Superman Through the Ages! Forum

I just got my copy of the Amazing (http://superman.nu/a/BookShop/tomorrowarchives/button.jpg) Archives. I only got the chance to read the intro and the inside flap but wow what an attitude change. It appears that DC finally came around and has embraced Superman's Silver Age past. I mean just compare the text in this book with the 1st DC Silver age reprint "Superman in the 60's" and "The Greatest Superman stories ever told" where DC not only hated those stories but were also embarrassed by them, those days thankfully are long gone. I think you can thank all the great members here for posting their classic posts at the old DC board (which you can read here : http://superman.nu/dcmb/ ) and of course this amazing site, please note I have nothing to do with this site other than being a mod here and giving Rao some of those on-line comics, so please don't think this is a self serving post. I am posting this to say how glad I am that this attitude adjustment finally happened. People may not remember when this really was the ONLY site to even mention that Superman existed before Byrne, I kid you not, where DC wouldn't even discuss the Pre-boot Superman at all. A time when Howard Stern of all people, who is a HUGE Silver Age Superman fan went on a hour long rant on Superman on his show, only to have a DC editor call in to tell him that that silly old version didn't exist anymore, Stern wasn't aware that they reboot him since he stop reading the comics by the 80's, he was not too pleased. It was the Silver Age Superman that MOST people around the world know, not the reboot version, which is Superman in name only. Now of course DC has released many toys based on the Silver Age comics and have begun adding bits and pieces of the old school version to their reboot version, making him less and less like Byrne's version and more like the real deal. Soon with "All-Star Superman" a new Superman will be introduced that will be a modern take on the Silver Age version with an all star team working on the book like Superman deserves.

To me this archive is like the crowning jewel, the greatest victory so far for my childhood hero.

Hopefully before I die I will be able to have the full Silver age run in archive format.

yay!

This raises an interesting question: What happens when the Iron Age finally ends (in terms of this site)? Will there be reviews of NEW Modern Age Superman comics? And what exactly would we call this new age of comics, perhaps the "All-Star Age"?  :D

Anyway, I've found that the most unlikely people are hardcore Superman fans. We all have that inner-child in us that the wonder and excitement of Superman appeals to. It literally is modern mythology.

It's good to see DC finally embrace the past, rather than try to downplay it.

They have to finally - its called cross marketing strategy and the new Supes will'll have to entertain and please his fans around the world and since most know the Reeve era or Reeves era, the Superman must closley linked to those archetypes is of course, the Silver Age Supes. :D

Where's my signal watch?  I feel a Jovian giant girl friend on the way and my porcupines are showing! :wink:  :twisted: :wink:

Holy cow - my standing just changed - Im the last son of Krypton?!!!  Guess it's my Birth Right, after all.  :D

I think DC is finally understanding that 20 years of pushing the post-Crisis Superman has done nothing to penetrate the culture on the scale the Silver Age version did.  With the reboot, DC wanted desperately to "Marvelize" Superman and they certainly succeeded; all he is now is just another conflicted, doubting, put-upon sad sack no more or less special than a gazillion other goofballs in long johns.  He is no longer the most powerful superhero, no longer the first to appear, and with the new emphasis on Clark Kent as the "real" man, he doesn't even have the "alien outsider" thing going for him any more.  In fact, unless you're really crazy about his costume, there's nothing, not one thing, to differentiate Superman from any other generic do-gooder at DC or Marvel.

References to the *real* Superman in Seinfeld episodes, the "Iron Giant" film, "Kill Bill" and so on prove that he lives on in the hearts of millions of people.  Now it seems even DC is catching on to something a 5-year-old should understand: if you have a character people love, take advantage of it!  Market him with toys and books and DVDs and anything you can.  Why knock your head against the wall trying to force a new version down people's throats when they're still willing...happy, even...to pay good money for the old one?

What we've seen here is a re-run of the infamous "New Coke" debacle, only on a grander scale and played out over two long decades.

Anyway, "The Man of Tomorrow Archives" is a fantastic book and I hope they fast-track it so I can get another one this year!

And yes, kudos to Rao for keeping the hope alive in the darkest of times!

And a 30th century wink to Nightwing, Defender of Kandor,  for his grand work here too. :wink: Maybe that should be "candor". :D

If you havent read his tribute to Chris Reeve -please do so.  Moving and profound.

Its on his site.

Zeeeeeee Zeeeeeeeee Zeeeeeeeeee!

Wow,

It's been a long time since I've posted here, and so back I come to once again tackle the tireless debate (albeit in a much more abbreviated fashion.)

First of all, congratulations all.  I sense (d'uh) that you perceive a victory here with DCs recent turnaround with SUPERMAN.  If you feel that this is a good thing, which I don't doubt that you do, then I wish you the heartiest of congratulations.  *SERIOUSLY*  (That's in case anyone thinks I'm being sarcastic.  It's hard to tell in writing.)

That being said, I still can't believe that you guys would see this as a good thing.  Case in point:



Sorry to pick you out there, Nightwing.  I just don't see how he can have that "going for him."  The original concept of SUPERMAN was supposed to be someone you can identify with.  The "alien outsider" part has nothing to do with that.  The CLARK KENT/SUPERMAN relationship was that we all feel like the poor schlubs who no one pays attention to.  But if they knew who we really are, that we are indeed Supermen (and women) then that would be something else.  The alien part was a means to an end.  A way to get him those powers.  The joy of BATMAN is that he shows that you don't need to have super powers to be a hero.  But more importantly, SUPERMAN is the opposite of BATMAN in his methods.

Look back to KINGDOM COME (the original comic version, if you will.)  I think it can be argued that the SUPERMAN presented there was nondescript enough that he could have been interpreted as either being the Silver Age or Iron Age or any other in between incarnation of SUPERMAN.  What was it that made SUPERMAN stand out?  He was an inspiration to all other heroes in his ideals and his morals.  It was this belief and refusal to change that set him apart from the rest.  It wasn't his alienness.

I can't identify with an alien.  He sees things differently than I do (literally, I suppose.)  He may think differently, he may believe different things.  This doesn't mean that I don't like him, but it's that much harder to put myself in his shoes.  To identify with what it is like to be him.

Being an alien doesn't differentiate him from other heroes.  There are a thousand other heroes (and villains) that are aliens.  Even being a Kryptonian doesn't make him unique (we've definitely gone over that arguement before.)

If your problem is with that fact that he can brood, and that he is fallible like the rest of us, go read the "Continuing Adventures of Jesus."  Superman should not be a religiously perfect character.  I doubt that anyone would be comfortable in that role, and if he was, I don't think I could ever trust him (I mean, what an egotist.)  And if he's uncomfortable with that sort of role, I call that angst.  D'oh!

Look, you're all obviously not alone.  There are many people who agree with your arguments.  Some of them are even the higher-ups at DC.  That's how the change was made.  Kudos for you that you could get that done.  All I'm saying is that I'm starting to find SUPERMAN becoming a character that I can't identify with anymore.  I don't think it would hurt anyone here to simply acknowledge that the Iron Age SUPERMAN had some wonderful stories.  I know you guys will forever brand him a murderer (he did kill.)  He's a murderer like our presidents have been.  Like the forefathers of the United States have been, and yet these people have fostered our admiration, regardless.

You hold your SUPERMAN to a high standard, that much is for sure.  And I don't blame you.  I do as well.  But the difference is that as a kid I always imagined being SUPERMAN.  I used to pretend I was him.  For the most part it was me being me with his powers.  I simply made sure that my morality matched his.  I'm not saying I would be an ideal SUPERMAN, but I always wanted to believe that if I tried, I could do it.  I know that if I was SUPERMAN, I'd have angst.  I'd have moments to brood.  I'd even be reflective from time to time.  I want to see myself in SUPERMAN.

Is that such a crime?

Welcome back, jmr72777.  I, too, have been a bit too silent on this board and have only recently been drawn into more involved discussions.

Superman being marginalized because he's an alien is the original social outcast in comics.  That same formula is why Spider-Man works and more importantly, the X-Men work too.  In the mutants' case, they speak to the adolescents who feel like outsiders as they struggle to cope with their identity crises; we all went through that.  Kal-El is no less human in actions, characterization, theme, nor motivations for his 'alienness'.  He's still quite clearly 'human' in character regardless of any debate on his biological rights to the name -- and I can justify within comics canon that all eras of Superman are biologically 'human'.

