King Kong

Year of Superman Week 36: Electric Boogaloo Part I

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After last week’s extended wind-up, this week it’s time to do a deep dive into the era of Electric Blue Superman. I’ve honestly got no idea how far into the run I’ll get in the next seven days, but I intended to have a good time finding out.

Before I get into it, though, some fun news hit today. James Gunn hopped on social media earlier with a post of image by Jim Lee: Superman (in the David Corenswet costume) and Lex Luthor in his power armor. Along with the image came the caption, “Man of Tomorrow. July 9, 2027.” This is pretty exciting. We knew he was working on the next movie already, but this is far more information than I thought we would possibly get before next year. We’ve got what seems to be a title, and maybe even a hint of the plot, with Lex in his armor. Obviously, I’m pumped.

After all, isn’t the one thing Superman has always been missing a screwdriver?

But I gotta tell you this story. I got a message right before lunch and, being in class at the time, I obviously couldn’t stop to look at my phone. When the lunch bell rang, the students left the room and I checked to see that Mark had shared this image. I got excited, I replied, and then I stepped out into the hall. Not 90 seconds after I got Mark’s message, a student ran up to me – not even a student I teach, just one who knows me – who wanted to know if I had seen James Gunn’s announcement yet.

I have a brand, don’t I? 

And as always, you can check out earlier blogs in the Year of Superman Archive!

Wed., Sept. 3

Comics: Adventures of Superman #546, Action Comics #733, Superman: The Man of Steel #68, Superman Vol. 2 #124

That image looks…familiar somehow.

Notes: In Adventures of Superman #546, Lois Lane has her first meeting with her new and improved husband. As glad as she is to see him okay, he’s just as angry when he sees that the Daily Planet’s inflammatory new columnist Dirk Armstrong has painted him as a menace…mostly because Clark thinks he was right. When word comes in that Dirk’s blind daughter, Ashbury, has been kidnapped, Superman races to search for her, only to get sidetracked when he’s attacked by his old foe Metallo, who wants to try his hand at facing the new Superman. Don’t worry about the kidnapping victim, though – Ashbury is rescued by Scorn, who she briefly mistakes for Superman. Liking the role of hero, Scorn puts on Superman’s old symbol as his own. 

In Action #733, Superman just manages to escape from Metallo’s clutches by switching to his human form, but winds up injured in the process. Hoping to gain more control over his new powers he seeks out someone who has similar experience: the energy-hero called the Ray. After a few tips, Metallo rises again, and Superman figures out some new tricks to take him down. This is an interesting issue – Ray only appears on a few pages, despite getting a nice “guest-starring” credit and half the cover. But what he does here isn’t insignificant, helping Superman start to figure out his powers and even theorizing that the reason he has no powers in his human form is because he subconsciously is imitating humans as he sees them. I like the fact that Superman isn’t above going to a younger hero for help when he needs it, even one as relatively inexperienced as the Ray. It’s the sort of thing that works well as a character beat, showing how even-tempered and nuanced he is.  

The battle with Metallo continues in Man of Steel #68, and courtesy of Jimmy Olsen, it gets a lot harder. At this period, Jimmy was working as a TV reporter for WGBS news instead of his traditional photographer gig, and desperate to stay on top of the ratings heap, he starts covering the Metallo fight and explaining Superman’s new powers based on information he got from Professor Hamilton. Metallo is monitoring the TV broadcast, though, and using Jimmy’s broadcast to change his tactics. Superman manages to beat him, but winds up spinning into space, having absorbed far too much energy. 

After ending Man of Steel #68, Dan Jurgens makes the rather odd choice to begin Superman #124 after the crisis has been resolved, with Lois and Clark discussing how the Planet’s publisher, Franklin Stern, is angry over his frequent absences lately. Then Clark dives into a flashback in which he’s saved from dissipating into energy in outer space by the timely intervention of one of Jurgens’ favorite creations, Booster Gold. The rescue fries the armor Booster has been wearing for some time, though – actually, ever since his original super-suit was destroyed in battle with Doomsday. Superman brings Booster to Hamilton, who uses the leftover weave from Superman’s containment suit and combines it with the remaining future technology Booster brought back from the future with him, giving him a new suit that’s a bit more in line with his classic one. I love when you see stuff like this – Jurgens clearly wasn’t happy with how the writers that followed him on Justice League America changed Booster’s armor and used this opportunity to fix it a little bit.

This issue gives us a lot of advancement on several subplots as well. Jimmy kind of patches up his relationship with Lois and Clark, ashamed of how his broadcast had endangered Superman, just in time for Perry White to storm into the Planet office and announce that his cancer is in remission and demand his job back. In Kandor, the town’s rulers find evidence that the bottled city – which is actually out of phase in another dimension – is on the verge of destruction. And Scorn is drawn to Lois and Clark’s apartment, where he finds one of Clark’s old costumes. 

Reading these issues this way, one after another, following the story for long periods of time, is really making me feel nostalgic for the Triangle Era in a way that not even the Death of Superman. I love having this quick progression of story, so unlike a typical monthly comic book story. Even right now, when the Superman comics are really good, this is a different feeling. It’s a feeling I like.

Ah, I wish we could get it back. 

Thur., Sept. 4

Comics: Adventures of Superman #547, Action Comics #734, Superman: The Man of Steel #69, Superman Vol. 2 #125, Secret Six Vol. 5 (Super-Son)

The Atom only went along because Superman told him they’d go spelunking instead of skydiving.

Notes: Still adjusting to his new powers, in Adventures #547, Superman is alerted to the crisis in Kandor and decides to reach out to a hero with experience in size manipulation: the Atom. At this point, though, Ray Palmer had gone through an even more radical transformation than Superman, having been reduced in age to a teenager. He was currently the leader of a new, very different version of the Teen Titans in a book written and drawn by our old pal Dan Jurgens. Still, despite having a teenager’s body and attitude, he retained his memories, and as a former Justice Leaguer, jumps at the chance to work with one of the big guns. Hamilton journeys to the Fortress with the two heroes, and Superman and the Atom dive down into Kandor. Scorn, meanwhile, is wandering around Metropolis stalking Ashbury and carrying around the Superman costume he took from Clark’s apartment, seemingly trying to decide what he wants his path to be now that he’s free of Kandor. 

Action #734 picks up with Ashbury reuniting with Scorn, although the blind girl is still under the misapprehension that he’s Superman. At that same time Rock – a villain Superman caught a few months back – breaks out. With Superman and the Atom in Kandor, though, Scorn takes care of Rock by himself, to the confusion of the SCU, who sees this horned, blue brute wearing Superman’s old costume. In Kandor, Superman and the Atom fight off some of the city’s peacekeepers who are still loyal to their original captor, Tolos, and a group of dissidents manage to attack the city’s environmental generator. The city is beginning to freeze, but that’s not even the real issue. They’ve got one hour to get the generator back online before everyone in Kandor suffocates to death.

 In Man of Steel #69, Superman, the Atom, and a telekinetic local named Faern try to get to the generator to start it up again. But the generator is bombed, and in the explosion, Tolos is revealed to be alive and hiding in Faern’s body. He escapes and takes over Superman, which I’m sure you can imagine is inconvenient for everyone. Outside of Kandor, Scorn has crashed at Ashbury’s apartment, with the blind girl finally figuring out that he’s not actually Superman, but she befriends him anyway. When her dad shows up, though, he thinks Scorn is a menace and Scorn, not realizing Dirk is Ash’s father, leaps from the window with her in his arms. Perry White demands that Planet staff get to the bottom of the Scorn situation, and still more questions about Clark’s attendance issue are raised. 

