Superman Through the Ages! Forum

read the issue then read this, or spoil yourself silly with this link:

Dan DiDio: Crisis Counseling Session 3
http://www.newsarama.com/dcnew/InfiniteCrisis/Counseling03.htm


Spoilers

these are from other boards:

spoilers: I recieved my books early again this week so here it goes.
We start out at Atlantis where Aquaman,Mera,Tempest,Dolphin and a Mermaid named Lori(Lemrus?Thought she was dead?)and others are battling the Society.It looks like Arion is there also.Tempest is in the middle of some sort of ritual when The Spectre shows up and it looks like he just crushes Atlantis with his Ginourmous hand.Then he says "Vengance is mine."Then we pop over to Paradise Island where the Amazonions and Wonder Woman are fighting a helluva lot of Omacs.It turns out the Omacs are telivising the whole thing and making the Amazons look very warlike and not really committed to peace as they have said.Then we cut to the Batcave where Batman is trying to get brother eye to stop its evil plans.It says no,then Bats gets really pissed and throws a chair into the moniter then has a little breakdown.He says to himself"This wasn't supposed to happen."A flash of his Folks getting killed."I cant Breathe.Cant...Do this anymore."A shot of him as a boy at their graves."God...I wish..."A shot of him holding a dead Jason Todd."...I just wish I could start over."Then Earth-2 Supes come's out of the shadows and tell him he can start over.Bats says "Superman?" "Yes but not the one you know.Not yet."Is his reply.
Next is Power girl talking to E-2 Lois and Alexander.Superboy comes in and continues to try to talk Kara into helping them change things back.
Next we're in El Paso Texas.A guy named Jaime is talking college stuff with what I guess are his brother and sister
when what looks like meteors start falling on the city.I frst introduction to the the guy thats gonna be the new Blue Beetle.
 
spoilers:
Well supes discusses how his Earth was better and that he thinks that his Earths Bruce's death was the reason for this Earths differince in hero's.
Bats asks him If people are better on his Earth and Supes says yes.Then Bats asks him if the Earth-2 Dick Grayson is a better person than ours and Supes says "...No."At that point Bats takes out his peaice of Kryptonite that our Supes gave him and try's using it on him.Supes-2 then tell him our Kryptonite does'nt hurt him "at least physiclly."Supes proceeds to use his heat vision on the ring and destroys the kryptonite.He then flys away saying that it would have been great to have the "worlds finest" together again.
Then Bats procceeds to watch a security tape of what happend in the tower just before it blew up.
Ok if you guys dont want to know the huge surprise of the end turn away now!


We go to Lex Luthor-1 confronting Lex-2,They jibe and attack one another then our Lex hits the other Lex's computer and reveals that the other lex is actually Alexander Luthor!
 
spoilers:
SPOILER******************************************* ************************************************** *We see the Anit-Monitor's remains hooked up to one of the vibrational devices the Monitor used in the first Crisis.

Red cape (that blows up the watchtower) is Earth Prime Superboy...he and Alexander are working together (Martian Manhunter is among a group of heroes--Lady Quark, Breach, the Ray--hooked up to the Monitor's machine, along with dead Anti).
 

spoilers:
I enjoyed the reveal of the villains on the last few pages. Also, it was very sweet to see that under the LexCorp armor, green-eyed Lex had the classic Luthor suit (purple with black X). Superboy Prime as a baddie is interesting and unexpected.

Nice to see the Professor back, meeting the new Firestorm. And I am starting to wonder now if Alex masterminded Captain Atom's predicament in the Wildstorm Universe (CA appears near the end in a viewing "ice portion").

have a few problems with the spoilers for IC 3...if you haven't read them...go away...











1. Martian Manhunter being attached to the freaking "Mind Wipe Machine" or whatever the hell it ends up being doesn't really fit with JLA where Martian Manhunter is on the Astral Plane talking with Manitou Dawn. What's up with that?

2. Alex Luthor is the other Lex...? So, he either has some bad ass teleporting equipment/power or he can make it back to base somehow faster than Supes of E2...without being noticed.

3. Further, according to these spoilers that would mean that Alex has been in and out of Paradise quite a bit. Sure makes E2 Supes "escape" in IC 1 seem a lot less impressive. What gives?

4. Did the Anti-Monitor have a body? If I remember COIE correctly than he was energy in a containment suit. Hell, when he died he was just this weird clump o' energy screaming at Superman. Or, techincally, as giant waves destroying everything in their wake for millions of miles. Now his suit (at least) has been put together and put in a machine. If this is true than this is retconning at its worst.
5. I'm just wondering...why was Kal-L so dissappointed, when he said "No"...what happened to the Earth 2 Dick that made Kal-L answer "No", and the way he looked away when he said it..what happened?

