One of my favorite contemporary authors, Scott Sigler, dropped a new book this week. Voidstrike is the second novel in his series The Crypt, about the crew of a starship in deep space embroiled in the grip of a war. The series follows the P.U.V. James Keeling, a ship that has been nicknamed “The Crypt” because of the absurdly high mortality rate among its crew. In fact, posting to the Keeling is typically given as an alternative to prison time or even execution for people convicted of crimes. The book is military sci-fi with a dash of horror with plenty of violence and gore. You should not allow yourself to get overly attached to any of the characters, because any of them can – and will – be brutally slaughtered at any moment. It’s fun for the whole family, and naturally, I preordered it immediately.
“You see it’s SCARY, see, because…because VOID. But it’s even SCARIER because STRIKE. See? Get it?”
I haven’t started reading it yet, though, because I’ve got to finish the book I’m currently reading first (that being a re-read of Stephen King’s It for those of you who somehow missed last week’s post). Here’s the question I’m currently grappling with though: although I know that after my sojourn in Derry, Maine is over, my next stop is going to be aboard the Keeling, I can’t decide if I should jump right into Voidstrike or go back and re-read the first book in the series again. Book one, Shakedown, came out about two and a half years ago, and as anyone with kids can tell you, one of the side effects of parenthood is a memory that erodes like a urinal cake during halftime at the Super Bowl. I remember the broad strokes of the book, but I’m fuzzy on the details. So should I go back and read Shakedown again?
Let me make one thing clear at the jump: I am NOT asking whether or not re-reading books in GENERAL is okay, because of COURSE it is. In any given year, I would guess at least half of the books I read are books that I’ve read before because they make me happy, or comfort me, or because I’m doing research for something that requires me to make a return visit. And all of those things are perfectly legitimate. In fact, there is only one reason for re-reading a book that matters at all: do you WANT to re-read it? If the answer is “yes,” then you’re good.
What I’m asking, instead, is whether a re-read in this particular case is justified. Yes, I re-read a lot of books, but it’s rare that I return to one that I read as relatively recently as Shakedown. Most of the books I return to have at minimum a five year gap before I pick them up again. It’s not a rule or anything, but I’m actually quite anxious to get to Voidstrike, so should I just check out a Wiki recap of Shakedown and get to it, or should I take the long way around?
If it was a movie, there would be no question. I frequently re-watch a movie if I intend to watch an upcoming sequel, and most of the time, I feel like it’s time well spent. When Ghostbusters: Afterlife hit theaters, I made it a point to carve out time to watch the first two movies in the series again, and as such a lot of the little beats and references landed in a way that they wouldn’t have had the older movies not been fresh in my mind. When my son told me he wanted to see Zootopia 2 back in November, I sat down with him and I watched the first one again, and that made the jokes funnier and the story more enjoyable. And in truth, the only reason I haven’t watched Tron: Ares now that it’s on Disney+is because I haven’t had a chance to revisit the first two movies in the franchise yet.
I would never have understood the Twinkie reference in Afterlife if I hadn’t just watched this.
For the most part, I think this practice is rewarding. Having the earlier installments fresh in your mind can make the new ones more fun – callbacks are easier to notice, the characterization and worldbuilding gels better…it’s like polishing the rust off a bumper before you take a car out for a drive.
With books, though, although all of the same things are true, it’s much more of a time commitment than it is with a movie (unless we’re talking about something like Lord of the Rings, of course — the books are about a half-million words total, but legend has it that the last movie is still finding new endings to append out there somewhere). In the case of The Crypt it would be relatively easy, I’d only have to read one book over again. But what about those longer-lasting series? Think about something like Jim Butcher’s The Dresden Files. The 18th book in that series dropped earlier this month, and that’s to say nothing of the assorted short stories and novellas also set in the same universe. If there are any Dresdenheads out there, tell me, did you go back to Storm Front (the first book, published way back in 2000) and march your way through the next 16 in order to have everything right there are the forefront of your mind before you dove into Book 18, Twelve Months?
It’s called Twelve Months because that’s how long it would take to catch up for this one.
That wouldn’t matter if the books are episodic. Series like the Hardy Boys or Nancy Drew have continuing characters but rarely have continuing plots, so you can pick up any volume at any time and feel like it’s more or less complete. But one Harry Dresden adventure carries over to the next, and if it’s been a while since you visited him, would you feel like a return visit was necessary? Would you just read a Wiki recap? Would you return to the high points of your favorite books and do a cursory refresher on the others?
And what about books that have a substantial gap between installments? Not long ago I was poking around TV Tropes (like you do) and I came across a reference to Jasper Fforde’s Thursday Next series. I remember reading – and enjoying – the first book in that line several years ago. The Eyre Affair was originally published back in 2003, and focused on a special “literary detective” who investigates crimes in the worlds that exist inside of books. It’s a neatly metafictional concept, one that allows for a lot of humor and a lot of satire about the way that stories are written, which is the kind of thing that holds a lot of appeal to me. So it’s kind of baffling that I only ever read the first book in the series, because I enjoyed the first one quite a bit. I decided to see if the series was still going, and discovered that the eighth book, Dark Reading Matter, is scheduled for publication in June of 2027.
The bright colors say “kidnapping mystery.”
Fforde also claims that this will be the last book in the series, which means if I want I can spend the next year and a half catching up on the six books that I never read (after probably re-reading the first one, of course). Out of curiosity, I looked at the most recent book, The Woman Who Died a Lot, to see when it was published, only to learn that it was way back in 2012. That means that there will be a 15-year gap between the final two books of this series. I have to wonder why that is. Did Fforde think he was done with the series back then, only to decide relatively recently that he had one more Thursday Next book in him? Or is this something that was planned that just kept getting pushed back for one reason or another, a process known in literary circles as “Pulling a Martin”?
Oh yeah. We gonna go there.
Ah yeah, you know I have to mention George R.R. Martin and A Song of Ice and Fire. The series that inspired Game of Thrones released its most recent volume back in 2011, and there are reportedly two more to come to finish the series. In that time, the books spun off into a TV series that became a global phenomenon, the TV series passed up the books and had to cobble together an ending presumably based on Martin’s notes for the unwritten books, a spinoff of the TV series premiered and finished its run, and a SECOND spinoff has now begun airing. And there’s STILL no telling when book six of the series is going to come out.
I’m not going to speculate as to the reason for this decade-and-a-half span of radio silence. I’m not going to try to guess as to what has prevented Martin from finishing the books in this time, nor am I going to try to imply that he “owes” his readers anything, because as disappointing as it may be for his most fervent fans, the truth is that he doesn’t. What I WILL say, however, is that if he were to announce tomorrow that Winds of Winter is finally going to be published this August, the sales of the first five books would skyrocket overnight as readers realize that in the past 15 years they have lost, loaned out, donated, or hurled their books through a window in frustration and they need new copies if they’re going to refresh their memories before book six hits the bestseller lists.
Sometimes in these Geek Punditry posts, I’m addressing some problem that needs to be solved. Sometimes I’m just throwing out wish lists for things that I would like to happen. And sometimes, like today, I’m just taking some element of storytelling that I find interesting and rolling it around in my brain, here on the internet, where anybody can read it. My question, friends, is this: do you re-read books, especially before the next book in the series drops? How often do you do it? And which books do you think you’ve re-read the most often? I’d love to hear your answers in the comments.
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. You can subscribe to his newsletter by clicking right here. He’s also started putting his LitReel videos on TikTok. He is aware of the irony of posting about this when volume two of Little Stars is somewhat overdue, but compared to George R.R. Martin, it still ain’t a drop in the bucket.
I don’t want every “Superman Stuff” post to be comic book recaps, hence last week’s post where I talked about the upcoming Spider-Man/Superman and Bizarro: Year None announcements. That said, one of the reasons I wanted to keep this going was so that I could keep talking about the NEW Superman comics as they come out. With that in mind, this week I’m going to give my feelings on some of the Superman-related comics that have been published so far in 2026.
Superman Unlimited#9 Title: Die Laughing Part One Writer: Dan Slott Artist: Mike Norton Main Cover: Dave Johnson
A series of strange deaths strikes Metropolis, and although they could be accidental, there’s something that makes it feel like they’re linked to an old foe of Superman’s. (I realize I’m playing coy with who the villain is, and they name drop him on the cover, so I guess that’s a little pointless.) Meanwhile, Metropolis’s new Mayor Perry White finds himself a target, and at Steelworks, Jon Kent gets an important warning from a very unexpected source.
There is a LOT of stuff going on in this issue. The main plot regarding Perry White is the through-line, but the story of Jon at Steelworks feels like there’s more going on than is readily apparent, and the ongoing story of the massive Kryptonite meteor that’s fallen to Earth is woven in through what happens in the other plots. What’s more, we also get to see a classic foe and a new collaborator show up here in ways that feel like there’s a lot of story to tell. The way this book is packed is honestly reminiscent of the way stories were structured during the much-missed Triangle Era, and as I read this I felt those pangs of regret that I’m going to have to wait a month for this storyline to continue rather than just one week.
Slott does some of the little character bits he’s so good at here. For instance, we see Clark Kent at a press conference by Mayor Perry White where he acts just like he’s asking questions to any random elected official, and Perry humorously reminds him that he doesn’t exactly have to introduce himself. It’s funny, but it also brings up the idea that it’s kind of unethical to send a reporter to cover a press conference when the guy at the podium happens to be godfather of the reporter’s son. Then again, Clark has been reporting on himself for almost 90 years now, so…
Mike Norton steps up for the artwork this issue, and it makes me wish we saw him drawing Superman more often. His lines are clean and bold, very reminiscent of the style we saw from the likes of Dan Jurgens or Jerry Orway back in the day. Having him on this book feels very, very right. I hope we get to see more of his work on Superman in the future.
Batman/Superman: World’s Finest #47 Title: The Merger Part Three: Truth and Consequences Writer: Mark Waid Pencils: Adrian Gutierrez Inks: Vicente Cifuentes Main Cover: Dan Mora
Fusion – the merged form of Superman and Batman – is in battle with Merger, the Lex Luthor/Joker mashup. And if that wasn’t bad enough, Merger has used Hawkman’s Absorbascon to learn the identities of our heroes and transmit that information all over the planet. Fortunately, Fusion has a whole Justice League to back them up.
I’ve loved this book since day one, because Mark Waid is clearly having a lot of fun playing around with all these classic pieces of the DC Universe. World’s Finest is set several years in the past, so when the secret is revealed we get to see some things that wouldn’t happen if this story were set today: a more villainous Poison Ivy going after Alfred, or a Lois Lane who is heartbroken to realize that Superman has been hiding under her nose all this time. Waid writes these moments very well, with compelling character work, especially in the Lois Lane scene.
That said, he’s walking a tightrope here, playing with what they sometimes call “Schmuck Bait.” It’s when a story (particularly in an ongoing franchise) teases a development that you know will not or cannot stick. In this case, we know with 100 percent certainty before the issue even begins that the secrets of Superman and Batman’s respective identities will go back in the box, so that lowers the stakes dramatically. The trick is to use this to milk good character beats that will retain their significance even once the actual plot is reversed. He manages to do that here, and even ends the issue with a new little wrinkle that could be brought back later, either in the pages of this book, or in other DC titles set in the current continuity. Either way, there’s potential there.
Supergirl Vol. 8 #9 Title: Resolutions Writer: Sophie Campbell Art: Joe Quinones Main Cover: Sophie Campbell
Continuing the holiday kick this book has been on (the last three issues have been Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas stories, respectively), it’s New Year’s Eve in Midvale, and Supergirl’s squad has been invited to a booze-free party to ring the year in. Lesla, unfamiliar with the effects of alcohol in the first place, is a bit disappointed to learn that it wouldn’t have any effect on her Kryptonian physiology. Lena has an idea for how to fix that little problem. Chaos ensues.
I have to admit, I didn’t see this issue coming. The first half comes across as Campbell trying to do an 80s style “very special episode” about the consequences of drinking, which would actually fit very well in what we’ve gotten from this series so far. The second half, however, takes a rather wild left turn when those consequences actually begin to stack. Stuff happens in this issue that drives a severe wedge in the family of friends Supergirl has built up around her, and I frankly didn’t see it coming. What’s more, Kara herself comes across as kind of cold in this issue – outwardly, at least. The reader gets to see her agonizing over the choices she makes and the way that she’s forced to push away her friends, but to those friends themselves she puts on a face of stoicism that’s really unexpected. Particularly in the case of Lesla, who is arguably a victim here, Kara doesn’t show the usual compassion that we get from her. I’ve been a big supporter of this book, but this is the first issue that feels like a misstep.
I’ve got no such complaints about the artwork, however. Campbell’s work on this title is great, but whenever she steps aside, they can bring in Joe Quinones to pinch-hit. I love his take on Kara and the rest of the cast, and I especially would like to see more of his version of Kandor.
Action Comics#1094 Title: Our Superboy at War Writer: Mark Waid Art: Patricio Delpeche Main Cover: Ryan Sook
This is an interesting one. The main story here is Superboy – in conjunction with his arrangement with General Sam Lane – being summoned to help with a military operation. Although that’s the A-plot, it’s also the least interesting part of the issue to me. That’s not to say that it’s not handled well – Mark Waid taps into the psyche of Clark Kent and has him go through this storyline in a way that feels very accurate for the character. The issue is that it’s very by-the-book. The beats are predictable, as are Clark’s reactions. I suppose that’s the thing about understanding a character really well – sometimes it can make certain stories feel very rote.
