Showing posts with label Kryptonite. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Kryptonite. Show all posts

Thursday, 11 March 2021

Superman Red/Superman Blue





“The Amazing Story of Superman-Red and Superman-Blue!”

The original Superman-Red/Superman-Blue tale is an “Imaginary Story” that first appeared in Superman #162 (July 1963). The script was written by Leo Dorfman, with art by Curt Swan.

In the story, Superman is compelled to finish a list of unaccomplished goals, including the enlargement of the Bottle City of Kandor and eliminating crime and evil from Earth. In order to accomplish these goals, Superman invents a machine, powered by various types of kryptonite, that will increase his intelligence. The machine works, increasing Superman’s intelligence a hundredfold, but with the unexpected side effect of splitting Superman into twin beings, one outfitted in an all-red Superman costume and the other in an all-blue version. The twins name themselves Superman-Red and Superman-Blue.

The Supermen, using their enhanced intellects, first repair Brainiac’s “enlarging ray”. They then create a means to bring all the fragments of Krypton together, creating a “New Krypton” (eliminating all existing kryptonite in the process), and successfully enlarge Kandor on its surface, freeing its citizens from their bottle prison. At the urging of Lori Lemaris, the Supermen create an underwater world for the citizens of Atlantis and arrange an interstellar voyage to transport them to their new home. The two Supermen go on to create an “anti-evil” ray which can cure criminal tendencies in anyone. They place the ray into satellites in orbit around the Earth, curing not only villains such as Lex Luthor and Mr. Mxyzptlk, but reforming Communists such as Nikita Khrushchev and Fidel Castro. The reformed Luthor goes on to invent a serum that cures all known diseases, which the Supermen put into the water supply. Supergirl then releases the Phantom Zone inmates, also reformed by the ray, and they immigrate to New Krypton in a spaceship provided by the Legion of Super-Heroes.

With nearly all of the world’s problems solved, the two Supermen now have the opportunity to deal with personal matters. The split allows them to resolve the love triangle between Superman, Lois Lane, and Lana Lang. Superman-Red proposes to Lois, while Superman-Blue asks Lana to marry him. Each woman claims her own Superman, and they have a triple wedding: Superman-Blue and Lana, Superman-Red and Lois, and Lucy Lane marrying Jimmy Olsen (since Lucy need no longer wait for Lois to marry before she does). Red decides to live on New Krypton with Lois, renouncing his powers and raising a family, while Blue remains on Earth and retires to devote his life to scientific research and starting a Super-family of his own.

Superman-Red and Superman-Blue appeared again in a story written by Bob Rozakis and Paul Kupperberg and illustrated by Adrian Gonzales and Vince Colletta and first published in German in Superman Album No. 1 in West Germany in 1981. The story was published in English in 1982 in the oversized Superman Spectacular (an unnumbered one-shot in the United States but published as No. 1 in a series in The United Kingdom.) In this story, Red Kryptonite causes Superman to be temporarily split into Superman-Red and Superman-Blue and the two Supermen battle Lex Luthor and Terra-Man.

Superman-Red and Superman-Blue appear in a panel in Infinite Crisis #5, when Alexander Luthor, Jr. is trying to fuse the many alternate Supermen.

Superman Red/Superman Blue”

The second incarnation of Superman Red and Superman Blue began in a 1998 storyline. While temporarily deprived of the solar energy required to give him powers, Superman had developed energy-based abilities, which eventually forced him to adopt a blue and white containment suit to prevent the energy dispersing. While retaining most of his abilities, he could now also sense different kinds of energy, including the trail of radioactivity from a passing van, bolts of electricity and magnetic tractor beams rather than his original heat vision. 

He was also able to absorb the radiation, although this was incredibly painful. He also gained the ability to turn his powers “off,” though this took time to control as he inadvertently fried a toaster at home. This switch to Clark Kent also left him as vulnerable as a normal human, which was a bit of a surprise to him when he stubbed his toe while answering the phone. This version of Superman was referred to by some fans as “Electric Blue Superman”.

In the Superman Red/Superman Blue one-shot (February 1998), a trap created by the Cyborg Superman working with Toyman, caused Superman to split into two beings who represented different aspects of his personality, though each believed himself to be the original. Superman Blue was the more cerebral entity, preferring to think his way out of situations and actually solve problems with his mind as well as his powers. Superman Red was more rash, but also more decisive, preferring action over taking the time to think. Over time, these two personalities grew more and more polarized and individual, to the point that neither entity wanted to become one Superman again.

Both Supermen deeply loved Lois Lane; unlike in the earlier Red/Blue story, there was not another love interest for one of the Supermen to pair up with. Instead, they fought over Lois’ affections, each with almost no consideration for her feelings; Lois lost her tolerance for this and essentially kicked them both out of the house until they could figure out how to unite.

Perplexed, both Red and Blue flew to Antarctica to see if Kryptonian technology could solve the issue, but were met by a woman named Obsession, who had previously shown an incredible level of romantic lust for Superman. Then Maxima, another superpowered female admirer of Superman’s (only this one was far more volatile), stepped in. While Obsession liked the idea of two Supermen, Maxima found the existence of two utterly unacceptable. A fight broke out between the women when Obsession offered to share them with the Amazon from Almerac, insulting Maxima’s royal sensibilities. Superman Red and Superman Blue separated and reprimanded the combatants.

Following a battle with the Millennium Giants (Cabraca, Cerne and Sekhmet), the two Supermen merged and Superman returned to his normal powers and original costume.  The explanation is vague; Superman felt he was “rewarded” for Saving The World, although he later claimed that he returned to normal when his electromagnetic energy dispersed.

