Originally published February 12, 1993, in Comics Buyer’s Guide #1004
Well, the word is out about the return of Superman. An assortment of press releases and coming-issue blurbs has crossed my desk, confirming the rumors that have been floating around for weeks.
“Four beings simultaneously appear,” proclaims the general media announcement, “each claiming to be the Last Son of Krypton. Is one of these the real Man of Steel? Is it:
“The cyborg from space–half machine, half alien? He proclaims himself a Superman retooled from the future, and no one has the guts to contradict him.
“The cold super-being who sets up shop in the Fortress of Solitude and relentlessly takes the law into his own hands?
“The super-powered teenager who appears to be cloned from the first Superman? He must be a clone–why else would he have no memories of a previous life?
“The steelworker, John Henry Irons, buried alive during Superman’s battle with Doomsday, who, like a man possessed, uses his talents to create a high-tech suit of armor and weaponry to literally become a Man of Steel?”
Split infinitives aside, it sounded like the next words should be, “Or is it–someone else? Match wits with Ellery Queen and see if you can figure out–who done it?” The fans can guess all they want, but if Jim Hutton were still around, he and David Wayne would have this thing sorted out in no time.
The other “Coming Comics” articles outline in more detail the information disseminated fairly succinctly in the first release.
What I found somewhat lacking was any detailed discussion of the creative teams. The biggest rap on Marvel is that publicity always seems to emphasize the characters over the creators. (An article in Entertainment Weekly about Wolverine, for example, quoted editor Bob Harras extensively, and even featured a photo of him–while Len Wein, who created the character, and Chris Claremont, who defined him, were never mentioned.)
DC, on the other hand, is ostensibly the place where creators are emphasized over characters, with such maneuvers as splashing the creator names all over the covers.
So one would think that the Superman spotlight would be the ideal time to get some serious ink for the creators. But the only person mentioned by name in the main press release is editor Mike Carlin–indisputably the central figure in all this, but even so, he’s not writing or drawing the comic books.
No, the folks who merely write the stories and draw the pictures are mentioned (out of five pages worth of material) precisely once. None of them are quoted. Even more, we’re not told which writer is working with which artist, or which titles they’re working on. Jerry Ordway’s departure from the series is mentioned off-handedly, with no clue as to why.
Indeed, the only mention of the creative teams is in conjunction, not with their respective titles, but with their contributions to Adventures of Superman #500, in which they’ll be “documenting four ‘sightings’ of Superman.”
It’s a sign of the times when you read five pages of material and learn more about the cover gimmicks than you do about who’s producing the comics inside the cover. If DC is going to follow Marvel’s lead on something, why did it have to be this?
At any rate…
Thus far, BID has made several speculations about Superman’s return. The first, as John Byrne so kindly reminded us, was that we would see a grim and gritty Superman. If I were a less mature individual than I am, I might be inclined at this point to say:
“Nyaah, nyaah. Told’ja, John. Told’ja John. Told’ja so, told’ja so, told’ja so. I was right, you were wrong, neener, neener, neener.”
However, being the mature, sophisticated patron of the arts that I am, you’d never seen such a childish display in this column.
The second speculation, as outlined in “Ask the Self-Proclaimed Experts,” was that DC was going to have to define just who Superman is before it could then determine where to go from there. Little did we suspect at the time that this statement would be so literally correct.
Now, putting aside all the carping about the ignoring of the creative teams, I happen to be jazzed about this entire development, for four reasons:
1) It perpetuates the mystery without committing DC to any particular direction. One of the greatest successes of the mutant titles has been their continued ability to pose question after question without offering any concrete answers. Any sane person would think that this would quickly lead to boredom, but the fans keep coming back for more, so there must be some merit to this approach. So it augers a continuation of the interest in the adventures of DC’s oldest costumed super-hero.
2) It introduces some new characters to the DC Universe under very high-profile conditions–characters who, if they develop their own following, could stay around long after this whole business is finally resolved.
3) Pat O’Neill has pointed out that this would be the ideal manner in which to reintroduce a Superboy into continuity–simply by continuing the adventures of the young Super-whatever-he-is. This maneuver would eliminate the two long-standing raps against Superboy: a) You don’t have a sense of everything being moot because everyone knows he grows up to become Superman; b) You don’t make yourself crazy trying to figure out what time period to put him in. (Remember when Superboy was so far back in continuity that he met Bonnie and Clyde?)