Didn't the Earth 2 Dick Grayson die in Crisis?

Yes, this was certainly an issue full of surprises.  Alex Luthor and Superboy Prime are the villains of the piece.  Are they really planning on bringing back Earth 2 or are they up to something else?

I suspect Kal-L won't go along with them when he finds out what they are really up to.

Did the anti-monitor have a body?

He fled one of his bodies, after Supergirl trounced him within an inch of his life.

Afterwards, he was an energy being.

Yeah, god forbid we have the Worlds Finest again.  :(

As for the villification of Alexander Luthor and Earth Prime Superboy: F-Off DC.

It is crystal clear now that this entire thing will be little more than a long drawn justification for continuing down the same blood soaked darkness path that they have been and the characters who object to this will of course be put into a negative context basically as DCs way of saying "screw you" to anyone who wants DC to put the super and heroic back in it's superhero books.

A gazzillion and half shock value driven issues later it will still be grim n'gritty business as usual.

I don't see why Alex Luthor would Turn Heel.. unless the anti-matter part of him somehow is being controlled by the anti-monitor somewhat..

It's sad Considering Alex Luthor was IMO The main character of Crisis of Infinite Earths A la Adam Warlock in Infinity Gauntlet (which IMO is inferior to the original Crisis even given the fact that pre crisis fans hated it)

It is quite surprising that Alex Luthor is turning out to be the villain of this piece, along with E-p Superboy.  This creates further doubt that Earth 2 will return in any form.

Super detailed review:

http://www.newsarama.com/forums/showthread.php?s=548e5466d8d21c7c0040c881ce8790d8&threadid=53331

The only way DC cn salvage this mess is if the Anti-Monitor is controlling Alex and Superboy Prime.

I recently picked up the He-Man/She-Ra Christmas Special and watched one of  the two interviews with the various creators.  The interview I watched was about the morals they put at the end of the show.  They took a moral lesson and built a story around it and used the 30 second moral at the end to reinforce what the story was saying.

I think the people at DC need to sit down and watch that interview and watch the original He-Man and She-Ra shows.

Doing it the way that cartoon did may be a bit too heavy handed but I see what you are going for. I really do. I like the show myself and bought the first season boxed set just recently.

Despite the budget and other constraints that show had they created something that gave you enough to set a kids imagination on fire and maybe even learn the virtures of freindship and honor in the process. Which really aint half bad for a show that was made on a extremely limited budget, at a time when S&P was almost Naziesque in what they would approve and not approve, and made at all just because someone said "we need a commerical for these toys".

Yes, He-Man and She-Ra was a bit heavy handed, but it was one of the constraints.   One of the writers of that Filmation series went on to make other excellent shows.  His name was Paul Dini

Seriously, DC needs to make Pual Dini editor in chief.  He should be able to clean up the DCU and tell good stories at the same time.  He understands superheroes.

I think Infiinite Crisis will be the break point when I leave DC's 'mainstream' offering for good.  Didio's message is that truth, justice, humor, and honor have no place in the world is geting a bit much.

I'm trying to figure out what could have been done with Max Lord or Doctor Light.  You can't put them in jail, toss them in an insane asylum, mind-wipe them, kill them, or anything else because it would be the wrong thing for a superhero to do.

He-Man is getting lots of DVD releases. A best of DVD, the X-Mas special DVD, season one vol.1 and coming soon season one vol.2.

He-Man's 1st ever comic book appearance (besides the minis) was in DC Comics Presents with Superman himself, and of course Paul Dini was a writer on the TV show who later went on to do some other cartoons ;)

He-Man was however, infamous for being the 1st cartoon based on a toy line. Despite being seen by detractors as nothing more than 30min infomercials, it was more than just that.

here is a good article on the show:

http://flyingmoose.org/heman/heman.htm

Well, I knew that Alexander Luthor was the villian. As for the Antimonitor being an energy being, remember that Alexander Luthor is half-antimatter. So he's likely being controlled, or is possessed by, the antimonitor. Besides, Alexander is the one who told Kal-L that he could never leave paradise again and kept him there for 20 years. It's likely that he could have left all along, but didn't until Alexander wanted him to.

However, Bruce Wayne's seemed to reach a breaking point in this issue. Something tells me that he's not going to be Batman anymore...he's going to marry Selina and have a baby!

Yeah, that would make a bit of sense. Kal-L defeated the Anti-Monitor, and if Alexander has fallen under the AM's sway all of this--the darkening of the post-Crisis Earth, Lois-2's illness, etc--might be the Anti-Monitor in a bid for revenge against the one enemy who truly bested him.

 I'd heard Bruce was going to have a bit of a nervous breakdown and hand the reins over to Dick for awhile. I just don't see Bruce Wayne retiring anytime soon. . .he's part of the Warner Brothers formula after all.

 -Def.