Superman Through the Ages! Forum

Klar, I added the Sally Selwyn (http://superman.nu/wiki/index.php?title=Sally_Selwyn&rcid=915) entry for you.

:s:

I entered the Virus X article from the Fleisher Book (it's one of the many 'Superman' subsections: http://superman.nu/wiki/index.php/Superman#Virus_X )

but it needs to be updated with the information from that late 1960s story where Superman truly contracts the virus.  I don't remember how he got cured.

I updated the Super-monkey entry with some cover art.

Almost done with the revised figure illustration for Superman. I'll post it as soon as I can. If it's okay with everyone, I'd like to post the cover of Action Comics #1 alongside it for the entry.

Bizarros threw white kryptonite at Supes "funeral" capsule and the white K destroyed the virus a form of plant life.  This was a 6 part serial in Action in the late 60s.  Bizarro was showing his joy at Superman's "death" so that's why he was showrering him with various forms of K.

Thanks but I think someone else requested it. Possibly Al Plastino's best work ever!  

Ive added a ton of stuff that I need to expand like Luthor, Lex!  :shock:

Wait The Kryptonian (?) did and he even mentioned something non-canonical (YOU KNOW WHAT!!!).  

Ill deal with Young Lex's hair loss issues ...later. :wink:

Does anyone know who the Kryptonian is?  Kryptonian, are you on this forum?

He's got Byrne and post Byrne material in two entries - Lex Luthor and Clark Kent.

I posted about this on his talk page and on the Lex Luthor discussion page, but I don't think he noticed.

Sorry, I meant Kal's Pal.

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Byrne and Post-Byrne?!! NOOOOOOOOOO!!  :wink:  :lol:

Paging the RE-editor! :twisted:

oh crap, I'll edit it.

I just copied the old Lex Luther entry from this site.

I will try to fix Clark's as well.

and someone else can touch it up to make it perfect, but please no Iron Age stuff!!! :x

Nice work, old bean! :twisted:

I completely re-did both Lex and Clark Kent.

Check them out, both texts were taken from this site. So don't give me too much credit ;)

I also added a warning to the front page for those pesky Iron Age fans ;)

Thanks Rao! Hey, I know you guys seem to use 'The Great Superman Book' as your guiding point for Supermanica, but is it alright to still slightly alter entries directly from that book? Like, be slightly more clear on certain facts or even add to them? (For instance, in the 'Jor-El' entry, I'd like to mention how he helped avert an alien invasion by building  Krypton-II as mentioned in 'Krypton Lives Again!', Superman #189 - I don't believe it's mentioned there).

And regarding referring to issue numbers, perhaps putting them in italics when they are referred to, so as to make reading the profiles easier? Just a suggestion!

And BTW, is Superman (Kal-L) of Earth-2 going to be given a profile?

Yes you can add to them. The whole point of this protect was not just reprint the book on-line but also updated up until right before crisis.

You can add Superman (Kal-L) of Earth-2 if you wish because he was around long enough, so add away :)

Finished the entry on Neutron, the Living Bomb. KA-BOOM!  :twisted:

Also finally finished the new Superman figure illustration for the overview section of Superman's entry. I just didn't think the one I already posted was "Pre-Crisis" enough, so I took a cue from both Curt Swan's style and Alex Toth's Super Friends model sheets, and drew my own interpretation. Plus, I wanted to make the colour richer. Comments, anyone?

(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v313/Bill_9000/superman.jpg)

Stupendous, as usual.  I saw the image before your text and sure enough I thought, "looks like Swan meets Toth!"

So you nailed it. :D

Super Friendly  :D

I was just looking over the canonical sources list. Are we not including material from DC Comics Presents? That would mean eliminating such great villains as Mongul, or Kristin Wells' run as Superwoman (although she first appeared in the novel Superman: Miracle Monday, she didn't become Superwoman until DC Comics Presents Annual #2). Similarly, the Earth-1 and Earth-2 Luthors didn't meet face-to-face until DC Comics Presents Annual #1.

Just want to be clear on this before I start entering data that we shouldn't be including.

DCCP is a tough call.  Yes, the annuals have Superwoman, but the series in general has some questionable material and might be far too wide-ranging in its scope.  Superman and the Masters of the Universe?  Santa Claus?  The Vigilante?  And the final issue with Steve Gerber's PZ criminals, which was in that post-Crisis pre-Reboot grey zone.

As much as I'd like to pick-and-choose which issues of DCCP are canonical (this is the sort of thing I do with STTA, and in this case I would pick "just the DCCP annuals"), I think that with Supermanica we should include either the whole run or none of it.

I also think a good argument can be made either way.  Perhaps a poll (http://superman.nu/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?p=8911)?

:s:

Ugh! Finally finished the updates to Titano's entry. Now I'm going to sleep. G'night, all. :wink:

Restored "The Return of Titano" image to the page, in addition to your's as well.