The b-plots in this issue are much more interesting to me. In the early part of the book, Clark has a study date (of sorts) with Lana Lang, and we’re teased with a strange animosity her father has for Clark. In the latter part, he goes on a camping trip with Pete Ross and laments the fact that there’s nobody he can share his secrets with. Both of these segments, to me, were far more satisfying than the A-plot. In each case, Waid is using established elements of the two characters to build them out a bit. For instance, Lana’s father being an archaeologist is a long-standing and well-known piece of the lore, but Waid seems to be using it here in a way that feels somewhat menacing, as though that status has a dark secret that’s going to cause trouble down the line. Pete, on the other hand, is famous for being the character who (in the Silver Age) knows that Clark is Superboy, but doesn’t tell anybody – not even Superboy himself. It definitely seems like we’re trending in that direction, but I trust Waid to do more with the concept than previous writers did. In the meantime, it’s really sad to see Clark upset about his big secret and the fact that there’s nobody else that could possibly understand what it’s like to have his kind of power.
Dang, if only he had some friends. If only he had a Legion of them or something.
Adventures of Superman: House of El#5 Title: I Am the Lantern in the Dark Writer: Phillip Kennedy Johnson Art: Scott Godlewski Main Cover: Scott Godlewski
A Sun-Eater has been unleashed on Lanternholm, the world that serves as the haven for the Lightborn. Superman and Ronan Kent join the fight alongside Ronan’s sister, Rowan. The Lanternholm stuff has actually been the most interesting part of this series yet to me, and I’m glad to see it take center stage in this issue. The DC Universe, let’s face it, has a LOT of potential futures. Some of them are easily compatible with one another, others require a bit more shoehorning to fit in, and this future in particular is at best going to be relegated to an alternate timeline in which Superman never comes home because – come on, let’s be honest here – we know that Superman is going to come home. It’s another example of that Schmuck Bait I mentioned earlier.
But that’s something that could theoretically be used to the story’s advantage. It is impossible for this future to be the “real” future of the DC Universe, so why not take some wilder, braver swings with it? I’d like to know more about what happened to the Lanterns in this future. I’d like to know more about what happens afterwards, with Rowan’s new status at the end of this issue. I’d read a miniseries about that, I’d read a miniseries about her. I’d be excited for it.
Absolute Superman #15 Title: The Never-Ending Begins Part One: In Blue Writer: Jason Aaron Art: Juan Ferreyra Main Cover: Rafa Sandoval
A new storyline kicks off this issue, although it kicks off in a very low-key way. After the huge win at the end of last issue, Kal-El is trying to settle in, taking over the Kents’ farm and running it the way they would have wanted while, at the same time, operating as Superman around the world. Of course, as the beginning of a new story, new threats are coming in as well, and we see the seeds for a few things planted here.
It’s nice to have something of a breather this issue, as we see Kal-El spending time with a lot of people, exploring his relationships with both Lois Lane AND Lana Lang, and interestingly enough, even Ra’s Al Ghul. There’s shoe leather to be expended here, building on who each of these people is to our new Superman. What I really like, though, is the direction this series is trending. Clark has traded in his Kryptonian suit for a uniform made for him by Martha, a uniform that speaks to a brighter future for the character. The Absolute Universe is one where Darkseid’s ethos reigns supreme and hope is the underdog…but despite that, Superman still acts as a symbol of that hope, and this issue continues to demonstrate that.
We also get the first appearance of the Absolute version of one of Superman’s oldest foes, and he’s taken in a very different direction. The Toyman has gone through several incarnations over the years. This one is different from any of them, but it suits the universe we’re living in and still fits the concept of the character fairly well. We also get a cameo by next issue’s big guest star, Hawkman, and recent comments by Scott Snyder that we’ll see a gathering of heroes in this universe sooner or later feel like they’re inching closer to fruition.
DC KO #3 Title: No Mercy Writers: Scott Snyder & Joshua Williamson Art: Javi Fernandez & Xermancio Main Cover: Javi Fernandez
Following December’s “All Fight Month” event, the combatants in the KO tournament have been narrowed down to an “Elite Eight.” The remaining fighters are each given an opportunity to choose a partner to fight alongside in the next battle. However, the one fighter who generated the MOST Omega Energy gets a special prize – their partner may come from ANY level of reality…and that winner is the Joker.
Much as the “All Fight” issues were at their best when used as an examination of character, even the selection of the heroes’ partners serves that same purpose. Some of them are obvious, some of them are understandable, and some of them are baffling. All of them demonstrate something about the character who makes the choice, and it’s writing like that which has elevated DC KO from being just a mindless slugfest into one of the most compelling events the DC Universe has had in ages.
There’s a running commentary from the Heart of Apokalips throughout the story that focuses heavily on Superman as well – what’s going on in his head, how he’s dealing with the battle, how he handles the fact that he’s got to fight, kill, perhaps even use his friends. What’s more, from the beginning the idea has been that it was okay for the heroes to die or to kill in pursuit of winning the tournament, because whoever wins and gets the Omega Energy at the end will have the ability to reset the universe and fix everything. This issue Snyder really starts to explore what that would actually MEAN. Would anyone – even Superman – have the wherewithal to only turn the clock back to before the tournament, or would that temptation to make the world unto what he thinks would be paradise be too tantalizing?
Also, there are a couple of moments in this issue that are gonna make for great action figures.
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!
“Hey,” one of my students whispers to the kid sitting next to him. “He’s reading It.”
And I smile.
On the wall in my classroom is a small whiteboard. At the top of the board is written “What is Mr. Petit reading?” Underneath, I regularly update the board with the title and author of whatever book has most recently been removed from my To-Be-Read pile and is actually in the process of being read. Currently, that book is Stephen King’s It. I’ve had that board up for a few years now, and I update it whenever I begin a new book, and having it visible has led to lots of really great questions such as “Are you still reading that one?” and “How many books do you read, anyway?”
“Not to put too fine a point on it, but I read more books yesterday than some people in here will read in their entire lives. Please don’t take that as a challenge.”
Occasionally, though, the board can lead to an actual conversation if a student happens to have read the book, is curious about it, or didn’t know that a book even existed (for properties they’re only familiar with as movies, such as Ready Player One). It is the book currently on the board, and it’ll probably stay there for a little while, because even for Stephen King, it’s kinda long. Some students are horrified when I tell them that I’m reading a book that’s in the ballpark of 1100 pages. They are even more baffled when I tell them that this is not the first time I’ve read it. I don’t recall, honestly, if this is the third or fourth time I’ve taken this particular trip to Derry, Maine, but I know exactly when the LAST time I read it was – it was late August and early September of 2017, and I remember it because it happened to be the book I was reading the week my son was born. I recall sitting there, scrolling through the pages on my tablet as Erin and Eddie slept, each of them rather exhausted after recently undergoing the most dramatic moving day in the history of a human being.
Don’t worry, I didn’t whip out my book and start reading as soon as the kid popped out – this was some time later, as we had to stay in the hospital a little while as they treated him for some blessedly minor things that prevented us from going home for about five days. If you’ve ever spent time in the hospital, no matter how serious the condition may be, you’ll know that after a few days you start crawling up the walls if you don’t have something to do. My something was to visit with my friends in the Losers Club.
In retrospect, this may not have been the best choice for a new father’s reading material.
The specific reason I started reading It again this week, though, is because I finished the first season of HBO’s TV series Welcome to Derry, a prequel to the film adaptations of the novel from 2017 and 2019. The series is produced by Andy Muschietti, who directed the films and half the episodes of the show as well. I thoroughly enjoyed the series, and it made me thirst to go back and revisit the source material again. As I’m reading it, I’m noticing the little bits and pieces, the tidbits the writers and showrunners planted in the show that help build out the world with water from the original font.
To be clear, this TV series is a prequel to the MOVIES, not the book. There are some important differences that prevent it from working as an adaptation of the novel, chiefly the time period. The original novel is set in two eras: 1958 (when the protagonists are children) and 1985 (when they return to Derry as adults to finish what they started). The creature they do battle with has a cycle of about 27 years in hibernation, after which it returns to wreak havoc on Derry once again. 1985 was contemporary when the book was written, but Muschietti decided to keep the story set in the “present” when the films were released, meaning the events were shifted to 1989 (for the kid portions) and 2016 (for the adult portions). Welcome to Derry details the previous cycle of It in 1962. The point is that the movie universe cannot fit the timeline of the book universe, and that’s honestly not a bad thing.
People who saw the show know just what a dirty trick this poster is.
Since the show, from the outset, cannot be a direct prequel to the novel, Muschietti and the writers are playing a little more fast and loose with the story, while still paying respect to it. For example, in the original novel Veronica Grogan is the name of one of the countless victims of Pennywise during the monster’s 1958 cycle. The TV show elevates her to one of the main characters fighting against the clown in the generation BEFORE the Losers’ first encounter with the monster. The names of many other characters from the book are peppered throughout the show, some of them characters mentioned in the novel, others with names that imply (and in a few cases, make abundantly clear) that they are relatives or ancestors of characters from the original in this version of the story.
But the connections to the works of Stephen King don’t end with elements strictly from It. At one point, a character is sent to Shawshank Prison, the setting of King’s classic novella (and its classic movie adaptation) The Shawshank Redemption. Shawshank is frequently referenced in King’s Maine-centric stories, which is to say a little more than half of them, so it’s not a surprise when it turns up here. An even bigger link, though, is the character Dick Halloran. Halloran is one of the principal characters in his novel The Shining, which was written before It, and the original novel reveals that he was somehow involved in the tragically violent events that concluded a previous cycle of It. Welcome to Derry expands upon that, showing those events in full and giving Halloran a much more significant role. What’s more, they don’t even stop there, referencing elements of Halloran’s character that come neither from It OR The Shining, but rather from the latter’s sequel, Doctor Sleep.
“Honestly, we’re just glad somebody remembered we were here.”
What I’m getting at here is that Welcome to Derry feels like it’s inching closer and closer to something that Stephen King fans have wanted to see for a very long time: a true cinematic universe.
Yeah, we’re going to that well again. Marvel has its cinematic universe. DC is on take two. We’ve got one for Star Wars and John Wick and even horror franchises like The Conjuring. But the thing you need to remember is that none of these franchises INVENTED the idea of a shared universe. It’s been around for a very long time. William Faulkner linked several of his novels and short stories together via the inhabitants of the fictional Yoknapatawpha County, Mississippi. James Joyce’s Dublin serves as the backdrop for several of his stories and, inasmuch as it’s possible to understand anything Joyce wrote, several of them link together. And King, much like many other contemporary writers, delights in dropping in Easter Eggs, hints, clues, and references that tie his various stories to one another.
Now not ALL of his stories can be said to definitively take place in the same universe. The Stand, for example, is a novel about a virus that kills most of the population of the world, which clearly precludes most of his later works from being set in the same universe. Cell isn’t exactly a zombie story, but it’s close enough that this world is incompatible with most of King’s other work. And it’s hard to reconcile the bleak, horrific vision of the afterlife from Revival with several of his other stories which feature good, even friendly ghosts on occasion, such as Bag of Bones. Then there are the Stephen King books that explicitly reference other King books – or their movie adaptations – as fiction. That’s a bit of a roadblock.
On the other hand, King himself has provided us with a handy device that can explain away any discrepancy via his Dark Tower series: a multiverse. The Tower itself is a sort of central hub around which all reality converges, and that includes many different worlds and dimensions that are similar to, but distinct from, one another. The Dark Tower provides links not only to It and The Stand, but to multiple other books and short stories. And lots of the other stories he’s written drop in casual references that remind us that yes, their universe is one of the countless that are connected to the Tower.
If ever there was a scene that MUST be committed to film, it’s this.
So all that said, why HAVEN’T we gotten a proper Stephen King cinematic universe before? The biggest obstacle, frankly, is licensing. King’s first novel, Carrie, was published in 1974, and he’s been turning out book after book and story after story since then. The most recent count I can find credits him with 67 novels and novellas and over 200 short stories over his 52-year career, and he’s been selling off the rights to them to different players all along. I don’t begrudge the man this – Lord knows I wish I could get that kind of payday – but the result is that the film and television rights to his works are all over the place. Dozens of studios and even individual filmmakers own bits and pieces of him, and getting all of them together to play nice and collaborate seems like a pretty impossible prospect. It’s the same reason that Marvel characters didn’t start meeting each other on screen until Marvel Comics stopped selling the rights to anybody who offered them twelve dollars and half a Fruit Roll-Up and started making the movies themselves.
It’s not like King isn’t still a significant player in the entertainment game. People who don’t follow him may think of his work primarily as the grist for a huge slate of horror movies from the 1980s, but they’ve been coming out regularly since then – and they’re not all horror. 2025 brought us no less than four big-screen adaptations of his work: The Monkey (which turned a straight horror short story into kind of a bizarre black comedy), The Life of Chuck (a beautiful and faithful adaptation of a semi-fantasy by director Mike Flanagan), and two adaptations of books he wrote under his Richard Bachman alias, The Long Walk and The Running Man. These last two are both dystopian science fiction rather than horror, but they’re radically different from one another, despite the fact that they both have the same hook of characters competing in a lethal game in the hopes of a life-changing prize. But while The Long Walk is a dark, nihilistic societal commentary, The Running Man is a slam-bang action film.
There have been attempts in the past to create a sort of King universe. Most notably, in 2018 Hulu produced Castle Rock, a series “inspired” by elements from a great number of King’s various works and set in that OTHER town in Maine that seems like it must be a nightmare to actually live in. The show was okay and it lasted two seasons, but I don’t think it actually gave fans what they wanted: a world in which the stories they love (or at least versions of those stories) could coexist. In Castle Rock, it was more like they took chunks of King’s books – characters, names, places – and pieced them together into something different. That’s a legitimate storytelling technique, of course. Mike Flanagan did it with Edgar Allan Poe for his exquisite miniseries version of Fall of the House of Usher. But it wasn’t quite what we were looking for.