I bring up that last point mostly because I think it’s an interesting note for the character. One of the reasons for Clark choosing the job of a reporter is usually the notion that it will allow him to be absent frequently to act as Superman under the guise of “covering a story.” That might work if he’s gone for a few hours, but as we’ve seen in these books lately, his other job sometimes has to take him away for days, weeks, even months at a time. The excuses he (and later, Lois) come up with to explain his disappearances often strain credulity and are frequently lampshaded these days. All of this is just to say that things like this are why I like the interpretation of the characters that say Perry White knows – or at least strongly suspects – that Clark is Superman, because otherwise he’d never put up with this.

The Kandor story wraps up in Superman #125. Tolos, controlling Superman’s body, frees himself from Kandor and attacks Hamilton, who’s been holding vigil over the bottled city. But Hamilton manages to science Tolos out, sending them both – separately – back into the bottle. Superman manages to trick Tolos, trapping him in the “glass” of the bottle, which is actually an energy barrier containing the city in its pocket dimension. Reuniting with the Atom, the two heroes manage to fix the machines that maintain the city’s environment, and the story ends with Superman swearing to the people of Kandor to find a way and a place to release them from the bottle and set them free.

It sounds awfully familiar, actually.

The first extended team-up between Energy Superman and the Atom is an interesting glimpse at the characters and the time. Superman is still learning the ropes of his energy form, but he’s still essentially the same person at his core. The Atom, on the other hand, has his memories and powers intact, but the brashness and eagerness of a teenager. Almost every other page in these four issues includes a reference to him hoping to impress Superman enough that he’ll score an invitation into the newly-formed (at the time) Justice League. The story flows together the way the Triangle Era did, and although this version of Kandor has been excised from continuity, there’s some interesting stuff going on. I especially like Scorn – a character who looks like a monster but decides that, if he’s gonna be stuck on Earth, there are worse things to be than Superman. He’s not wrong. 

Fri., Sept. 5

Comics: Adventures of Superman #548, Action Comics #735, Superman: The Man of Steel #70

“Why you electrocuting yourself? Why you electrocuting yourself?”

Notes: In an epilogue to last month’s adventure, Kandor is shifting its allegiance from Tolos to Superman. In fact, his shield (the current, electric blue one) is showing up as a graffiti tag on city walls. Superman tells the Atom he’d be willing to recommend the Atom to rejoin the League, but suggests he could be of more use leading the Teen Titans, which he decides to take as a challenge. Clark returns to the Planet and tries to excuse his absence by saying he was hunting down the story on the new Superman, to which Perry replies, “Which one?” But while working on the story, Lois drops a bomb on Clark that he hadn’t been made aware of before: that the electronic fabric in his new suit was supplied by Lex Luthor. He rushes to LexCorp Tower, suspecting Lex of being involved with his power change as he’s tried tampering with them in the past, but leaves when Erica fakes a problem with her pregnancy. And in a moment that’s chilling to any long-time DC fan, the Phantom Stranger pops in to tell Clark that there’s some great disturbance in the universe, something that may or may not be connected to Superman’s new powers. And the fact that he’s not sure should be pretty scary to anyone.

(Wait — has anyone told Booster Gold that HIS suit has LexCorp tech too?)

Action #735 brings us the return of Saviour, a delusional serial killer who wants to “punish” liars and fakes, and who doesn’t believe that Superman actually returned from the dead and is dedicated to killing the “imposter” using his name. Ashbury, meanwhile, has found a hiding place for Scorn in the abandoned pool at her school. When Scorn hears Saviour on the radio calling Superman out, he is determined to help. Superman’s new energy powers allow him to find a way to cancel out Saviour’s energy, taking him out, but he manages to slip away and vow revenge. 

In Man of Steel #70 Superman and Scorn part as friends, but not before Superman tells the alien he has to bring Ashbury – a 17-year-old girl – back to her father. Although Ash protests, Scorn trusts Superman’s judgment, and she finally acquiesces upon learning her absence is taking its toll on Dirk’s health. WGBS, meanwhile, airs Jimmy’s interview with Hamilton about Superman’s new powers, despite the fact that it gave Metallo an edge in the fight, and this time Saviour picks up on it. With his reality-warming, he starts to mimic Superman’s new powers to get his attention. Scorn and even Bibbo get in on it, with Bibbo snatching a crib sheet Saviour wrote to keep track of what he learned about Superman’s powers. Superman and Scorn beat Saviour, but Jimmy’s relationship with his friends is damaged even further. 

Jimmy could rarely catch a break during the Triangle Era. A running theme seemed to be him making a foolish mistake and then having one consequence after another stacked up on him like an enormous Dagwood Sandwich of Suck. It honestly could get a little tiresome after a while. These days we don’t see him quite as often as I’d like, but when we do, it’s usually more in the vein of the weirdness magnet that Matt Fraction (and, to a lesser degree, James Gunn) used him as. I prefer that. 

Sat. Sept. 6

Comic Books: Adventures of Superman: Book of El #1, Absolute Superman #11, Justice League Vs. Godzilla Vs. Kong 2 #4

Notes: I’m taking a break today from the electric saga to pick into this week’s new Superman titles, starting with Adventures of Superman: Book of El #1.

🎶”Who wrote the book of El?”🎶
“I told you, Phillip Kennedy Johnson. Stop singing.”

This new miniseries is written by Phillip Kennedy Johnson as sort of the conclusion to his run on the Super-titles that followed Brian Michael Bendis’s run and lasted into the Dawn of DC era before he stepped aside. I had mixed feelings about his run. Coming off of the (ahem) previous writer it was inevitable that it would be an improvement, and there were certainly things about Johnson’s run that I enjoyed, but I ultimately got turned off. In this period, Johnson wrote about a Superman that was depowered on Warworld, and for most of that run, it was the only regular comic featuring Clark Kent. (The Superman title was sidelined and replaced with Jon Kent as Superman: Son of Kal-El.) I got burned out on Warworld eventually. Towards the end of the run I realized what the problem was – it was simply too long. A solid year of Superman on another planet and separated from Lois, Metropolis, and all the other elements that make Superman so great just didn’t work for me. In the Triangle Era they could have gotten away with it because a twelve-issue storyline would still only last three months, but 12 was too much. I greatly preferred the final section of Johnson’s run, after Superman returned to Earth and Action Comics became kind of a Superman Family title. 

All that said, let’s look at what Book of El gives us. The story starts on a lazy day in Smallville, with the Kent family all together: Lois and Clark, Jonathan and Martha, Jon, and the adopted twins from Johnson’s run, Otho-Ra and Osul-Ra, who have ostensibly been living with Lois and Clark this whole time but who even the good writers of the modern Superman titles consistently forget about. Their idyllic afternoon is shattered by an attack by Kryl-Ux, an enemy from Warworld, leading an invasion force and – seemingly – hurling Superman into the future. On the last few pages Clark encounters Ronan Kent, a descendent of his from Johnson’s Future State comics, and the knowledge that he disappeared from Earth hundreds of years ago.