Although Superman briefly returned to his electric-blue form when facing Brainiac-13 after he was apparently absorbed by Brainiac’s energy conduits while trying to disrupt his power supply, this was revealed to be the result of Brainiac 2.5–Brainiac-13’s past self, hiding in Lena Luthor to avoid being deleted by his future self–creating the electric Superman based on scans taken of Superman in that form, intercepting B-13’s attempt to absorb Superman and uploading Superman’s mind into the electric body to keep Brainiac-13 occupied while Superman’s true body was restored in a LexCorp facility.

Superman Red appears in Superman/Batman #25 alongside an army of alternate Supermen and Batmen.

Sunday, 21 February 2021

DESTROY SUPERMAN, NOW!



The Human Heart is Still Subject to Monstrous Deceits....

— Jor-el of Krypton




Dan Jurgens: I have always liked working with characters that offer a wide sense of scope. Superman certainly fits that. On top of that, I appreciate the idea that Clark's private life offers a great deal of potential as well. He lives in a major city, works as a reporter and has a background in Smallville, Kansas, which is quite different. But so much of it touches on a certain sense of Americana that, when all those elements are combined, one ends up with tremendous story potential.

Mike Carlin (Superman group editor, now creative director for DC Animation): I was working with John Byrne at Marvel Comics on Fantastic Four when he decided to leave Marvel and take DC's offer to relaunch their Superman line, with Marv Wolfman and Jerry Ordway. A few months after JB's departure, I was fired at Marvel. After the summer of 1986, the editor of the Superman books was shifting to work on the relaunch of Justice League, so he'd need to phase out on Superman. Dick asked Byrne who he'd like to work with and he said something like, "I liked working with Carlin on (Fantastic Four)."

During the 1986 relaunch of DC Comics, Byrne would for a stretch serve as writer and artist on both Action Comics and the eponymous Superman title. Superman also had a third title in regular rotation, Adventures of Superman, which would eventually also come to be written by Byrne. Superman's "never-ending battle" was now hitting comic book stands every week but one during the month.

Carlin: We decided to have John write Adventures with Jerry [Ordway] staying on as the artist. With one person writing three titles it was just natural that one issue would lead in to the other.

Through a series of circuitous events, Byrne would end up leaving his Superman duties near the second anniversary of the Superman relaunch. This was no small hurdle to overcome, as Byrne had been the driving force behind the characters resurgence in sales and popularity. Carlin began to assemble a crew of veteran comic book talent to replace him.

Jerry Ordway (Writer/Artist, Adventures of Superman): I started on Adventures of Superman #424 in July of 1986. I worked my way up to writing when John Byrne left.

Roger Stern (Writer, Adventures of Superman/Action Comics): In August of '87, after 12 years at Marvel, I began writing freelance for DC and eventually began a run on Action Comics with issue #644. I wound up writing that title through issue #700.

Carlin: Byrne had left us with a pretty big story to follow up on. Superman had killed the three Kryptonian Phantom Zone prisoners and we all felt that that was too big a story to just move on from without addressing what kind of fallout Superman would have to deal with personally and psychologically.

So simply by talking on the phone Roger, Jerry and I concocted the "Superman in Exile" storyline, which was so big and sprawling, again, it solidified the ongoing importance of continuity between the titles. There simply seemed to be no other way.

Connecting the stories was much easier to manage when Byrne was helming most of the storylines himself. As the creative teams on the respective books began to diversify, some changes to the plotting process had to be made.

Carlin: The Superman titles were climbing in sales and, maybe more importantly, getting critical notice for our "style" and continuity and consistent use of the supporting characters. So I was able to convince DC to let me host a meeting at the offices with all of the principal players in attendance. So after a dinner and a hotel room meeting, the Super-Summit was born.

These annual "Superman Summits" allowed all the creative teams to get together in one spot to map out the next 12 months of Superman adventures. Eventually, talk of a fourth Superman title began to kick around DC.

Carlin: Paul Levitz liked the success of the linked Superman comics so much that he kept asking "When am I gonna get that fourth title?" So we had to expand the universe. Once again, I looked backwards to folks I'd worked with at Marvel. Jon Bogdanove was simply a favorite artist of mine, and Louise Simonson (eventual writer of the fourth title) is everyone's favorite, the end. Jon's son was named Kal-El, so I knew it was only going to be a matter of time. Jon HAD to draw Superman. So Superman: The Man of Steel was added to our monthly output filling up every week. Superman: Man of Tomorrow actually filled the gap in the four 5-week months that landed on New Comic Day… so we did literally 52 Superman titles a year.

Ordway: Here's the truth: it was hard work! People think we did one big continued story month in and month out, but it was mainly the subplots or B and C storylines that were the continued thread from title to title, as a way to get comic fans to buy all the titles, not just the main Superman one. That's where the idea started.

Carlin: I'd start the yearly story summits with charts tacked to the wall. A box for every issue of a Superman title for a year-plus. Folks would say what they wanted to do in their titles and we'd piece the year out filling the boxes right there in front of everyone. This was a "check your ego at the door" kind of meeting as we were all there in service of our pal Superman.

I stood as the arbiter of what was written down. This final chart arrived at by the end of the meeting would be transcribed and copied and sent to everyone. This didn't mean that there would be no room for divine inspiration as the year went on, but the skeleton of the year's plans was pretty sacred so that all four teams were running on the same train tracks for the year.

Superman Man of Steel 1
Credit: DC Comics
We flash forward a few years to the Summit meant to plan events for the 1993 slate of stories. While the quality on the four Super-titles had been bolstered by the expanded roster of comic book veterans, sales were now not reflective of the quality. It was now a struggle to keep Superman relevant in a climate that favored flashier or darker anti-heroes.

Bogdanove: So here we were, writing and drawing some of the best superhero stories of our lives, but feeling like nobody was really paying attention! It vexed us.

They needed a hook. An event.