In Welcome to Derry, the events of the two It movies are canonical, and the things we’ve seen so far make it quite easy to link that world with The Shawshank Redemption and the Shining/Doctor Sleep duet – if not exactly the movies we’re familiar with, then at least some version of those events. All of those movies, it should be pointed out, were released by Warner Bros., which is no doubt why they could play with those toys so easily. The show has not officially been renewed for a second season, but it has achieved real critical acclaim (although, typical for a streaming service, we have no idea what its numbers are), and Muschietti has been quite vocal about his plans for the next two seasons of the show. Future seasons would tell stories of two earlier iterations of the It cycle, in 1935 and 1908. This, I think, would be the perfect opportunity to build out the universe and add more parts of the Stephen King world. In fact, I think in some ways it would be almost REQUIRED to do that.
I loved season one of Welcome to Derry. The story was tense and compelling, the performances were great, and even though King wasn’t directly involved, the new characters all felt like the sort of characters that we get attached to in his books – ordinary people who get swept up in something far beyond their comprehension. If there is one legitimate complaint about the show, though, it’s probably that about half of the plot (the half that focuses on the child protagonists rather than the adults) is a bit TOO similar to the original It: a bunch of outcast children band together to stand against the evil of Pennywise the Clown. If we’re going to do another two seasons, they can’t just be two still-earlier stories about kids teaming up and fighting the monster. They need to bring something else to the table.
Andy Muschietti, I think, has proven himself an able enough storyteller that he is no doubt aware of this fact. The way he’s talking, it seems like he already knows what the story will be in 1935 and 1908. What I’m hoping is that he finds ways to tie in to other King stories. Could there potentially be references to John Coffey or the other characters from The Green Mile (set in 1932 in the novel, but it wouldn’t be outlandish of them to drag it forward in the timeline a few years)? Could we see the immortal vampires of ‘Salem’s Lot or the origins of the mysterious government project called “The Shop” from books like Firestarter? All of these, of course, would depend on rights issues in various ways, but I don’t think any of them are impossible either.
Then there’s The Dark Tower itself, the rights to which currently reside with the previously mentioned Mike Flanagan. There was an earlier attempt to put the story of Roland of Gilead to film, a 2017 movie that foolishly tried to condense seven novels (all but one of which fall into doorstopper territory) into a 90-minute feature, and fans were not pleased. Flanagan, who already has several well-received King adaptations under his belt, has expressed the desire to use The Dark Tower for a television series of about five seasons, with a pair of movies to conclude the story. This is a much smarter approach to the material, and Flanagan has proven himself time and again to be someone perfectly suited to bringing Stephen King’s stories to life.
This…was NOT perfectly suited.
The optimal version of this, for me at least, would be for Flanagan’s Dark Tower to share fabric with Muschietti’s series. Characters common to both projects could be played by the same actors, the stories could be woven in concert with one another – separate, but linked. Could it happen? Well, Warner Bros. owns the rights to It and Welcome to Derry, so for this to happen, Flanagan would have to produce his series in cooperation with Warner Bros. It’s not out of the question. His previous development deal with Netflix is over, and his current deal with Amazon does not include The Dark Tower. He could take the story anywhere he wants. And he’s got a relationship with Warner Bros. as well – he directed their adaptation of Doctor Sleep and wrote the upcoming Clayface movie from DC Studios, which coincidentally, is ALSO in the Andy Muschietti business, as he’s been signed to direct their upcoming Batman movie, Brave and the Bold.
I’m not saying that this will happen. I’m not saying that Flanagan and Muschietti and Stephen King and Warner Bros. will join forces and finally begin to create the Kingamatic Universe that Constant Readers have been craving for the better part of five decades.
I’m not saying it’s going to happen.
I’m just saying it would be pretty damn cool.
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. You can subscribe to his newsletter by clicking right here. He’s also started putting his LitReel videos on TikTok. He also hopes that somewhere in there they find a way to tell us what happened to the Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon…specifically, does she still love Tom Gordon, or has she moved on to – say – Shohei Ohtani?
Last week brought us a pair of announcements about upcoming Superman books, both of which I’m happy about, although I’m slightly reserved about one of them.
First of all, Marvel Comics announced the creative teams for their half of the upcoming Spider-Man/Superman crossover. DC announced at the end of last year that Mark Waid and Jorge Jimenez will be doing the main story for their half, which comes out in March. Marvel’s side of the crossover will come out in April, and last week we learned that the main story will be by Brad Meltzer and Pepe Larraz, pitting the wallcrawler and the Man of Steel against Lex Luthor and Norman Osborn. I’ve been a fan of Meltzer for quite some time – I love his novels, I’ve shared his childrens’ books with my son, and I’ve always liked his comics. I was surprised, though, to discover that he’s done almost no work for Marvel in the past – save for a single page in 2019’s Marvel Comics #1000 special, I believe this will be his first Marvel work.
They also revealed the creators and characters that will appear in the back-up features. Dan Slott and Marcos Martin will team up the Golden Age Superman with Spider-Man Noir, Jason Aaron and Russell Dauterman will pit Wonder Woman and the Jane Foster Thor against an army of symbiotes, Louise Simonson and Todd Nauck will turn John Henry Irons against the Hobgoblin, Joe Kelly and Humberto Ramos will chronicle a “campus crossover” between Gwen Stacy and Lana Lang, and Brian Michael Bendis will re-team with Sara Pichelli, with whom he co-created the Miles Morales Spider-Man, in a story where Miles meets Superman. The thing about that last one, though, is that I’m not actually sure WHICH Superman Miles is going to meet, Clark or Jon. The solicitation doesn’t make it clear, and there are variant covers featuring Miles with each of them. This is one of the many, many things that drives me crazy about aging Jon up, but I’m not going to belabor that point here. I’m excited about most of these stories, particularly to have Louise Simonson writing Steel again.
The second announcement that hit this week is for another project launching in April, a four-issue Bizarro: Year None miniseries, purporting to tell the “definitive, indefinitive” origin of Superman’s imperfect doppelganger. This one is going to be co-written by Kevin Smith and Eric Carrasco, with art by Nick Pitarra. I couldn’t think of a better team to do a Bizarro comic, and at the same time, I cannot help but be a bit trepidatious about this one. And anyone who’s familiar with Kevin Smith’s history in comics will know exactly why.
Look – I am a fan of Kevin Smith. I have been since 1999, when my buddy Jason introduced me to what was then still the “Jersey Trilogy” just in time for us to catch Dogma. And I’ve been into most of his comic book work too…when it actually gets finished. Once his film career was established, Smith broke into comics first with stories featuring his own characters, then on acclaimed relaunches of Daredevil and Green Arrow. In 2002, he came back to Marvel for a miniseries, Spider-Man/Black Cat: The Evil That Men Do, which released three of six issues before it vanished. Smith got sidetracked on other projects, and it took three years before he came back and did the back half of that miniseries. But that’s nothing compared to Daredevil/Bullseye: The Target, a miniseries that also launched that year and never made it beyond a first issue. We’re sitting here 24 years later, and that story was never finished.
This became a bit of a theme for Smith. In 2009 he and artist Walter Flanagan (yes, that Walt Flanagan, if you’re a fan of Smith’s movies) produced the first six issues of what was supposed to be a 12-issue saga: Batman: The Widening Gyre. At the time, Smith promised that the second half of the story would be told after a brief hiatus. The hiatus is at 16 years and counting.
To Smith’s credit, he’s totally aware of the problems he had, and in more recent years he’s gotten a lot better about it. Whether it’s because of working with co-writers or just making certain that he has the scripts for an entire project finished before it’s even announced, his work in the past decade has not suffered from the George R.R. Martin-esque disappearances that plagued his comics back in the day. But as someone who’s still curious as to how, exactly, that gyre was supposed to finish widening, it’s hard to hear his name attached to a project without at least THINKING “here’s hoping he’s got all the scripts finished already.”
I think he has. All the same, the Bizarro miniseries is scheduled to run for four issues, starting in April. So here’s hoping we’ll have all four of them by the end of July.
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!
Arthur Hardy is retiring. For the majority of you reading this, that probably doesn’t mean anything, but if you’re from the New Orleans area that name has resonance and the knowledge that his era is coming to an end probably makes you a little bit sad. Hardy is a local historian who, for nearly 50 years, has also been the publisher of an annual Mardi Gras guide that has become a significant part of local culture. This annual magazine contains not only the routes and schedules for virtually every Mardi Gras parade in Southern Louisiana (and for those of you who’ve never done Mardi Gras, I’m telling you now, there’s probably a lot more of them than you think), but also detailed, entertaining, and informative writing about the history and traditions of carnival and the various Krewes, significant figures, and all the collected effluvia that comes with the season. Much like every kid in America used to sit around waiting for the annual Sears Christmas Catalog every year, here in New Orleans it just wasn’t carnival season until Hardy’s Mardi Gras guide showed up on the magazine racks in local gas stations and drugstores.
Farmers have their almanac. We have this.
I bring up Arthur Hardy because in his final season as the unofficial king of carnival, the local PBS station has produced a documentary about his life and career, Arthur Hardy: Our Mardi Gras Guide. If you’re in New Orleans and want to watch it, it’s going to air on Jan. 22 at 7:30 pm on WYES, with additional airings to follow, and it will also stream on the app. I’m excited to learn about this, not only because Hardy is a figure of great cultural importance to the most quintessentially New Orleans tradition there is, but also because I’m a sucker for a good documentary.
I love movies in general, of course, it would be impossible to read more than a couple of pages on this blog without that becoming abundantly clear, but there’s something about a great documentary that can be really compelling. To tell a true story and tell it accurately is an art form that even the greatest narrative filmmaker can struggle to pull off. Finding those bits and pieces of a person’s life and assembling them into a story isn’t easy, especially if the subject of said documentary is someone that the audience will likely already be familiar with. What can you say about this person that hasn’t already been said? What can you show that the fans don’t already know? And can you take the stuff they do know and present it in a way that’s both compelling and entertaining?
In the case of these biographical documentaries, I particularly find myself drawn to those that focus on somebody I’m already a fan of. Films like Jim Henson: Idea Man , Music By John Williams, or To Hell and Back: The Kane Hodder Story all scratch that itch for me, giving me a deeper dive into the life of someone whose work I adore. That said, it’s not a requirement that I’m already intimately familiar with the subject of a documentary for me to enjoy it. For example, I’ve never been a wrestling fan and I knew virtually nothing about the life of Andre the Giant outside of his participation in The Princess Bride, but the Jason Hehir-directed Andre the Giant documentary moved me to tears. I’m just more LIKELY to watch a documentary if it’s a subject I’m already familiar with.
So in anticipation of the Arthur Hardy documentary, today in Geek Punditry I’m going to talk about five of my favorite “biodocs” from the last decade or so, five films that delve into the life of an artist or actor whose work is meaningful to me and why the documentaries land so well.
Super/Man: The Christopher Reeve Story (2024)
This is one of those moments where nobody who is even remotely familiar with my taste will find anything surprising. I am, of course, the biggest Superman fan that most people who meet me will ever meet, and I even made one of my (sadly) all-too-rare movie theater visits these days to catch this documentary during its limited Fathom Events screening when it premiered. I was born near the end of the 70s, reared in the 80s, and in my heart of hearts, Christopher Reeve is and always will be MY Superman.
The movie tells two stories in parallel: the story of Christopher Reeve from the beginning of his life through the growth of his career and his life as Superman, intercut with the story of the horseback riding accident that put him in a wheelchair and the unexpected direction his life took after that. The directors (Ian Bonhote and Peter Ettedgui) go back and forth between these two periods, telling their individual stories more or less chronologically but bouncing between the two every few minutes. The result is the surreal experience of watching this young man – strong, talented, and determined – juxtaposed by the person he would become at his lowest point and how he managed to crawl back from that point to become something more. The story of him portraying Superman is presented side-by-side with the story of him actually proving what a real-world Superman can be.
The movie is, as is to be expected, heartbreaking and uplifting at the same time. It’s a beautiful tale that everybody knows from the beginning will have a tragic ending. The filmmakers don’t try to portray Reeve as perfect either – they spend time (especially in his early years) putting on display his faults and some of the questionable choices of a young man who is propelled to stardom. The movie also spends a surprising amount of its runtime focusing on Reeve’s relationship with Robin Williams. It’s common knowledge that the two of them were good friends, but until watching this documentary I don’t think I ever realized just how deep that friendship was. If you aren’t crying at that point already, get ready for the moment where Glenn Close (one of many actors interviewed for the film) speculates that if Reeve hadn’t died, Robin Williams would still be with us today as well.
Hell, you might be crying right now and you haven’t even watched the movie yet.
The film is currently streaming on HBO Max, which means if you want to watch it you should probably hit “play” in the next 15 minutes before they do something else stupid and remove more content from the service that absolutely should still be there.
The Scrooge Mystery (2018)
Don Rosa is one of the most globally popular comic book creators of all time, but far too many American fans have never heard his name. That’s because the bulk of his career was spent chronicling the adventures of Scrooge McDuck, his nephews, and the assorted characters that have sprung up around him in the world of Duckberg. Rosa spent decades writing and drawing stories of Scrooge and Donald Duck, and while they have been published and enjoyed here in America, they have achieved rock star status in Europe, where Disney comics are among the biggest pop culture outlets there are.
Rosa’s life and career is the focus of this documentary by filmmaker Morgann Gicquel, and through its two hours you’ll see the story of a young comic book fan who fell out of the artform and found his way back by carrying on the mantle of the great Carl Barks, Scrooge’s creator. Rosa talks candidly about his career, including his interactions with various publishers around the world, which ones treated him better than others, and his relationship with the company that actually owns the characters that he has made even more famous through works like his masterpiece The Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck.