I've always looked up to the real Superman as a role model to aspire to.  Making him more flawed in fundamental ways doesn't make him more relevant for me but less inspirational.  He's never been a 'god' but his influence on the real and fictional worlds has certainly been godlike.  I accept that some fans want a flawed Man of Steel.  I just agree with Nightwing that this doesn't set Superman apart from the crowd of his imitators that followed -- and all comics super-heroes besides him are his imitators to some degree.

Let's remember something else: The classic Superman appealed to more generations of fans than the Byrned version, and this includes the Post WW2 population bulge that dwarves the fanbase of any era.  While the Byrned era appeals to some superfans, obviously, that fanbase is clearly a small subset of the total superfans.

What can one find in a superbook that is unique if all he does is imitate his imitators?  The Superman-haters will continue to hate him and will simply rejoice in the greater opportunities to knock him for powers, power-levels, and character that didn't exist before; they certainly will not come into the fold to enjoy the character but to berate him further.  And this has happened in the Byrned era.

The dedicated fans would tolerate the flawed imposter being published but would campaign and long for the days when the True Legend reclaimed his title.  And this has happened.

The new comics fans would see whatever incarnation is currently out there and would either buy into him or not.  And if he's just the same as all the other guys competing for rack space, coupled with the notion that he's 'old fashioned', then he's likely to not appeal to them.  But if he has an iconic appeal with truly larger-than-life motivations and ideals that he lives by instead of just paying lip service to, then he sparks interest in them -- the way he got me interested when I saw a character that was truly the ideal Humanity should aspire to.

'The Man of Tomorrow' isn't just about his powers.  It's also about his character ... the character that we should one day evolve into.

Captain Kal,

It's great to hear from you again.

You and nightwing make very thoughtful points with regards to SUPERMAN and him being different from others.  I think you've come the closest to understanding what I've been saying about SUPERMAN all along with regards to his alienness.

But as to being unique, I think he will always be that.  He has a unique enivronment (OK, so Peter Parker works at a newspaper also -- first off, he's freelance, and secondly he's a photographer....Besides, Clark did it first.) He has unique friends, and a unique support group.  His enemies are his own (even if Luthor bears a strong similarity to the Kingpin, the circumstances themselves are unique.)  It is what the character does in these surroundings that will truly set him apart.

I have to say that I have heard more people berate SUPERMAN being perfect (the world's biggest boyscout) then I've heard people berating his failings.  To me, it's the fact that he can overcome his own failings to be the inspiration that he is that makes him so incredible.  If he has no failings, and does what he does, what is so inspiring about that?  I'm not perfect, so I can't hope to be like that.  I can only try.  But as someone who is not perfect who can succeed, that gives added hope that I can one day attain that.

He'd be inspirational either way, in my opinion.  I just think that he's a more interesting character with flaws.  It adds dimension.

I accept all that you say as valid, at least from some fans' POV.

I just added this bit above while editing my last post so I'll restate it here.

Let's remember something else: The classic Superman appealed to more generations of fans than the Byrned version, and this includes the Post WW2 population bulge that dwarves the fanbase of any era. While the Byrned era appeals to some superfans, obviously, that fanbase is clearly a small subset of the total superfans.

I'm sure we could find some fraction of the fanbase out there that would buy a Superman based on Lobo or a mutant Superman or what-have-you.  I just think the classic version has broader appeal to more of the fanbase.  Maybe it's just me.

Thank you, Captain Kal.

Hm. . .would we call this the Platinum Age? Renewed with the glory of the Silver, but an age with a unique feel all it's own regardless? I dunno.

 To me, Superman has always been a role model, someone whom we aspire to be, but he did have his flaws and foibles and humility too. . .in Clark Kent. Clark was Superman's other side, the part of him that allowed him to be human, to be fallible, to be one of us. People see Superman and feel free to deride him for being too goody-good, but they don't see the whole picture. Clark was Superman's humanity, the part of him that could screw up and sometimes did, who looked as silly and flawed as the rest of us. That's why I feel the 'Clark is the real man, Superman is the disguise' idea doesn't really hold water. Yes, Kal-El once thought of himself as Clark. . .but then he discovered his true origins, remembered his heritage, came to embrace it. He created the 'disguise' Clark to allow himself to stay in touch with that fundamental humanity he had learned to cherish from Ma and Pa Kent, but he discovered himself, his true self, and embraced it. He became something more than human. . .and in some ways a bit less as well. Clark may not be 'real', but he's Superman's outlet, his means of understanding us. No one in the modern DC offices seems to get that.

 The idea of 'All-Star Superman' is an encouraging sign, as is the return of Krypto and Kara. I'm hopeful DC has finally realized that throwing out the baby with the bathwater was a bad, bad idea. Now if we can just persuade them to make Clark the first Superboy and have him in the Legion you'd be looking at one happy camper. ;)

 -Def.

Defender,



The fundamental problem here is that if Clark Kent is a disguise, and he's only acting, then he only has foilbles and problems as much as an actor playing a part.  Christopher Reeve didn't spend his time worrying that Lex Luthor was going to blow up California.  Superman did.  As Superman, he pretended to be concerned because he was acting the part.  By the point you make above, all of Clark Kent's concerns and problems should just melt away the moment he takes off his suit and gets into his Superman uniform.  A man with fake problems isn't very interesting.  Ultimately knowing that he could shed all these problems makes them very unreal and not particularly menacing.

"Oooh, people think Clark is stupid and they don't like him...Oh well, *riiip*  now I can fly away and it won't matter."  Clark can't have any real insecurities knowing that he can just tear open his shirt and have them all go away.  This is all about why Clark's problems have no bearing on SUPERMAN.  You can't say that Clark is the troubled character.  That makes the whole thing even more schizophrenic.

If SUPERMAN only has problems on a global scale, that brings me back to audience identification.  How do you identify with someone who only thinks on a global scale?  He should have some personal problems that the audience can relate to.  

I believe the story was called "Must There Be A Superman."  In it, the Guardians of the Universe introduced a touch of doubt to the Man of Steel.  That perhaps he was doing too much for humanity, and therefore stunting their growth.  Correct me if I'm wrong, but he spent a good deal of that story brooding.  It introduced angst.  And yes, this was before the Iron Age.

Hm. . .maybe I could've phrased myself a little clearer jmr. What I mean is that Clark represents Superman's ability to relate to us. Superman is human, fundamentally he's the ideal example of humanity. But for us as the reader, we need Clark Kent as our gateway into Superman, if you follow me. Superman is a god, or at the very least a godling, who has a moral core that many of us strive for, but can never really attain. But Superman does have the capacity for doubt and worry and anger, which while he restrains himself of while in uniform, he can experience and channel through the medium of his life as Clark Kent.

 Superman can be related to, I'm just saying it can be a bit of a challenge. All that perfection can lead to the impression of being a bit too much of an ideal. Just my opinion, your mileage may vary of course.

 I do like the idea of exploring the Clark/Kal-El duality a bit further. . .Maggin hit it on the head, but  I wonder if anyone else has really driven it home before. . .hm. Interesting stuff regardless.

 -Def.

Quick side note: There is already a period of comics history referred to as "The Platinum Age" --the period from about 1900 to 1935 or so before the publication of Action #1.  Even if this is not a universally acknowledged fact, it would still tend to confuse many comics fans who take their comics history lessons from the Overstreet Price Guide (and there is a lot of good info in there! :D ).

As to the issue of Superman's (split-)personality, morality, powers, etc:

I have always found the character to be essentially the same.  The Silver-Age version, as written by everyone from Siegel to Maggin, was a flawed character with god-like powers and hyper-competence (to use an idea from Great Rao's conversation with the author of the new Superboy text stories).  The post-Byrne/post-Crisis version of the character is slightly more flawed and slightly less powerful, to the point where he seems essentially the same as every other hero to most fans (indeed, it was deemed editorially acceptable to have him a murder a villain --a return to an aspect of his Golden Age roots, I might add).  But to most people outside the comics fanbase, the two versions were essntially the same, no?  I agree, the Silver Age version (or a contemporary equivalent, a la Morrison) makes more sense both editorially and from a marketing standpoint, but I don't really think that the kid who carried a Superman lunchbox to school in 1988 thought of the image on his pail very much differently than a kid in 1968 (unless 1988 was the year they introduced the mullet version of SM --a true aesthetic abomination  :evil: ).