I really do like the way Johnson writes the whole Kent family together. He gives each character a voice that fits them, and his Lois and Clark interactions (so infrequent during his Warworld storyline) are excellent. The revelation at the end takes all the air out of the tires, though. Clark is missing for centuries? Presumed dead? And the invasion of Earth is successful? The whole thing may as well end with a big banner that says “THIS STORY WILL BE RESET AND THIS FUTURE WILL NOT HAPPEN.” By the end of this miniseries, I have absolutely ZERO doubt, something will happen that will eliminate the future of Ronan Kent from being a potential future. That doesn’t mean the story can’t still be good, but it excises the whole thing from consequence in continuity, and that hurts.

Brainiac doing his best Cryptkeeper voice: “What the matter, Kal? Got GORE-gia on your mind? HEEHEHEEHEHEHEHEEEE!!!”

In Absolute Superman #11, Kal-El is in the clutches of Brainiac, who is forcing him to experience hundreds of torturous simulations of the final days of Krypton with the intention of brainwashing him into becoming a tool for Ra’s Al Ghul. Despite some early success, though, Kal-El begins to resist the reprogramming. Meanwhile, Lois and Jimmy are captives of Talia, and find a very unexpected rescuer coming to their aid. This series is progressing a little slowly, to be honest, but this issue is solid. There’s a lot of action and great stuff with Kal-El and Brainiac, and I particularly like the way Jason Aaron is playing with [REDACTED] when that particular character comes to the rescue. Good stuff here.

Finally, we have Justice League Vs. Godzilla Vs. Kong 2 #4. The League is trying to recruit Godzilla to help with the current situation, but something in the other realm where Godzilla resides is preventing the Kryptonians from fully processing the solar radiation that powers them. To even the score, Mr. Terrific whips up a device that will temporarily make Superman kaiju-size…but at the same time, reduce his intellect to a point where he’s operating on pure instinct. That’s right: it’s Godzilla vs. Kaiju-Superman!

And somebody decided to go with a cover of a few random League members facing a water monster that doesn’t even appear in this issue. I swear, boneheaded movies like this are the reason I should be put in charge of comic books. 

Sun., Sept. 7

Comic Books: Superman Vol. 2 #126, Adventures of Superman #549, Action Comics #736, Superman: The Man of Steel #71, Superman Vol. 2 #127

Clark had trouble making friends in this era.

Notes: It’s back to the electric era today, starting with Superman #126, in which our new electrified hero faces his Dark Knight buddy. Lex Luthor is planning his legal defense for his…well, trillions of crimes. But his scheme is to argue that he was somehow influenced by the Kryptonite ring that gave him cancer. Despite the fact that it might help Luthor, Mr. Truth and Justice Superman has no choice but to go to Batman and retrieve the ring. He returns it after some tests or run – or so he thinks. Luthor had one of his “scientists” pull a fast one, replacing the ring with a duplicate. Superman and Batman don’t know that the ring in the Batcave is a fake…but Luthor doesn’t know that Kryptonite no longer affects Superman in his energy form.

There’s an awful lot going on in this issue. In addition to the main plot I just recapped, there’s a great sequence where Superman saves the city from a plane crash, having to figure out how to use his new powers to do something that would have been relatively simple for the “old” Superman. Scorn is also convinced to abandon the Superman costume he’s been wearing and forge a name for himself. There’s good stuff there, but the actual Superman/Batman meeting is kind of a letdown. I would have hoped Batman would have more to say about Clark’s transformation, as this is presumably the first time they’ve encountered each other since it happened, but Batman barely seems to notice. It feels like those early Byrne issues where the two were tense rivals at best. Granted, they weren’t yet Superbesties again at this period, but as teammates in Grant Morrison’s Justice League, I would have expected them to be a bit more cordial to one another. 

Adventures of Superman #549 stars with Superman forced to do something he didn’t need to do when he had hearing and vision powers: go on patrol. Instead of stumbling on Intergang, though, he winds up in the middle of a rumble between the Newsboy Legion and the Dingbats of Danger Street. No, really, those are actual comic book characters. Jimmy, meanwhile, is struggling to find some credibility after his recent struggles. He decides to check in on Lois and Clark, but arrives just as Intergang firebombs their building as a warning to Lois to back off. Superman evacuates the building, but is then forced to go back in as a powerless Clark to protect his identity. After spending the night in the hospital suffering from smoke inhalation, he goes to Professor Hamilton to ask if he’s discovered a way to restore his powers to normal, but Hamilton gives him the shocking news that this change seems to be permanent. Also at the end, Superman brings in yet another obscure group of DC kid characters to settle the issue between the Newsboys and the Dingbats, and Jimmy decides he’s going to resurrect his career by making one of the stupidest decisions he’s ever made in his entire life, and keep in mind that this is a man who once married a gorilla.

Action Comics #736: The mysterious shadowy figure who recently assembled a Superman Revenge Squad starts assembling…well…a new Superman Revenge Squad. He busts Barrage out of prison, then recruits Rock and the Parasite to his cause, with a promise of more to come. Clark, meanwhile, is depressed over the revelation that the change to his powers will be permanent. He heads to Pennsylvania on assignment for the Planet, only to get trapped in a coal mine collapse with a bunch of miners. The old Superman could get them out in moments, of course, but if he were to fire up his new electrical powers, he runs the risk of igniting the coal dust in the air and killing them all. This is the kind of story that they do every so often to prove that Superman is more than his powers – he’s actually got a brain, too. Clark finds a way to save everybody without his powers, because that’s what Superman does, no matter what costume he’s wearing.

Man of Steel #71 picks up on the Jimmy Olsen Bonehead Show. After the incident at the apartment, Jimmy is convinced he’s figured out Superman’s secret identity, and the rest of the crew at WBGS news is trying to convince him to pursue and report it. But at the same time Bibbo, who punched Jimmy out a few issues ago for his LAST boneheaded move, gets back in the boxing ring and wins, then surrenders his title as penance for hitting Jimmy. Somehow this is enough to cause a moral quandary in a man who should have NO moral quandary about the question of WHETHER OR NOT TO RUIN THE LIFE OF HIS BEST FRIEND, JAMES BARTHOLOMEW OLSEN, WHAT IN THE NAME OF NERON ARE YOU THINKING?

Ahem.

Also, the mysterious recruiter picks up a new villain, an electrical woman named Baud, to join his new Revenge Squad, and his identity is revealed as…Morgan Edge. It’s not the most dramatic reveal, honestly, but it tracks. He sends them to fight Superman, because that’s what he does.

And in Superman #127, Superman narrowly escapes the Revenge Squad as they start to fight amongst themselves. Superman lets the Parasite take out the other three, then bounces in and reverses things on his magenta rival, defeating him by using his new powers to suck the excess energy from him and leaving him helpless. Then, Lois and Clark get a visit from Jimmy, who asks their advice on whether he should pursue the story of the century, even if it will get someone “really mad at him.” Clark, being Clark, tells him that the truth is the most important thing, and Jimmy leaves renewed in his determination to blow Superman’s secret identity, because they are really writing him as unforgivably stupid at this point in the series. Honestly, I’d forgotten about all this. Jimmy. James. Jimothy. What the hell, dude? 

Mon., Sept. 8

Comics: Adventures of Superman #550, Action Comics #737, Superman: The Man of Tomorrow #9, Jon Kent: This Internship is My Kryptonite #7, Justice League of America #28

Or “The Adventures of Superman’s Stupidest Friend, Jimmy Olsen.”