The movie is entertaining, filling in blanks in Rosa’s life that even comic book fans (like myself) probably wouldn’t know, since the lives of cartoonists are not nearly as heavily covered by the media as those of actors and directors. As Rosa gives the filmmaker a tour of his home – including a gargantuan comic book collection that will make anyone who loves reading deeply envious – he comes across as a little awkward and eccentric, but endearing in the process. You’ll also get to see Rosa at work and feel your heart crumble a bit as he describes his deteriorating vision and how it is one of the things that caused him to retire. To look at some of the amazing, meticulously detailed artwork he’s created over the decades and know that the man whose pencils made those lines now has to practically press his face against the page in order to keep drawing is truly saddening.
I was one of the original Kickstarter backers for this movie back when it was in production, so I got a Blu-Ray copy of the film upon its release, which I was lucky enough to have Rosa to autograph last year when he came to Fan Expo New Orleans. Those of you who don’t already own the film may expect to see it on Disney+, but the odds of that happening are pretty slim. (Spoiler warning: although Rosa had good relationships with many of the publishers he worked with over the years, he makes it abundantly clear in this film that his feelings about the modern House of Mouse itself are far from kind.) Fortunately, it is currently available on several free streaming platforms, including Pluto TV, Hoopla, and Tubi. If you’re interested in Disney, comic books in general, or the marriage of the two, this is a great film.
For the Love of Spock (2016)
So far this list has turned out to be a chronicle of my own personal fandoms, hasn’t it? First Superman, then Scrooge McDuck, and now Star Trek. There have been a great many documentaries made about Trek over the years (one of the best movie theater experiences I ever had was watching Trekkies in a room full of like-minded nerds), but as far as films focusing on the life of a single person, I think this one is the best.
For the Love of Spock looks at the life of Leonard Nimoy and his sometimes tumultuous relationship with the character he brought to life. The film discusses those years when he tried to distance himself from the role and how he ultimately came around to embrace it. These are things that Trek fans, of course, are already intimately aware of. What makes this movie special is its director: Leonard Nimoy’s son, Adam. This is a very specific subcategory of documentary – films made by the family of the subject – that I always find intriguing. Adam Nimoy, as one would expect, has a very personal and unique perspective on the life of his father and what exactly Star Trek means – not only to Leonard Nimoy himself, but to the world at large. There are a lot of people who could tell the story of Leonard Nimoy, but it is doubtful that anybody else would tell it the same way as Adam Nimoy.
Nimoy passed away in 2015, while this movie was in production, so in a way it also serves as kind of a “last word” on him and the character. At least, as much as there will ever be a “last word.” Star Trek isn’t going anywhere anytime soon, and Spock is one of the signature characters of the franchise, so this movie is never going to not be relevant. But it will always be, to quote Nimoy’s signature character, “fascinating.”
Like The Scrooge Mystery, this one is currently streaming on Pluto TV, Hoopla, and Tubi, as well as the Roku Channel.
Won’t You Be My Neighbor (2018)
Morgan Neville directed this film about the life and career of Fred “Mister” Rogers, a man who probably helped raise most of the people who are reading this column right now. For over three decades, Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood came into the homes of the children of America and showed us things about creativity, imagination, kindness, and life. The question someone on the outside would likely ask, then, is how much of that was an actor playing a character and how much of that was the man himself.
This film puts forth the thesis that, when it came to Mr. Rogers, ol’ brother Fred was doing very little acting. The sweet, tender, and understanding soul that entertained us in the mornings of our formative years was the same soul Fred Rogers carried with him in his day-to-day life. The movie uses interviews with actors and crew from the TV show, Rogers’ wife Joanne, and others that were touched by him over the years to paint a portrait of an intrinsically good and humble man who never wanted anything other than to show children kindness.
That said, the movie isn’t totally saccharine either. It delves into the struggles of the creating the show, those periods where the real world was too harsh and how Rogers struggled how to deal with it, and the sort of existential crises that truly good people sometimes go through. Rogers was human, and not without his doubts. Towards the end, after his retirement, there’s a segment about how he struggled when asked to come back and make a short video speaking to children after 9/11, and the pain as he tries to figure out what to say is palpable. On the other hand, whereas many movies of this nature spend time looking at the failures or vices of its subject, this movie struggles to FIND any vices to put on the screen. It is particularly telling when Joanne reports that, as Rogers’ life was coming to an end, he was worried that he hadn’t done enough good for the world he was leaving behind.
Good grief. If Mr. Rogers wasn’t good enough, what chance do ANY of us have?
But the takeaway here should be that the doubt was only in his mind, that it is only the truly good among us that would ever worry about such a thing. And I am using the adjective “good” here rather than “great” very deliberately – if you don’t understand the distinction, you need to watch more Mr. Rogers.
This one is streaming right now on Amazon Prime Video
John Candy: I Like Me (2025)
The newest film in my top five came out just a few months ago. Directed by Colin Hanks, John Candy: I Like Me is a sweet dissection of the life and career of one of the funniest men of the 1980s, and to a degree, about how the world failed him. Hanks interviews Candy’s friends, co-stars, and family to give us an image of someone who was deeply kind and generous, but at the same time, wasn’t without his own demons. Hanks does his due diligence by showing those things, but it’s all through the perspective of interviews with people who obviously adore Candy and are in the business of preserving his memory.
This is a case where I don’t think there’s anything in the movie that’s particularly revelatory, but in which we dig more deeply into things we already knew. For example, Macaulay Culkin (who co-starred with him at the advanced age of eight) mentions how Candy was one of the first people who seemed to notice the toxic and abusive nature of Culkin’s father, and how he went out of his way to check in on and shield the boy on the set of their film Uncle Buck. Conan O’Brien’s remembrances of Candy came not as the host of a popular talk show, but from when he met the already-famous Candy when he was a college student, and how his interactions with the man shaped his career.
The movie is awash with interviews with the likes of Bill Murray, Catherine O’Hara, Mel Brooks, Eugene Levy, Martin Short, Steve Martin, Dan Aykroyd, and many other people who seem to be lining up to tell the world that John Candy was a beautiful, kind, and talented man. If you’ve ever been a fan of his, I don’t think there’s anything in this movie that you’ll find shocking. But by the end of it, as you wipe the tears from your eyes, you’re definitely going to find yourself wishing that we had been lucky enough to have more of him before the ride was over.
This one is a Prime Video original, so go stream it there.
As always with these “Five Favorites” columns, my choices are inherently subjective and may change at any moment. There are a dozen other documentaries I can think of that would have fit into this list, and on any given day, may have bumped one of the ones that made the cut. But I’m always interested in more. If you know of a great biodoc, particularly one about a creative type like the five I’ve listed here, drop your own suggestions in the comments. I’d love to watch another one.
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. You can subscribe to his newsletter by clicking right here. He’s also started putting his LitReel videos on TikTok. He cannot fathom why his Kickstarter for a documentary about American Idol alumni William Hung keeps getting flagged and taken down.
Last weekend was Fan Expo New Orleans. If you recall, during the full Year of Superman last year, I wrote about the Superman-related stuff I found at Fan Expo 2025. And right now, let’s all be grateful that was last year and not this year, because this year’s Fan Expo – I’m sorry to report – was kind of a bust. The big cons have been shedding comic and science fiction participation for years, that’s nothing new. The shows are becoming more and more focused on anime and photo ops. And look – it’s not like I think that everything has to cater to me personally. I know, I’m an old man and people need to chase the money young people are bringing to the table. But there are full-on anime cons out there. The convention culture was built around comic book and sci-fi geeks, such as myself, and it feels very much like we’re the ones getting left out in the cold. All of this is to say, after a Saturday afternoon of prowling the vendor floor, I probably spent less money at this year’s Expo than I ever have before.
Seeing as how this is “Superman Stuff,” I’m only going to run through the few related finds I got. I knew even before I got there that I was going to hit up one of the booths that sells custom LEGO-style minifigures, because I’ve got a display of Superman-related figures in my classroom and I wanted to add to it. There was a movie version of Superman and Krypto that I added to my display, but sadly, those were the only two Superman characters they had that I didn’t have already. (I did, however, pick up the movie Fantastic Four, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and the core Heeler family from Bluey, so I came away satisfied.)
The comics were an even bigger bust. I like to hit the bargain bins – the dollar comics, the weird stuff. But I found only two such bins in the whole show. and I’m pretty sure there were only four or five comic book vendors TOTAL. I walked away with a handful of old Archie comics and some 80s Marvel goodness, but the only Superman comic that fell into my hands was a battered reading copy of Action Comics #342 from 1966, which I’m digging into today.
In “The Super-Human Bomb,” Brainiac is prowling space, trying to think of some way to defeat Superman, when he finds himself under attack by another alien named Grax, whose 20th level intelligence is obviously way above Brainiac’s mere 12th level. Grax has a beef with Superman as well, and has come up with a scheme to destroy him, but he needs a force field and somehow Mr. 20th Level can’t figure out how to make one, so he steals Brainiac’s. Grax tricks Superman with a missile that attaches a bomb to the man of steel, a bomb he claims is powerful enough to annihilate Earth, and it’s rigged to go off if Superman tries to remove it. Oh yeah, and just in case he gets any smart ideas about flying into space, Grax put Brainiac’s force field around Earth, trapping him here, with a 24-hour timer on the bomb.
I have to admit, inability to invent a force field notwithstanding, so far Grax is making a solid case for being eight levels smarter than Brainiac. He never got this far.
Superman spends the next 24 hours trying desperately to stop the bomb, but everything fails. He even offers to let Grax kill him if he will spare Earth, but Grax refuses. Minutes before the explosion, Brainiac messages Superman and tells him how to defeat Grax: build an enormous magnet (shaped like a horseshoe, because theming) and use it to draw Grax’s ship against the force field, trapping him in the blast radius of the bomb. Superman gets into Grax’s ship and hits the switch for the bomb, just as – in the most dramatic moment in comic book history – I realize that this $1 reading copy I purchased is missing pages out of the middle, so I can’t see how the story ends.
Incredible!
The back-up story, fortunately, is complete: Supergirl stars in “The Day Supergirl Became an Amazon.” College student Linda Danvers is on a trip to the South Pacific to gather specimens for the school aquarium, when their ship is struck by a heavy storm. Supergirl secretly guides the ship to an island, where the students casually decide to begin collecting their specimens rather than wondering about, y’know, getting rescued. But the island turns out to be occupied by an Amazon tribe that would later be sued by Themiscyra for trademark infringement.
The Amazons put Linda and her classmates in slave girl costumes because fun, and that night Linda puts her Supergirl costume on a bird so people will see it flying around and assume Supergirl is on a mission, and that may be one of the most confusing sentences I’ve ever written. The Amazons feed the girls a “nectar of strength” which doesn’t appear to impact Linda’s classmates, but she pretends that the nectar has given her super powers and starts wiping the floor with the Amazons in trial after trial. Eventually, Linda does such a good job of building a pyramid with the stones from the Amazon’s homes that the queen gets fed up with her and lets the girls go. The story is an absolute masterpiece, assuming that you don’t stop to wonder why Supergirl dropped their ship on the island instead of taking them to a safe place in the first place, why she felt it necessary to put her costume on a bird, or what Linda’s major was and what kind of college sends three random students to the South Pacific in a hovercraft.
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!
Before we start, I want to assure you that this column will NOT spoil the final season of Stranger Things. I do my best to avoid spoilers in general, but it will be particularly easy in this case because I have not yet watched the final season of Stranger Things. A lot of people around me have, though, and a lot of people have opinions about it. This week, as my students filtered back into my class after their Christmas break, I heard them discussing the series finale and I had to kindly request that they refrain from speaking about specifics in my presence. (I believe my exact words were “If you spoil anything for me I’m going to make it my mission to see to it that you never graduate.” It’s good to teach seniors sometimes.)
“These kids were in high school for ten years, don’t think I won’t do that to you, too.”
One of the non-spoiler things I heard them discussing, though, was something people were calling “Conformity Gate.” I don’t know exactly what this is a reference to or where the term comes from, other than the generic tendency ever since Nixon to append the -gate suffix to any sort of scandal or conspiracy because people are too lazy to come up with something original. From what I gathered, the “Conformity Gate” discussion centered around an internet theory that there was a SECRET NINTH EPISODE of the final season, that the episode that dropped on New Year’s Eve was NOT the actual series finale, and that on the evening of January 7th, Netflix would surprise us all by dropping the TRUE series finale of the epic and long-awaited sci-fi/horror series Stranger Things.
And I gotta tell ya, when I heard this theory, I lauuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuughed…
This isn’t the first time I’ve heard such a thing. Last fall, there was supposedly a secret episode of Peacemaker season two. At one point I recall hearing such a theory about Game of Thrones. I’m pretty sure I’ve heard it for certain series of Doctor Who. And just like with those other series, Jan. 7 came and went and there was nothing except an announcement for the (previously-announced) Stranger Things animated spin-off series.
These theories are simply never true. And honestly, the way that TV and movie production is handled in this day and age, such a thing would be virtually inconceivable.
Not impossible. In fact, it would be relatively easy to do. It’s just that the studios would never let ’em do it.
Now I’m going to preface this by saying that these theories are almost always spread by people who are upset about the final episode and unable to accept that what they just saw was the “real” ending. It’s a stubborn, childish insistence, and even in those cases where I happen to agree that the final episode was disappointing, it’s kind of an insult to the people who actually made the show. (I can only imagine what would have happened had this sort of speculation been common when How I Met Your Mother wrapped.) I’m not saying that it’s unfair to be disappointed in how a show ends – that is of course a matter of personal taste and nobody has the right to tell you that you’re right or wrong for your tastes. But it IS pretty darn childish to have the attitude that what you watched was somehow SO bad that it MUST have been an intentional misdirect.