And just for the record, I do not, and we should not, think of George Washington or George Bush, or nation states in general, as morally inspirational characters in the same league or sense as fictional paragons of virtue like Superman or legendary religious or mythical figures.  Nation States can only be moral actors in the negative sense without reduction to "lesser evil" politics.  (The exception to this is when a cartoonist like Frank Miller wants to make a philosophical or satiric point about the character and US foreign policy; or when we talk about Superman not as an idea but as a corporate property, the product of a morally ambiguous creative process.)

As to the issue of the Clark-Superman split, I think this is an overrated, ultimately futile (but still fun!) line of inquiry.  What is exquisite about the character(s) is the unknowable, contradictory nature of the duo persona, not the cut-and-dried idea that Superman is one thing and Clark is another, or that Clark is real and Superman is fake (or vice versa).  The duality was never dealt with to my satisfaction during the Silver Age despite any number of editorial assertions to the contrary.  And it is this exquisite duality which appeals to the vast majority of people, I would venture (Tarantino's Kill Bill script doesn't answer the question, it stirs the debate in the public's mind).  Every writer seemed to have a slightly different take, and the nature of the character(s) changed slightly as the stories required.  (Another interesting aspect of the character to endlessly speculate about is the morality of Clark/Superman's "deception".)

For myself, when I am a fan/reader, I identify with both Clark and Superman to varying degrees, and have a hard time separating their "personalities" and motivations in my mind (now or during the act of reading/watching).  The Superman who is an isolated alien has a lot in common with the schlub reporter who has a secret life, even if one or the other is just a facade.  Both characters have problems of a personal nature, usually shared, but often separate, all rolled up in one delicious schizophrenic ball.  

And who cares what any one editor, writer, or corporation asserts!  Superman is bigger than all of us at this point.

How about the "Ruby Age?"  If that flops like bad plan of a Lex Luthor, he's a few ideas:"The Super-Age", "Sliver Age II", "Rebirth Age",
"Reborn Age".

I recently bought the Birthright hardcover.  It contains some bonus material, including excerpts from Mark Waid's original series proposal.  I think he's got it spot on when he talks about the relationship between Superman and Clark.  This is an edited and trimmed down selection of excerpts from the Clark Kent section of the article.  I highly recommend getting a copy of the book and reading the whole thing - including the story. :)


Reading the entire article makes it very clear that Waid had many more ideas than those that made it into those original 12 issues and was planning or hoping or had been told that he was to write many more.  I hope we see them soon.

TELLE,

Welcome to the debate.  My intent was not to paint anyone between George Washington to George Bush or anyone in between necessarily as inspirations or heroes.  I probably should have thought out my wording better. My point was simply that to call SUPERMAN a murderer would be to call them ones as well.  Not so much because they are supposed to be as inspiring or heroic as he, but simply because they technically have as much moral authority as SUPERMAN does.  Again, I wouldn't say that SUPERMAN was right to kill, but simply that branding him a murderer is a bit too harsh.

Now I know I'm going to get rapped in the mouth for this (so to speak) but Starchild, you've just brought up something that actually irked me a while back.  I too read Mark Waid's bit in the BIRTHRIGHT TP.  It affected me so that I was forced to write about it.  Rather than trying to recreate the feelings that it gave me, I will simply leave links below:

http://www.livejournal.com/users/kal_el77/39720.html

http://www.livejournal.com/users/kal_el77/39995.html

The rants above do retread on some of the old themes that I've discussed on this site before, as well as in other places and earlier posts in my blog.[/url]

Wow, I'm falling behind in this debate but it's great to see it anyway. And I note others have pretty much explained where I was going.

But just to clarify: no, it's not the fact that he's from another planet that made the old Superman unique (after all, even in the new continuity he's still from outer space).  It's that he's from a place that no longer exists, one he feels some loyalty to and longing for.  The bottle city of Kandor, the Fortress and various other plot elements kept this theme coming up again and again...Superman was a man displaced, torn between making a new life for himself on Earth and honoring his heritage on Krypton.  As writers more scholarly than I have pointed out, this is a very American attitude, one that consciously or not reflected the dilemma of Superman's creators, two Jewish kids with parents who came to America from a world that was destroyed behind them.  This is the crux of the immigrant's dillemma...assimilate or honor your heritage?

I just feel that in the old continuity, things happened for a reason.  Superman was an alien on purpose; it mattered to the mythos.  Now he's an alien, but so what?  It's just a means to an end, a way to explain why he's got superpowers (and not even a good reason..."Why's he so powerful?"  "Oh, he's from another planet!" "Okay, got it").  Whether he sees himself as an Earth man is irrelevant...he isn't one!  At least in the old days he was honest enough with himself to acknowledge and attempt to deal with his unearthly origins.  Now he just ignores them.  Whatever else that might say about his mental character, or lack of same, it is at the very least a waste of story potential.  Suppose you had a story about a "love child" who never knew his father's name.  Maybe he never once wonders who that man was or how he came to be his father, and maybe he'd be happy that way.  But it would sure make for a dull story, wouldn't it?  Or as the saying goes, the unexamined life isn't worth living.

On a more personal level, everyone feels like an alien at some point or other, especially kids.  Maybe you can't identify with someone from another planet, but odds are you have felt like an outsider before, and that's where Superman is identifiable.  Again, this strikes me as a deliberate twist to the mythos, and a smart one.  How do you make the most powerful man on Earth sympathetic without taking away his powers?  Give him psychological depth.  The "alien thing" was their way of doing it, and it worked for me and millions of others.  (And frankly, if Byrne was interested in making Clark Kent "identifiable," he wouldn't have made him a football star and Pulitzer-winning columnist.  Heck, why not go all the way and just make him Tom Cruise?)

My point is that every character needs something to set him apart from the crowd.  The poor, put-upon sad sack gimmick has been done: it's called Peter Parker.

What I like about the post-Byrne character is that Superman is effectively made up of three identities:  Kal-El, Clark Kent and Superman.

Kal-El, rarely seen because he isn't very heroic, is a rational being.  No emotions but a great intellect and great power.  He's the Last Son of Krypton, and he operates on the most basic function simply to continue the existence of his people.  Kal-El is essentially a completely detached God to whom the problems of mere human beings are nothing more than the melodrama of ants.

Clark Kent, on the other hand, is pretty powerless.  No, he's not literally powerless, since he has all the muscle in the world, but he doesn't know where to put it.  He's very emotional, just like any other human being, but also like any other human being, Americans in particulars, he can do much more than he knows and he knows much less than he understands.  Where Kal-El cares about nothing, Clark Kent cares about everything and so ends up directionless, a bumbler, awkwardly chasing after butterflies.

Superman is where these two "halves" overlap, cancelling out the negative traits and augmenting the positive traits.

The thing is, for that to work, Krypton had to be cold and ultimately worthless place.  Which then necessitated further changes, and on, and on.

Which doesn't necessarily make it better than the pre-Byrne versions of Superman.  Personally, my favorite is the Golden Age Superman, who was pretty simple:  "Well, now that I've figured out the right thing to do, I'll do it.  Because I can."

That's what I think we need; a mixture of Clark the decent man who was raised among humans by a loving family, and Kal-El, the starchild forever enthralled with humanity and devoted to their protection, but feeling the dull ache of knowing he'll never truly be one of them, that he is the last of his kind in all the universe.

 -Def.

jmr72777, I think that we have to call him a murderer (or would killer be more accurate?) and that we are just kidding ourselves when we say that our political leaders are not guilty of murder when they order soldiers to kill others, especially noncombatants or "innocents".  I realize that this is how the world operates (and I would probably do the same thing if I ever had the misfortune to be a political leader), I'm just opposed to the wordplay we engage in that allows us to gloss over these facts (and allows most of us to sleep at night/remain sane).