Notes: Jimmy’s giant bonehead extravaganza comes to a head in the “double-sized anniversary issue” Adventures of Superman #550. As he prepares his news special in which he plans to reveal Superman’s identity, he tries to justify it in his head by saying that, without his hearing and vision powers to alert him to danger, Superman’s identity being public would make it SO MUCH EASIER for people to come to him for help, displaying the kind of mental gymnastics that wouldn’t be associated with Superman again until Zack Snyder fans started to desperately try to pretend that the James Gunn movie wasn’t successful. Jimmy invites Lois and Clark to the taping of his special, along with two other guests: former football pro Johnny Dakota and Newstime magazine publisher Collin Thornton, both of whom also happen to live in the same building as our happy couple. Lois storms out of taping as Jimmy reveals what’s up his slave, but Clark instead gives Jimmy a kind but firm dressing-down about how Superman wouldn’t do anything to hurt anybody. The speech doesn’t fall on deaf ears, but Jimmy realizes it’s too late to back down now, and so on live TV he announces that Superman’s secret identity is…NOBODY! 

Okay, he did the right thing in the end, but Jimmy B. Olsen comes across – both in-universe and to the reader – as one of the dumbest characters in the entire DCU. 

Predictably, he gets fired from WGBS and he decides to take a little time off, even keeping the truth about Superman’s secret to himself…that Superman is really, of course, Collin Thornton.

I dislike this take on Jimmy so, SO much. I’ve talked before about how I prefer it when characters are played to the top of their intelligence, and this is as far from that as it could possibly go. Not only does Jimmy completely miss every clue that Clark is, in fact Superman, a fact that even a child could infer from the speech Clark gives him in this issue, but his emotional intelligence would have that same child look at him in disgust. One of my favorite bits of the new movie is the scene in the end, where Perry White and Jimmy Olsen quip about how long Lois and Superman have been hooking up. The scene can be read one of two ways: either they know Lois is involved with their biggest headline, OR they know that Lois is involved with Clark and that Clark happens to be Superman. There’s been quite a lot of chatter online about this, and personally, I prefer the latter interpretation, much for the same reason that I believe that James Gordon knows that Batman is really Bruce Wayne – he’s just too smart NOT to have figured it out, but he knows it’s best to keep it to himself. THAT’s the Perry and Jimmy I want to read about.

Not this assclown.

But as it turns out, the dumbification of Jimmy Olsen wasn’t over yet. Action Comics #737 picks up the thread, as (in an issue by guest writer Mark Waid) Olsen is attacked by Intergang, who isn’t buying his claim that Superman has no secret identity, and they’re ready to get the truth out of him. Jimmy just barely manages to escape – in only his boxers, which only serves to deepen his public humiliation when he’s picked up by the police. It just gets worse when the people who bail him out turn out not to be family or friends, but the same Intergang agents who were after him before. Meanwhile, at Lex Luthor’s trial, Lex’s lawyer argues that Lex, while dying of Kryptonite radiation, was saved by one of his research team, but lay comatose for months, only coming out of it shortly before the Final Night crisis. The real criminal was his clone, “Lex Luthor Jr.” (which is technically true, if you ignore the fact that Junior was just Lex’s brain in a younger body). The real kicker, though, is when the defense actually produces the clone – now aging, infirm, and raging in court. The judge, reluctantly, allows Lex to go free. 

There are a couple of good bits in this one, even as Jimmy continues to act like a bonehead. First, after Lex’s trial, a snide and confident Lex Luthor informs his lawyer that everything he just said in court was bupkis, he was indeed the one responsible for the “clone’s” crimes, and he’s about to go launch a plan to destroy the Justice League which the attorney can’t tell anyone about due to attorney/client privilege. It’s just the kind of utterly arrogant thing that makes Lex such a delicious villain, and Waid sells it nicely. Another good bit is at the end, when a desperate Jimmy turns to Bibbo for help. The same Bibbo who punched Jimmy out for his jackass behavior not that long ago comes to his aid because, in his own words, “We’re both pals o’ Superman, and dat’s a pretty solid brotherhood.”

The world needs more Bibbo Bibbowski in it. 

A quick note about the next book I’m going to be reading, Superman: The Man of Tomorrow #9. During the “Triangle Era” we had four monthly Superman comics, which equaled 48 issues of Superman a year. As you may have heard, though, years actually have about 52 weeks. Comic books come out on Wednesday, and roughly four times a year you get a month with five Wednesdays in it instead of four. DC decided to fill in these gap weeks with Man of Tomorrow, a bonus title that only appeared in these missing Wednesdays. It was a fun idea, but they rarely added anything substantial to the ongoing storyline (I suppose DC knew that even with a triangle on the cover some people would skip it) and eventually it was phased out in lieu of DC’s “fifth week” events, where they’d fill Wednesday #5 with a series of themed one-shots like Girlfrenzy or New Year’s Evil. 

Anyhoo, Man of Tomorrow #9 is kind of the perfect expression of this series. It’s a one-off story in which Jonathan and Martha – talking about their son’s recent transformation – run down all of the other trials and tribulations he’s faced over the years. The book is really nothing but a condensed history lesson of all the main storylines that had happened to the character in the decade since John Byrne’s Man of Steel reboot, which is kind of an odd choice for a book they’re afraid would only be purchased by the most intrepid of readers, because they would be far more likely than the casuals to already know all of this stuff. The cover is pretty misleading too, with a banner that proclaims “The Secrets of Superman’s Costume!” Spoiler alert: there are absolutely no secrets in this book, just a parade of Superman’s history with a visual focus – courtesy of artists Paul Ryan and Brett Breeding – on the assorted different costumes and appearances Superman had over the years. We got glimpses of pretty much everything, from the armor he wore during Krisis of the Krimson Kryptonite to the circus strongman getup from Time and Time Again to the battle suit Mother Box gave him in Superman/Doomsday: Hunter/Prey. In fact, if I were a toy manufacturer looking to do a really comprehensive line of figures featuring every different getup Superman ever wore, this book would be a pretty valuable resource for this time period. As a story it’s cute, but kind of a throwaway. 

Tues., Sept. 9

Short Film: Superman 75

And he doesn’t look a day over 87.

Notes: My original plan for today was to read the Superman annuals that featured ol’ Electric Blue, but September 9th turned out to be one of those days that just gets away from you. I had my hands full with various things, and by the time I’m writing this at nearly 7:30 pm, I haven’t had a chance to indulge in any Superman content. It’s time to play one of the little “emergency cards” I had planned out at the beginning of the year – a quickie I could sneak in on a day like this one, when time is of the essence and I might not have another chance to keep my streak alive. Today I chose Superman 75, a two-minute animated short directed by Zack Snyder and Bruce Timm to celebrate Superman’s 75th anniversary back in 2013. 

Say what you will about Snyder (and at some point, before the year ends, I intend to do so), but this short really does show a respect for the character of Superman. In two minutes, Snyder and Timm craft a wonderful little visual retrospective of Superman’s 75-year history, which I still can’t believe was already 12 years ago. I hope DC has some plans in place for year 90, it’s going to be here before they know it. 