Carlin: The wedding was planned in '90 or '91 to happen in Adventures #500 in early '93.

Everything was in place to finally consummate what was without question the longest courtship/love triangle in comic book history, and hopefully draw attention back to Metropolis. But they weren't the only ones with wedding bells ringing in their ears.

Carlin: [DC president] Jenette Kahn had actually interested Warner Bros. Television in a Daily Planet-centric TV show that was pitched using the soap opera elements in the current interlocked Superman comics. She pitched it as Lois Lane's Planet and it evolved into Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman.

This was big news to us. Contrary to some Fake News out there, it wasn't Warner Bros or the TV showrunners who didn't want us to do the wedding. Jenette and I decided that we wanted to hold off, save the plans, but not get to it when we had originally planned to. If the show was a flop, we could do the wedding as soon as we wanted. If the show was a hit and lasted long enough, maybe we could do their wedding on TV AND in the comics at the same time. What a great idea, we thought!

Unfortunately, when the writers showed up for the '91 Super-Summit, they weren't so excited about the idea. And the prospect of having to come up with something that could stand up to a wedding they had spent two years setting up made the idea even more daunting.

Ordway: We had had several meetings with various people involved in trying to get Lois & Clark launched, and it went on quite a long time. A month or two after our Florida conference, we were called into the DC Comics conference room and told that the wedding was on hold, so we could coordinate the event with the TV show, which had a new showrunner, Deborah Joy Levine. We were given a start date, a year later. The mood was more of annoyance, I recall.

Bogdanove: It's tough to see good work tossed out, but I think we knew we'd be able to work our way back around to use most of it later. At the time, though, we'd all been locked in that conference room at DC for three days when we were told we had to start over. We were already tired and a bit frayed. All the artists felt pressure to get home and get back to drawing, lest we fall behind on our deadlines. Mike rallied us and we dug back in and got to work.

Action Comics 662 Superman
Credit: DC Comics
Ordway: I personally wasn't upset too much to put the wedding on hold. When we plotted the engagement story, Lois was going to turn Clark down. I was writing the plot of the issue, and called Carlin up to tell him I thought it was better for Lois to say "yes." It felt right to me, though it was a last minute change. So Roger's title, which was next after Superman #50 on sale, would need a major change, and the result was for Clark to then reveal he was Superman to Lois. He couldn't start the engagement with a lie. In my mind, they could have been engaged for years, you know?

Jurgens: We already knew the wedding was off the table so I had already been thinking of other ideas. It's not like we went in and heard it for the first time.

Stern: There was some initial disappointment. After all, we'd already been building to that story for a couple of years. But then, it became another challenge: OK, if we can't have Clark and Lois marry, what can we do?

Bogdanove: The classic story we all tell at conventions is mostly true. "The Death of Superman" all started with Jerry Ordway. As he always did whenever we hit a bump about what should happen next, Jerry wise-cracked, "Let's kill him!"

Ordway: I believe I first made the joke at whichever story meeting where Carlin set up the giant poster boards on the walls. We came in, perhaps for the story conference that launched the Pérez Action Comic title, and I thought those blank issue boxes seemed intimidating. I joked for Mike to fill in the last box on the last of maybe six boards, "Everyone dies. The end." And I guess it became a running gag, which I repeated at the next meeting, to get the ideas flowing, with that one box filled in.

Carlin: But at this meeting, there really was a feeling that we had done these guys wrong by taking away the planned storyline that they'd invested time in setting up and a whole bunch of ideas that, now, felt like we would never get to. So when Jerry said "Let's just kill 'im!" this time… there weren't a lotta laughs. So I said: "Okay, wise guys, IF we kill him, THEN what happens?"

I felt like I needed to make a peace offering to break the mood and get back to filling boxes. Because we were scotching the wedding set-up were more empty boxes than usual. I was desperate to get some conversation going.

Bogdanove: What made the difference when Jerry said it this time was Louise Simonson. Louise had been editor of all the X-titles at Marvel, where she had presided over the deaths of many mutants. She knew the value of "killing your darlings." Louise spoke up, saying "You know what you get from killing a character: You get to show just how much that character means — to his friends, family, enemies, to the whole world!"

That got us thinking! We were a contentious, brawling bunch sometimes, but we were definitely all united by our passion for Superman. We loved this character. We loved his myth, and what he was all about, thematically and symbolically. Superman really mattered to all of us!

Carlin: Our own personal frustrations with what was popular in comics at the time, murderers and anti-heroes everywhere, and the persistent labeling of Superman as a "boy scout" and a cornball fueled the death itself. If only murderers and monsters were heroes and you readers were going to take Superman for granted, then you won't mind if we take him away.

Bogdanove: In those days, sometimes referred to as The Dark Age of comics, characters like Superman — good-hearted, purely altruistic heroes — were unpopular. Dark, vengeful, brooding heroes held sway with fans, almost to the exclusion of all other types of heroes, including ours. Superman, the very first comic book superhero, was seen as too "old school" to be taken seriously.

Jurgens: We had considered the "Death of…" idea earlier, but never in any depth. More of a recognition that it had been a classic story, many years earlier, that affected us as readers. Prior to the summit, I talked to a couple of the other creators on the phone and suggested it as a story with big possibilities. I had no idea how to do it—just that it offered some great drama. I believe I had mentioned it earlier during the meeting but it didn't catch. In all honesty, it was the skimpiest of ideas. No story built in.

Carlin: Dan had long wanted to pit Superman against simple brute force. What if, no matter how strong and powerful you are, there is ALWAYS someone out there who is bigger? So his issue #75 of Superman was on the schedule before Adventures #500 (both "anniversary" issues, of sorts). We all decided that that was where Superman would die — at the hands of a literal force of nature — and that he'd come back to life in Adventures #500.

