people of Smallville view their savior from the stars.

We’re all so used to Superman’s reputation in the mainstream DC Universe that it can be easy to forget how different the Absolute Universe is. Taking a moment out with John Henry to see how people see Superman in this world is valuable. It helps to ground a book that has the biggest of threats and the most massive of stakes, giving us a nice reminder that Smallville is a town of real people and the world Clark is trying to defend, while darker than the one we’re used to, is still mostly made of ordinary human beings defenseless against the likes of Brainiac. The narration also gives us some wonderful insight into John Henry himself, a new version of one of my favorite Superman Family characters. What I’m loving here is that both of our heroes, Clark and John Henry alike, are fundamentally still the same good men that we know. No matter how dark the universe, it seems like there’s just something about Kal-El of Krypton that cannot be dimmed, and shining that light on others ignites them as well.

Action Comics #1103
Title: Lex Luthor Year One (Chapters One through Three)
Writer: Mark Waid
Art: Patricio DelPeche
Main Cover: Christopher Brunner

Having spent the last year or so of this title exploring the first year of Clark Kent’s career as Superboy, this issue Mark Waid shifts focus dramatically with the beginning of Lex Luthor Year One. Lex narrates the story of his own childhood, how an association with one of the DCU’s big bads left his father mentally damaged, how his own intelligence isolated him, and how only the only person who ever made him feel safe was his mother. It’s…probably not gonna end well for Leticia Luthor.

The issue alternates narrators, with two Lex Luthor chapters sandwiching a chapter narrated by Clark, reflecting on the day in his own childhood where he first really understood how different he was from everybody else. It’s the contrast between the two of them that makes the issue work. We get a portrait of two exceptional young men with all the potential in the world, and an exploration of how drastically their fates diverge because of their upbringing. I don’t want to speak for Mark Waid, but this really feels like a story of nurture over nature in the making.

Patricio DelPeche is handling the art for this issue, with a style that kind of straddles the line between modern storytelling techniques, but with linework and coloring that has kind of an old-fashioned flair to it. It’s highly appropriate for this story, feeling like a lost chapter of a comic book from the past. The whole thing, in fact, gives the impression of a lost chapter, which is honestly the best way to handle a story like this one.

Batman/Superman: World’s Finest #56
Title: Extinction Event Part Two
Writer: Mark Waid
Art: Adrian Gutierrez
Main Cover: Dan Mora

With Ra’s Al Ghul’s insidious disease spreading across the globe and most of the Justice League off-world on Rann, Superman and Batman have only hours to assemble whoever they can to help save the world. While Superman sets out to find Ra’s, Batman and Kid Flash turn to some very unexpected help to thwart the virus, and an even MORE unexpected force to help hold back the invading armies of the Ocean Master.

Considering Mark Waid’s pedigree as a DC writer, the characters who get brought in this issue to help save the day shouldn’t be that unexpected. That said, I love seeing them used this way. It’s worth remembering that, particularly in the world of comic books, there are DEGREES of villainy, and not everybody is as genocidal (despite his personal protestations against that word) as Ra’s Al Ghul, and Waid plays both Batman and his unlikely allies to the top of their intelligence. Superman, to be honest, feels slightly off his game, as though the stress of what’s happening is beginning to get to him. Although he’s certainly stopped his share of world-ending menaces, here he’s being forced to do so while saddled with the newfound knowledge of Batman’s complicated relationship with Talia and the fact that Dick Grayson is clinging to life. Unlike Batman, who at least outwardly is holding up better than the Man of Steel, Superman is the type to wear his emotions on his sleeve, and that’s going to be hell on the bad guys when the final confrontation comes to pass.

Excellent issue. But I repeat myself. This might be my favorite ongoing DC Comic.

Supergirl #18
Title: The Ego Death of Supergirl Part One
Writer, Art, and Main Cover: Sophie Campbell

At the end of Kingdom of Zod, Supergirl was left with a Kryptonian sunstone which she used to build her own citadel, similar to her cousin’s. This issue she invites the friends she’s drawn into her “Super Force” to join her at this new Fortress of Solidarity, but as they’re setting up shop they find some big secrets and a bigger danger.

First of all, you gotta give it up to Campbell for giving us one of those classic double-page “Headquarters Schematic” spreads, showing off the new Fortress with a diagram that shows off the whole thing and gives us some fun, dandy tidbits to sink our teeth into. But once we get past that, into the meat of the story, we get hit with one thing after another. It’s classic Kara to build a team populated almost entirely by super-powered women who tried to beat her up until she made friends with them. It’s a dynamic that only feels right with this character and in this series, and I really enjoy it.

But the big turn is the one that Campbell announced a few months ago: Supergirl finds the Matrix, the protoplasmic being that operated as Supergirl during that time that Kara was “dead.” Mark Waid’s New History of the DC Universe laid out how the timeline has changed: Kara did, in fact, die during Crisis on Infinite Earths, and her return in Jeph Loeb’s Superman/Batman series has been retconned into her resurrection rather than a reboot. In-between those stories was the Matrix Era.

This issue seems to indicate that the Peter David “Earth-Bound Angel” Supergirl has been rendered non-canonical, and although that’s a little disappointing, it’s somewhat understandable. At least you can still read those stories and enjoy them, even if they aren’t part of canon anymore. At any rate, having Matrix back is something that fans have awaited for some time.

Just one request: there’s a bit in here where Kara tells Matrix “We can both be Supergirl.” Please. Please, no. I hate, hate, HATE the modern trend to have multiple characters running around using the same name. If Matrix is back to stay (and I hope she is) let her find her own identity. Let’s not turn this into a Conner Kent/Tim Drake/What the Hell Do We Do With This Person? situation.