Regardless, I think the analogy equating the "Superpowers" and Superman is very useful and I find myself thinking of it all the time these days --something many comics writers have been doing for years (the examples I'm most familiar with are Moore's Watchmen, Miller's Dark Knight and the Authority).  Maybe it's proof of my arrested development, but I thought about superheroes on 9-11 and now almost everyday since the invasion of Afghanistan.  I saw a short news doc about Bush's Texas ranch/hometown and all I could think of was Superboy and Smallville --(the version from the Crime Syndicate's Earth, of course -- I also think of Canada as Earth Prime and the US as Earth I. :D).



Nightwing, I feel the same way about the Silver Age and feel that this website provides the same function vis Superman's Fortress (will I feel this way if Morrison's "All-Star" Superman triumphs and becomes the norm?).  I love the loneliness of Superman while feeling it is sustainable despite the existence of Kandor, Supergirl, etc.  

One of my favorite writers on this theme is Michael E. Grost whose Classic Comics website is chock-a-block full of interesting observations on the Superman mythos:

Classic Comics Home-Page:
http://members.aol.com/MG4273/comics.htm
Superman:
http://members.aol.com/MG4273/superman.htm
The Mourning Stories:
http://members.aol.com/MG4273/superman.htm#Mourning

Telle,

I think my problem comes with the negative connotation that this site (which I enjoy very much, regardless) places upon SUPERMAN: The Murderer.  I've spent countless posts here (I think most of the ones in my message count, in fact) in some way or another defending his actions.  This is not because I agree with murder.  I don't.  However, circumstances dictate actions and consequences.  I could re-open the argument all over again, but for now I won't.  What I will say is that if you (the royal "you," not necessarily you in particular) think the Iron Age SUPERMAN is any less heroic than the Silver Age, fine (although I wouldn't necessarily agree if you said the same about the Golden Age.)

What I would say, is what this particular thread has touched upon already.  Be it Golden, Silver, Bronze or Iron, the essential core of the character is still SUPERMAN.  Not because he was rocketed to Earth from the planet Krypton (although that DOES help), but because in his core, he's the same character.  The same man.  The same (if you will) soul.

The rest, is minutae.  It's not important whether or not he embrace his Kryptonian heritage.  That's not who he is.  How long did it take for the ORIGINAL SUPERMAN to come to that point?  How many years?  Not the 30's.  Not the 40's.  Maybe there was a genesis in the 50's.  Maybe it came into it's own in the 60's.  And maybe it really became an important part of his character in the 70's.  So really, how important is it to his character?  If it was that important, SUPERMAN would not have been the iconic character he was for all those years before.

I'm sure that someone here may find evidence to dispute me.  Of course SUPERMAN thought about and talked about Krypton before the 60's.  I wouldn't dispute that.  I would just say that it became an overriding part of him in the 60's-70's, almost 30 years after he was created.  Before then, it was a small part of him.

As for powering him down?  I was never happier then when he was powered down.  It was the same as making Kryptonite scarce.  It always urked me that any dime-store hood could buy Kryptonite and manufacture it into whatever they wanted.  And as for a guy who can "juggle planets?"  What sort of threat do half the people on this planet pose to him?  There can only be so many super sci-fi/technical gadgets or magical potions that any person can read about before they all blur together.  Besides which, if SUPERMAN could travel fast enough to break the time barrier, doesn't it stand to reason that if he didn't travel quite that fast, but perhaps a little slower, he would never be late to anything?  He'd always arrive on time, with time to spare.  He could almost be literally everywhere at once.  How much drama does THAT create?  I'm generalizing, but I don't think the point is any less valid.

       I agree completely. Superman can still be the most powerful hero on Earth and should be the physically strongest probably but that should not mean his strength is limitless and all the world is one second away. Frankly the current Supes has creeped a little power high for me.  The silver age Superman was great not because of his extreme power level but because of the man he was, the example he set and the upbeat wildly, imaginative stories we saw.

It happen in the 1940's that he found out he was an alien, during the Golden Age, the story was reprinted in DC's The Greatest Golden Age Stories Ever Told. It was a HUGE part of him all through the 1950's, 1960's and 1970's and the 1st half of the 1980's.





Let me tell you straight up, no matter what some people may think this is a PRE-CRISIS site, please note that all the post crisis stories that were posted here or are talked about here have something to do with the pre-crisis Superman. Therefore to complain about this fact is like going to a Yankee message board and complain about the lack on Mets fans, I mean they are both New York City Pro Baseball teams, but everyone know they do not share the same fans and they are not the same thing.

Beyond the issues of the character's relative heroism or morality, or physical powers/strength, there is the problem of these circumstances that "dictate actions and consequences":  the post-Crisis writers and editors inserted the character into generally horrible, self-indulgent, aesthetically ugly stories --with little of the craft or care (or long-term marketing savvy) that marked most of the previous 45 or so years' stories.  I'm sure there are some bright spots but the essential dilution and poverty of the Post-Crisis incarnation of Superman can't be ignored.

With this as a given, the story about a Superman-like character killing another character is perfectly fine. :D

And I would agree that the rest in minutae  but it is minutae introduced to make the stories interesting and to give the characters aspects of a well-rounded personality.  I feel we can't ignore the minutae for these reasons, precisely because the characters are much more than their essential natures.  Besides, what would I do with all my time if I wasn't thinking about Superman minutae?

Super Monkey,

I know this site is a Silver-Age fan site.  I see your analogy regarding Mets/Yankees.  My problem is what I perceived from some as being a lack of tolerence.  I mean no disrespect to you, or to anyone else I have had the pleasure of debating with.  I enjoy these debates, which is part of the reason I bring this stuff up.  Again, the other part is the small amount of intolerance that I've come up against.  One would naturally assume that a SUPERMAN fan would be FULL of tolerance and respect for the beliefs of others.  Some I have encountered seem to really look at the POST-CRISIS SUPERMAN as being tantamount to the Anti-Christ.  In the vein, I simply maintain that he's not THAT bad.

I do believe that there is merit to be found in the IRON AGE version.  I'm not a HUGE fan of the SILVER AGE or BRONZE AGE versions, but I will respect their contributions to the mythos and to the legend.



I know he found out in the 40's.  That's not in dispute.  I'm looking at how much a part it played in who he is.  Unless I'm mistaken, GREAT RAO (pardon me, oh great one, leader of the site) didn't become his official exclamation for some time afterwards.  Up until that point, I believe it was GREAT SCOTT!  (And, before you say anything, I know that GREAT MOONS OF KRYPTON was also one, among others.)

I think if you really wanted to be fair, you could say that he truly thought of himself as KAL-EL of Krypton starting *maybe* in the mid to late 60's.  Before then, I think he thought of himself as SUPERMAN, and KAL-EL and his heritage were saved for more convenient plot purposes.


And, Telle?

I love the minutae as much as the next guy.  I'd like to think that neither of us let the minutae get in the way of our enjoying this truly great character.   :D

There is a big difference between people disagreeing with you and intolerance, of course, most people here will disagree with you since this is a pre-reboot site, but there is no intolerance here. No one will never ever be banned for liking the reboot Superman.





This is simply NOT true, there is just no way this could be true. I have the FACTS to back it up:

FACT : SUPERMAN Returns to Krypton! 1949
FACT : Three Supermen from Krypton 1950
FACT : Superman's Big Brother 1953
FACT : Krypto the Superdog  1955
FACT : Superman Land  1955
FACT : Supermonkey! 1957
FACT : Kandor  1958
FACT : Supergirl  1959

That's only a small taste of the endless stories from the 50's that deal directly with Superman's Kryptonian origins!

jmr 72777 writes:



You're right to a certain extent.  Ask people all over the world who Superman is and they will list off the "iconic" references, not the minutae we as comic collectors tend to focus on.  They will reference the Daily Planet, Lois Lane, Jimmy Olsen, Clark Kent, and the other handful of set pieces and characters who survive all the various interpretations on radio, in films and on TV (which, let's not kid ourselves, is how most people know Superman, not through the comics).  They will also know he was rocketed from Krypton, though they probably don't know his parents names and they certainly don't care what the architecture looked like or how the government was structured.

But for those of us who want more, who want to go deeper, there are the comics.  And I would argue that until the 80s, the building of the mythos was an additive process.  Layer upon layer was added to the central mythos, making it richer and more nuanced.  Some additions didn't work and were discarded, others did work and were maintained, then added to.   But on the whole, nothing new destroyed anything before it.  The 40s Superman was still from Krypton, he just didn't know it yet.