Anyway, over the two minutes of the short – which is mostly set to the classic John Williams score — we start off with an extreme close-up of the S-shield from the cover of Action Comics #1, which then springs to life and then begins evolving through the various ages of the character. At turn, we see glimpses of the Fleisher Superman, some Golden Age comics, George Reeves, the proliferation of new heroes and villains that joined Superman in the Silver Age, a glimpse of the Super Friends, a dip into the 70s when Superman boxed Muhammad Ali, the death and return, the electric era, the Animated Series, Smallville, Kingdom Come, and the New 52 (WHEW!) before the short finally wraps with a glimpse of Henry Cavill in that first promo shot we ever saw of him, where Superman was standing in the rubble of what looked like a bank vault. For the last segment the music shifts to the Hans Zimmer score, paying what I still think was a suitable tribute to the character as he was at the time.  

I’ve watched this cartoon probably a half-dozen times since it was first released, and I enjoy it every single time. It’s a nice visual history of my favorite hero, and it’s the sort of thing I’d like to see them revisit and update every so often. But when I watched it on my laptop this time, something interesting happened. My son, Eddie, heard the now-familiar strains of the John Williams music coming from the computer and asked what I was watching. So I had him sit on the couch next to me so we could watch it together. As we went through the short I briefly informed him which eras we were passing through, and he thrilled at the appearance of Krypto during the Silver Age segment. Of course he did – we all love Krypto. If James Gunn throws Beppo into the Man of Tomorrow movie, I’ll show this short to Eddie again and he’ll go wild over that.

Assuming I have a little more time tomorrow, I’ll get around to those annuals, and then continue on my journey through Superman’s electrical era. Until then, friends!  

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. You can join in the Kryptonian Konversation every day in the Year of Superman Facebook Group!

Year of Superman Week 34: Crossover Chaos Part III-The Final Amalgamation

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I spent last week dipping my toes into the DC Vs. Marvel crossover, as well as the first wave of Amalgam Comics titles. But I’m not done yet: I’ve still got over half the huge Amalgam Age Omnibus to get through, including two sequel miniseries and the second wave of Amalgam Comics. Not only that, but after a few weeks where the beginning of the school year has kept me busy, I finally get a chance to sit down and catch up on more recent Superman comics. Oh yeah – and Peacemaker season two drops this week, and while I don’t expect to see Superman to show up, James Gunn has promised that the story of this season follow on from the film, so there’s a pretty good chance I’ll have some thoughts to share about that. Let’s begin, shall we? 

And as always, you can check out earlier blogs in the Year of Superman Archive!

Wed., Aug. 20

Comics: DC/Marvel: All-Access #1-4

I had the same look on my face as Access when I read Civil War II.

Notes: I’m going to say something that may be controversial here. I actually like the follow-up miniseries, like DC/Marvel: All-Access, better than the DC Vs. Marvel event itself. DC Vs. Marvel was a fun experiment, but the plot was really just a flimsy excuse to show off fights between the characters and frame the Amalgam specials. All-Access, on the other hand, has an actual STORY to it, and I appreciate that. Written by Ron Marz with art by Butch Guice, whom you may remember passed away earlier this year, All-Access starts out with Axel Asher, the man who straddles the line between the Marvel and DC Universes as Access. A psychic flash warns him that Venom has somehow hopped universes, and if anyone from either universe stays in the other one for too long it could cause the worlds to fuse into the Amalgam Universe again, so the cosmic hall monitor has to get to work. He comes across Venom in Metropolis, where he’s throwing down with Superman, and so Access decides to get some backup by calling in someone who knows what Venom’s deal is: Peter Parker, the Amazing Spider-Man.

This is all in the first issue of the miniseries, by the way, which almost works very well as a standalone Superman/Spider-Man team-up. There’s no gratuitous hero-on-hero fighting here, just two good men teaming up to take down one bad one, and Marz plays them both perfectly. Re-reading this issue is where I started to realize that this is kind of what I had hoped DC Vs. Marvel would have been all along.

Superman doesn’t show up again until the last page of issue #3, but in the meantime, Jubilee convinces Access to take her back to the DC Universe because when she and Robin were supposed to be fighting each other, they kind of fell in love. (To this day, it’s probably the best relationship Tim Drake has ever had.) Their reunion is interrupted by an encounter with Two-Face, then again when the Scorpion appears, once again mysteriously having been pulled from the other universe. Access recruits Batman to help him solve the mystery of the “crossovers,” and Batman suggests that they track down the man who, in the combined universe, was supposed to be its defender: Dr. Stephen Strange. Batman approaches Strange, suspecting that he’s causing the crossovers somehow, and Jubilee calls in the X-Men to hold him off. Issue three ends with Access once again calling in the cavalry, bringing in the rest of the Justice League.

Issue four is X-Men vs. JLA, at least at first. Things change when Access discovers that Dr. Strangefate has been hiding in Strange’s subconscious ever since the merger and used him to cause the crossovers in an attempt to restore the Amalgam Universe. He fuses Wonder Woman and Storm once again into their Amalgam counterpart, Amazon, but when he realizes he doesn’t have the right parts to put together anyone else, he starts creating NEW Amalgams: Superman and Bishop! Iceman and Aquaman! Jean Grey and the Martian Manhunter! Things get wild!

The story ends with a nice little promise, the Amalgam Universe restored as a sort of pocket universe where Strangefate is locked away, and the Marvel and DC Universes get to remain separate. But this miniseries was so much fun, seeing the characters actually interact in ways that didn’t go straight to the fisticuffs. The Robin/Jubilee stuff in particular was fantastic, and I loved seeing Superman and Spider-Man working together again. 

It’ll never happen, but I’d love to see a longer Access series, say a 12-issue event in which he’s trying to solve some sort of mystery that encompasses both worlds. And I’d love if, during this year, he appears not only in his own series, but in the ongoing comics of both companies, bringing surprise guest stars with him. But seeing as how the original plan was for DC Vs. Marvel to end with She-Hulk and Martian Manhunter swapping universes for a year until that plan was nixed by the lawyers, it’s doubtful that anything like that could happen. It’s not like the world has gotten LESS litigious since 1996, after all. 

Thur., Aug 21

Comic Books: Super-Soldier: Man of War #1

The amalgamated Snyder Brothers fans get SO angry that they gave Super-Soldier his trunks back.

Notes: A year after DC Vs. Marvel, a second wave of 12 Amalgam one-shots were released, six of them continuing adventures of the characters from the first, six of them with all-new Amalgamations. What’s interesting is that even the books that carried over didn’t continue the STORIES from the original. Some of them were unrelated stories, some made brief reference to the previous, and some went REALLY wild, like Dark Claw Adventures giving us an adventure of the Amalgamated Batman/Wolverine combo in a Batman: The Animated Series style. For our first visit with the Super family, Super-Soldier: Man of War dipped back in time to give us an adventure of the character from World War II. Mark Waid and Dave Gibbons reunite for this story, which kicks off with Super-Soldier at a meeting of the All-Star Winners Squadron. But he’s only there long enough for us to notice some new Amalagams (such as the Human Torch/Green Lantern mashup Human Lantern) before it’s off to join Jimmy Olsen for a special undercover Daily Planet assignment overseas. 

On the ship to Europe, Clark and Jimmy make the acquaintance of Sgt. Rock and the Howling Commandos, and Clark is later chagrined to find that Winston Churchill has fallen for the do-gooder act of his arch-nemesis, Lex Luthor, husband of Lois Lane. In a way, Luthor’s involvement actually makes this a prequel to the previous story, as the issue ends with him unveiling the plans for the Ultra-Metallo that Super-Soldier fought the first time we read one of his adventures. Kinda makes you wonder why it took Luthor 50 years to get it together.

