The OTHER alien cities Brainiac shrunk

[NotSuper]

Does anyone know what happened to the OTHER alien cities Brainiac shrunk and stole? Did Brainiac bring them back to Colu and enlarge them? Or did Superman return the shrunken cities to their original planets?

[nightwing]

I'm pretty sure Superman said he put them all back where they belonged.  Except Kandor, of course, which had no world to return to.  Get the new Archive and you'll know for sure! (Mine is still in the mail, darn the luck).

This might have made for some interesting follow-up stories, I suppose.  If the other cities had been shrunken as far in the past as Kandor -- or even earlier -- it must have made for some difficult adjustments as beings were returned to their homeworlds and tried to re-enter their societies.  Would they have lost friends and family to the passage of time?  Would their cities be far behind others in terms of technology and culture, since time essentially stopped for them when they were shrunk?  Might they have evolved cultures very different from those they left behind, cultures that don't mesh well upon their return? As "alien abductees" would they be forever ostracized and looked on with suspicion by their planet-mates?  

The story as told brushes these issues aside...Superman returned the cities to their worlds and that's that.  But I imagine if you or I were in a city that had spent 20, 30 or more years away from Earth, we'd have a hard time indeed adjusting to being back.

In fact, on Earth, we'd hardly have left a "smoking hole in the ground" for decades.  We'd have rebuilt!  So what happens if Superman takes a city back and there's no place to put it, because another was built in its place?

Maybe a better solution would have been to create something like what we saw in Gerard Jone's "Green Lantern: Mosaic" series...a world composed of cities from various other worlds.  It might have made for an interesting addition to the Super-mythos.

[Captain Kal]

In the first Brainiac story, Superman used Brainiac's devices to restore and return all the cities to their rightful places.

But when he got to Kandor, only one charge of restoration power was left.  The Kandorian scientist, Professor Kimda, used it to restore Superman to normal instead of Kandor.

See the below links to the relevant pages of that story.

http://superman.nu/tales2/superduel/?page=12

http://superman.nu/tales2/superduel/?page=13

[NotSuper]

In the first Brainiac story, Superman used Brainiac's devices to restore and return all the cities to their rightful places.

But when he got to Kandor, only one charge of restoration power was left.  The Kandorian scientist, Professor Kimda, used it to restore Superman to normal instead of Kandor.

See the below links to the relevant pages of that story.

http://superman.nu/tales2/superduel/?page=12

http://superman.nu/tales2/superduel/?page=13

I re-read that story before I posted the thread. I'm actually speaking of the RETCONNED humanoid computer Brainiac, not the one who first appeared in the comics. As you can see in the first story, Superman only returned the stolen EARTH cities and took Kandor. While the retconned Brainiac stole many other alien cities.

The retconned Brainiac was introduced in this story.

[Captain Kal]

Ahhh, gotcha, NotSuper.  I'm switching out of stupid mode now. heh

I don't think those cities were ever shown being returned to their homeworlds, at least not by Superman.

The Coluans revolted against the computer tyrants so they arguably had access to all the technology and shrunken cities, esp. since Vril Dox had a 12th-level intelligence compared with the tyrants' 10th-level ones.  While not shown, arguably the Coluans, or at least Vril, restored those other cities.  I can't honestly see them keeping those shrunken victims around after asserting their own justice for themselves.

The shrunken cities were never shown either in the present or 30th century Colu, so I suspect that's what happened.

[NotSuper]

Ahhh, gotcha, NotSuper.  I'm switching out of stupid mode now. heh

I don't think those cities were ever shown being returned to their homeworlds, at least not by Superman.

The Coluans revolted against the computer tyrants so they arguably had access to all the technology and shrunken cities, esp. since Vril Dox had a 12th-level intelligence compared with the tyrants' 10th-level ones.  While not shown, arguably the Coluans, or at least Vril, restored those other cities.  I can't honestly see them keeping those shrunken victims around after asserting their own justice for themselves.

The shrunken cities were never shown either in the present or 30th century Colu, so I suspect that's what happened.

That's a good theory, but wouldn't Superman have had Kandor restored by the Coluans if that was the case? I think Superman would've just returned the shrunken cities to their home worlds, maybe even restoring the inhabitants after he restored Kandor.

Was there ever a story, which re-told the original encounter between Superman and Brainiac? If there is an answer to this question, we'll find it there.

[Captain Kal]

In the context of that first retcon story, Superman was both unaware of Brainiac's machine nature nor his Coluan origins.  Ergo, he'd have no reason to go to Colu to rescue the other cities.

In later stories, Brainiac's android status becomes common knowledge.  That begs the question why he didn't ask them, esp. Vril, for help enlarging Kandor?  Heck, he's met Brainiac 5 in the 30th century so why didn't he ask for his help?

Simple explanation:

The Legion (Saturn Girl/Supergirl) placed a super-hypnotic suggestion in his mind that prevents him from remembering things from the future that would interfere with present-day history.  So, he doesn't think of Brainiac 5 helping out with Kandor since that would wreck Kandor's destined history according to their records.  This super-hypnotic suggestion may go so far as to block the idea of going to Colu in the present since LSH records have Kandor being enlarged independently by Superman.

It's a stretch but it does use existing Pre Crisis continuity elements.

[NotSuper]

Let's examine several possible theories:

Theory #1: Superman returned each of the shrunken cities to their home planets. He promised the inhabitants that he would return and enlarge the cities once he had discovered how. After he restored Kandor, he went to these planets and restored the cities (which suffered the same effect as Kandor).

Theory #2: Kandor was the only city Brainiac had in his posession when he first encountered Superman. The other cities he took had been taken back to Colu for study. Later, Vril Dox returns each city to its rightful planet and restores it using his vast intellect.

Are there any other theories I've overlooked? Is there any way to confirm which of these is true?