Of course, again, the likelihood of this is contingent upon how they resolve the storyline.
(One would think, logically, that the resolution will come in one of two ways. I tend to think it’s going to be an all-or-nothing proposition: Either none of these guys is Superman, or all of them are Superman–different aspects of his “soul”, as it were, splintered and inhabited these four beings. This would then suggest a climactic storyline in which they all unite in some manner and the “real” Superman, whole once more, returns. This resolution would, on the surface of it, call for the disappearance of all four characters, eliminating the possibility of any of them continuing. So perhaps the success of this plan (or lack thereof) will determine where they go from here.)
4) And most important–it’s real.
What do I mean by “real”?
I mean that I like stories that have a real-world feel to them.
All too often, super hero comics exist in their own reality, divorced from considerations of how the real world would react to the goings-on.
Rarely does any one sue for property damage after a battle.
We rarely see heroes reading scandalous stories about themselves in supermarket rags (“Mr. Fantastic’s Tortured Sex Life!”; “The Thing and Alicia: Is Their Sex Life On the Rocks?”).
Name all the stories in which some woman has come forward, stating that she’s carrying someone’s super-lovechild?
Super-heroes are not, by and large, hounded by paparazzi (aside from one memorable sun-bathing experience for She-Hulk). They’re not constantly tied up in court testifying against villains. In short, except for rare occasions, you don’t get a sense that these people exist in the same world that we live in–a world that exploits and devours anyone of any notoriety.
And that is the kind of world we live in, make no mistake. If three network films in a week about Amy Fisher didn’t convince you of that, then nothing will.
Considering the real-world reaction that the death of Superman incurred–a world in which, let’s face it, Superman was and is a fictional character–I think it fairly safe to say that, in the DC Universe, Superman is unquestionably the most popular, the most idolized, the most famous man. I mean, that’s the whole point of “World Without a Superman,” right?
And that’s why these new developments ring so true.
Because we know that, in a world where there was a Superman, that these new occurrences are the logical progression. Devastatingly logical–so much so that I’m, frankly, annoyed that I didn’t see it coming.
Why so logical? Even inevitable?
Because it’s happened before, that’s why.
It’s happening right now.
I mean, c’mon. Superman was the king of super-heroes. The biggest. The best. We’ve seen him young, we’ve seen him older.
It’s so obvious what DC is doing. It makes so much sense.
He’s no longer merely Kal-El.
Now…
He’s Kal-Elvis.
Yes, that’s right. Intentionally or not, the Superman creative team has perfectly paralleled the life, and, more importantly, the afterlife, of Elvis Presley. The King.
It’s all there, right in the press releases.
First it begins with Superman sightings. Now how many times–how many–were we subjected to continued reports of Elvis being spotted here, there and everywhere, long after he died?
Elvis at K-Mart. Elvis at Burger King. Elvis at Red Target stores. Elvis at the A&P. He wandered through Bloom County. We saw him picking up his newspaper in Eerie, Indiana. There was a song, for crying out loud, called “Elvis is Everywhere” (“Why are ships vanishing in the Bermuda Triangle? Elvis needs boats.”), and for a while that seemed pretty true.
I, however, still cling to the belief that Elvis is dead, but Andy Kaufman, the world’s greatest bender of reality, is in fact alive and going around doing his Elvis impression for gullible shoppers at King Kullen.
And that leads us into the next step of Elvis worship, which is being faithfully followed by DC–namely the Elvis/Superman imitators. Oh, sure, there were people who did Elvis impressions before he died, but that’s nothing compared to what we’ve seen since.
Elvis impersonators by the truckload have paraded across the American consciousness. And now DC, in presenting the life of Kal-Elvis, is dutifully giving us four Superman impersonators.
Does it matter if any of them really looks like Superman? Of course not. Look at the real-life parallel.
We’ve seen young Elvis. Old Elvis. Fat Elvis. Thin Elvis. Black Elvis. White Elvis. Hawaiian Elvis. Japanese Elvis. Baby Elvis. Toddler Elvis. Honeymoon in Vegas gave us the Utah chapter of the Flying Elvises. Some look and sound authentic; others aren’t remotely so. It doesn’t matter. They’re still walking around, singing around, twisting around, and calling themselves Elvis.
Some people, of course, know that they’re just dressing up. But I saw a guy interviewed who said, with all seriousness, that Elvis was channeling through him–that he was, in fact, Elvis.