Think about it just for a second: is anyone who works on TV – writers, directors, actors, showrunners – ever going to DELIBERATELY make a bad episode? Would they take such a risk? That’s not anyone’s goal. They want to build interest and anticipation with each installment, and having people trash your work doesn’t do that. There’s an old adage that the only “bad press” is “no press,” and I’m here to tell you, that’s a straight-up lie. Just ask the people who made the Spider-Man quasi-spinoff Morbius.
If you didn’t share 19 “It’s Morbin’ Time!” memes were you even ON the internet in 2022?
That movie was the talk of the town. Everybody was discussing it, making memes about it, and pushing it to the forefront of the conversation…but the buzz, deserved or not, was all BAD. And then the movie came out and completely bombed. Then when people kept talking about it, Sony took a shot at re-releasing it, and it bombed AGAIN. I’m not saying that without the bad buzz the movie would have been a hit, but it’s undeniable that heavy internet chatter surrounding the film did NOTHING to help its numbers.
Then there’s the other reason that such a thing would be virtually inconceivable today: the studios who make movies and television shows are utterly adverse to surprise. Everything – and I mean EVERYTHING – has to be dumped out onto the public far ahead of time. Casting news, romantic subplots, climatic battles, full songs are all spilled out onto the internet weeks, months, even years before the movie or TV show actually makes it to your screen. Movie trailers have become particularly bad about this. I love a good trailer. Making a good trailer – essentially a short film intended to get an audience interested in watching the FULL movie – is an art form in and of itself. But the studios seem to have forgotten that, and rather than doing something artful to engage the audience and make people want to head to the movie theater, their strategy seems to be to just give away every surprise and plot point in the hopes that it will accomplish the same thing.
I get why they do this, of course. Whether you’re talking about a theatrical release or a streaming show, in the 21st century it seems like the only numbers that matter are those that we get in the first few days of a release. Let’s use the recent slate of Avengers: Doomsday trailers as an example. In the last few weeks, we’ve started to get teaser trailers that show a glimpse of a character or two, followed by the announcement that “Steve Rogers will return in Avengers: Doomsday.” Or Thor. Or the X-Men. And by the time you read this, there will probably be teasers with everyone from the Fantastic Four to Spider-Ham to Millie the Model.
This is the one that broke the Internet.
None of these (except Millie) would be much of a shock. Last year Marvel had a huge streaming event which amounted to showing us – one at a time – director’s chairs with the names of assorted cast members, their way of telling us who was going to be in the movie. Some of them were a surprise at the time, and that was (I admit) kind of cool. But wouldn’t it have been cooler if we had NO IDEA that Patrick Stewart and Kelsey Grammar were going to be back as Professor X and the Beast until we were in the theater, watching it, and then they showed up out of the blue?
I think so, anyway.
Would in-theater surprises get people excited? Would it make them engaged? Absolutely. If an audience is excited and energized about a movie, they’ll walk out talking about it, they’ll tell their friends they have to see it, and the movie can grow legs. But the problem is that the studios no longer CARE about legs. This strategy – keep it a surprise and build word of mouth – is the way to get people excited about a movie in the long-term. That’s not how movies are evaluated anymore, unfortunately. All that matters is that opening weekend in a theater or the first 48 hours of streaming. If you don’t get massive numbers up front, a movie is declared a failure. There was a time when a movie might not have had an enormous opening weekend, but positive word of mouth would allow it to stay in a theater for weeks or even months until it became what they called a “sleeper” hit.
The studios don’t care about that anymore. An ad that says “the number one movie in America!” is way sexier than one that says “we made back our budget in the fifth week of release!” So they do everything they possibly can do to frontload the audience and get everyone to see the movie right away. This, by the way, is one of the approximately 3,972 reasons that I’m very nervous about the prospect of Netflix buying Warner Bros. Netflix is a streaming platform, and the head of the company has frequently expressed outright disdain for the theatrical release model that I personally hold so dear. I’m very much afraid that if this deal is eventually allowed to happen, it will be the final chokehold on the already-dying movie theater experience.
But that’s a whole different topic. What does this have to do with “Conformity Gate” and the potential for another episode of Stranger Things? It’s simply this: Netflix (any studio, really, but we’re talking about Netflix specifically at the moment) would simply never take the risk of hiding such a thing. They are ADDICTED to telling you EVERYTHING. Remember, this is the studio that tells its writers that the characters have to ANNOUNCE WHAT THEY ARE DOING OUT LOUD because they assume that most of the audience will be scrolling on their phones instead of really paying attention when they’re watching a show. Do you honestly think they’ve got a high enough opinion of you to drop a surprise like that?
The tragedy of it is that I actually think it WOULD be a great thing to attempt, kind of like a hidden track on a CD. (Those don’t really exist anymore either, so kids, ask your parents.) It would be amazing if Netflix, or anybody for that matter, was capable of keeping a secret of this magnitude and then executing it. Now they obviously couldn’t do it all the time. It would need to be used sparingly, and only for exactly the right project, a story for which that kind of surprise ending would be both structurally and tonally appropriate. And let’s be honest here: they would not hide the existence of the episode right up until the moment it drops. It’s far more likely that the episode we EXPECT to be the finale to end with a “To be continued” card or something to that effect. But if executed properly, it could be a really thrilling moment.
The funny part is that Netflix actually did do something like this once. Anybody remember the Super Bowl in 2018? Like most Super Bowls, the biggest draw was the commercials. I was there to see what Doritos was up to, or Pepsi, or something dot com that probably doesn’t exist anymore. And most of all, I’m there for the movie trailers. As far as I’m concerned, every Super Bowl commercial should either be really funny, or a kick-ass movie trailer. In 2018, one of those trailers hit us with the Netflix logo, then scrolled into scenes from some sort of outer space thriller that we hadn’t heard of before. It wasn’t like getting a Marvel or Star Wars trailer, where we knew that the movie was in production and we were just hoping for our first glimpse. This was something totally new.
And at the end of the trailer, we got the title: The Cloverfield Paradox. Holy crap. It was the new Cloverfield movie, the one that had been rumored ever since 10 Cloverfield Lane. And it wasn’t going to theaters, it was gonna be a Netflix movie.
Then came the biggest shock: the announcement that the movie was NOW STREAMING. It wasn’t telling us that the movie was dropping in a year or a month. It was ON NETFLIX AND WE COULD WATCH IT RIGHT NOW.
“If it’s HALF as good as the first two Cloverfield movies, this is gonna change everything!”
I thought then – and still think now – that it was one of the most brilliant marketing moves Netflix could ever have done. It was an incredible surprise and it got me more enthusiastic about watching that movie that I think would even have been possible otherwise. And it’s a shame, really, that as a movie The Cloverfield Paradox turned out to be…well…not great. Because if it had been, that would have been checkmate. This could have been an annual thing. We could sit down for the Super Bowl every year, wondering what movie Netflix was going to announce during the game that we would have the option to watch as soon as the game was over (as opposed to the random episode of Matlock that they usually show for some reason).
But it didn’t pan out that way, and now Netflix is more risk-averse than anybody. Remember, this is the studio that cancels entire series if they aren’t a smash hit in the week after the first episode drops. Do you really think they’d take a chance at a whole surprise episode?
It would be cool, don’t get me wrong.
I just don’t see it happening.
So the next time you’re unhappy with the finale of a Netflix show and someone floats the idea that there’s a special “hidden” episode waiting for you, ask yourself if the streamer that killed The Santa Clarita Diet would actually do such a thing before you pass that rumor along.
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. You can subscribe to his newsletter by clicking right here. He’s also started putting his LitReel videos on TikTok. He’s planning to start his own Stranger Things conspiracy theory. Now that Netflix has Sesame Street, they’re doing a miniseries that will reveal the hidden connection between Eleven and all her siblings to the terrifying and legendary Count Von Count. You heard it here first.
At the end of 2025, I made the decision to keep up my blogging about Superman. Unlike 2025, though, I’m not going to require myself to read or watch something literally every single day. That was a fun challenge, but the truth is, I know it’s not sustainable. I’ve got other writing to do, after all. But I’m going to aim to have some “Superman Stuff” for you roughly once a week. This might be a review of a comic book, a TV episode, or a movie. It might be a discussion of recent news or announcements. It might be talking about a new piece of merch or discussion of merch that I just WISH existed. I’m leaving the doors for this very open for me, because I want that freedom to take this in any direction that strikes me.
I call it…
To start this new, open-ended journey, I’m going to read a couple of the many books that were left over in my massive “Year of Superman” reading list, the first two issues of the 2016 DC Rebirth reboot, which celebrates its 10th anniversary this year somehow. Following the divisive New 52 era, this version of Superman (by Peter J. Tomasi and Patrick Gleason) felt very much like a return to form – it was the post-Crisis Superman again, married to Lois Lane, raising their son Jonathan together. And oddly enough, it began with Superman – the classic Superman – mourning the death of his “brother,” the New 52 Superman, which had happened just months before.
The Kents are still living on a farm here, under the assumed identities that they were using to avoid the revamped universe’s Clark and Lois. The relative seclusion is also helpful for Jonathan, still learning his powers. At the beginning of this issue he gets a horrific reminder of just what he can do – when a bird snatches his cat, Goldie, Jonathan’s heat vision fires instinctively, annihilating both the bird AND the cat. To make matters worse, a neighbor girl witnesses his trauma. Jonathan snaps at his parents later, upset about having to hide who he really is and what he can do, and is sent to his room. As he sits in his room, his father gets a visit by Wonder Woman and Batman, both concerned about this “new” Superman and his family – particularly the ten-year-old boy with Kryptonian power.
In issue #2, Superman takes Jonathan out with him to watch as he helps a ship trapped in ice, only to find an enormous tentacled creature beneath the waves. As Superman battles the creature, he instructs Jon into how to use his heat vision to neutralize the monster and send it below the waves. To his surprise, Jon realizes it’s…kind of fun. That fun is shattered later when Jon is hanging out with Kathy – the neighbor girl who saw him use his heat vision – and takes a tumble from a tree. He’s unconscious, hurt far more than he should be, and Clark decides a trip to the Fortress of Solitude is in order, not knowing that a visitor is waiting there.
This was such a great era for Superman. The classic version is back, the family is back, and best of all, we get stories like this. Clark is teaching his son to use his powers, helping him slowly discover them and having sincere discussions about what it means to be a hero. The episode with the monster in the ice, for example, is entirely orchestrated by Clark. He knew that Jon used his heat vision on the cat (he could smell the traces of ozone left behind by a heat vision blast) and decided to pull the ol’ “get back on the bicycle before you’re scared of it” routine to put him in a position where he has to use his powers to HELP people.
Jonathan killing the cat, as awful as it is for him, is a great story beat. Superman’s “no killing” code is a fundamental part of the character, but it’s also a lesson that he had to learn. Jonathan gets to learn that lesson early, through an accident that is no less traumatic. It’s kind of emblematic of what being a parent is – you want your child to be better than you and learn from your mistakes, knowing full well that they’re going to wind up making mistakes of their own. Goldie’s death was a total accident, and Clark knew that Jonathan would take it to heart, so rather than punishing him or lecturing him, he turned it into a unique teachable moment. It was peak parenting.
This was the first time we were going to see Superman as a dad for an extended period, and Tomasi’s approach is great. In the first issue, shown mostly through Jonathan’s perspective, Clark is a little intimidating, the way kids can see their fathers. In issue two, that barrier is broken and we realize that the kind, caring nature of Superman extends to his nature as a parent. The scenes with Clark and Jon in this issue are note-perfect, and would be a hallmark of Tomasi’s run.
To be blunt, this is yet another reason I’ll never quite forgive DC for aging Jonathan up a few years later. There are hundreds of stories about teenage superheroes out there, and for the most part, they haven’t known what the hell to do with Jonathan since then. But stories of the greatest hero in the world fathering, tutoring, mentoring, TEACHING a super-powered child? Those are in very short supply, and they had only scratched the surface of the potential here before it was swept away.
At some point, I may try to find a reading order of all the Superman comics between Rebirth and Action Comics #1000, because that whole too-short two-year era calls to me as something well worth revisiting again and again. It was a great time for Superman. I just wish DC had realized it.
Blake M. Petitis 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!
Yesterday, January 1st, was the first day since 2024 that I didn’t read, watch, or listen to anything related to Superman.
And I missed doing it.
Unless you’ve been living under a Kryptonite rock, you know that at the end of 2024, enthused for the then-upcoming James Gunn movie, I declared that 2025 would be my Year of Superman, and for the next 365 days I adhered to that. Every day for a solid year I read comics, watched movies and TV shows, listened to podcasts, and otherwise spent time with stories featuring my favorite superhero and his extended family. 52 blog posts later (all of which are archived right here, by the way) it’s time for me to look back and think about what it all means to me.
Nailed it.
To begin with, I don’t do this very often, but I’ve got to congratulate myself for actually accomplishing the goal. In that original column when I announced the project, I said that I would give myself grace, fully expecting that at some point in the year I would slip up and miss a day. And let me tell you, there were days in 2025 in which I didn’t want to read or watch anything. Bad days came and I didn’t want to do much more than retreat to my own Fortress of Solitude. But I didn’t. I made it without missing a single day. Let’s talk about what that means by the numbers. Over the course of 2025, the media I consumed included:
1 TV special (the Superman 50th Anniversary special)
And finally – are you ready for this? 1206 individual comic book issues that featured at least one story in which a member of the Superman family appeared.
That’s – and keep in mind that I’m referring to myself here – batshit insane. I don’t know if David Corenswet spent as much time in 2025 thinking about Superman as I did. So after all that…what does it mean? What have I learned about him?
The truth is, I find that the things I already believed were mostly affirmed. Superman has been around for nearly 90 years now, and in that time there have been many stories told about him and many different interpretations of the character. And that’s all fine. But let me tell you about MY Superman, what I get from the character, why he matters so damned much to ME.