Jurgens: I went in with a yellow legal pad that had two ideas on it. One was, "Monster trashes Metropolis" and the other was "Death of Superman." At the time, there was no thought of combining those two ideas and the monster had no name. All I knew is that I wanted a physical confrontation for Superman because most of his villains, from Luthor to Prankster to Toyman to Mr. Z didn't allow for it.

Credit: Dan Jurgens
Credit: Dan Jurgens


Bogdanove: Dan had come to the meeting with a drawing of a Hulk-like character covered with those damn bony protrusions. We artists were always campaigning for tougher bad guys Superman could punch, but Dan had made it his mission.
Jurgens: I had a very rough doodle of an exoskeleton sort of monster.

Doomsday Sketch 4
Credit: Dan Jurgens
Carlin: The four pencil artists all took a stab at designing what Doomsday would look like and we democratically voted for the one we all liked best.

Bogdanove: As fate would have it that day, there was Dan's sketch, taped up on the wall, near the little box in which Mike had written the words "Doomsday for Superman." Without knowing it, Mike had already named him. Doomsday was born.

Doomsday Sketch 5
Credit: Dan Jurgens
Ordway: Part of the bargain among those present was that if we did the big action stuff, the story had to have consequences. People would die, and Metropolis would be pretty damaged.

Carlin: Dan also wanted to do an all splash-page issue… and since this was literally going to be a big fight, this seemed like the perfect place to do that method of storytelling.

Bogdanove: It had to be a visually powerful moment. It had to be a fight. Inker Brett Breeding had the clever idea of dividing the fight among all four titles in a way that would not only progressively build up the power and suspense to the fateful climax, but had the added effect of accelerating the pace of the action the closer you got to the end.

Carlin: The issue of Man of Steel before Superman #75 was deemed to be drawn with two panels a page. The issue of Action Comics was to be three panels a page. And the issue of Adventures before Action was to be four panels a page. So what we had was a super-subtle build in the action across the four weeks leading to Superman's death.

Bogdanove: No one wanted any of the villains in Superman's rogues' gallery to gain the distinction of ultimately being the one to kill Superman. It couldn't just be Luthor without negating something thematically important. Also, it couldn't be Kryptonite, because that would have been too passive and a crutch from a writing perspective.

Superman Doomsday sketch
Credit: Jon Bogdanove
Jurgens fittingly enough would be the artist who drew that final image of a battle-weary Superman finally succumbing to battle with Doomsday, cradled in Lois Lane's arms, with Jimmy Olsen forlorn in the background.

Jurgens: As for that final double page splash, well… it first appeared as a triple page spread at the end of Superman #75. I don't think it has ever been reprinted that way, with a double page spread that then folds out into a triple pager. We spent an extraordinary amount of time getting it to work properly and I think it really helped bring Superman #75 to an appropriate close.

Superman #75 would go on to sell millions copies over multiple printings, reaching sales figure that were bolstered in no small part by the mainstream attention the death of this international icon had attracted.

Ordway: Coincidentally, the public's actual reaction mirrored what we did in the comics — they suddenly came out in numbers, professing their love for Superman. That was what we wanted all along, though of course none of us had any idea it would sell. We had hopes that people would respond, maybe comic shops might order more Superman comics.

Jurgens: There is no way we, DC or anyone was prepared for the reaction to our story. We were simply trying to tell a good, dramatic story that said something about the nature of a great character.

Carlin: I still can't believe people believed Superman would be gone forever. Reporter after reporter came up to DC and asked "Why are you killing Superman?" and my standard answer was "When was the last time you bought a Superman comic? Hell, when was the last time you bought ANY comic?" And every reporter said they hadn't bought a Superman comic since they were kids, to which my response was: "Then you're the one who killed Superman!" And most of these reporters, men and women, said that they were reporters because of Clark and/or Lois's inspiration!

Superman Lois Jimmy Death of Superman
Credit: DC Comics
For the creative team, the story they yearned to tell was not the slugfest that led up Superman's death, but the stories of loss afterward.

Bogdanove: In what seemed like no time, we'd written most of "Funeral for a Friend," which was where the real meat of the story was. I think we accomplished exactly what Louise spoke of. Through the eyes of Metropolis and the world, via the reactions of heroes, villains and the friends and family he knew, I think we got to say a lot about why Superman matters.

Certain scenes stand out in my memory: Bibbo (Bibowski, a supporting character who idolized the Man of Steel) saying, "It shoulda' been me!" Ma and Pa Kent watching the funeral of their own son on television, all alone by themselves. Some of these scenes we talked about that day still make my eyes tear up just thinking about them.

Funeral Friend Superman
Jurgens: That's what the "Funeral for a Friend" storyline was all about. By taking Superman away, we could really explore his importance to the world at large. What worked great is that reality seemed to fuse with our storyline for a while, as any number of columnists wrote pieces that addressed the question of Superman's importance to the world.

Stern: I remember at one point thinking, "We'd better not screw this up." Seriously though, I saw it as a great opportunity to show how important Superman is to the world — and how much he would be missed, once he was gone.

Carlin: We really thought they were great solutions to having to stall the wedding for a bit… and all was good.

But then came the tricky part: bringing him back. And even trickier: keeping it a secret.

Carlin: This is also when another idea came up when we called Paul Levitz and the marketing guys to tell them our grand scheme: four titles all published the same day spotlighting a NEW Superman who might be the real deal… or not. They loved the idea, but with the solicitation cycle we would be telling people Superman was returning BEFORE they actually bought Superman #75! So everyone decided we would stop publishing Superman comics for three months, which was unheard of since 1938!!

Bogdanove: It was the vision of Mike Carlin, Jenette Kahn, and Paul Levitz, and the courage of DC Comics, to commit to actually ceasing publication of Superman books. And then to come back without the title hero! Pretty damn gutsy, unconventional thinking in those days.