Then comes 1986 and it's all out the window.  Sure you can argue that the iconic stuff is still there, so why complain?  "You've got Clark and Lois and Jimmy and the Planet, you've got the costume and the powers.  What are you complaining about?"  And maybe all that's enough for some people.  But those of us who invested a lot of time and emotion in the old mythos needed convincing.  We needed to be shown why it all had to go away.  Specifically we need to know that it was sacrificed in favor of something better, or at least equally good.  Many of us feel we never got that.  

Is it possible to create a Superman who's not interested in Krypton and make him interesting?  Probably.  But it hasn't happened yet!  If I felt for a moment that the post-Crisis Superman was equal in quality to the pre-Crisis model I'd shrug my shoulders and say, "Eh...apples and oranges."  But as it is, I'm left thinking, "They got rid of Superman for THIS?"

In fairness, you are dead right: remaking Krypton, or putting "Clark" before "Kal" are not things that "ruin" Superman in and of themselves.  The problem is Superman stories have been rotten, on the whole, for a long time now, and when we are left to do our post-mortem and ask "why?" we start analyzing where things might have gone wrong.  What we (some of us anyway) have decided is that some wrong decisions may have torpedoed the reboot from Day One.

Understand I was hopeful, even excited about the reboot at the time.  I was not running around yelling "they're ruining Krypton!" or whatever.  It's only now, years later, that I look back and begin to understand why things worked one way but not so well the other.  In fact, in 1986 I may have made some of the same mistakes myself.  But I like to think that I would have admitted my mistakes earlier on and reversed some of them.



It's not so much that Krypton's ignored, but that it's been remade.  Before, it was a scientific utopia, a dream of what Earth might be in a thousand years.  And Superman, the "Man of Tomorrow," was here to guide us toward that bright future.  Now, Krypton is a dystopian nightmare world, a place that's remembered only long enough to deliver a cautionary tale.  Krypton is the hell we might turn Earth into if we forget our humanity. The new Superman's message, if he has one at all, is "don't go there!"  

You can argue that's minutae, and maybe it is, but as the saying goes, little things mean a lot.  This subtle shift in the mythos has had lasting and sweeping effects, and for my money it cast a dark cloud over Superman's new adventures from the very beginning.  It took something bright and hopeful out of the story and left something dark and dreary in its place.  We was robbed!

Super Monkey,

Perhaps INTOLERENCE, like MURDERER is too strong a word.  I don't mean to say that people have been mean or cruel in any way.  I wouldn't frequent the site if I felt that way.  Certainly everyone here has been nice.  And I don't expect everyone to agree with me, just as I don't agree with others.  I have great respect and fondness for this site, and would think it unfortunate if anyone felt I was here as some sort of malcontent.

In the spirit of debate, I merely state my opinions that the "Byrne'd" continuity isn't as poisonous as some would believe.  Again, let me restate my congratulations to everyone here who feels that a triumph has been made in the reemergence of Silver Age ideas.

As to the other bit:



I would enjoy hearing more.  I think I'm still being misinterpreted, because I have not said that his Kryptonian origins weren't addressed.  Heck, in SUPERMAN #1, they restate his origins.  That's 1939-40, if I'm not mistaken.  I can only make statments regarding what I've seen on this site.  I think you can agree (I may be wrong) that the (for example) Elliot S! Maggin Superman/Kal-El paradigm, their relationship to the whole, and the "Kal-El" persona's prominence is VERY different from how it appears in "Three Supermen From Krypton," "Superman's Big Brother", and "Supergirl."  Back then, Kal-El was what you called Superman if you were Kryptonian.  I don't think it was ever made clear that that was how he thought of himself, as "Kal-El."  It wasn't until much later that he took on a much strong sense of alien self.

Again, though, I can only say that based on the stories that I have read.  At 27 years of age, I spent the first 8-9 years of my life buying new SUPERMAN comics and reading the ones that my Dad collected as a child.  I also had the benefit of a few collected editions of SUPERMAN stories throughout the years leading up to that.  I remember reading SUPERMAN's first meeting with Mxyzptlk.  SUPERMAN's first encounter with Lex Luthor.  The ORIGINAL SUPERGIRL (from the magic totem) as well as Kara's origin.  "Superman No More," an especially poignant story which I enjoyed.  Stories from "Superman's Lawyer," back to Action #1, all the way through to Alan Moore's "Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow."  And then, I continued buying new comics when John Byrne restarted in 85-86.

My memories are admitedly clearer of the Post-Crisis continuity, but I do have a fair share of Pre-Crisis experience.  That is why I would like to hear more.  In the grander sense of the comics that I read, that was my take.  The true paradigm shift in SUPERMAN's psyche happened much later.  He explored his Kryptonian heritage in these early stories, true.  But he really embraced it much later.

I would argue the original Byrne stories were actually pretty good and mostly upbeat until we hit the Legion fix stories. The problem is Byrne didn't realize what a mess later writers would make of his changes or the reprocusions of them.. The point about Krypton is well taken. From stolen Utopia to place that destroyed itself in a later revision. I would certainly agree the additive process was infinitely richer and more satisfing in the long run. That said, I still really enjoy most of Byrne's Superman run but really hate what the present books have gone to. Telle called it prefectly in his characterization of the modern tales.
    I'm personally more annoyed at the drek that has accumulated post crisis than all the stuff beforehand.   I might roll my eyes at some of the sillier older stuff but it never left me as annoyed as many of the modern comics. I yell all the time "Superman would never do that!"as my wife patiently agrees. I REALLY want to support the comics industry but they need to give me a product that doen't make me crazy,
    Frankly most of my superhero fix now comes from reading old comics( really cool with your kids), watching JLU and playing freedom force(great games allows custom heroes olay often as Supes.). If the comics industry would give me something not gritty and gross but interesting I would patronize it a whole lot more.

Simply not true.

Please read this story from Action Comics #210 (1955), by Bill Finger, Wayne Boring, and Stan Kaye "Superman in Superman Land"
http://superman.nu/tales2/supermanland

That's proof potive that he had Embraced his Kryptonian heritage FULLY!

Super Monkey,

I remember reading that story when it was reprinted in a larger size.  Part of something or other like "The Amazing World of Superman."  My friend had it and let me read it.  Funny how it just all comes back to you, isn't it?

Actually, as much fun as it was to re-read it, I don't see how it makes your point.  Although, I will admit it's subject to interpretation.  I would like to believe that SUPERMAN did not approach an amusement park company with the idea of creating a park based on his life.  To me, that sounds kind of conceited.  I would prefer to think that the company approached him, and SUPERMAN being the man he is said that he would allow them to do that provided they donated all proceeds to charity or something akin to that.

With that in mind, it would be up to the amusement park directors to decide the content, (although one could argue that SUPERMAN himself would insist on what is what.)  Personally, I'm not sure that a man who is concerned that people will try to hurt him through his friends would insist on an entire wing that deals with exactly who his closest friends are.  That I will leave to the innocence of a bygone era and the fact that the story was written for kids.

I see the Krypton exhibit as being an aspect of sensational amusement park work.  The owner of the exhibit would need the kind of content that would stimulate the imagination of the kids.  Scenes from Krypton would certainly do that.  Not to mention, people are aware of his orgins, so like any museum dedicated to a subject, the orgins have to be addressed.  However, if you look at the story as a whole, I think it makes my point more than yours.  Look at how much space was donated to Krypton as opposed to everything else in the story.  It had equal space with the other facets of his life, sure....His powers, his friends, novelties, etc.  But it got no greater space or time than anything else.  It was a part that he knew a lot about.  Not to mention, if he had truly embraced it, wouldn't they have mentioned his Kryptonian name on the tour?  Or maybe some family history?  

I look at stories like the one (I forget the name) where BATMAN shows SUPERMAN what his life would have been like if he had never left Krypton as showing a man who is certainly wondering about his heritage, but not one who has embraced it.  He isn't living his life as a Kryptonian.  He doesn't seem to celebratet their holidays yet or anything like that.  It's certainly a part of him, it's just not the overriding piece of his personality.

SteamTeck writes:



Well, this gets back to the point I was making about the importance of starting things off on the right foot.

