Superman Through the Ages! Forum

Question(s) about the Returned Heroes

To me there seems to be some discrepancies about the rate of aging of the four. Lois and Alexander seem to be much older, Superman and Superboy-Prime about the same age as when they entered "Paradise". And what kind of Paradise would it be where the retired heroes can see what a mess the world has become? I also remember that "Paradise" was actually a pocket dimension only accessible by Alex's matter/anti-matter powers. Where did the crystal barrier come from? GA Super-man busts it open with physical force? Maybe these four are not who they seem?

Well, there you have it: the two that have superpowers have aged much slower, possibly because of their superpowers and superpowered metabolism, which presumably takes more from the food they eat and retains water and in general breaks down a lot less. Superman may or may not be immortal, but it makes sense that he (and someone with his powers, like Superboy) would age much more slowly.

On the other hand, Alex has no superpowers, whereas Lois is a normal woman that, it should be added, has been ill. Most older people when they're sick appear to be much, much more aged.



Good questions, actually. I really hope they resolve some points about the dimension that Earth-2 Superman is placed in.



Nah, no way. They have the big surprise reveal of Earth-2 Superman returning, and suddenly they pull the rug and say, "ha ha, we tricked you!" Something like this is too big to possibly end in a "fakeout."

How old does poor Lois look?

Since you mention that breaking through a crystal barrier to return to the real DCU, did anyone else notice how that resonated with the Superman of the 853rd century punching his way through time to return to his own era?  Both obstacles they were overcoming were dimensional barriers.

We do know E-2 Superman is capable of super-speed time travel, so he probably has the same dimension hopping potential of his E-1 Pre Crisis counterpart.  Any dimensional barrier that could make him struggle must be awesome indeed.  Of course, the legendary Hercules broke the supposedly unbreakable chains of Atlas.

I guess what Picard said on ST:TNG is true: Things are only impossible until they aren't!

The 4 minute mile comes to mind.

Sorta off topic, Kal-L's power didn't come from yellow sunlight did it?

No, it didn't.  You're noticing just one of the many assorted Earth-2 Superman continuity flubs that we've seen in Infinite Crisis.  It looks like DC is pretty much creating a new Earth-2 Superman.  Not that I mind, I think it's great.  It's just not clear whether or not this is an intentional move on their part.

:s:

I doubt it's intentional. Probably just another continuity gaff.

Well, yes and no to a continuity gaffe here.

Siegel established Krypton's red sun in Action Comics #14, well in the early Golden Age.

Up until about 1982, the two Supermen were depicted as equals when the occasion arose in the stories.

Even in COIE, E-2 Superman was capable of decking his more powerful counterpart which puts them in the same league for power.  He proceeded to the final battle with the Anti-Monitor; though assisted, his was the final blow to defeat the super-villain.

While it's not definitely stated in any true GA stories that the red sun was a factor in his powers, E-2 Superman could arguably be retconned into that being so for him based on the above.  The early red sun reference and the relatively high power levels (that really couldn't be purely grav-based) are consistent with this.

Re: the crystal barrier, Kal-L found it in the Kingdom. I tried to find the images on the Internet somewhere...but couldn't. He decided not to use it at that time, though.

So Mark Waid (surprise) initially set up the return of Kal-L. I think our conspiracy runs deep  :D

However, I just read Infinite Crisis #2 this morning....

[[[OMG SPOILER ALERT!]]]] [[[[OMG, RUN AWAY IF YOU'RE SCARED!!!]]]]







and I'm a little cynical and worried. Infinite Crisis #1 was completely pessimistic until the end, when Kal-L returned. Crisis #2 was the opposite; it represented our point of view, that the comics world is devoid of optimism and joy, that Kal-L should fix it, and Power Girl's Earth-1 memory was restored in this issue.

Yet the end of it seemed ominous. Kal-L explained that the current earth is Earth-2, with aspects of the others folded in. (I like to think of "Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?" as the last Earth-2 story, but that's been re-retconned now. stinks to be me!) His solution? To bring back Earth-1. I have a scary feeling that Kal-L is going to take the same misguided path that Hal Jordan once took, try to restore his homeworld, and ignorantly spawn this new crisis. I really hope not, but despite all the optimism so far, "Crisis" is still in the title.

At the same time, Superman Chronicles is coming out next year. Why would they do that if there wasn't a market of people who wanted to catch up on Kal-L adventures? So I'm not afraid he's going to die. I'm afraid that the Crisis will be his fault, and he'll be tainted just like the others, which is a fate worse than death.

This is a big reason I'm waiting to see how it all comes out before (maybe!) buying the TPB.

I'm a Hal Jordan fan, but I didn't celebrate like other fans when DC brought him back.  I'm an E-2 Superman fan, but I'm not dancing in the street over his return, either.  And I hope to high heaven they leave poor Barry Allen in his grave.

The bottom line is I'd rather have these characters in limbo or purgatory than subject to the whims of writers and editors in the modern DCU.  Even if E-2 Supes survives this series, I hope he escapes back into limbo where he's safe from mutilation.

Oops. I made a mistake.

(http://www.thismodernworld.org/arc/1992/92terrible-mistake.gif)

I know I already gave a fairly complete rundown on why a yellow sun powered E-2 Superman isn't too far off canon.

Here's another point that I missed before:

Unlike most of the revived Silver Age heroes, Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman never went out of print and were discontinued from the Golden Age to the Silver Age.  In a real sense, the same characters had the same continuity running from their GA to the Pre Crisis era.  It was an arfiticial retcon in itself to declare a point where GA Superman leaves off and SA Superman begins.  Schwartz himself noted that some of the adventures of the two Supermen probably overlapped and they shared them in their respective timelines.

Also, the real GA Superman spent most of his career working for the Daily Planet and Perry White.  The Daily Star and George Taylor disappeared early in the GA run.  This adds fuel to the fire that we could legitimately include some of the SA sun power aspects to the E-2 Superman since we have my old reasons on this thread and the unbroken continuity of the character in the first place.