Carlin: I was relieved that would give us three extra months to get those first four issues done… and then I wasn't relieved because I had to publish SOME kind of Super-stuff in those three months.

Jurgens: Those intervening weeks got special, Death of Superman-related material.

Carlin: We did stuff like a Lex Luthor/Supergirl mini-series, and an actual issue of Newstime Magazine (the DC Universe's version of TIME Magazine) This marketing maneuver really was smart — it preserved our story's surprises AND added to the illusion that Superman was really gone forever!

Jurgens: As we had planned the entire "Death of…" and "Funeral for a Friend" stories, we had not planned anything in terms of Superman's return.

Carlin: We did have an "Emergency Super-Summit" when we saw just how huge the sales figures were going to be… and we knew we couldn't just have Superman sit up in his coffin in Adventures #500 and say "I'm baaaaaaack!". This meeting was away from the office in a hotel in Tarrytown, NY, where we plotted the "Reign of the Supermen" story.

The only new person in the room was Karl Kesel, who I had worked with on Hawk & Dove. Another great team-player who loved Jack Kirby's work, Jimmy Olsen in particular, which we would reference a lot in the Superman books. This was Karl's only association with Marvel: liking Jack Kirby. I had finally broken my bad habit!

Karl Kesel (Writer/Inker, Adventures of Superman): Jerry Ordway felt he'd put in his time on Adventures of Superman and was ready for something new, so Mike Carlin needed a new writer on the book and called me. This was before the death became what it became — no one saw it coming. I'm sure Jerry would have never left the book if he'd known what was around the corner! When Carlin offered me the gig, I talked to Jerry about what it was like working on the book (since there was clear cross-pollination between all the Superman titles) and what sort of royalties I might see— which were maybe a couple hundred bucks a month, I believe.

Ordway: My wife and I started our family, and I was consciously trying to avoid working all the time, because those art deadlines are brutal, with long hours and little time for family. That's why I scaled back to just writing. As to leaving, the opportunity came to me once we actually planned the "Death of Superman" storyline. Jurgens had the actual death in Superman #75, and I was going to bring Supes back in Adventures of Superman #500, which was just a nice number.

Once the sales numbers came in on "Death," I'll admit I had some regrets, but I wasn't going to take the book back from Karl before he even started! And I felt like I was leaving on a high note, whatever the sales were. That newfound success was an uphill battle I fought on Superman since Byrne left, to get comic stores to care more about Superman.

Carlin: In the ramp-up to this meeting all of the writers had a different idea on how to do a NEW kind of Superman… if I would only pick their idea and everyone would play along. I really didn't know how to enter this meeting having to pick a "winner." At some point, Louise Simonson said on the phone to me, "Why don't we just do them all?" That was the answer! Saved the day! AND for a little while, the teams would all get to kind of do their own thing after years of forced collaboration—at least for a few months

four supermen
Kesel: The couple months where we had a certain amount of autonomy in each of our titles meant I could ease into the cross-continuity of the books.

Carlin: Louise and Jon did their "everyman as Superman" in Steel. Roger Stern and Jackson [Guice] explored the Kryptonian side of Superman in the Eradicator. Karl and Tom got to do the adventures of Superman when he was a boy in Superboy. And Dan Jurgens got to do the all-powerful superhero who needed no civilian life in the Cyborg.

The storyline would run under the banner "Reign of the Supermen," which itself was a homage to the original short story by Siegel and Schuster entitled "Reign of the Super-man," the pairs first published work with a character named Superman, pre-dating the debut of the caped version in Action Comics #1 by about five years.

Bogdanove: Before we all split up into our groups, Dan had suggested Louise and I do a blue-collar character. But I think he thought he should be comic relief, a poor man's Superman. Louise and I didn't want to just play him for laughs. We wanted to create a working-class hero with dignity. Louise brought her Marvel experience to bear.

DC didn't really have an Iron Man-type of armored character. We thought the idea of a homemade Iron Man might be interesting. How could a guy with no fortune or Stark/Wayne-like resources possibly fill in for Superman? What would motivate him even to try? I'd always loved the Legend of John Henry, The Steel-Drivin' Man. I had made drawings of him in my teens, and even wrote a poem, I think. His story and archetype were meaningful to me. When Louise pointed out that he was more than a mere legend, that John Henry was a real historical figure who really did duel a steam-powered drill for the dignity of workers and won at the cost of his life — I knew here was a superhero motif that needed to happen.

Kesel: When I first started as an inker on Legion of Superheroes, within six months I pitched [editor] Karen Berger an idea for a new title. (That I would write, of course.) I won't go into details about what the idea was (because I still like it and may be able to do something with it someday) but not long ago I ran across the typed-out proposal — and the main character was exactly like Superboy in attitude and tone! So this sort of character had obviously been in the back of my head for some time. Why I came up with this sort of character, I have no idea. But he was a blast to write.

Jurgens: Villains are, in many ways, always more interesting to write. I just thought it'd be great to have a "rebuilt" Cyborg Superman appear and to my best to convince everyone that he was the real Superman. The idea that I could bring readers to the point of that belief, pull the rug out from under their feet, and reveal him as a villain was really fun to write.

I had introduced Hank Henshaw, who became Cyborg Superman, a few years earlier so readers already knew him as a villain. But this elevated him a great deal.

Reign of Supermen
Stern: I wanted to show the readers how frightening a ruthless Superman could be. The Eradicator had always represented the cold, Kryptonian side of Superman's heritage, so I went with that full force. The Eradicator had originally been created in Action Comics Annual #2, as part of the "Superman in Exile" storyline. We didn't give the Eradicator a humanoid body until the "Krypton Man" storyline. That story launched Superman: The Man of Steel #1.