Jerry Seigel relegated Krypton to a couple of panels in the first origin story and all we knew was it was an advanced culture in the Flash Gordon mold..something cool and spiffy looking.  It was only years later when other writers (and a returned Seigel) started filling in the blanks, as it were, and tried to flesh out the details; what kind of technology might exist on Krypton?  What would Superman's father have been like as a person? How would an advanced culture deal with crime and punishment? And so on.  What emerged, bit by bit, was an appealing culture we could admire and aspire to.  Was that the objective from the beginning?  Possibly not, but as the legend grew, writers and readers realized this was a cool place.

Byrne recreated Krypton as a dystopia.  Like Seigel, he didn't dwell on it much...it was there, it blew up, end of story.  But in order to get to that moment in "Man of Steel" #6 when Supes says, "I don't care where I'm from, I'm an Earthman now," Byrne stacked the deck and made Krypton the kind of place it was hard to pine for.  Or perhaps more to the point, he tried to make Superman's arrival on Earth an "escape," a gift from father to son, a chance to live life more fully and satisfyingly than he ever would at home.  Fair enough, but again other writers had to follow and in time they, too, would want to flesh out the details.  What was life like on this Krypton?  What kind of man was Jor-El?  And so on.  And the answers they got were very different from the answers pre-Crisis writers got, because the basic building blocks provided by Byrne were totally inverted from those given by Seigel.

So to my mind, there is no such thing as "minutae" when it comes to the Superman mythos, or at least not when it comes to his origin.  However sketchy the details when you start out, they will over time be fleshed out and added to, and they will slop over into other aspects of the book until they are so entwined in the mythos they can't be ignored.  Consider: the portrayal of Krypton post-Crisis affects the way Superman sees himself, the way he interacts with his foster parents, the way other aliens see him, and so on.  It gave us the Eradicator, the Cleric, the new Fortress and tons of other trappings in the new legend.  In various ways, the new Krypton has affected every facet of the new Superman.

Anyway, you're right: I don't think Byrne did consider the repercussions of his stories, which is why he was the wrong man for the job.  He's good at playing with other people's toys...Jerry Seigel's, Stan Lee's, Jack Kirby's...but except for some FF stuff, I've always felt everything he ever did on any character at Marvel or DC should carry an "Elseworlds" label...maybe it's fun to read, but it should never be canon.

The simple fact that the comics had story after story about Krypton with many of these stories focusing on and built around the fact that he is Kryptonian makes it impossible to argue that it wasn't suppose to be a big part of him, since if that was true why were there  countless stories about Krypton during the 1950's?

The real life reason of course was because Sci-Fi was HUGE during the 1950's so focusing on Superman's alien side became very important during this time as a way to cash in of the Sci-Fi fad.

So why would this be important now? Well, I think that Nightwing has already put it best.

Thing is, while I don't necessarily think that Byrne's version of Krypton was thematically appropriate for Superman, I do think it looked a lot better and made more sense from a technological point of view.

And some ideas were just plain neat.  Byrne kind of blended the previous two versions of Krypton in certain ways that I don't see people picking up on (so maybe it's just in my imagination).  For example, whereas before Byrne you had stories about Kryptonians that had powers on Krypton, conflicting with the stories where Kryptonians had no powers, Byrne had powerless Kryptonians wearing skintight suits that gave them immense abilities.  This even helped to make sense of why Superman's costume was skintight, not exactly the sort of thing that would have otherwise made sense.

Byrne also got away from the Flash Gordon visuals of previous eras, which was good, and if you don't believe me, check out the early 80s version of Flash Gordon that remains stylistically true to the old serials and tell me that it looked like you want Krypton to look.  While I might find that a gutsy move, I don't know if that's what would put butts in the seats, y'know?

I wouldn't suggest making Krypton look Flash Gordon-esque in today's jaded world. Rather, I think Krypton should look like a positive portrayal of the future from a modern perspective. For example, Krypton would be a world where many of the problems that face our world would have been fixed. The only real flaw Krypton should have is that many of its people are overconfident and lazy (Jor-El and Lara are not, however). It is this one flaw that results in their destruction.

This would be a true tragedy, rather than the mercy killing of a civilization long since devoid of feeling. The death of the Kryptonians is something that should’ve been preventable, if not for pride. Krypton should be the place Kal-El longs to return to, but alas, never can. He should be determined to see that Earth and the humans inhabiting it don’t have the same thing happen to them.

Super Monkey,

I'm going to restate this point blank, and ask if you agree:



If so, how would you describe the difference.  If not, please explain.

[Of course, if you'd rather not, that's fine too  :D ]

Getting back to an earlier point that seems to have been lost, while Superman is clearly 'human' both in characterization and biology, what resonates about the Kryptonian/alien angle is/was the marginalized outsider, the loneliness of the man and his mission.  A lot of struggling adolescents and a fair number of adults can relate to that loneliness and find it quite compelling.  Don Quixote works because he speaks to that in our souls -- and so does classic Superman.  In many ways, he's the ultimate immigrant too, which speaks louder about America since it's largely a nation built upon immigrants.

Byrned Superman did away with that lonely outsider and made him 'just one of the guys like us'.  He didn't suffer for his cause nor was it elevated because it was so difficult for him.  In fact, Byrned Lost Son of Krypton seems to have particularly weak motivations that come closest to being a rip-off of Spider-Man's in MOS #1: He's a hero to atone for abusing his powers on the gridiron.  Making him 'just one of us' loses not only the outsider angle but the immigrant theme.  His Byrned origin basically just paid lip-service to his tradition of being an alien/immigrant but then made it completely irrelevant -- and even a nuisance to be ignored! -- to this Superman.

Captain Kal,

I don't think that in MOS #1, Superman was inspired to be a hero to atone for abusing his powers.  If anything, it was a means to an end.  His parents had been teaching him to keep his powers secret and so forth.  For the most part he had been, but not on the field.  He kept them in check, but still used them to his advantage.  The wake-up call (and I think many can relate to this) was really in the disappointment that his father showed.  It served to jolt him.  It's admitedly a stretch that his father had been unaware of what he was doing for so long, but given that, serious parental disappointment can hit people hard.

It was all this that spurred him to re-think his life.  He then traveled the world, where he helped where he could.  In his travels, he was taught the lonliness of what and who he is.  He always helped people anonymously.  He hid his abilities from them, and remained in the shadows.  That's not exactly a cozy way to live.  He was, in effect, an outsider.  Being CLARK KENT is even more of that.  Remember that even if CLARK isn't a bumbling oaf, he still isn't SUPERMAN.  He can't be super strong or super fast.  He still has to hide who he really is and what he can really do.  Keeping secrets like that can also make one lonely.  And even if he can talk to his parents, who can only talk to their parents?  It's still a lonely existence.

I don't think the concept was lost per se, but that its focus was shifted.

If one reads MOS #1 carefully, it must be noted that Clark himself admits that his parents had taught him over the years to not use his powers to make himself better than anyone else, to make anyone feel useless -- and that that's exactly what he was doing.  IOW, he knowingly and deliberately disobeyed what his parents specifically taught him not to do.  And this was extended over at least several years of high school football going by those several football trophies Lois saw in his apartment later.  Darn straight that he screwed-up here.  This is yet another example of Byrne's flawed writing and characterization.  For that Jonathan-admonishing-Clark scene to work, we have to accept that Jonathan was such an uninvolved, absentee father or a remarkably dense dunderhead not to have noticed his son abusing his powers for all those years on the gridiron, and we also have to accept a Clark willfully disobeying his parents' express wishes on this matter for the same period.  His parents come off as seriously retarded and Clark comes off as immoral.  Human error is making the odd mistake.  Human culpability results from a pattern of repeatedly doing the wrong thing and knowingly.

Anyway, Byrne's 'making Clark lonely' isn't new since Clark has always been an outsider and a loner in all his incarnations.

Captain Kal,

I never meant to imply that Clark being lonely was a Byrne invention.  Merely that this loneliness is an identifiable trait as valid as if it were because of his alien origins.  It's just something more readily identifiable to the audience.

Was he amoral as a teen?  No.  He was an adolescent.  Teens do rebellious things.  It's all about perspective.  You see, first of all, with the post-crisis addition that he didn't come to Earth with powers, but that they built over time, it's perfectly plausible (at least for the sake of speed, although not invulnerability) that when he started playing football, he didn't have THAT much of an advantage over the other players.  Besides which, it's one thing to be MVP and another to effectively bench the rest of the team.  This may simply have been the apex of Clark's abilities, and it had gotten to the point that Jonathan finally had to say something.