In Man of Steel, Henry Cavill popularized to the mainstream something that had been part of the comics for a few years at that point, that the S-shield Superman wears, the emblem of the House of El (at least going back to the 1978 Christopher Reeve movie) was a Kryptonian symbol for hope. But what exactly does that mean? Is it just because Superman is so powerful? Is it because when you see that symbol, you know that the danger you’re in is only temporary, that somebody will be there to save you? Is that “S” just for “Superman,” or does it also mean “Savior?”
Yeah. That guy. Any of him.
Superman’s story has a lot of allusions to Christianity, with Marlon Brando’s Jor-El even referring to Kal-El as “my only son,” but Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster were Jewish and the story perhaps fits the concept of Moses even better. If you’ll forgive a brief moment of spirituality, Jesus was sent as the Savior of the human race in a direct way, and we get that whenever Superman saves someone falling from a burning building, leaps in front of a speeding bullet, or stops a locomotive to save the kid stuck on the tracks. Moses, on the other hand, was a less direct kind of savior, a leader, someone who GUIDES his people to a better world. And it is in this capacity that the parallels to Superman are stronger. Sure, Superman will save you from a flood, but more importantly, he’s there to show you that there’s a better way.
Let’s say it one more time: It’s not subtle.
It’s almost a cliche to say it at this point, but Superman’s greatest power is not his strength, his speed, his ability to fly or see through walls. His greatest power is his compassion, his unflinching belief in the goodness of people, and his ability to help others see things that way as well. Superman is the man who will never give up on you: no matter who you are or what you’ve done, he will always have faith in your ability to be better.
If you’re going to wear that shield, Kenan, you need to remember this.
In the climax of the new movie, David Corenswet tells Nicholas Hoult’s Lex Luthor that his greatest strength is his humanity, and that he hopes for the good of the world that some day Luthor will realize the same thing about himself. From anybody else, that line would sound trite, pat, and cloying. From Superman, you believe it. The tragedy of Lex Luthor is not that he’s a criminal or a killer or anything else. That makes him a villain. What makes him a tragic figure, what Superman laments every time he faces him, is that he has a mind that could make the world a better place, but chooses to use it selfishly. And every time he faces Luthor, Superman hopes that this will be the time that Luthor sees the light. It’s even happened in the comics a few times, where Lex has turned good. It’s always been temporary, of course, except for in self-contained continuities like All-Star Superman, but we’ve seen time and again that even Lex Luthor has within him a seed of redemption. We’ve seen time and again that Superman is right. And if he’s right – if even LEX LUTHOR has the potential to be a better person tomorrow than he is today – then what does that mean for the rest of us?
Superman believes the best of you. And he inspires you to believe the best in others. In the final episode of Superman and Lois we see him in flight with his extended family of heroes, and we learn that he and Lois manage to change their world for the better. In Final Night, we are reminded that half the superheroes in the world look to him as inspiration (the other half, naturally, look to Batman). The whole point of The Iron Giant is that the Giant himself – an alien weapon – looks to the example of Superman and sees that he can make himself better.
The Giant gets it better than anybody on BlueSky.
We cannot bend steel in our bare hands. We cannot leap tall buildings in a single bound. We cannot change the course of mighty rivers, or freeze those rivers with our breath. We cannot fly through space unaided, travel through time, or crush a lump of coal into a diamond. Those things are beyond us.
But we can believe in the best of each other. And maybe, if we do enough of that, those others will actually begin to earn that trust. And maybe, if we do enough of that, we can learn to believe in the best of ourselves.
We should believe the best of ourselves.
Because Superman would.
Remind yourself, in those times where you’re dangling off the edge of that cliff and you think you’ll never make it, that Superman would believe in you.
And who are you to tell Superman that he’s wrong?
And don’t you forget it.
So now what?
Some people, after spending an entire year dwelling on a single character, would get tired of it. I…I’m not. I want more Superman. And there’s so much more to come. There’s the Supergirl movie coming out later this year, of course. And a new season of My Adventures of Superman is also scheduled to drop some time in 2026. Next year we’ll get Man of Tomorrow. DC Comics has announced some really interesting things for the ongoing Superman comics after the current DC KO event wraps up that I’m certainly going to want to talk about. They’ve also teased the return of the Legion of Super-Heroes, and come on, if Superman’s not involved with that in some way, what are we even doing? And let’s not forget that in March, after decades apart, Superman is finally going to meet Marvel’s friendly neighborhood webslinger again in a new Superman/Spider-Man crossover.
We’re back, baby!
Then there’s all the stuff on my list that I just didn’t get around to this year: John Ostrander’s amazing miniseries The Kents, Grant Morrison’s DC One Million event (which – let’s be honest – is a Superman story at its core), or the “world without Superman” Elseworlds series Justice League: The Nail. There are still several animated films I didn’t get to watch. I had hoped to do an entire week on fanfilms, but ran out of time. And I had stories picked out for weeks focusing on Jimmy Olsen, Lex Luthor, Kong Kenan, and other characters that didn’t get scratched off the list.
The truth is, I don’t want to stop reading, watching, or writing about Superman. I just don’t want to HAVE to do it EVERY DAY.
So consider this my official announcement. Starting in 2026 and going on…well, as long as I wanna do it, I’ll be bringing you SUPERMAN STUFF right here on the blog. Sometimes it’ll be new comics, new movies, new TV shows. Sometimes it’ll be classic stuff that I haven’t talked about before. I’ll still endeavor to have at least one blog post a week, but they won’t be as long as they were in 2025 (you’re welcome) and they may not necessarily always be on a Wednesday.
The world of Superman is vast, and despite the mountain of stuff that I mentioned in the list above, there’s plenty more to dig into. The regular Geek Punditry blog here on Fridays won’t change. But I’m going to continue to devote real estate here to talking about the characters and stories that I love.
Because there’s something to be learned here. And it’s a lesson we can all use.
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. You can subscribe to his newsletter by clicking right here. He’s also started putting his LitReel videos on TikTok. To all the people who sent him messages urging him to make 2026 “The Year of Captain Underpants,” he considered it. A little.
I’m writing this on Christmas morning, sitting amongst piles of wrapping paper and the mountain of Hot Wheels that Santa Claus brought Eddie, The Muppet Christmas Carol on TV because it’s not time for football yet. But it’s also the first day of the final chapter. After 51 weeks in which I have watched, read, or listened to at least one piece of Superman-related media every single day, no matter what life had in store for me, I’ve only got seven days left to reach the finish line.
I’m going to think of this week as “the best of the rest.” I’m going to try to read and watch some of my favorite or some of the most significant stories remaining on the gargantuan list I started the year with. And make no mistake, that list is still pretty big. I haven’t gotten close to scratching off all of it. So perhaps, just perhaps, when I reach New Year’s Day, my journey with Superman won’t be ending, but merely evolving.
Comics:Superman Smashes the Klan #1-3, DC Go! Holiday Special #32
Notes:A few weeks ago I listened to the radio serial “Superman Versus the Clan of the Fiery Cross.” In 2019, writer Gene Luen Yang and artist Gurihiru loosely adapted that storyline into a three-issue miniseries, Superman Smashes the Klan, that kept the skeleton of the original story, but added some new elements that really made for one of those evergreen graphic novels that will be read for a very long time.
Set in the days after World War II, the story kicks off with a Golden Age-style Superman polishing off a leftover Nazi calling himself Atom Man. The fight is tougher than it should be, as Atom Man is powered by a glowing green crystal that Superman has encountered before, that makes him weak and sick. We soon discover that this is a very young Superman who does not yet know the truth of his alien origins. Something is nagging at him, and he sees an odd vision of himself in the mirror looking like a creature from outer space. Meanwhile the Lee family – Dr. Lee, his wife, and their children Tommy and Roberta – is moving from the Chinatown section of Metropolis to the city proper because Dr. Lee is starting a new job as Chief Bacteriologist of the Metropolis Health Department. Their new neighbor, Jimmy Olsen, stops by to introduce himself and invite them to the Unity House Community Center baseball practice.
The story follows the plot of the radio show fairly well, but it adds in elements that weren’t present on the air. Superman learns in the course of this story that he’s an alien himself, giving an added dimension to the story of the Lees and their struggle to find acceptance in Metropolis. We’ve also got an original character, Tommy’s sister Roberta, who wasn’t in the original story but takes on a large part of the narrative. As the daughter of a Bacteriologist, Roberta is a bit of a germophobe, which only serves to enhance her existing awkward nature, making it much more difficult for her to acclimate to her new home. I like this angle a lot. Having Tommy fit in as a typical all-American boy worked well for the radio show. You didn’t even know that he WAS Chinese for the first few episodes, making the angle of the Klan come across as a surprise to the listener. But in a comic book, there’s no way to make that kind of thing a surprise. While Tommy is still that kid who everyone loves and blends in with the Unity House baseball team easily, Roberta gives us a character to depict the alienation that someone – especially a kid – can feel in this sort of situation. The idea in the original was just to point out how foolish the likes of the Klan were, and that’s all to the good, but Gene Luen Yang (himself a creator of Asian descent) brings a whole new dimension to the story by emphasizing the struggle of an immigrant family through Roberta’s perspective. Not to make it sound like she’s some damsel in distress, mind you. Roberta is Superman’s deuteragonist in this story. She overcomes her anxiety to help her brother, realizing very quickly that Chuck Riggs is involved with the Klan and using her knowledge to race to Tommy’s rescue. She also inspires Chuck’s change of heart much earlier than happens in the radio serial.
Tommy, on the other hand, perhaps tries a little TOO hard to fit in, leaning on his ethnicity in ways he didn’t in the original radio story. Once he becomes part of the Unity House baseball team he keeps dropping jokes about being Chinese (“Confucius says” references, for example), using what makes him different to enhance his popularity. Although he’s a good-natured kid, his insistence on drawing attention to being Chinese bothers his sister almost as much as the people who insult them.
Superman himself has yet another perspective on the immigrant experience. He knows he was adopted, and we see flashbacks of Jonathan showing him a strange device that was in the ship that brought him to Smallville, but it spoke a language they were never able to translate. He’s even gone so far as to mentally suppress some of his more fanciful powers, making for a nice explanation for why he goes from “leaping tall buildings” to outright flight.
Another addition to the story is the Atom Man subplot. After Superman captures Atom Man in the beginning, we see periodically that he’s not in police custody, but being studied by the Metropolis Health Department, a study that Dr. Lee clearly has misgivings about. Lois Lane – who had almost no presence in the original radio story – takes the lead on this one, cracking open the story about the “Health Department” which turns out to be a private enterprise conducting dubious research. Naturally, this turns out to dovetail with the story of the Klan in a rather unexpected way. This is one point I’m a little unsure about. Making the Klan a more high-tech organization, with “loftier” ideals than the simple bigotry of the original works for this version of the story, to be certain, but I’m not sure if it undermines the original point at all. Perhaps smarter people than I can answer that one.
The is a fantastic story – a bold, proud tale that does far more than simply adapt the original radio drama. Indeed, it ties the story of Tommy and Roberta Lee in with the core concept of Superman, making who they are as integral to the series as who he is. I can’t recommend this one highly enough.
Fri., Dec. 26
TV Episodes:Superman and Lois Season 4, Episodes 6-10
Notes: With my wife working and my son having a mountain of toys to play with and college football to watch, I decided that the day after Christmas was the time to finally finish the last season of Superman and Lois. I’m not going to to a play-by-play on these last five episodes, so let’s assume that you’ve watched these episodes that I’m watching for the first time, and I’m going to discuss my feelings about them as I watch.
In episode 6, we see Lex trying to tighten his grip on Smallville by buying up property and bribing the citizens, but they hold firm and resist – mostly because Clark wants them to do so. It’s a wonderful series of scenes in which Clark realizes something that viewers figured out several episodes ago: after seeing Lois and the boys run to Superman’s side after he was killed by Doomsday, the entire town of Smallville now knows that he’s really Superman. And best of all, every single one of them is willing to keep the secret and cover his back. It’s a great story beat, and actually one I’ve thought about several times over the years. Considering everything that he did for the town of Smallville, especially in those continuities where he had a career as Superboy, it would be utterly absurd if there weren’t a lot of people who deduced the truth. The fact that they keep the secret speaks to an inherent goodness in them, a loyalty to the hero who has saved them time and again. Plus, when we see him trying desperately to put the cat back in the bag, convincing people that he’s NOT Superman, it’s hilarious.
Of course, there’s gotta be some drama, and the fact of his identity leaking out predictably causes some problems – kids who are resentful of Jonathan and Jordan, an antagonist from an earlier season that comes back and causes trouble. The scene where someone takes a shot at him in a diner, forcing him to reveal himself, is just glorious, and it leads to the secret being revealed to the world. When that happened in the comics I hated it, because I knew this was a genie that had to go back in the bottle and we’d seen it before. But here, when it happens on a TV series that only has three episodes left, it’s an opportunity to tell a story that hasn’t been told with Superman before, and the creators nailed it.
Beyond that, of course, another big arc in this season is the fact that Clark now has Sam Lane’s heart, and it’s reducing his powers, causing him to age. At the same time, Luthor is planning his final revenge with the combination of a new super-suit (stolen from John Henry and beefed up with Kryptonite) and the return of his Doomsday monster. It all collides in the final episode, “It Went By So Fast,” a title which I can only assume was a meta way for the writers to indicate the fact that they didn’t really want the show to end. I get it, too – this last half-season, lower on the soap opera dramatics and higher on the Superman stuff, was really fantastic, and it’s leaving me wanting more.
They’ve done the Doomsday battle before in live action – in Smallville, in Batman V. Superman, and even before in this series…This is probably the best one I’ve ever seen. With Clark on the ropes, seeing Jonathan and Jordan step up to fight hits me in that parenting place that seems to dominate how I interpret stories these days. John Henry and Lana joining the fight as well shows how big Superman has become, how this world is rising up to meet him. He may have lost a step thanks to his heart transplant, but he’s also inspired another generation of heroes, meaning he doesn’t have to do it alone.