That last story, of course, had ended with the Eradicator being dispersed within the Fortress of Solitude. During the Summit, it occurred to me that we could bring him back as the replacement Superman for Action Comics and do it in such a way that the readers wouldn't realize who he was until the ultimate big reveal.

The conclusion of the "The Reign of Superman" finally returned Superman to the land of the living, fresh from a Kryptonian Regeneration Matrix, and added four new players to the Superman mythology that have endured to this day.

Carlin: We all had shorthand distinctions in our minds about what made each of the new Superman different… and those distinctions actually helped translate some of these guys into their own ongoing series after the whole "Death and Return" storyline was over. Steel and Superboy had long-running series of their own, Eradicator had a mini-series or two, and well, Cyborg Superman never got a book because he was the bad guy!

Carlin: What was great about Steel and Superboy, in particular, is that Louise & Jon and Karl & Tom got to break off from the (very hard to do) continuity and finally run and explore what they wanted to do in their own stand-alone series! They'd earned that.

Bogdanove: It's good to try to maintain a certain detachment about characters you don't own, even if you created them. I learned this long before Louise and I created Steel. I love John Henry Irons. That character feels like a real person to me, like family, almost. I'm actually honored Shaq liked the character so much he wanted to make that movie! It certainly has craptastic charm. In the comics, Steel has generally fared much better than he did in his movie. Several writers have written him. Those I've seen have been pretty good! I am particularly pleased with Christopher Priest and Denys Cowan's run on the character.

Also a fun byproduct of Clark's emergence from the regeneration chamber: The Super-Mullet.

Superman Mullet
Credit: DC Comics
Bogdanove: All I really want to say about that is the long hair wasn't my idea! I know that in Brett's videos, I'm the guy running around in a ponytail, but the Super-Mullet wasn't me And it wasn't a mullet, it was Tarzan-hair!

Kesel: All I can say about the mullet is that it probably stayed around longer than anyone thought it would simply because we kinda forgot about it. At least, I did! (How long a character's hair is really doesn't impact plot lines.) I can't even remember now — when DID we get rid of the long hair? Certainly by the wedding…

Carlin: The longer hair came about as Superman was returning… and we wanted to show at least a slight change. Nothing as drastic as the four Supermen, but just a nod to the fact that something new was happening. Lois and Clark was coming to TV the same week that Superman returned in the comics, and in the pilot Dean Cain's hair was slightly longer.

We took that cue to lengthen Superman's hair as well as deepen the blue and red of his costume to show that while things were back to normal they wouldn't be entirely the same. Some of the pencilers went a little overboard and we ended up with lion manes and ponytails, but the longer hair served a purpose in the storytelling. And like most of our stories we knew the hair was going to have its ending… and it did when Lois & Clark got married and Superman went back to his classic cut with the "S"-Curl as a gift to Lois and readers around the world.

Carlin: We personally felt bad that characters like LOBO and The Punisher were being hailed as role models of some sort — and maybe it was our fault that Superman felt old-fashioned still. We were in a position to do something about it, or at least to TRY to do something about it, so we took that awkward opportunity of a postponed wedding and really made our point: Don't take Superman for granted — or he might not be there when you need him.

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And I know we succeeded incredibly in getting that message out there, because the real world reacted the exact same way that Jimmy and Lois and Bibbo and all the denizens of the DCU reacted. Life was imitating art… and here we are 25 years since Superman died and returned and this story still matters enough for us to have put out an animated Death of Superman direct-to-video feature film this summer with Part Two, The Reign of the Superman, scheduled for release next January.

Sunday, 7 February 2021

Inoculation, Not Vaccination





A scientific experiment turns all the kryptonite on Earth to iron, as Clark Kent moves from newspaper to television journalism.


vaccination (n.)
1800, used by British physician Edward Jenner (1749-1823) for the technique he publicized of preventing smallpox by injecting people with the similar but much milder cowpox virus (variolae vaccinae), from vaccine (adj.) "pertaining to cows, from cows" (1798), from Latin vaccinus "from cows," from vacca "cow," a word of uncertain origin. 

A mild case of cowpox rendered one immune thereafter to smallpox. 

"The use of the term for diseases other than smallpox is due to Pasteur" [OED].

 
The earlier 18c. method of smallpox protection in England was by a kind of inoculation called  variolation (from variola, the medical Latin word for "smallpox"). 

There are two forms of smallpox: a minor one that killed 2% or less of the people who got it, and a virulent form that had about a 30% mortality rate and typically left survivors with severe scarring and often blinded them. 

Those who got the minor form were noted to be immune thereafter to the worse. 

Doctors would deliberately infect healthy young patients with a local dose of the minor smallpox, usually resulting in a mild case of it at worst, to render them immune to the more deadly form. 

Jenner's method was safer, as it involved no smallpox exposure.

Entries related to vaccination

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Thursday, 14 January 2021

WEAKNESS








No One knows him better than I do.

The Extreme Lengths to which Our Boy has gone to Make Himself Strong are powerful indicators of The Weakness he feels that he must overcome.

That Weakness is still thereinside.


-- Hurt.

Doctor Simon, Hurt.

He's Daddy's Evil Twin -- 

And Your Own.




 


"Samson’s Hair. 
Achilles’ Heel. 
The oddly elaborate gymnastic contortions that exposed the vulnerable spots of Celtic superwarriors. 

Even the greatest heroes needed a weakness
or there would be no drama, no fall or redemption.

  If nothing could hurt Superman, 
what could hurt him?

  In fact, Weisinger and his writers understood 
The Most Important Thing
about Superman: 

That His Heart 
was vulnerable
and 
His Self-Esteem 
could be fragile

The Super was just 
The Icing on The Cake, 
The sugar coating : 

These were stories about 
Man and His Role 
in A New World.