Clark has never come across as lonely and only can be speculated to have been so on his travels as you posited above.  This was certainly not an element of Byrne's revamp.

Clark was clearly shown lifting a truck with one hand to get his ball as a kid sometime around eight years old or so, and certainly before he turned into a teenager.  No human on Earth could stand up to a kid with that kind of strength.  He obviously was far stronger in high school.  Your speculation here contradicts what MOS #1 clearly showed us about his power development.  The coach and Lana certainly did agree that Clark had been a star player for quite awhile.  Lana agreed that Clark was just getting better and better.  The coach declared that Clark just won another one for the team which surely means he's done this before.  The coach even said Smallville has never seen such a great all-around athlete like Clark Kent which implies he's been abusing his super-powers in other sports than just football.

Captain Kal,

All valid arguments.  On the flip side, it was never shown or even hinted at that little Clark was kicking through the bottom of his cradle, nor was he flying around the ceiling as a child (post-crisis.)  As such, one could make an argument that (running with the SOLAR BATTERY theory) that he was soaking in energy, and that he could do stuff (at that age) but just not for a prolonged time.  And that long-term storage of the solar energy is what made him SUPER later on and which was why the abilities such as flight, x-ray vision and so forth didn't manifest until later in life.

Byrne glossed over it enough that many theories could be valid, depending on how you want to look at it.  As for being a football hero, I contend that there are many football heroes abounding right now that aren't from other planets.  He merely could have been a great player when he started (star status) who became phenomenal as the years passed.  If one WANTS to believe that the Kents were neglecting parents and that CLARK was an amoral thug, then certainly they could rationalize it that he had his abilities all along.

It's the fundamental difference in the YELLOW SUN part between Pre and Post crisis.  In the Pre-Crisis SUPERMAN, he couldn't have been a solar battery, because he just couldn't store the stuff.  The moment he was exposed to the rays of a Yellow Star he was up to full strength.  The moment he was exposed to the rays of a Red Sun, he IMMEDIATELY lost his powers......  Therefore, he had them all along.  The Post-Crisis SUPERMAN had to store up his energy to work at full power.  This was taken a step further when a group of villains (I forget which) decided to tax SUPERMAN by creating all sorts of worldwide havoc in an attempt to wear him down and deplete his stores of solar radiation.

Just for the record, this panel was not from 1986's Man of Steel, it was from a Karl Kesel story published in the 1990s.  At that time, it was a radical change of direction from the theory put forth in MOS that Clark's powers came on him slowly and didn't begin to manifest until his teens.  This was the first of many attempts to slowly alter the MOS continuity to try to fix it.

(http://superman.nu/a/images/ball.jpg)

:s:

No, Great Rao.  MOS #1 did show the truck lift scene which Byrne kept as an homage to an earlier version of Superman's origin.  This wasn't Kesel's idea nor Byrne's but from an origin in the early Silver Age.

Clark was supposedly completely powerless as a newborn up until eight.  That was the first demonstration of super-powers: his invulnerability to being trampled to death by a bull.  His super-strength manifested next on the next page as he casually lifted that truck with one hand to retrieve his baseball.

Given all that is actually stated during Byrne's run in MOS and elsewhere, Superman does not appreciably lose his stored power for any period less than three days.  Nothing in canon supports the baseless speculation that his younger self ever had bouts of losing power in shorter periods.  Indeed, Jor-El did state that the yellow star would make Kal-El grow ever more powerful.  Speculation only counts if some evidence exists to support it.  It fails even more if evidence contradicts it.

The fact remains is that Clark did knowingly abuse his powers on several occasions and we only saw the 'final straw' that Jonathan took Clark to task on.

The coach said Clark just won 'another one' for them.  That's plural for being the star player.  He said Smallville never saw a better all around athlete like Clark Kent.  That means he did this in a number of other sports besides just football.

Only the Zero Hour retcon that put his power development in his late teens could fix that.  Post Zero Hour, Clark could compete fairly in sports since he didn't have any powers until nearly adulthood.  Before that, he was clearly cheating.

I stand corrected. I'll have to stay out of this discussion, my neurons and knowledge are obviously focused on something other than Byrne.

I'm going to go read some more Jimmy Olsen now... :oops:

:s:

Captain Kal,

The evidence to support Clark's growing powers over time is still in MOS#1.  Clark didn't start flying until he was 17-ish, remember?  And he was definitely older than 8 when he looked into the next room and found Ma's purse with his x-ray vision, no?

It's not baseless, and there is evidence to support it.  Again, how many football seasons could Clark have participated in in high school?  If he won the last 5 games for the team, SOLO, that would still be a minority in the season, and more than enough to only start raising eyebrows then.  I appreciate your attention to detail.  



I don't believe that it was ever clearly stated that he had bouts of losing his powers per se.  I am merely looking at it from the standpoint of what a rechargable battery can do.  It stores energy just fine as long as it is plugged in.  However, it doesn't store energy nearly as well if you're using it at the same time.  Now, if the energy is low to begin with, and you use energy while it's charging, you could run into problems.  This on top of the fact that as he gets older, his body should be able to store and process the energy more efficiently (one would think.)  Putting this all together should reasonably support what you may claim to be a "baseless speculation."

Furthermore, if you want to take it one step further, the powers would never necessarily disappear per se, but the power levels would fluctuate.  I don't think that THAT is too much of a stretch.....

When I read Superman comics from the 40's, 50's, 60's 70's and early 80's, aka pre-reboot Superman comics, I always had the sense that it was the same person, any difference perceived was just due to writing style rather than any change in his personality or values.

When I read the post-reboot Superman comics, which I don't not read anymore, I do not get this sense. I called him Superman in name only.
That's not to say that all post-reboot stories are awful, just the vast majority of them.

Some good Modern Superman Comics:


http://superman.nu/tales3/deadman-xmas/
http://superman.nu/a/ProArt/swan3.php
http://superman.nu/tales2/truth/
http://superman.nu/tales3/last/
http://superman.nu/tales2/thesuperman/
http://superman.nu/tales2/thesuperman/2/
http://superman.nu/tales2/thesuperman/3/
http://superman.nu/tales3/typical/

One of the big differences between pre and post crisis Clark/Superman is in pre the Kents were gone, and even though the lesson they taught him would go on Clark was disposable. Superman could always just pack it in and create an other persona if he needed to.  With the Kent’s alive it brings a whole new dimension to his life, one being if he abandoned Clark Kent, how would it affect them and how would they explain it to everyone. Plus it affects his line of thinking and feeling, one of the things, I believe that made him grown into Superman was not only did he lose Krypton and everything he had there, He lost the Kent’s at a young age also and his fathers last words to him were along the line of  “ It’s time to put away childish things and become a man, to become the force for good that only you can”.  I think this was a very internal motivation for him to not let Pa Kent down.

Clark/Superman/Kal-El is one of the most complicated characters in comics because he is a man of 3 worlds, as Clark he has his life as an ordinary human with friends that treat him as an equal and he has gained some success in his chosen field, which has earned him respect and admiration of his peer group but doesn’t really set him apart from them. As Superman he is viewed as a the ultimate hero, and force for good even his co-members of the meta-human world look at him in awe most of the time (with the possible expectation of Wonder Woman and Batman.) As Kal-El he is the man with out a world and will always be separate from us, other alien heroes can go home again if they change things about themselves or are willing to accept something on their home worlds Kal doesn’t have that option.  This may be why he embraced the Kryptonian culture as much as he could; it was all that he had to keep him connected and the memory of his home world alive.
 The discovery of Kandor while giving him a physical connection could never become his home, because that would mean leaving every bit of Clark/Superman behind and wouldn’t allow him to live up to the Kent’s dreams for him.  And as he discovered in the arc “who took the super out of superman” he can’t give up being Clark or Superman either.  While he may walk among us and even inspire us to be better then we think we can be, Clark/Superman/Kal-El will never truelly be one of us.
Not even Supergirl had to deal with this. She was born and raised as Kara Zor-El, became a Supergirl, and adopted the identity of Linda Lee, her adtoped parents were still alive as well as her birth parents, in many ways she had it much eaiser then her cousin ever did or could.