And that’s just act ONE of the finale.
While Clark is chucking Doomsday into the sun, back on Earth Lex attacks the twins and Lois goes after him directly. As she shouts at him to stop attacking everyone around her when she’s the one he really wants, she yells the most Lois Lane line I’ve ever heard: “I am not afraid of you, but you’ve always been TERRIFIED of me,” then nails his warsuit with a mine. It’s not enough to stop him, but it slows him down enough for Clark to make it back to Earth and really start the final battle. It’s an epic, airborne spectacle that ends, inevitably, with Luthor taken down.
And now we’re only HALFWAY through the episode.
Next we get a time skip to about year later with Lana’s wedding to John Henry Irons (an event that would happen a few months later in the comics as well). Kyle and Chrissy are expecting a second child, and Kyle and Lana have reconciled into what appears to be a sincere friendship. Jordan and Sarah, similarly, seem to have finally buried the hatchet, and John Henry spends a tender moment with Natalie as Lois gets an important text about Lex’s future behind bars.
In the final act, we get a voiceover from Clark about how Sam’s heart allowed him to live another 32 years, and how he wanted to leave behind a legacy, making the world a better place. Clark, along with the twins, John Henry, Natasha, even Bruno Mannheim, begin to make real change. Using the influence of Superman and Lois Lane, they start a foundation that accomplishes good throughout the world. The twins each marry and have kids of their own, and we get a nice scene of Grandma and Grandpa Lois and Clark (in admittedly dubious aging makeup). But eventually, Lois’s cancer returns, and Clark is left alone. He lasts for several more years before Sam Lane’s heart that had beat in his chest for so long finally gives out, passing away quietly with his sons next to him.
Clark sits up, young again, seeing his own body behind him. He embraces his sons – young again – and sees his grandchildren. He finds Luthor, of all people, sitting at his kitchen table, and offers him forgiveness…says goodbye to his friends one at a time, and in the end he sees a vision of Lois, waiting, to take him into the light.
Here’s the thing: the story of Superman doesn’t end. It just – it doesn’t. Five years from now, ten years, a hundred years from now, there will and should be new stories of Superman being told.
But if Superman DID end…this is the right way to do it. An ending that is happy in the life he and Lois get to lead, despite the fact that this life – like all those of mortals – must end. And the fact that a Superman left behind a better world than he arrived on in that spacecraft from Krypton. In the comic books, they can’t really do a story in which Superman changes the entire world this way, because they still need something to tell stories about next month and next year. But here, with a television series coming to an end and, with it, closing off the stories of that universe, they have the freedom to show what Superman is REALLY capable of. This season has been a buildup, showing how Superman inspires those around him – not only his own children or friends, but the people of Smallville who were willing to stand up for him, and the people of a world that grows to do the same. The ending of this episode is a tearjerker, but it’s left with a beautiful message of hope that is entirely appropriate for Superman.
But it’s not only hope. Superman is about hope, yes. But the thesis of this series is true as well: “[Love is] the thing that makes life worth living.” It’s what makes the story of Lois and Clark so powerful, in all its many iterations. A man from another world, a woman who represents the best of ours, and how they come together…this is a story worth telling.
Comics:DC Go! Holiday Special #41
Sat. Dec. 27
Comics:DC Go! Holiday Special #43 (Cameo), Detective Comics #1103, Superman: The Kryptonite Spectrum #5, Superman Unlimited #8, Action Comics #1093, Superman Vol. 6 #33, Absolute Superman #14, Batman/Superman: World’s Finest #46, Supergirl Vol. 8 #8, Justice League Unlimited Vol. 2 #14, Justice League Red #4 (Power Girl), Justice League Vs. Godzilla Vs. Kong 2 #5
Notes: For the final time (this year), I’m going to do a roundup of recent Superman-related comics, starting – oddly enough – with Detective Comics #1103. One of the first comics I read this year, back in the first week of January, was an issue of Tom Taylor’s Detective that showed Superman helping Bruce through an existential crisis. This actually serves as a nice bookend, with Bruce teaming up with Lois to help with an investigation. Superman appears briefly, but most of the issue is concerned with Lois showing off how dang capable she is, and how much respect Bruce has for her. It’s the middle of an ongoing storyline, so it’s probably not something most people would read on its own, but it’s worth mentioning because it’s a great Lois guest appearance.
The final issue of Superman: The Kryptonite Spectrum wraps up W. Maxwell Prince and Martin Morazzo’s celebration of the Man of Steel in dynamite fashion. Lex Luthor has engineered a new Kryptonite Man, powered by the entire spectrum of the remnants of Superman’s home, and the battle between the two of them sends Superman on a spiral that leaves him questioning the very nature of the universe itself. Prince’s story leans heavily on metafiction, concentrating on Superman as a story and weaponizing that part of the character’s nature. The finale is entirely unexpected, but in its own way, as sincere a love letter to Superman as the likes of All Star Superman was – in fact, Prince and Morazzo lean heavily on Morrison and Quitely’s story here, and they do so in a way that’s both loving and triumphant. This is hands-down the miniseries of the year.
Superman Unlimited #8 gives us another of the one-off stories that this series has been doing so well. The influx of Kryptonite on Earth has changed a lot of things, including energy sources, and an experimental space flight is planning to make faster-than-light travel a commercial enterprise on Earth. With Lois Lane as a passenger on the maiden voyage, the Justice League assigns Guy Gardner to escort the flight in case something should happen. And wouldn’t you know it? Something happens. I have no doubt that Guy’s appearance in this issue is at least partially due to his guest-starring role in this summer’s big movie, but at the same time, it’s done exceptionally well. Guy is such a fun character – a rude, insufferable boor that is in every way diametrically the opposite of Superman…except for the fact that they’re both true heroes at heart. Seeing them together, both clashing and cooperating, pretty much always makes for a good time, and this issue is no exception.
Action Comics #1093 is another one-off story, this time Mark Waid telling a Superboy tale that shows an event that’s fundamental to Superman’s moral core. Dozens of farmers throughout Smallville are given notices of foreclosure on their farms at the same time. The new owner of the bank assures them that if there’s an “error” they’ll figure it out, but the time it would take to do so would ruin every farm in Smallville. When Superboy contemplates using his power to “find” the money to save the town, it becomes a battle of wills between Clark and his parents, who think that using his powers for personal gain – even to save the town – isn’t the way to go. I’m sure that everyone who’s ever read a Superman comic has fantasized about having the power to hunt down undiscovered gold or some other get rich quick scheme, and Waid does a good job with the Kents of painting a picture of why such a thing should be above a Superman. I still have to confess that I’d probably go dig up the gold if I had Superboy’s powers, but in my defense, nobody has ever called me Earth’s greatest hero.
DC KO’s “All Fight Month” continues with Superman #33, with the unlikely battle between Lex Luthor and Etrigan the Demon. Throughout the month I’ve been impressed at just how well these battles have transcended being mere slugfests. Oh, there’s fightin’ a-plenty, but each of them has gone beyond that to telling a story that digs into the heart of the characters involved. We see who they are, why they do what they do, and what makes them worthy of the Omega Heart, even if it’s only in their own mind. Joshua Williamson taps into the blackness in Lex’s heart and simultaneously shines a light on him. By the end of the issue, you almost (aaaaalmost) want to root for him in his fight with the Demon, because damned if he doesn’t convince you that he’s earned the win. We also continue the storyline with Superboy-Prime and Lois, whose Superwoman powers have returned, in the Fortress of Solitude. Recent announcements about the state of the Superman titles after KO ends have made these pages a bit more relevant than we’d realized, and although I hate the fact that they keep spoiling things in the solicits, I’m very curious to see what’s coming next to this title.
Absolute Superman #14 ends the current storyline with an epic battle between Kal-El and Ra’s Al Ghul for the heart of Smallville. As the two of them go at it, we see Lois facing off against the Peacemakers and Sol’s internal battle with Brainiac, all of which come to an amazing crescendo in this issue. Without going into a blow-by-blow, the ending of this one is probably the most hopeful thing I’ve seen yet in the Absolute Universe as a whole, although as suits this world tainted by Darkseid’s energy, the victory is bittersweet and not without a price. In many ways, it clears the table for this series, and it will be very interesting to see where the story goes from here.
World’s Finest #46 continues the story of Lex Luthor and the Joker, fused into a single being and armed with the power of a device that gives them the sum total of all knowledge in the human race. Superman and Batman, naturally, have to step up and stop them, this time getting a little extra help from Green Lantern to juice them up in a way he’s done once before. The issue ends on a cliffhanger, and it’s a pretty good one, except for the fact that it suffers a bit from Prequelitis. Admittedly, even in the present day what happens at the end would likely be wiped out by the next issue, but when you’re dealing with a series set in the past, there’s really zero tension with the “shocking” ending. It’s still a great, fun story, though.
I’m going to end my tour of new comics with Supergirl #8. It’s Christmas in Midvale, but Supergirl isn’t feeling merry. The holidays, with their emphasis on family, always make her remember everything she lost in the destruction of Argo City. Still, the Danvers and Lesla-Lar do their best to cheer her up, even as they get a strange visitor from the past that Supergirl has neglected for far too long. Sophie Campbell’s Supergirl is probably my favorite new comic book title of the year, but this issue is a little atypical. While the series is usually very bright and uplifting, this issue is somewhat darker and more bittersweet, particularly for a Christmas story. That said, it works really well. Sophie takes Kara’s pain and shapes it into a valuable lesson for Lesla-Lar, whose journey to becoming a superhero is an important component of this title. The story is told well and propels the characters forward, while still giving us a little Christmas cheer in the process.
This is most likely the last I’ll talk about newly-released comics in the Year of Superman, and it’s bittersweet for me too. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t looking forward to taking a break on January 1st, but at the same time, I’ve enjoyed pontificating about these new issues as they come out. It’s one of the main reasons I’m thinking about how to continue this blog into the new year.
Yeah, I’m teasing that again. Sue me.
Sun. Dec. 28
Comics:Superman: Space Age #1-3
Notes: Continuing the theme of “Endings,” today I’ve decided to revisit the three-issue Space Age miniseries by Mark Russell and Michael Allred from 2022. Published as a Black Label series, like many of them, it really feels more like an Elseworlds. It’s set in a universe where Superman rises to prominence in the 1960s, with a Clark Kent that’s spurred to go out and find ways to save the world following the assassination of John F. Kennedy. Before he puts on his costume for the first time, though, he encounters a strange man called the Pariah, who warns him that the world will end in approximately twenty years. Pariah claims to have accidentally unleashed a great evil called the Anti-Monitor, an ancient being whose goal is to bring order to the Multiverse by destroying every positive-matter universe until only his own Antimatter universe remains. He tries to dismiss the Pariah as one of the “kranks” he’s assigned to cover as a Daily Planet cub reporter, but something about him sticks with Clark and he’s unable to shake it. On the other hand, he’s sometimes skeptical that the world will even last 20 years, as the arms race is intensifying and made worse by a false flag attack on Coast City orchestrated by Lex Luthor. The cataclysm turns out to bring heroes out of the woodwork: Batman captures Luthor, Abin Sur passes his ring on to Hal Jordan, Themiscyra sends Diana to the UN as an ambassador, and Superman makes his true debut disposing of American missiles before they can annihilate the Soviet Union. Book one ends with these four coming together at a new Hall of Justice.
In book two, we jump ahead to the 70s, where Superman is well-established, and the world is at peace following a nuclear disarmament treaty. But an interview with Lois leaves him questioning whether he’s doing all he can, and a similar disagreement drives a wedge in the Justice League. It’s a bad time for it too, as Green Lantern warns of the impending approach of a cosmic threat called Brainiac and, at the same time, a Superman from an alternate universe where all human life has been rendered extinct. It’s not all bad news, though – Clark is promoted to an editor’s desk at the Planet, Lois breaks Watergate, the two of them fall in love and she confesses that she knows he’s Superman just before he tells her. They even have time to get married and have a son before Brainiac arrives on Earth. But he’s not there to destroy the world, only to take its greatest resource before the Anti-Monitor can destroy it himself, hoping to use that resource in his battle against the Multiversal destroyer. That resource, as it turns out, is Kal-El of Krypton. The League drives Brainiac off the planet, but at the cost of Green Lantern’s life.
The final book in the trilogy takes us into the 80s where Clark finds Pariah again, who is impressed by his years of heroism, but still sees the end as inevitable. With less than two years before the Anti-Monitor arrives, the Brainiacs again ask Superman to join their fight, and this time, he considers it – but when a heart attack fells Johnathan Kent, he changes path, dedicating himself to saving the human race by eradicating disease by scanning their DNA. It turns out to be a ploy to record their genetic code. When the Anti-Monitor destroys the world, Superman makes for the Brainiacs’ portal, but instead of going into it he pushes through a crystal encoded with the DNA of every human he could collect, sending them to the empty world populated by the other Superman. He returns to his family just before the end, where on the other world the other Superman restores the human race on a new home.
In terms of “ending stories,” I kind of have mixed feelings about this one. On the one hand, it’s excellently done. The writing and storytelling are top-notch and the characters, even in the Elseworlds setting, still feel mostly true to the heroes we know and love. And I’ll pretty much always be on-board for artwork by Mike Allred, whose unique style is one of my favorites of all time. On the other hand, there’s an impending sense of doom that spreads across the entire thing. There are other dark “final” Superman stories, like Kingdom Come or Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?, but in both those cases we journey through the darkness with Superman and ultimately end in a place of hope. This one has a sense of nihilism that doesn’t quite befit the character. Even the ending, where the other Superman brings back humanity (starting, naturally, with Lois Lane), leaves us with the feeling that it’s only buying time. After all, the Anti-Monitor is still out there, the final battle has yet to be fought, let alone won.