As before, Waid and Gibbons do a great job lacing together the Superman and Captain America characters, this time bringing in the World War II-era heroes of Easy Company and the Howlers as well. Peggy Carter, for instance, shows up here as a member of the French Resistance (although I couldn’t figure out which member of Easy Company she was supposed to be mashed up with). The appearance of Major Zemo and his War Wheel pushes this over the top – silly and gleeful. These Amalgam books, when done well, are just an enormous amount of fun. Is it too much to hope that the new DC/Marvel crossover books that are about to come out will open the door for the return of this mixed-up universe? 

Fri., Aug 22

No, you give YOUR dog an invisible bone!

Last night was the premiere of Peacemaker season 2. I thought that meant I would be able to watch it when I got home from work, but apparently, it dropped at 8 p.m. EST, by which time my sports fanatic son was engrossed in a preseason game between two teams that nobody in our house has any personal connection to. But that was okay, I figured that I would just watch it the next day. I guess that was pretty stupid of me, though, to assume that I could wait a whole 20 hours and not have anything spoiled for me. Before the game was even over, though, posts were appearing on social media that spoiled something that really pissed me off. You see, season one was made BEFORE James Gunn was given the job of revamping the DCU, and was intended as part of the previous iteration of the DC Extended Universe. With the new DCU that began in Creature Commandos and continued into Superman, though, there were questions as to which parts of the season were still canon. Gunn has been exploring that in the official podcast for the show, but there was a moment in the finale that they were going to have to work a little bit to reconcile. 

Naturally, looking at Facebook last night, I was spammed with different pages that I don’t even follow sharing a screenshot that ruined a pretty amusing moment. How dare I assume that people wouldn’t make it into a headline? It had been an entire 180 minutes since the show dropped! What are they, made of stone?

Here’s the rule: If you’re posting spoilers about a show on the day it airs, you’re an asshole. That goes for individuals as well as all of those pages that I have since blocked.

By the time you read this it will have been nearly a week since that episode, and I STILL wouldn’t talk about it without giving you a warning. So in the next paragraph I’m going to spoil a few things about the end of Peacemaker season one and the beginning of season two. If you haven’t watched them and want to remain pure, skip ahead to Saturday.

TV Show: Peacemaker Season 2, Episode 1: “The Ties that Grind.”

Season one of Peacemaker ended with the titular hero and his team, the 11th Street Kids, saving the world from an invasion of alien butterflies. It’s more impressive than it sounds. But in the battle, Emelia Harcourt was nearly killed. Towards the end of the episode, Peacemaker is carrying her to safety when, lo and behold, the Justice League appeared – too late to do any good. The League, in this case, included silhouettes of Superman and Wonder Woman, as well as Jason Momoa as Aquaman and Ezra Miller as the Flash. It was a funny scene, but as that Justice League doesn’t exist, that scene clearly was no longer canon.

Gunn promised to explain it away and he did at the very beginning of the episode, in the “Previously on…” montage, where the League was replaced by the Justice GANG from the movie. The silhouettes of Superman, Mr. Terrific, and Supergirl all appeared, as well as a quick and the cameos have been replaced by Isabela Merced’s Hawkgirl and Nathan Fillion’s Guy Gardner. It was a funny bit. But I bet it would have been funnier if not for the asshats on the internet posting it the night before I got to watch it.

Fillion and Merced appear later in the episode as well, alongside Sean Gunn as Maxwell Lord allowing Peacemaker to audition for the Justice Gang. Watching the episode, it’s clear why DC put out the digital version of Superman last week – there are a lot of things in this show that build directly on that movie, although it’s still Peacemaker’s story of course. Rick Flagg shows up, worried about another dimensional rift like the “Luthor Incident” that happened this summer. Besides the connections to Superman, the show also starts trickling in new characters, like a surprising cameo by White Rabbit and references to the likes of the Ultra-Humanite and Captain Triumph. Rick Flagg is even working with Sasha Bordeaux, a supporting character from Greg Rucka’s Batman comics. Gunn seems to be using this season of Peacemaker to lay in chunks of the history of the DCU that Superman only hinted at, and I’m really quite excited by that. 

Look, it’s not a HUGE Superman link, and it’s DEFINITELY not a show I’m gonna watch with my seven-year-old like the movie, but this show is starting to look like it’s going to be part of the fundamental fabric of the new DCU, and that would make it worth watching even if it WEREN’T really good. 

Comics: Jon Kent: This Internship is My Kryptonite #5

Sat., Aug 23

Comic Books: Superman: The Kryptonite Spectrum #1, Superman Unlimited #4, Supergirl Vol. 8 #4

This is why you don’t watch whites with colors.

Notes: The beginning of a new school year traditionally keeps me busy, and today was the first time I’ve made it in to pick up my new comics in a few weeks. As such, I’ve got a hefty nine Superman or Superman-related comics sitting in my stack, waiting to read and discuss, including the much-anticipated Superman: The Kryptonite Spectrum #1. This Black Label series is by W. Maxwell Prince and Martin Morazzo, the creative team behind Image Comics’ incredible existential horror series Ice Cream Man. That’s the only thing of theirs that I’ve read before, however, and while I’m a big fan, I’ve been curious ever since this was announced as to just how their sensibilities would translate over to the Man of Steel.

As it turns out, they translate wonderfully.

In this story, Superman discovers four new strains of Kryptonite beyond the usual colors we’re aware of, and recruits Batman to help him experiment with them and find out what they do. The first, a Purple K, distorts Superman’s perception of time – something that is especially concerning as Lex Luthor chooses just that minute to unleash Solomon Grundy in Metropolis.

It would be fair for someone to question whether a creative team best known for a cosmic mind-tripping horror comic would be an appropriate choice for a Superman story, but Prince and Morazzo acquit themselves right away. The Kryptonite Spectrum isn’t a horror story by any stretch, but when Superman’s concept of linear time is skewed, we get a story that drifts into the kind of psychological twists that make Ice Cream Man so compelling while skipping the actual terror. Prince uses this conceit to play with the reader’s concept of time as well, and the script even twists Superman’s interactions with his friends, with a few scenes with Lois Lane dipping into the very real anxieties that Ice Cream Man so frequently mines for pure horror. Here, though, rather than terror, Prince uses them for character drama, displaying things about the relationships between the characters that feel very true, very human. This may not have the “Elseworlds” label, but the story clearly isn’t set in the mainstream DC Universe, with Superman and Lois’s relationship framed in a way that doesn’t fit that world, but feels quite appropriate for the story that Prince and Morazzo are telling. This is a great first issue of a very different kind of Superman story, and I enjoyed it heartily. 

Remember this the next time one of you wants to give me grief for putting up my Halloween decorations in September.

Dan Slott and Rafael Albuquerque are back with Superman Unlimited #4. With the Daily Planet expanding to a global operation, Jimmy Olsen has been tasked with helping set up their Gotham City office. While he’s in town, he and his ape city sidekick Tee-Nah run across Man-Bat and wind up summoning Superman for help. What they don’t know, though, is that this is a new Man-Bat, one who can transmit its curse via a bite…and a chance encounter with all the Kryptonite on Earth these days has left Superman just vulnerable enough to get nipped. Soon it’s Robin and the Birds of Prey vs. Superman-Bat! 