Just my thoughts, feel free to comment or flame

Super Monkey,

Asked and answered, of course.  I wish I shared your opinion of the pre-crisis SUPERMAN.  All I can say is that while I do enjoy the stories and the character, there are certain things which just got better starting in 1985-6.

As for you example of the modern stories that aren't bad, that's a very interesting selection you have.  Some don't take place in current continuity, others are written to purposely resemble previous ages and the remaining was written by......... well, nevermind that.  I appreciate the nature of your choices.

Just A Fan,

You've reminded me of another thing that I didn't really like about the Pre-Crisis SUPERMAN -- The feeling that he could abandon CLARK KENT and just be SUPERMAN.  This always seemed to be to be a bit shallow, because it led one to believe that he didn't really care for the friendships he had made as CLARK to Lois, Jimmy, Perry and the rest.  Certainly, according to "Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow," there were contingencies in place, but that's an awful lot to expect, isn't it?  That was a special circumstance anyway.

Super Monkey's original post in this thread was about how much he liked the Man of Tomorrow archives and what a great thing it was that the book was published and that DC has a few "classic Superman" projects in the pipeline.  This is all great stuff.

But here's what I want to know:  How come whenever anyone posts anywhere that s/he likes the Silver Age Superman, it somehow degenerates into an interminable Byrne MOS argument, rehashing all the minutae in the 1986 mini-series?  What is the alleged connection?  This has been a continuing pattern for the last 18 or 19 years.  When are we going to move past it folks?  JB certainly isn't worth all the talk he generates, and his continuity is over.

It's time to move on.

I'm sure I'm going to regret this, but what is the current canonical DC version of Superman's origin/heritage?  Is there an intro for beginners on the "official" SM homepage or a new miniseries/origin issue that has replaced Man of Steel for a new generation?

My understanding is that Man of Steel was retconned out in a recent issue of Superman involving the Futuresmiths.  Superman's new origin was given in the Birthright miniseries.

The artwork on the hardcover collection actually gives the full title as:
Superman: Birthright: The Origin of the Man of Steel (this last part is in really small type):

(http://superman.nu/superman-comics/birth-mid.jpg)

The reviews at amazon (http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1401202519/ref=ase_theamalgamatron/102-9048484-0272956?v=glance&s=books) are worth reading.

So is the book.

My apologies Starchild for the degeneration of this thread into another JB rant.  The interesting part of that is, while I do appreciate his contribution to what I perceive as another great chapter in SUPERMAN's life (as the floodgates of criticism open wide...) I don't see him as the messiah or anything.  I simply don't understand why people hate the so-called "Iron Age" so.  I mean, even SuperMonkey's list of good modern stories is essentially bare of any regular stories from the past 15-20 years.

I can certainly recall my favorite stories from EACH age, despite the overall merits of the age.  Yes, some of them are imaginary tales, but some of them are just regular canonical stories that reflect that par for stories in that age.

Call be stubborn but I just don't understand (despite reading the whole page devoted to it on this site) the sheer, unadulterated hatred for "the Iron Age."

Jmr72777,

The issue isn't whether Clark's powers grew or not.  The issue is that no canon evidence exists that he ever used up his powers faster when younger than when older.  He never suffered a power failure until the Post-Byrne stories Doomsday and The Final Night.  The only evidence we have is the number of powers and their power-levels increased over time; he was always getting stronger in one way or another.  The evidence for your speculation is nonexistent therefore it's a baseless speculation.  That's equivalent to making it up.

It was really a shame that they discarded all those stories way back when.  Hopefully the attitude readjustment will continue.  They literally threw the baby out with the bathwater when they redid the legend, in my own opinion.

To quote Alan Moore :

"Superman himself seems to have been a bit lost for a number of years, it's not the character I remember. What made the character appealing to me has been stripped away in a tide of revisionism. Given that I was somebody who sort of helped bring in the trend of revisionism in comics, I've got to take some of the blame for that. But it seems to me that there might have been a case of the baby being thrown out with the bathwater with the original Superman."

"What it was with Superman was the incredible range of imagination on display with that original character. A lot of those concepts that were attached to Superman were wonderful. The idea of the Bottled City of Kandor, Krypto the Superdog, Bizarro, all of it. These are fantastic ideas, and it was that which kept me going back each month to Superman when I was ten. I wanted to find out more about this incredible world with all of these fascinating details."

My problem isn't that Byrne rebooted Superman. It's that he went about it the wrong way.

Superman, to my mind, works best as a man of two worlds, Krypton and Earth. He embodies the best qualities of both but can never fully belong to either. This has been done to great effect in the Reeve movies and on the the WB animated show. Byrne's decision to make Krypton as horrible a place as possible so there would be no attachment to it whatsoever gutted the character, to me. Without that love and respect for his heritage, what is Superman? Just a Joe Average in tights, another Peter Parker. The grandeur and sense of being more than just a Kansas boy was deliberately gotten rid of. In its place we got a farm boy who would never grow away from that old mindset, and who had every reason to hate where he came from. For being so quick to bash the earlier Superman for being too Kryptonian, Byrne sure wasn't shy about plunging Superman into an equally harmfull opposite extreme.

The Luthor revamp was interesting at first, but over time, and especially in the last decade, it proved to be a creative dead end. Over and over again, Luthor was made so untouchable that he could never be exposed or defeated, and any exposure was blamed on evil clones and the like. He never grew or evolved as a character, and he ended up being really boring and static. And time and again, Superman was made to look stupid by never being able to expose Luthor. It's like DC didn't want to be bothered with growing away from the original Byrne setup. They just wanted to stay stuck in 1986 at all costs, and it was reflected in the stories.

The revamps of old characters was just pathetic. The assembly line of Supergirls has been hopelessly convoluted and hard to keep straight, especially the Byrne Supergirl. Brainiac started off with the stupidest of new origins and became another convoluted, confusing mess. The assembly line of disposable Bizarros, ending with the bizarre fantasy-made-flesh we now have? Worthless. The various General Zods from Byrne onward? Gimme the movie Zod any day; the post-Crisis comics versions are stupid beyond belief. And don't get me started on the two Kryptos....

And ultimately, the biggest problem I have is that Byrne made a point of sucking all the epicness and scope out of Superman. The stories, right from day one, were so down-to-earth that there was rarely ever any sense of lift, of greatness. Occasionally there've been some Superman stories that are truly great and worthy of the character, but they're the exceptions, not the rule. More and more DC opts for overwrought soap-opera contrivances. Like making Lois a blackhearted, emotionally abusive spouse who treats Clark like garbage and is always ready to walk out on him for no reason whatsover. Like giving Clark job woes and having Superman such a whiny, self-doubting loser that he has to seek therapy because he can't cope with being a superhero. Like piling on a mountain of dead-weight supporting characters whose sole purpose is to disguise the fact that Superman himself is being badly written. Like sticking the books in an "all-event, all the time" format where shallow, short-term gimmicks are what drive the series. And so on. DC doesn't WANT to write good Superman stories. The minute you get a book like Birthright that DOES try to bring back the greatness of yore or a book like Matt Wagner's Trinity that shamlessly depicts Superman as the herpoic, inspiring man of two worlds he's supposed to be, DC does everything possible to pretend those projects don't exist and leaves them to rot, supporting the latest regurgitated tripe instead. They really don't get Superman; all they care about is staying stuck in 1986 and that's that. What did they take from Birthright? Krypton's design scheme. They didn't even try to look at the richer persona Waid gave Superman. THe commanding, assured Superman of Trinity (the best post-Crisis Superman story to date)? DC wouldn't be caught dead using that treatment of Superman. They're too busy using angst-consumed Peter Parker-Lite.

A couple years ago, I read Alan Moore's Supreme TPBs, and I was shocked by them. Even though he was using a Superman analogue, his stories were genuniely, truly Superman, with updated takes on the classic characters that truly worked. Had Superman been rebooted in that fashion in 1986, the character would almost certainly not be in the hopeless mess he's in now, and the books would have been better off in the long run. Instead, after the dual failures of two miniseries that deserved far better fates, we're all pinning our hopes on All-Stars Superman to save the day. But again, I have to ask: What guarantee is there that DC will learn anything from it?

I agree 100% with EVERYTHING you said--you said it all.