And since comic books are a heightened, exaggerated reality, we’re seeing an exaggerated version (but not too much, really) of the Elvis-imitator syndrome. An alien takes up residence in the Fortress. Some determined Elvis imitator could occupy Graceland and maybe even start convincing people that he’s Elvis back from the dead. Hëll, I’ll bet anything that tons of folks would believe it.
I just hope that DC really takes the opportunity to carry this all the way. Enough of these tasteless cardboard coffins. Let’s go for tasteless and tacky.
I want my velvet Superman painting.
I want my Superman wine decanter (head or full figure, preferably both).
I want my Superman Live! stage show.
I want my TV show about a young Superman. (Oops, already had that. Sorry.)
I want the Utah chapter of the Flying Supermen, and baby, you’ll believe they can fly.
I want my musical Superman sweatshirt, sold exclusively through QVC (playing “Up, Up and Away,” I suppose).
I want my commemorative Superman plates, which may or may not go up in value. I want my Superman medals from the Franklin Mint. I want my Superman books, CDs, tapes, keychains, T-shirts, poseable dolls, collectible dolls, and toilet paper.
Dammit. I want my Superman postage stamp, so I can stand in line for two day to get one.
And, best of all–I want DC to introduce women with small children who they claim are Superman’s out-of-wedlock offspring.
(“See here–Little Kal has a spitcurl, just like his dad. And he’s invulnerable, too. Watch… I’ll bounce this rock off his head.” Klonnk! “Oh, look, he’s pretending he’s unconscious. He’s so clever, just like his superdaddy was. Wake up, honey.”)
Yes, I want all that–and more.
Why?
Because Kal-Elvis would have wanted it that way.
(Peter David, writer of stuff, will be organizing a pilgrimage to the Fortress of Solitude, where a candle lighting ceremony will be held. Send applications and $10,000 in small, nonsequential bills to cover airfare and sundries, to To Be Continued, PO Box 239, Bayport, New York 11705.)
• 
Okay, this is just weird. I read Superman #82, where all of the stories got wrapped up, when I got home at five o’clock this morning. Talk about a serendipitous coinky-dink.
And now I want a velvet Superman. As for the mother with the kid, I want their last name to be Coolidge.
Just thinking, here, that someone who eventually went to work for Pixar read this column. The seed had been planted, and thus Peter David is responsible for some of the more litigious elements of The Incredibles.
17 years later – good call on 2) and 3).
Well, Peter, in less than 10 years from the time you wrote that column, you had your show about a young Superman (which has gone on to become one of the longest-running genre series in American TV history) and the Superman postage stamp, not to mention a lot of the other merchandise you mentioned.
Well, I do remember hearing about four new Supermen at the time, but I didn’t remember any details. Man, they sound awful.
But mostly right now I’m so thrilled that somebody else remembers the Ellery Queen TV series. (Would you believe that was where I learned the phrase ‘Who done it’?)
They aren’t as bad as they sound. Two of them (Superboy, Steel) were interesting enough to hold their own series after a while. A 3rd proved to be a reformed villain whose methods contrast in interesting ways with Superman’s (Eradicator); grafting him to a human later was a misstep though. The last one, who proved to be an existing villain, Reed Richards analogue Hank Henshaw… okay him I can’t really defend too well; I did like the idea of one of them proving to be evil, but I would have liked to have seen a more gradual reveal.
Speaking of having a real world feel, the Wolfman/Perez run of New Teen Titans had that feel, too. At least to me. In what way? Two things come to mind off the top of my head. TV reporter Bethany Snow portrayed the Titans in very negative light, especially whenever they crossed paths with Brother Blood, and/or his organization, the Church of Brother Blood. Snow, as we readers knew, was a member of the Church of Brother Blood. I don’t recall if the Titans also knew, at least at first, but the general public didn’t.
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The second example was Councilwoman Elizabeth Alderman, who waged a politically-motivated campaign against the Titans. I believe she brought up property damage, and tried to paint them as irresponsible children. I also think she was angling to become mayor. But it’s been a while since I’ve read those issues, so I’m vague on the details concerning Alderman’s agenda.
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As to the whole “Reign of the Supermen” storyline, I liked it. I liked that these other characters were developed in the various S books before we got a definitive answer about Kal-El himself. I was interested enough to read the four S books at the time. And bringing readers in (or back, as the case may be) was undoubtedly one of DC’s goals.