  But now that The Man of Tomorrow had achieved near-divine heights of omnipotence, The Need for some kind of convincing Physical Vulnerability was becoming greater. 

Or so goes the prevailing opinion. 

The glowing green killer mineral Kryptonite had been introduced in the 1943 Superman radio series. 

The contaminated remains of Superman’s Home Planet fell to Earth in meteor form—much more often than the debris of A Distant World might reasonably be expected to fall, and in sufficient quantities to threaten Superman’s Life on a regular basis. 

As a weapon, it had a certain symbolic resonance: 
The notion that radioactive fragments 
of Superman’s Birth World 
had become toxic to him 
spoke of The Old Country, 
The Old Ways, 
The Threat of The Failure 
to Assimilate.

 
Superman was a 
naturalised American

The last thing he needed 
were these lethal reminders of 
Where He’d Come From; 

That he, The Son of Lordly Scientists, 
had been reduced to 
Toiling in a farmer’s field or 
Minding the general store.

  Weisinger knew how his young readers’ minds worked 
and stretched the idea a little further: 

If there was Green Kryptonite, 
couldn’t there be other colors too

The prismatic splintering began 
with the invention of Red K
The Cool Kryptonite --

Possibly because it made literal 
The Master Silver Age Theme 
of Bodily Transformation. 

It was mineral LSD for Superman, 
affecting not just His Mind 
but also reshaping His Body 
into A Playground of Fleshly Hallucination.

  No two trips on Red K 
were the samein-story 
logic promised. 

Red K would affect Superman 
in a different way every time 
and theoretically might never become boring. 

So, under its influence, Superman might develop 
The Head of An Ant, scaling The Daily Planet building as 
The Commander of a Nightmarish Army of 
Giant Insects —

“BZZ-BZZZ … 
WE MUST CAPTURE LOIS LANE … 
SHE WILL BE OUR QUEEN!”

— or split into Good Clark, Bad Superman
or even become goofy for forty-eight hours.

  Red K and The Silver Age are inextricable. 

Red K was LSD for superheroes, and under its influence 
Superman could unclench 
his entire being and 
Walk The Razor’s Edge 
of Joyous Self-Abandonment 
and Ego-Annihilating Terror — 

An American Pioneer.

Red-K served equally as a handy metaphor 
for the adolescent hormonal shifts, physical changes, 
and weird moods of elation and despair 
that were being experienced by its readers.

  Other Kryptonite variants were created 
as plot mechanics demanded 
rather than with any eye to longevity

That’s Why --
Gold Kryptonite 
removes Superman’s Powers permanently
Blue Kryptonite 
affects only Bizarros, 
and 
White Kryptonite 
is deadly to plants
which makes it about as interesting 
as matches, DDTor a stout spade.

But, of course, 
Superman’s Ultimate Weakness 
was his Secret identity

Why wouldn’t shy Clark Kent 
choose to tear open his shirt 
and reveal to his unrequited love 
The Potent God-Man behind the buttons? 

Instead he hid The Truth from Lois Lane, 
devising deceptions that became so elaborate as to be cruel : 
The Ghastly Tricks of Semantics 
a Man-Boy might play on a Child-Woman, 
all in the guise of 
“Teaching Her a Lesson.”


  A story like “The Two Faces of Superman” showed the hero promising to marry Lois Lane but only if she met him at a particular time outside the church. 
When she met his conditions, 
he contrived to seal her car door with his heat vision so that she couldn’t get out. 
Unable to marry him at precisely the correct hour meant that Lois forfeited her chance. 
A relieved, chortling Superman took to the skies, having hoodwinked the predator once more.








  Like RumpelstiltskinTom Tit Tot, and the other creatures of folklore who knew that 
names held power 
and kept theirs secret, 
Superman maintained his distance 
from Clark and vice versa. 
Their paths rarely crossed

He hid His Heart in a plain suit, 
behind glasses. 

For Lois, A Girl, to know Who He Was would be The End. 

She’d only pressure him into exchanging his gaudy suit and life of adventure for something less embarrassing, more domestic. 

She would expect him to be home for dinner, when there were stricken ocean liners to rescue. 

In the end, his self-deceiving fantasies of one day carrying Lois up the aisle were just that, and if he married Lois, he’d be Clark forever

It wouldn’t matter how strong or fast he was, he’d be Clark racing around the globe to pick up groceries. "



....or making soufflés with his heat-vison



"I never drink when I fly."

** TAKES A DRINK **

** LOSES THE ABILITY TO FLY **

Sunday, 8 March 2020

DROWNING


People need Ordering Principles, 
and Chaos otherwise beckons.

- Peterson



I hate it when They drown me....
— Buffy, The Vampire Slayer



LUTHOR :
Krrrrrryptonite..!!
You're asking yourself, "How?"

Didn't your dad ever teach you to look before you leap?

Crystals. They're amazing, aren't they?

They inherit The Traits of The Minerals around them... 
kind of like — A Son 
inheriting The Traits 
of His FATHER !



Look buddy, we sent you there 
to die, but ya' had to come back . . . 

Oh yeah. All those photos? 
Those stories about 
Krypton still existing? 

It was me
And him.

Lex looks toward Stanford. 

Thankfully, 
The Press doesn't check Facts like they used to.
 
Hey,  you took away five years of my life. 
I just returned the favor.




SUPERMAN :
I'm still Superman!

SUPERMAN REVENGE SQUAD :
Get up! Come on!
Now, fly.

STABS HIM WITH A KRYPTONITE SHIV AND SNAPS OFF THE BLADE

LUTHOR:
So long, Superman.

“We require RULES, STANDARDS, VALUES 
— alone AND together. 

We’re pack animals, 
Beasts of burden. 

We must Bear a Load, 
to justify our miserable existence. 