This book is really turning out to be just what I wanted. There’s an ongoing storyline – that of the Kryptonite meteor that fell to Earth and the consequences of that – however, each issue feels like it’s telling a complete and self-contained story. The A-plot, the “Superman-Bat” thing, is done in one and it’s over. The background story of the Kryptonite and the expanded operations of the Planet continue. Although it’s a single monthly comic, in a lot of ways it feels like the structure of the glorious “Triangle Era” of the Superman comics, and I love it for that. Slott also works in some nice tidbits regarding Superman’s interaction with the Batman family, which – coming right on the heels of having read The Kryptonite Spectrum #1 – makes it feel as if DC is using the month of August to make sure everyone remembers that Superman and Batman are best buds. Which, of course, I approve of wholeheartedly.

This is what happens when you don’t use fluoride.

Supergirl #4 continues Sophie Campbell’s new(ish) take on the Woman of Tomorrow. Having defeated her doppelganger Lesla-Lar last issue, this issue Supergirl takes her back to Kandor where she does something her cousin would most certainly approve of wholeheartedly: she goes to bat for her. Supergirl argues that Lesla has the drive to become a real hero, if only given the proper guidance, and volunteers to take that task upon herself. That’s the very beginning of the issue – afterwards we see Lesla make earnest attempts to prove her worth, leading up to a strange but entertaining encounter at a Goth club where she makes a mistake in judgment that winds up having the Supergirl squad face the forces of Decay. 

I just adore Campbell’s take on Supergirl. This issue in particular feels so true to the character – she comes off as someone who has demons in her past but, having largely conquered them, is sworn to help other people do the same. And following Lesla in this issue just magnifies that fact, demonstrating the effect that just being in proximity of someone like Supergirl can have on a soul that’s not truly evil, but merely lost. It’s such a good look for her and for the entire Superman family, and Campbell is nailing it in a delightful way. I also appreciate how Campbell is mining Supergirl’s past – the “new” villain, Decay, is a new version of an obscure character from Supergirl’s ‘80s series who, to the best of my knowledge, hasn’t reappeared since then. She knows this character’s history and she’s using it to her best advantage, which makes for a really rewarding read. 

Sun., Aug. 24

Comics: Krypto: The Last Dog of Krypton #3, Action Comics #1089, Justice League Red #1

Notes: After a busy Sunday of groceries, shoe shopping, making my weekly LitReel and, of course, a required stop at Spirit Halloween, it’s nearly 7 pm before I have a chance to sit down and read anything. Fortunately, I’ve still got six more new Superman-related books to dig into. Let’s see how many I get to this evening.

Beware the fetch.

Krypto: The Last Dog of Krypton #3 is first. Wandering alone after abandoning Lex Luthor, Krypto is stumbling through the woods when he comes across a little girl who’s as lost as he is. Roaming through the freezing woods, Krypto takes it upon himself to take care of the child, and in the process, proves just what a good boy he really is.

The first two issues of this miniseries blew me away. This one… DAMN it, Ryan North. Three issues in a row – THREE ISSUES IN A ROW – and you’ve got me in tears reading about KRYPTO THE SUPERDOG.

Honestly, if you’re not reading this comic book I don’t know what even is wrong with you.

When a teenager loses one of his contact lenses.

Action Comics #1089 may not have me sobbing over the adventures of a dog, but that doesn’t mean it’s not good. Last issue, young Clark Kent was surprised when his history teacher showed up on his doorstep and revealed that he knew Clark was Superboy. This issue, Mr. Blake has a reveal of his own and, frankly, I’m kind of irritated with myself for not picking up on who he was in the first place. Mark Waid is being Mark Waid here, tapping on his seemingly infinite awareness of the DC Universe to bring back a character who hasn’t been seen in a while and recontextualizing him in the world of Superboy’s Smallville. I can’t get much more specific without spoiling anything here, and in case you haven’t read the issue yet, I don’t want to do that But Waid is doing really interesting stuff in this issue.

My one complaint is actually the cover by Ryan Sook. It’s a great piece of art – evocative and certainly sure to get a reader’s attention…only it doesn’t seem to actually fit anything in the story. I hate when comic book covers are dull, generic pin-ups, but it may be even worse when the cover is of a scene that doesn’t even appear in the book.

Wait, some of these costumes need more red.

The last book I squeeze in before I’m alerted by my child that he’s hungry and he has expectations of something called “dinner” is the first issue of the latest DC All-In era Justice League spinoff, Justice League Red. Ever since the Justice League re-formed, Red Tornado has been serving as the computer intelligence running the operations for the team. This issue, Power Girl and Green Lantern Simon Baz get a red alert on their League ID cards that summon them to a satellite Red Tornado built without the knowledge of the rest of the League. His computer mind has been running millions of simulations and has determined that the new League is somehow going to lead to a catastrophe on Earth, and he needs a few trusted members to handle secret tasks the rest of the League cannot learn about in order to stop it.

Writer Saladin Ahmed is taking an interesting path in this book. The story leads us to believe that Red Tornado is unstable, and that all of these predictions and algorithms he’s run are unreliable. Even as Power Girl and Simon carry out their first mission, they’re skeptical as to whether they’re doing the right thing and whether they can trust their robot teammate. But to play that hand so early, to make it seem from the very beginning that Red Tornado may be going off the rails…it feels kind of like a feint to me. I’m willing to bet that we’re going to find out along the way that things are even worse than believing Red Tornado is wrong: we’re going to find out that somehow, he’s RIGHT. Interesting set-up, and I look forward to seeing where this goes. 

Mon. Aug. 25

Comics: Absolute Superman #10, Batman/Superman: World’s Finest #42, Justice League Vs. Godzilla Vs. Kong 2 #3

Confirmed: I still can’t see John Cena.

Notes: Time to wrap up my catch-up weekend (plus one day) with the final three Superman-related comics from my visit to the comic shop. I’m kicking it off with Absolute Superman #10. The battle continues between the Omega Men and Ra’s Al Ghul’s Peacemakers, with Peacemaker Smith on the front line in the hunt for Kal-El. With a Kryptonite bullet in Smith’s gun, Kal-El is faced with a decision, and a reflection onto a hard choice his father once made brings about a surprising result.

The conceit of the Absolute comics is that this is an entire universe tainted by Darkseid, where hope is the eternal underdog and the sort of values that characterize the traditional DC heroes are absent. This issue, Kal-El is faced with the kind of choice that Superman inevitably comes down to at some point in his career, and it’s a testament to Jason Aaron’s writing that, right up until the choice is made, I’m not entirely certain which way I think he’s going to go. 

I like the way the Absolute world plays with characters as well. Concepts like the Omega Men, Peacemaker, and especially Ra’s Al Ghul are not traditional elements of the Superman corner of the DC Universe, but they work in the story we’re getting here. Overall, it’s a good chapter in this saga. 

This am bad serious book.

In World’s Finest #42, Superman and the Dynamic Duo have been summoned to Bizarro World to help with a plague. The Bizarros (including Bizarro Superman #1 and Batzarro) who are infected find their minds realigned to a more Earth-like way of thinking. Such a danger can’t be allowed to spread, so they’ve turned to our heroes to save them…but together, they find that the danger may be greater than even the plague seemed to be.

