Silly question, but it popped into my mind while watching old Superman cartoons this past weekend.
Does Superman drink? After a hard day of beating on Brainiac, foiling a half dozen crimes, holding up a broken bridge so a bus full of school children can live another day, (and all that while doing his job at the daily planet) does the Man of Steel kick back with a cold one?
I can think of reasons he wouldn’t drink…Supes seems like the kind of dude that wouldn’t drink really, if he were a normal person even. If he did enjoy a drink or two does alcohol even affect him? If he doesn’t drink is it more because he is wary of what he might do if drunk?
I’d imagine it wouldn’t affect him… but then again, it did in* Superman III*. I guess someone with that level of power drunk would be a very bad thing for the world… so he’d probably refrain if it affected him.
I can think, vaguely, of several instances where he refuses alcohol in the comics. He appears to prefer milk and juice when given a choice. He is, indeed, the big blue boy scout.
If I remember right, he was under the influence of some synthetic tar-laced Kryptonite when he was drunk in Superman III. At full strength, he routinely does stuff like inhale whole clouds of poisonous gas; I’m guessing some beverage ethyl alcohol shouldn’t affect him.
Then again, he was drinking a beer with Jimmy in Superman Returns…
Best not to ask if Superman drinks. Because if he drinks, he probably pees. And Kryptonian micturation is probably on the “Man of Steel, Woman of Kleenex” level. Poor Pa Kent’s plumbing bill must have been devastating.
Even worse, if Superman drinks, he probably eats. And if he eats… well, I’m thinking that no courtesy flush is going to handle a Kryptonian poo. Assuming it wasn’t faster than a speeding bullet in the first place, I guess.
There was a fuss last year when DC withdrew a copy of Action Comics because it showed a picture of Clark Kent enjoying a beer with Pa at the family farm in Kansas. The cover was doctored to turn the beer bottles into soda pop and, once again, the world was safe.
Even as Clark Kent? Perhaps Clark doesn’t go bar hopping or play quarters, but would Supes have a brewski with friends as Clark? I’m betting its a “no”, but has DC established that Clark or Supes don’t drink? As Superman I totally understand him setting an example. As Clark I wonder if may have a few beers with Perry, Lois and Jimmy after work.
That would depend on the current depiction of Clark – at some times, look up “nerd” in the dictionary and there’s his picture; at others, he’s more apt to fit in.
What would it matter if he did? Consuming alcohol wouldn’t have any effect on him, any more than consuming cyanide would.
Have you ever calculated how much energy he has to expend to do the things he does? Lifting up buildings, flying at supersonic speeds, lifting up buildings while flying at supersonic speeds? The only explanation is that his gut is a nuclear fusion furnace. He extracts the energy he needs from food not from the Krebs cycle, but by fusing all the light elements into heavier elements – all the way down the energy-well to iron, if need be.
(Maybe that’s why they call him the Man of Steel. They’re describing his poop.)