G'night 9K.  Dont forget to recharge. :wink:

darn! I knew I forgot something!! Sorry, Klar. Actually, I rather like the way you include art credits for the covers. Think I'll do that with the cover images from now on.

Its OK Bill - that was a lot of text you entered. :)

Ah well ... at least it's a labour of love. Speaking of which, here's the latest illustrative piece that I wanna run by all'o yous before I upload it. Stand up and salute, for ye be in the presence of the Flag of Krypton!

(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v313/Bill_9000/flagofkrypton.jpg)

Um ... does anyone know how to sing the Kryptonian national anthem?  :oops:

Hail Hail Kryptonia? :wink:

Great flag!  I'm going to attach it to things randomly without any indication of what it is as a sort of secret code symbol for Superman fans to spot, like old hobo pictograms.

Just finished the text for the Mongul entry. I'm gonna upload the Krypton flag and insert it into the Krypton entry. Hmmm ... maybe I'll do a map of Krypton after I finish the Titano figure illustration.

Billie and Titano who'd a thunk? :wink:  :D

Great job on the Mongul entry, Bill!  If you're taking requests for pictures to do, what do you think about adding him to the list of possible subjects?

I just put together an entry for Professor Potter and found a great resource - I don't know whether or not this has already been mentioned here, but at http://www.comics.org , one of the search options is to search by character.  Then every story the character has appeared in is returned in the results.  I have no idea how accurate it is, though.

Capital idea, Starchild. I'll add Mongul to the list. And thanks for posting that link!! It's a fantastic resource for cover images.  :D

Bill, this may not even apply to your comment.  But I'd like to clear up any possible confusion: I have no objection to people scanning and uploading cover images - but I don't think we should be taking them from other sites - especially not from comics.org which, like Supermanica, is an open-source public project.  It looks like many different people have put a lot of effort into that site.  I really don't know how they would feel about having the material used elsewhere.  Maybe they would mind, maybe they wouldn't.  But why duplicate their work?  Comics.org is an invaluable complete reference tool (which we can use to find out character appearances for our own research, dates of issue numbers, story titles, etc.), but it doesn't have biographic information - and that's our purvue.

:s:

Agreed.

By the way, I noticed you went back to your "red sun" look. Why the change? And another question that I couldn't readily find an answer for: Does the Winkpedia format have the capability of handling PDF files? I ask because it might be neat (not to mention a savings on space and bandwidth) to allow folks to be able to read a PDF file of the diagrams of the Fortress of Solitude that I'm planning to revamp.

Whew! Finally finished. Here's everyone's favorite super-ape, and newly posted to his entry at Supermanica: Titano! I based him on the original Wayne Boring illustrations of him in Superman Vol. 1 #127.

(http://superman.nu/wiki/images/3/36/Titano.jpg)

Awesome!

As far as artwork from other sites and for this site goes, here is my take:

My original idea was to ultimately have Bill 9000 do all the artwork. I hope that some day this happen (no need to rush,  good art takes time), so that the Supermanica will be unique. That is the ultimate goal. In other words, one day it will be ALL original artwork, with no scans! Fully updated and complete entries. Of course this may take years!


It's better to use your own scans whenever you can. You could use art from other sites as placeholders (they will be deleted once Bill 9000 gets to the entry) but try to change them and make them your own even then, so it is not a total rip off. People worked hard to find those comics and scan them in, we should all do our own thing. So that we can have something to be proud of and worthy of Superman!

I like both Bill 9000 and trhe originals --how better to see the exact text we are referring to in our citations?

I agree with Beppo, I'd love to see the entire project illustrated by Bill 9000, if he's willing.  But that doesn't preclude having additional pictures in the entries to flush them out.

Bill, I'm not sure because I haven't tried it, but I think you can upload non-image files - like PDFs, etc. I'm pretty sure I read this somewhere in one of the online mediawiki manuals.  So you could probably have a "download blueprints pdf" link in the article.   Since this would be a separate file that could easily spread fire and wide, you might want to include your credits and possibly some sort of additional Encyclopedia of Supermanic Biography message that includes the "supermanica.info" link so that curious people could find their way back.

Like I said, I'm gonna do it as long as I'm able to. This project's da bomb! I'm gonna give the PDF option a try, and I can always include the Supermanica logo to identify where the document came from. I'm also gonna try a couple of tests for including a link.

I made a discovery (http://branemrys.blogspot.com/2005/02/in-which-my-geekiness-reaches.html) which got me thinking that the look should be changed.  I didn't have a new avatar ready, so I used the old "red sun on Jor-El's chest" avatar.

But now I've got a new one.