Mark Waid is doing some really interesting things with the Bizarros here. He plays with the notion of how science and physics don’t really allow for something like a square planet and what the consequences of such a world would be. At the same time, he tackles the Bizarro philosophy of things being “backwards” as well, in a way that makes me feel slightly abashed for my criticism of the Bizarro story in the recent Kal-El-Fornia Love summer special. There’s also a great moment for Batman here – Robin (understandably) questions why it would be such a bad thing if the Bizarros all had their minds reversed to what we think of as “normal.” Batman’s response is a little unexpected, at least until he gives his reasoning, displaying a depth of compassion that Batman isn’t often given credit for. It’s a good look on Bruce.

So they’re sitting around watching Japanese movies, so what?

I finally get to the end of the new Superman titles (less than 48 hours before this week’s comics go on sale) with Justice League Vs. Godzilla Vs. Kong 2 #3. At the center of the Earth, Superman and Lex Luthor are forced into an uneasy alliance as they come across a herd of giant gorillas. (A herd? A pride? What are a group of gorillas called? I should probably look that up.) On the surface, meanwhile, Supergirl and Wonder Woman get to work liberating a Monarch base being held captive by Task Force X, and Harley Quinn gets involved in a rather…unique therapy session. 

Obviously, I love crossovers, and seeing the League facing off against the Kaiju of the Legendary Monsterverse is a lot of fun. I particularly like bringing in the Suicide Squad as an alternative antagonist in this story. But it’s the sort of thing that’s a little hard to hold in your head from month to month. Waiting for the trade isn’t a practice I care for, but this is probably a situation where the story will read better in collected form than issue-to-issue. Once it’s over, I’ll have to re-read the whole thing in a lump. 

Tues., Aug. 26

Comics: Spider-Boy Team-Up #1, Unlimited Access #1-4

They don’t call ’em “Legion” for nothing.

Notes: We’re going to end our journey through the Amalgam Universe and the DC/Marvel Omnibus today with Spider-Boy Team-Up #1, and the subsequent Unlimited Access miniseries. The final one-shot, written by Roger Stern and Karl Kesel (cleverly Amalgamated into R.K. Sternsel) with art by Jose Ladronn, features the return of the Arach-kid with a special guest appearance by his pals in the Legion of Galactic Guardians 2099, and that in and of itself should tell you that at this point they were going WILD with the Amalgamations. At Cadmus, as preparations are made for the Kid’s upcoming nuptials to Mary Jane Watson, aka the Insect Queen, the Kid is plucked from the timestream and brought to the far-flung future, where the Legion is about to elect a new leader. Will it be Vance Cosmic? Martinex 5? Cannonfire? Multiple Mai–you know what, there’s too many, I’m not going to list them all. But it’s pretty interesting to note that there are so many Legionnaires that there aren’t enough Guardians to Amalgamate them all (or at least, there weren’t at the time) so they wind up mashing together with virtually any Marvel character that fits: Dream Girl and Destiny made up Dream Date, Matter-Eater Lad and the Trapster made Paste-Eater Pete, and my personal favorite, Bouncing Boy and Speedball mashed into Bouncing Ball. Unfortunately, Spider-Boy’s time displacement is causing stress on the time stream, and he winds up falling into different time periods, meeting different incarnations of the Legion.

The book turns out to be a real celebration and gentle parody of the Legion, poking some lighthearted fun at the various reboots the team has undergone over the years, a topic with which I have some passing familiarity. Even Ladronn’s artwork works really well, emulating the different styles of Keith Giffen’s Five Years Later era just as neatly as he does the Chris Sprouse-inspired Reboot Legion. The ending is a really nice touch, tying together the “2099” part of the melding with the only Legionnaire that it could possibly have been. Even divorced from the rest of the Amalgam comics, Spider-Boy was a glorious, joyful, wild experiment. Man, I hope the upcoming facsimile edition is just a precursor of things to come.

Something about Thor-El is kinda…compelling…

The last gasp – both for the Amalgams and for the Access concept of Marvel/DC Crossovers, came in the 1998 miniseries Unlimited Access by Karl Kesel and Pat Olliffe. The story starts with Access, the “Cosmic Hall Monitor,” popping back to his home in Marvel’s New York after sorting out a recent encounter between Spider-Man and Batman. Kesel implies here that this particular crossover had Access looking on from the background trying to keep things straight. As a concept, it actually would work to explain EVERY Marvel/DC crossover – Access, or someone like him, keeping an eye on temporary fusions between the worlds, which the respective heroes forget after the fact. If they decided to run with it that way.

Access has to untangle the appearance of Mantis – one of Darkseid’s lesser goons – in battle with Spider-Man, a fight that gets escalated when Juggernaut and Wonder Woman wind up in the mix. Things get even crazier when he takes Diana home only to find himself tangled in a fight between a still-savage Hulk and Green Lantern Hal Jordan…who is DEAD.

Superman doesn’t actually show up in the first few issues of this miniseries, so I’ll cut to the chase: as it turns out, Access doesn’t just bounce back and forth between universes, but discovers he can bounce back and forth in TIME as well, allowing him to meet the different versions of the Marvel and DC heroes from any point in the timestream (including the “Days of Future Past” X-Men from the distant year 2012). He’s also got the ability to create Amalgams, merging characters from the two worlds into one, which comes in handy when it turns out he’s being tracked by Darkseid, who wants his ability to traverse the worlds. By issue three, Amazing Grace has hypnotized the original Avengers and Justice League into battling each other, and Access decides to reach out for the only hero who stands a chance of fixing this mess: big blue himself, Superman. And I mean Superman during his electric blue era. It takes literally seconds for Superman to jolt everyone back to their senses, then he and Captain America mobilize the two teams to fight off Darkseid’s invasion of the Marvel Earth. But the crazy just keeps coming with the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants, the original X-Men, and a group of teen heroes who – just months later – would wind up getting their own title as Young Justice. 

By issue four, Darkseid and Magneto are teaming up to take over the world (this is early Magneto, when he was still into that kind of thing) and the heroes decide to combine their powers – literally – into a single strikeforce of Amalgams. Black Canary and Jean Grey: Jean Black! Giant-Man and Green Lantern: Green Goliath! Captain America and Captain Marvel Jr.: Captain America Jr.! I know, I didn’t write it. And of course, Superman and Thor are fused together as Thor-El. 

The fun part here is seeing these new Amalgams throw out casual references to help the reader to understand what they’re like in their own minds: Captain America Jr. possessing the “wisdom of Lincoln,” for example, or Thor-El referencing the Valhalla Zone. The series, and the history of Access, end with him accepting the truth about himself, beating Darkseid, and swearing to prevent a future he doesn’t want to experience. 

Reading this story again now, there’s so much potential left in this concept, and thanks to the nature of Access’s powers, there’s no reason that Marvel and DC couldn’t pick up on it again at any time. With new crossovers (finally) on the horizon between the two of them, the chance is right there. I don’t know if they’ll take it – I certainly hope so.

But for now, at least, our journey with Superman and the heroes of other worlds has come to an end. And I think it’s time to rededicate myself to stories focused around Clark Kent himself. That in mind, next week, I’m going to embark upon my re-read of the longest Superman saga I’ll have yet tackled for the Year of Superman blog. See you then!

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. You can join in the Kryptonian Konversation every day in the Year of Superman Facebook Group!