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Rick
True. I was reading Superman at the time, but if I wasn’t, the publicity might have made me curious, even though the final outcome was obvious to comic fans the very day the death was first announced. It’s an interesting idea for a story arc even if you know it can’t be permanent. Having said that, it did make the books more event drive. I would say that the post-Crisis Superman’s best years were immediately before the Death storyline, probably starting from when Roger Stern become one of the writers (though I did like Byrne’s stories as well).
I loved that pre-death period also. What first got me into comic was my dad that bringing me an issue of Action Comic by Roger Stern with Matrix-version-Supergirl and Lex Luthor Jr. in the cover that he bought from a 7-11. It was shortly after the Panic in the Sky storyline. I liked it so much we went back and bought every Superman issue we could find which eventually lead us to a comic store. I started buying back issues back until the storyline where Clark reveals his secret identity to Lois culminating in Superman # 50. I started reading all the issues in order.
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I remember liking Action Comics and Superman for the Stories. Action (Stern) focused on Lex Luthor a Metropolis itself. Superman (Jurgens) focused on Clark’s relationship with Lois. I liked Superman (Jurgens) and Adventures(Grummet) for the art. Man of steel was the black sheep for me.
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Good times. It brought me closer to my dad.
I still can’t get over how everyone fell for the whole “Death of Superman” crap, and all the hype that followed. It was amazing to sit back and watch the mainstream media lap it up, apparently them being clueless to the fact that death in comics means nothing.
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Speaking of Supermen, did everyone else here about Frank Frazetta?
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I can’t believe it.
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I have a book of his work on one of my shelves.
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http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=26160
Frazetta’s death got me and some friends talking today… its amazing the influence he had with a comparatively small amount of illustrations. His presence in today’s fantastic imagery is so ubicuous we could only think of Tolkien as a bigger influence. His “Princess of Mars” cover is one of the first things that come to my mind when I think about “epic” and “heroic”. And “Death Dealer” is a drawing that inspired a four novels serie, songs, comicbooks… all from one single iconic picture. He was a giant.
I’ll agree that the mainstream media was pretty clueless about the whole deal (I’ll still, every once in a while, run across someone who’s surprised to find out that they still publish Superman, because he died back in the 90s) but I think it’s unfair to blame the storyline for that. They did a story that explored the implications of Superman being willing to go out and risk his life every day for others, and they told everyone, “Hey, you should go out and buy this!” That’s really kind of what you do with any story in comics. 🙂
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They at no point suggested the death would be permanent, and Mike Carlin was very careful to highlight the fact that it was the beginning, not the end, of a major Superman story. I think it’s a lot fairer than, oh, say, the unmasking of Spider-Man, where they insisted at the time that this was a big deal that wasn’t just going to be magically undone a year or two down the road…and then had to explain that yes, they had known at the time that they were going to resolve it the way they did in “One More Day”, but they couldn’t say that because it would “spoil the surprise.”
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I actually think the Death/Return of Superman holds up better than people think. (Although it’s still silly that Doomsday reads the Metropolis road sign…)
Personally, I was glad to see Galactus (you read right…) turn the Cyborg into a Hershey-bar sized hunk of red metal…
And if we’re referring to Elvis… then shouldn’t we be talking about Captain Marvel Jr.? 🙂
I remain,
Sincerely,
Eric L. Sofer
x<]:o){
The Bad Clown…
Another vote: the best Supergirl stories ever told. I expect a few Peter David penned issues to figure prominently there. To vote, go there:
http://goodcomics.comicbookresources.com/2010/05/10/the-greatest-supergirl-stories-ever-told-voting/
Mary,
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Speaking of the Ellery Queen TV series, thanks to these new digital channels– especially the Retro TV Network– I’ve enjoyed watching it on Sunday nights. Though it’s been a while since I’ve seen it, as I haven’t been watching TV at that hour recently.
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As to the four Supermen, as I said, I liked the “Reign of the Supermen” storyline. With the obvious caveat that tastes vary, I think you’d find they’re not “awful” at all if you were to read the trade paperback. If your local library carries graphic novels and trade paperbacks, you might find it there.
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Andy E. Nystrom said, “I did like the idea of one of them proving to be evil, but I would have liked to have seen a more gradual reveal.”