I tried a test upload and the file was rejected.  So I think not.  I do not know whether or not the configuration can be modified to allow PDFs.  One possible solution would be if you just email me the file, I'll upload it manually to a directory on the server, then we link to it from the entry itself, maybe with a manually generated (and uploaded) thumb or something.

:s:

Hey Rao, that's you from the Sandman story, no?  I like it.

Not sure how the discovery of a hymn to Rao on someone's blog changed your avatar though.

I'm currently working on both the diagrams for the Fortress of Solitude and the figure illustration for Captain Thunder (which can be easily transformed into the Big Red Cheese himself ... Captain Marvel).

Speaking of the Big Red Cheese, since Cap and Supes shared a close friendship even during the Pre-Crisis DC Universe, he should be included in Supermanica (touching on only those events in which Cap actually encounters Superman). However, they first met in Justice League of America #137, the JLA series not being listed as a canonical source. Nor is All-New Collectors' Edition #C-58 (Superman vs. Shazam). How should one handle this?

An important question.  How else to explain Cap's appearance in the last Alan Moore stories?  Oh wait, they're not canonical either! :?:

Bill9K - a sidebar may be in order for the  Cap Thunder/Shazam/Marvel court case in which famed lawyer Louis Nizer repped National Periodical Pubs vs Fawcett...in other words, the famous legal Superman VS.Captain Marvel super battle!

Added images for the Ugly Superman and Gorgeous Superman.  :D Hope to have ones up for the Selwyns, and Bart Benson (1963) sometime soon. (Wonders would putting up an entry for 'Methuselah', the wrestler identity Superman assumes in the 'The Ugly Superman' would be too much, considering it is an obscure little story).  :wink:

In the meantime keep up the good work folks, you're all doing a great job!

Absolutely not.  One of the reasons we have a "Superman's Aliases (http://superman.nu/wiki/index.php/Category:Superman%27s_Aliases)" category is that I'm hoping we'll eventually have a complete list of every alias Supes has used throughout his career.  One of the many cool traits of the Silver Age Superman that DC seems to have forgotten is that Clark Kent wasn't the only "secret identity" that Superman used.


Ditto!

:s:

If Cap never appeared in the canonical sources - ie, he never appeared in any of the Superman titles - I don't see how he can be included in the encyclopedia.

Do you count 'DC Comics Presents' or 'All Star Squadron'?  There were a few stories in 'DC Comics Presnets' that had Captain Marvel meeting the Superman of Earth-1.  As to 'All Star Squadron', there was that story arc where the Marvel Family(Billy, Freddy, and Mary) get split into their heroic and non-heroic ID's.   The non-heroic ID's were being kept in Germany, so that the Spear of Destiny would retain control over the heroic ID's.  Yes, it was an all out war between Cap and the Superman of Earth-2 that time.

Maybe there needs to be a rehaul and revision of what are canonical sources and what isn't.

DC Comics Presents is already on the canonical list (see http://superman.nu/wiki/index.php/Canonical_sources ), so I guess you'd get Captain Marvel through any appearances in that title.  I think adding All Star Squadron and JLA would be a very bad move, you might as well just add the entire DCU if you're going to do that, and that'd be much too far off topic.  Right now the list is limited to Superman and Superman family titles.

Keep in mind that the focus here is Superman.  I think that trying to modify the list of canonical sources in order to get characters you like is the wrong way to look at things.  A more appropriate approach might be to look up which characters are in the canonical sources - and hence, which characters should be in Supermanica.  If random character "Thunder Tomato" never appears in the canonical sources, then he shouldn't be listed in Supermanica, in spite of the fact that he's a cool character and Superman once appeared in Terrible Tomato Tales and told Mr. Tomato that he liked him.

You do realize that in one issue of DC Comics Presents, Hoppy the Marvel Bunny showed up and saved both Superman and Captain Marvel?   :lol:

Another was Superman's visit to Gemworld.   Supes was definiatley at a disadvantage that time.  A magic world and that chunk of Green K that was absorbing magic from the Gemworld adding to the problems.

Adding All Star Squadron and JLA is going too far IMHO. But not the VS oversized One shots, as there were only a few of those, Then again, that would mean that Spiderman could be added, so yes maybe we should just stick to what we have.  8)

Yeah ... maybe you're right. Besides, adding Spider-Man to a Superman encyclopedia is just plain wrong.

Captain Marvel Stories in DC Comics Presents

DC Comics Presents #33
DC Comics Presents #34
DC Comics Presents #49

Which DC Comics Presents had Superman meeting He-Man?

I kid you not.  But this He-Man was the original.  No Prince Adam.  His and Skeletor's swords were two halves of the same sword and each was trying to get both halves.

DC Comics Presents #47

Curt Swan even did the artwork :)

Don't forget DC Comics Presents Annual #3, where Sivana steals Cap's powers and starts making like tough for the Big Red Cheese, Superman and even the Earth-2 Superman!