The series raises some interesting questions as the different Leaguers look on things with different perspectives. Green Arrow views the world through the perspective of the “Trolley Problem,” whereas Batman’s point of view is that he just saves whoever he can, knowing he can’t save everyone. Superman, as fits the character, refuses to accept that, and is determined to find a way to save everyone even if doing so seems impossible. It’s a noble point of view that works in the regular DCU, but Russell shines a light on how unrealistic that perspective actually is. If I was looking for something realistic, though, I don’t think I’d be reading Superman in the first place. Superman is an ideal, and ideals don’t have to be realistic. They’re something to strive for, even if you know they can never really fall into your grasp, and that’s how Superman works best.
So is Space Age a good story? Yes. Absolutely. Without a doubt.
I don’t think it will ever be one of my favorites, though.
Mon., Dec. 29
Comics:DC Go! Holiday Special #47 (Supergirl), Doomsday Clock #1-12
Notes: This is a controversial book, DC’s sequel to Watchmen which brings those characters into conflict with the heroes of the DC Universe, but I’m including it here for an important reason. In the end, this is very much a story about Superman. The first issue shows us the state of the world – since Ozymandias’s scheme was revealed by Rorschach’s journal, he has become the most wanted fugitive on the planet and the world has crept closer and closer to the very nuclear annihilation he was hoping to avoid. A new Rorschach has arisen, this time working with Ozymandias, who has a tumor growing in his skull. The two of them hope to find the only person in their universe with the power to change anything – Dr. Manhattan. Meanwhile, in another universe, Clark Kent wakes up from a nightmare, a horrible vision of the car crash that killed Jonathan and Martha Kent when he was only a teenager. It’s the first nightmare he’s ever had.
Ozymandias and Rorschach ally themselves with a pair of criminals – Marionette and Mime – who are seeking their missing son. They trace Dr. Manhattan to the DC Universe, where people are in upheaval following the popularization of the “Supermen Theory,” which posits the idea that the reason so many of Earth’s metahumans are American is because they have been deliberately created by the government since Superman’s first appearance. Faith in superheroes is eroding, with the only one who still has the public trust being Superman himself.
Over the course of these twelve issues Geoff Johns and Gary Frank delve into the nature of the DC Universe itself, starting with the notion (from DC Rebirth) that it was Dr. Manhattan who was responsible for the New 52 reboot in the first place. Turns out, it’s more complicated than that. Manhattan did toy with the fabric of the universe, but the reason it was possible for him to do so is because the “Prime” DC Universe – the one that’s called Earth-0 these days – isn’t actually part of the multiverse as we know it. Manhattan calls it the “Metaverse” (take that, Mark Zuckerberg) because it’s a core reality that the others are all reflective of. In the Metaverse, Superman made his first appearance in 1938 and inspired the heroes of the Justice Society. Then reality snapped, moving Superman’s appearance to 1956. The JSA still existed, but now Clark Kent had an early career as Superboy, inspired BY the JSA, and it was that Superboy that in turn inspired the Legion of Super-Heroes 1000 years in the future. Another snap popped Superman’s first appearance to 1986, and–
–are you seeing the pattern here?
The idea is this: Superman is the center of the Metaverse. As time goes forward, his existence is the constant, and as such, the universe is in a constant state of change. But every time the universe shifts, the previous iteration is preserved in a different world in the Multiverse. The original Golden Age Superman’s world is Earth-2. Another was preserved as Earth-1985. The version Manhattan created is Earth-52, and so forth. Eventually, Superman’s timeline will catch up with the Legion a millennium in the future, and when that happens, the ideals of Superman will become universal, and create a lasting peace.
Man, that’s a nice thought, isn’t it?
This book – much like the original Watchmen – suffered from a lot of delays before it could be finished, and many of the larger concepts have been ignored since then. I don’t think the concept of the Metaverse has been explored since this book, for instance, and by its very nature it makes sense that they wouldn’t bring it up all that often. On the other hand, this book also established that Martin Stein was part of a government conspiracy to create superheroes, and Firestorm was the result of that, something that I’m almost positive has not come up again. But that’s the beauty of this book – it provides a framework that can be used to explain away virtually any discrepancy or change in continuity. That thing you remember that the heroes didn’t? It happened in a previous iteration of the Metaverse, and it’s still canon out there in the Multiverse…somewhere.
If you’re the kind of person who considers Watchmen sacrosanct, I can understand why you wouldn’t like this book. It does, in a way, undermine the conclusion of that story by answering the intentionally vague question of what would become of Rorschach’s journals, and (perhaps even more blasphemous) it allows for that world to have a happy ending. But as good as Watchmen is, I have no objection to the notion of returning to that universe. The HBO miniseries did it in excellent fashion. I like this one too, if for no other reason than because it confirms something very important: Superman is the most important hero in the entire universe.
Shoot, guys. I could have told you that.
Tues. Dec. 30
Graphic Novel: It’s a Bird
Notes: As with Doomsday Clock yesterday, I want to spend these last few days of the year with stories about Superman and about what he means. That quest led me back to It’s a Bird, the unique 2004 Vertigo graphic novel by Steven T. Seagle and Teddy Kristiansen. It’s perhaps the most unusual Superman story of them all in that Superman isn’t actually in it.
The story, which is semi-autobiographical, starts with five-year-old Steve waiting in a hospital as his grandmother languishes. To placate him and his brother, their father brings them a Superman comic…after which, Steve swiftly rejects comics, as they remind him too much of the hospital, making it all the more ironic that he would grow up to write them. When an adult Steve is offered the job of writing Superman by his editor, he rejects it, unable to find the character relatable.
The story is mostly about Steve trying to find his way into the Superman, and along the way he takes some interesting detours. His father goes missing, and fears of the disease that took his grandmother come back. Meanwhile, everyone he talks to about getting offered Superman is ecstatic for him and dumbfounded that he doesn’t want the job. These two threads are intercut with pages of Steve’s own musings on Superman, on who the character is and what he means – or at least, what he’s supposed to mean – as he tries to find something about the character that he can make believable in the real world.
The interlacing storylines, of course, come together in the end, because such things always happen in fiction even if they almost never do in real life. His father’s disappearance turns out to be related to the death of Steve’s grandmother all those years ago, and in confronting his father and the disease that haunts his family, Steve starts to find a way in to Superman.
It’s a good story, a powerful one, but it’s one whose inherent premise is one I somewhat disagree with. Steve’s quest is to find a way to make Superman “real.” I don’t think that’s necessary. Superman isn’t part of our real world any more than Mickey Mouse or Bugs Bunny or the food replicators on Star Trek. That doesn’t mean that he isn’t important, though, or that there’s nothing to be learned from them. In a lot of ways, I think the very fact of Superman’s fanciful nature is perhaps the most important thing about him.
Just as the story is very atypical for a Superman comic (such as it is), so is Teddy Kristiansen’s artwork. Kristiansen’s style is an odd halfway point between sketches and realism, in some ways making me think of Art Spiegleman…which is appropriate enough, as this book echoes Maus in various ways. Both stories are autobiographical, and with a frame narrative about the author struggling to relate to their fathers. In Maus, of course, the ghost that hangs between Art and his father is the spectre of the holocaust, while in this graphic novel it’s the shadow of the Huntington’s Disease that follows Steve’s family.
The book, of course, is specifically described as “semi-autobiographical.” Not really knowing much about Seagle himself, I wouldn’t presume to declare which parts are true and which ones aren’t, but regardless of any plot elements I tend to believe that all of the emotion in this book is genuine. The concerns, the fears, the anxieties that “Steve” expresses are almost certainly part of Seagle’s own psyche. Writers tend to do that, after all.
This is the Superman book for people who don’t understand Superman. I don’t know if, in the end, it will actually help them figure the character out – at least, not the way that I understand him – but it will at the very least help them find a path through someone else asking the same questions, and that’s a journey very much worth reading.
Comics:Harley Quinn X Elvira #3 (Power Girl guest appearance), Justice League Red #5 (Team Member Power Girl), Justice League Vs. Godzilla Vs. Kong 2 #6 (Team Member)
Wed. Dec. 31
Comics: Superman #247, Kamandi: The Last Boy on Earth #29
Notes: Well glory be, here it is. 365 days later, and the journey I started back on January 1 with Action Comics #1 is about to end…or at least, to evolve. I’ll talk more about that (say it with me) later, but for now, it’s time for the final Superman reads of the year. I thought hard about what to read today. In the early part of the year I’d planned to end it with a classic “last” Superman story, like Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow? or Kingdom Come, but I decided to add those when I did the week of comics that influenced James Gunn’s Superman. So how else to end it? I ultimately decided to go with two comic books about what Superman is, because that’s where this entire journey has led me anyway.
First is Superman #247, the Elliot S! Maggin/Curt Swan classic “Must There Be a Superman?” Like many of the stories I’ve read this year, I encountered this one for the first time when it was published in DC’s classic Greatest Superman Stories Ever Told collection. Let’s talk about why it qualifies.
The story begins with Superman taking on a special task for the Guardians of the Universe – a pod full of deadly spores on a path to Earth, and as the spores are yellow the Green Lanterns are helpless to stop it. Superman creates an artificial planet to draw the spores away safely, but is injured in the process, rescued by Green Lantern Katma Tui and brought back to Oa to heal. As Superman is healing, the Guardians take advantage of his unconscious state to plant a notion in his mind that his influence on Earth may be impeding human progress. (If this had been the “Year of Green Lantern,” you would have found me discussing a LOT of stories that drive home an important point: the Guardians are pompous assholes.) When Superman wakes up, the Guardians give him a tour of Oa, continually dropping comments about him contributing to a “Cultural Lag” on Earth, and sending him home with the notion that if he steps back, Earth will be better off.
As he returns to Earth, he stumbles on a child migrant worker being abused by his employer. Rescuing him, the child – Manuel – brings Superman back to his community where the residents begin begging him to help solve all their problems, such as fixing their crumbling houses. Superman refuses, saying that they need to know how to care for themselves, but an earthquake strikes just seconds later, destroying their homes. Superman blunts the quake and rebuilds their houses, but tries to convince them that they need to know how to care for themselves because no one – even Superman – can do anything. He returns to Metropolis only to get word of a cruise ship endangered by a waterspout, which he rushes off to save, even as the Guardians watch from afar.
Looking back at this story now, I feel like this was Maggin’s way of responding to people who asked why Superman didn’t just sweep in and fix all the problems in the world. After all, with his power, why couldn’t he just solve hunger, homelessness, war, famine, disease, and so forth? From a narrative standpoint, of course, the answer is obvious: if Superman were to do all these things, what stories would be left to tell? It would literally be the end of Superman, as a going storytelling concern. But what about in-universe? How do you explain it to a kid like Manuel, who’s getting beaten up by a man who basically controls his entire life? The answer is something that people who know Superman could have told you from the beginning: even with the best of intentions, having someone (like Superman) doing everything for them would hold them back, leave them unable to act or take care of themselves. It kind of reminds me of all those stupid ads begging me to use Google AI to write an email or a Facebook post as if I haven’t been perfectly capable of doing that for my entire life.
Superman is there to take care of the things that we can’t. As far as the things we CAN take care of…we shouldn’t expect him to do it all for us. But that doesn’t mean we can’t take inspiration from him.
“Inspiration” is the theme of the final comic I’m going to read in this year of Superman, Jack Kirby’s Kamandi: The Last Boy on Earth #29. Kamandi, for the uninitiated, was a series about a post-apocalyptic world in which the human race is all but extinct, and the world is populated by anthropomorphized animals. In this issue Kamandi, one of the few remaining humans, finds the “Tablet of Revelation,” an ancient carving that prophesies the “return of the Mighty One,” a great warrior of the past. When the apes see Kamandi’s friend Ben Boxer, they believe him to be the returned “Mighty One.” One of the apes, Zuma, tries to engage him in combat, but the elder says that the Mighty One can only be revealed by demonstrating his powers against overwhelming odds. A catapult hurls claimants through the sky to prove that they can fly higher than the tallest building, an enormous boulder called the “Daily Planet” awaits the man who can move it, and so forth. Ben’s mutant powers convince some of the apes he’s the Mighty One, but a battle breaks out when they pledge to take him to his suit. In the fight, they come across a very familiar blue costume with a cape and a brilliant scarlet S-shield. Zuma tries to claim the costume, but perishes in battle as Kamandi defends the suit, saying “I know who owns it! I know that somewhere he’s still alive!” The suit is left, waiting until the true Mighty One returns.
This comic was released in 1975, some 30 years before the idea of the S-symbol standing for “hope” was put in place, but it’s hard not to think of it as you read this story. Kamandi’s faith that Superman is still out there is the sort of thing you’d expect, it feels like an appropriate place for the legend. The future of the DC Universe has been rewritten dozens of times, of course, with many of the various possibilities showing an immortal Superman, a legacy of heroes that lasts a millennia, or both. This feels like part of that, like the hero himself has left something behind with the promise that more is to come.
And that “promise of more to come” feels an appropriate place for me to stop.
Almost.
Movie: Superman (2025)
Notes: The first movie I watched this year was the original Christopher Reeve Superman from 1978. I’m going to end the year by revisiting the movie that inspired me to start this journey in the first place, James Gunn’s Superman. I’m not going to write it up again – Heavens knows you can find that on my original review. But I’m going to watch and enjoy.
One year later, and I have succeeded. I have watched, read, or listened to at least one thing starring or about Superman or a member of his family for an entire year. I’m actually quite stunned that I made it.
And I’ve still got so much to say.
But not yet. Come back Friday, friends, for my final thoughts on this year-long Odyssey, and my explanation of where I’m going from here.
Happy New Year.
Blake M. Petitis 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.
Blake M. Petit 