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I thought the Cyborg Superman’s reveal as a villain was gradual. It’s been a while since I read those stories, but didn’t the Hank Henshaw revelation come near the end of that eight-week storyline? I’m pretty sure even the readers didn’t know the truth (except for those who may have been privy to spoilers) when the Cyborg Superman saved the president earlier in the storyline.
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John Seavey said, “Although it’s still silly that Doomsday reads the Metropolis road sign”
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There’s a Far Side panel where Godzilla stops before a sign reading, “you must be as tall as this sign to attack the city.”
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Rick
I have that trade on my bookshelf at home, and I still pull it out and look through it occasionally. That storyline revived my interest in Superman for awhile, although it quickly flagged again, as four Superman titles a month was just too much for me to keep up with on a long-term basis.
I believe Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman had an episode with a woman who claimed to have had Superman’s love child, although this column predated that series by at least a year or two.
That episode perhaps but not the series as a whole. In fact the reason why Superman “died” in the comics was to put off the wedding until the show was ready to do the same.
It might have been 8 weeks but not 8 issues with Hank in them. While the characters did cross over between each other, each character was the focus of a different incarnation. While I doubt many did, it was entirely possible to follow just one incarnation for the first couple weeks, though the books did merge more after the cyborg reveal. There was a Bloodlines-related annual in the midst of that, but even if the writer of the annual (can’t recall the name, but not the regular writer) was aware of the truth, s/he still wrote him as a straightforward hero, no adding pieces of the puzzle. So I doubt anyone who opted to just focus on the cyborg solo stories would have felt it was that gradual. Don’t get me wrong: I was shocked when he wiped out Coast City; I would have just liked there to have been a couple more solo tales first, perhaps with a few thought balloons that take on a different meaning after the big reveal.
There were four annuals, I believe.
The ACTION COMICS annual featurng the Eradicator was written by Jeph Loeb (his first mainstream super-hero credit) and drawn by a young Lee Moder, prior to his defining runs on the Legion books and co-creation of STARS AND S.T.R.I.P.E.
Suffice to say that the Death/Reign storyline actually accomplished its goal of bringing me into the comic and making a regular customer/comic book reader (i.e. no longer that kid that gets the comic(s) at the drug store when he gets sick but in there on a weekly to monthly basis and now have 30+ long comic boxes)out of me.
I remember picking up the reign of superman books and actually talking with fellow people with the myriad theories as to the resolution of the one true Superman and I think the majority of us were in agreement regarding the “soul theory” and felt that Conner, Eradicator and Cyborg-Supes leaving Steel to be an eyewitness, potential sidekick. Then that theory all went to pot with the fifth Superman and the shocking turn by Cyborg Supes (I was actually starting to lose interest in the series until I grabbed the issues off the rack and saw Cyborg Supes takeout Eradicator, Superboy, Coast City and his mastery over Mongul.)
Im also amazed that thanks to this storyline, the Superman Office laid the unknown and unplanned groundwork for what turned out to be one hëll of a ride for us Green Lantern fans where they turned that ridiculous guy from the Superfriends with the Big Green Boxing Glove into a more notable big gun in the DCU that can make big green boxing gloves but can do alot more now…like save the Universe.
Hey Peter, I love your writing and actually even when I was a kid I used to watch Space Cases so I suppose you’ve had a subliminal influence on me for quite a while. I can even still recall Katalina’s Saturn chant (A beans-a-bags-a-bugs-a-bag!)
But I have to take a small bit of umbrage with you over something I saw in X-factor Nation X. Why did you make Tabitha Smith such a flake? She ignored Rictor and then used the word gay cavalierly, both of which shocked me. I know she may seem to be an annoying second-string character to some but in actuality Tabitha is a hidden gem and with her past with Rictor there’s no way she’d be too enchanted by Shatterstar to ignore him. The very first time Tabitha met Rictor she saved his life and the two have maintained a friendship and a bond that definitely was much more significant than the one she had with Shatterstar.
Tabby’s a sweet character who’s been far too watered down by writers lately and been made to be much too ditzy and stereotypical. She’s the victim of domestic abuse, a former thief, she was homeless for a period of time, she had an interesting destructive fascination with Sabertooth…she’s been through so much emotionally as a character and then for whatever reason she just dropped off and came back a different character. If you ever write for her again, look her up on UncannyXmen.net or something and you’ll see she’s much more tender and complex than that.
Always a fan!
-Felix.