Superman: Father of Tomorrow #6
Title: Fallout
Writer: Kenny Porter
Art & Main Cover: Danny Earls

At the end of last issue, “Hex” Luthor’s spell (poisoned by a curse laid on him by John Constantine) went awry, and Captain Atom (Sam Lane, in this continuity) was transformed into a Kaiju-sized atomic bomb, about to go off in the sky over Metropolis. With only seconds before an explosion that could repeat the destruction of Krypton on Earth, Jor-El has to team up with Lane and Luthor to save the world one last time.

I’m on the fence with this issue. There’s a lot of good stuff here. I very much enjoy seeing Jor-El taking on a role more like the one his son enjoys in the mainstream universe, reaching out even to his enemies in times of need. Seeing him working with Luthor to try to save the world, seeing Luthor forced to accept the fact that he (GASP!) made a mistake, is all very satisfying, very cathartic. And while the ending is a little bit of a cliche for this kind of Elseworlds story, it lands well and allows us to walk away from this world with a taste of contentment, as if all is as it should be.

The thing that doesn’t work goes back to the larger problem I’ve had with this series: the finale treats Jor-El’s sacrifice as some sort of penance for his crime of “altering” the Earth by delivering Kryptonian technology to the world, but six issues in, we NEVER really saw any negative consequences to this gift. Oh, we’ve seen Luthor and a few others walking around talking about how bad it was that Superman advanced human technology overnight, with a few quips about how people should learn for themselves, but the story never really succeeds at convincing us that they naysayers had a point beyond general paranoia. It’s like if you read 1984 and Winston Smith wanted to rebel against Big Brother, but instead of doing so from a dingy, miserable little apartment where he has to hide in the corner and scribble in a diary, he was doing so from a penthouse apartment where his robot butler delivered succulent meals, oh yeah, and pretty much everybody else was living the same way. What exactly is the downside here? We never get that, and that keeps the thesis of this series from hitting the way the writer intends it to.

Superman: The Stranger #2
Title: The Stranger Book Two
Writer, Art, Main Cover: Wes Craig

It’s Christmas in Metropolis, and her newest resident – Daily Planet custodian Clark Kent – is struggling to find a little human connection in the big city. But a report from Lois Lane gives Clark and his other identity a new sense of purpose.

Last issue, I felt as though Wes Craig was running a bit too much on a lot of really familiar tropes: a Superman in the Golden Age, the ol’ “man of the people” bit, and so on. This issue still leans on those, but not as heavily, and I feel as though the story is starting to build a bit of an identity of its own. Seeing Clark slinging a mop, oddly, brings to mind the old Mad “Superduperman” parody, but with a Clark Kent coming across as a bit more pathetic in a play for drama rather than comedy. And although she only appears in one scene, Craig’s Lois Lane shows me everything I’m looking for in a Lois – she’s smart, she’s got integrity, and she doesn’t suffer the nonsense of those around her.

I also questioned why this series is a Black Label book rather than an Elseworlds. We get a little closer to it in this issue. In an early scene, Clark has an encounter with a woman of…let’s say “ambiguous” legitimacy, and overall the entire book has a sense of being a bit dirtier, grungier than we’re used to. It suits the story, but perhaps it would be a poor fit for a traditional Elseworlds (although it’s not any darker than, say, The Dark Knight Returns).

If issue one left me feeling a little flat, this one is a step in the right direction. There’s more of an identity here, and that’s very much what issue one was lacking.

Superman Unlimited #18
Title: The Family Business
Writer: Dan Slott
Art & Main Cover: Lucas Meyer

As Clark settles back into his life, having returned from his journey as King Omega, he finds that Jonathan is in a sort of “discover himself” phase. The bulk of this issue is about the two Kents trying to reconcile that with each other.

There’s a lot of stuff about this issue I like. I’m a fan of the “big sister” attitude Natasha Irons has taken with Jon. I’m always happy to see Bibbo and I’m ecstatic that Slott is lining him and Beppo up to be regulars in the cast. And I absolutely adore the way he writes Lois – she’s the smartest person in the room even when the room is full of Kryptonians, and she knows it, and it’s perfect. I even like Jon as Tomorrow Man, because as I said before, I hate it when you’ve got multiple heroes using the same name. (Natasha seems to recognize this as a problem this issue as well.)

I don’t like the fact that DC seems to hate the idea of Jon Kent wearing a cape. Come on, what’s up with that? I’m okay with the open face mask, but you can’t look at that costume with and without the cape and tell me that it’s not 972 percent better with the cape. Not possible.

But the heart of the issue, like I said, is the interaction between Jon and Clark, and I’m of two minds about it. The whole “finding yourself” thing is kind of a cliche, and the idea that Jon seems to equate being his own person with pretending he’s not even a part of the family seems highly out of character. But cliche or not, I can’t deny that Jon’s identity confusion is an appropriate development for him. He’s been completely rudderless for years now, and this issue feels like a highly meta attempt to acknowledge that and promise to try to do better. Jon deserves better, and if Slott can wring a good story out of him figuring it all out, that’s going to be highly welcome.

Blake M. Petit is a writer, teacher, and dad from Ama, Louisiana. His most recent writing project is the superhero adventure series Other People’s Heroes: Little Stars, volume one of which is now available on Amazon. Don’t forget, you can check out earlier blogs in the Year of Superman/Superman Stuff Archive! Got a request for a future “Superman Stuff”? Drop it in the comments!