We require Routine and Tradition. 
That’s Order





Order can become excessive, 
and that’s Not Good




But Chaos can swamp us, so we drown — 
and that is also Not Good


We need to stay on 
The Straight and Narrow path. 


[I seek,] Therefore [to] 
Provide A Guide to Being There. 


There” is The Dividing Line 
between Order and Chaos. 

That’s where we are simultaneously 
Stable ENOUGH
Exploring ENOUGH
Transforming ENOUGH
Repairing ENOUGH
and 
Cooperating ENOUGH


It’s there we find The Meaning that justifies 
Life and its inevitable Suffering. 





Perhaps, if we lived •properly•, we would be able to tolerate the weight of our own self-consciousness. 








Perhaps, if we lived •properly•, we could withstand the knowledge of our own fragility and mortality, without the sense of aggrieved victimhood that produces, first, 
Resentment, then Envy
and then 
The Desire for 
Vengeance and Destruction. 

Perhaps, if we lived •properly•, we wouldn’t have to turn to totalitarian certainty to shield ourselves from the knowledge of our own Insufficiency and Ignorance. 

Perhaps we could come to avoid those pathways to Hell — 
and we have seen in the terrible Twentieth Century 
just how real Hell can be.


Humanity, in toto
and those who compose it 
as identifiable people 
deserve some sympathy 
for the appalling burden 
under which 
The Human Individual 
genuinely staggers; 

Some sympathy for subjugation to 
Mortal Vulnerability
Tyranny of The State, and 
The Depredations of Nature

It is an Existential Situation that 
no mere animal encounters or endures
and one of severity such 
that it would take a God to fully bear it. 

It is this sympathy 
that should be the proper medicament 
for self-conscious self-contempt
which has its justification
but is only half The Full and Proper story. 

Hatred for Self and Mankind 
must be balanced with 
Gratefulness for Tradition and The State and 
Astonishment at what Normal, 
Everyday People accomplish 
to say nothing of 
The Staggering Achievements 
of the Truly Remarkable. 

We Deserve some respect. 
You Deserve some respect. 
You are important to Other People, 
as much as to yourself. 

You have some vital role to play in 
The Unfolding Destiny of The World. 

You are, therefore, morally obliged 
to take care of yourself. 

You should take care of, 
help and be good to yourself 
the same way you would take care of, help and be good to someone you loved and valued. 

You may therefore 
have to conduct yourself habitually 
in a manner that allows you 
some respect for your own Being — 
and fair enough. 

But every person is deeply flawed. 
Everyone falls short of the glory of God. 

If that stark fact meant, however, that we had no responsibility to care, for ourselves as much as others, everyone would be brutally punished all the time. 

That would not be good. 

That would make the shortcomings of the world, which can make everyone who thinks honestly question the very propriety of the world, worse in every way. 

That simply cannot be the proper path forward. 

To treat yourself as if you were someone you are responsible for helping is, instead, to consider what would be truly good for you. 

THIS IS •NOT•  
“What You WANT.” 

It is also NOR “What Would Make You HAPPY. 

Every time you give a child something sweet, you make that child happy. 

That does NOT mean that you should do nothing for children except feed them candy. 

“Happy” is by no means synonymous with “Good.” 


You must get children to brush their teeth.
They must put on their snowsuits when they go outside in the cold, even though they might object strenuously. 

You must help a child become a virtuous, responsible, awake being, capable of full reciprocity—
Able to take care of himself and others, and to thrive while doing so. 

Why would you think it acceptable to do anything less for yourself? 

You need to consider The Future and think

“What might my life look like if I were caring for myself •properly•?"

"What career would challenge me and render me productive and helpful, 
so that I could shoulder my share of the load, 
and enjoy the consequences?"

"What should I be doing, when I have some freedom, to improve my health, expand my knowledge, and strengthen my body?”

You need to know where you are, so you can start to chart your course. 

You need to know who you are, so that you understand your armament and bolster yourself in respect to your limitations. 

You need to know where you are going, so that you can limit the extent of chaos in your life, restructure order, and bring the divine force of Hope to bear on The World. 

You must determine where you are going, so that you can bargain for yourself, so that you don’t end up resentful, vengeful and cruel. 

You have to articulate your own principles, so that you can defend yourself against others’ taking inappropriate advantage of you, and so that you are secure and safe while you work and play. 





You must discipline yourself carefully. 








You must keep the promises you make to yourself, and reward yourself, so that you can trust and motivate yourself. 

You need to determine how to act toward yourself so that you are most likely to become and to stay a good person. 
It would be good to make The World a better place. 


Heaven, after all, will not arrive of its own accord. 

We will have to work to bring it about, and strengthen ourselves, so that we can withstand the deadly angels and flaming sword of judgment that God used to bar its entrance. 

Don’t underestimate the power of vision and direction. 

These are irresistible forces, able to transform what might appear to be unconquerable obstacles into traversable pathways and expanding opportunities. 


Strengthen the individual. 
Start with yourself. 

Take care with yourself. 
Define who you are. 
Refine your personality. 

Choose your destination and articulate your Being. 

As the great nineteenth-century German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche so brilliantly noted,
 “He whose life has a why can bear almost any how.” 

You could help direct The World, on its careening trajectory, a bit more toward Heaven and a bit more away from Hell. 

Once having understood Hell, researched it, so to speak—particularly your own individual Hell—you could decide against going there or creating that. 
You could aim elsewhere. 

You could, in fact, devote your life to this. 

That would give you a Meaning, with a capital M. 

That would justify your miserable existence. 

That would atone for your sinful nature, and replace your shame and self-consciousness with the natural pride and forthright confidence of someone who has learned once again to walk with God in the Garden. 

You could begin by treating yourself as if you were someone you were responsible for helping.