Someone please update me on the Superman legend

Cafe Society
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I was a big Superman fanatic from about 1961 to 1973, then lost interest discovering girls, and later drugs. Now in my senescence, I’ve tried to follow a few discussion threads about Supie, and get completely lost as to what the hell happened to the Superman legend.

When I left him, he was born Kal-el on Krypton to Jor-el and Lara, shot off to Smallville and raised by Ma and Pa Kent, who died, then went off to Metropolis, was joined by cousin Supergirl, Krypto, Beppo the super monkey, superhorse, super cat, and hung out with Batman and the Justice League in his spare time. His Chief foe was Lex Luthor and Brainiac, and he was a mild-mannered reporter for the Daily Planet.

What the hell happened?

And are all those comics I saved from 1961 to 1973 worth anything today? I also inherited Superman #17 from my dad. It has Supie holding Hitler and Tojo up by the scruffs of their necks.

QtM

2

Wow, I’ve only seen pictures of the Hitler/Tojo cover. This site lists it as up to about $4,000 in mint condition.

Anyhoo, I collected consistantly from about 1980 to 1995. In 1987, artist/writer John Byrne was brought in a major revamp. The remodeled Krpyton is an untra-futuristicky sterile place that actualy kinda resembled the Chirstopher Reeve movie version. Kal-El gets rocketed off just as Krypton goes blammo and lands near Smallville to be picked up by the Kents. He wasn’t a two-year old child, but essentially a newborn (Kryptonian fetusses grow in “gestation chambers”, and Kal’s was put in the rocket). The Kents lived on an isolated farm some distance from Krypton and were isolated there by a five-month blizzard after they found the rocket, so as far as anyone knew, Clark was their natural child.

Clark’s powers develop slowly (pretty much like the Smallville TV series) and he has no “Superboy” career. He uses his powers secretly to avert disastars and whatnot for several years before being forced into a big public display while rescuing an experimental 'space plane", carrying reporter Lois Lane. He adopts the costume shortly afterward.

Other major story elements (or at least the ones that were in play when I stopped collecting) are:

[list][li]Jonathon and Martha Kent are still alive[/li][li]Superman is not quite as powerful as he once was. He’s not able to fly faster than light, though he did survive a 40-megaton nuclear explosion at a distance of about 10 inches.[/li][li]Superman did “die” temporarily, and one of his replacements is the new “Superboy” with different origin and powers.[/li][li]The only piece of Kryptonite on Earth was a chunk that got stuck to Kal’s rocket during his escape. It was briefly in the possession of Lex Luthor (now a Kingpin-like corporate type instead of a supervillian) who eventually lost his hand becuase of it. It turns out that Kryptonite radiation is harmful to humans after long exposure.[/li]
The storyline has been subject to so many tweaks and changes, including bringing back elements from before Byrne’s rewrite that it defies quick summary, but at least I tried.

Keep that Tojo/Hitler in a mylar bag in a safe-deposit box, please.

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Oops, the Kents live in an isolated farm some distance from Smallville.

That and my bad formatting only proves my need for preview.

4

John Byrne.

He was hot from an excellent run on Fantastic Four where he got rid of a bunch of the crappy '70s angst stuff and took them “back to basics” and it worked.

DC had something called The Crisis on Infinite Earths where they rebooted their entire universe and gave John Byrne carte blanche to do pretty much whatever he wanted to Superman.

That included (originally following the reboot…lots of this stuff has since been dumped as too stupid to remember)

No other survivors of Krypton. Period.

No career as Superboy (causing the Legion to go into a 18 year downward spiral from which it’s just now beginning to recover)

A depowered Superman. He can’t even fly through space without a spacesuit (or at least breathing apparatus)

Luthor became The Kingpin. Really. No difference. He’s become a much more interesting character nowdays, but under Byrne? Kingpin on Slim-Fast

Braniac is a mind-controlling alien who posessed a human. He doesn’t shrink people

Supergirl’s origin is too convounted to mention.

Krypton was a dreadful place that any rational person would be glad to escape from

Clark Kent (under Byrne) was an ex-Football playing Jock and a loudmouthed boor (no “meek and mild-mannered” for Byrne)

Ma and Pa Kent are alive and well…

In short, Byrne took everything that gave Superman character, charm and a bit of tragedy and ditched 'em so that Superman could be a “brie-eating yuppie” in Byrne’s words. :rolleyes:

This ain’t the Superman you and I grew up with. The one change that’s been made since the Crisis is that Superman is now stupid. He’s too dumb to understand anything without experimenting first. Superman’s code against killing? He had to kill a couple of completely powerless, helpess people (granted they were mass murderers, having killed everyone on a parallel earth) slowly and horribly. He was too dumb to know that drinking and driving was a bad idea until he crippled (or killed) a friend (or let him be crippled and killed. I can’t remember if he was the driver or not).

Anyway, nowdays, Luthor is President of the USA, Superman’s married to Lois, Jimmy’s been mostly forgotten (ditto Perry), Clark’s been mostly forgotten, Krypto’s back, Kara Zor-El may be back, Bizarro’s back (somehow.)and in the last story-arc, frankly I’m seeing just a [sub]tiny[/sub] glimmer of hope that the character can be salvaged as the character is being slowly unByrned.
**

Yeah. A bunch of the early stuff features key issues. If they’re in decent shape, you could be holding onto quite a boodle of money there.

Fenris

5

Luthor is no longer a mad scientist but rather a ruthless corporate mogul and, currently, President of the United States. (Although he is a bad guy, he is actually a pretty good president.)

When the Byrne revamp took hold in the mid-80’s, the directive was that Superman was the survivor of Krypton; no Supergirl, no Krypto, no Bottled City of Kandor. Over the last couple years that’s broken down a bit (there are versions of all three in today’s Superman comics, but none of them are strictly Krypton natives).

As for the Superman/Batman relationship, they are by no means pals like they were in the 50’s-70’s, but they still have a great respect for each other (and friendship, when the writer gets it, which some do and some don’t).

–Cliffy

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$4K for Supie #17, eh? Well, mine’s pretty near mint, and been in plastic for 25 years.

Thanks for the update. I think I’m glad I missed all that stuff.

Is Mr. Mxyzptlk (or whatever) still around?

7

Yes, but he typically sets a condition Superman has to meet before he’ll go back to his own dimension. It’s not an automatic thing any more, but once he sets a task, his own sense of honour compels him to leave Earth once it’s fulfilled.

Only in his first post-Crisis appearance was the condition that Supes trick him into saying his name backward. I admit, I felt a creepy rush of adrenaline at Myx’s second appearance when he said “Kltpzyxm”, Supes said “Exactly, now you have to go back,” and Myz said “Oh, Superman, that was last time.”

That frame was right at the end of a page, too, for heightened effect.

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[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by Bryan Ekers *
[ul][li]Superman did “die” temporarily, and one of his replacements is the new “Superboy” with different origin and powers.[/ul][/li][/QUOTE]

From what I remember skimming through the comic books of that time (early 1990s):[ul][li]Superman “died” fighting some tough stalactite monster I can’t remember the name of (if it even had a name).[/li]
Another of Superman’s replacements was a literal Man of Steel.[/ul]

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[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by tracer *
**
From what I remember skimming through the comic books of that time (early 1990s):[ul][li]Superman “died” fighting some tough stalactite monster I can’t remember the name of (if it even had a name).[/li]
[li]Another of Superman’s replacements was a literal Man of Steel.[/ul] **[/li][/QUOTE]

Right, the monster was called Doomsday.
When Superman died, four replacements popped up.[list=1]
[li]Superboy- a young clone engineered to be the closest Earth’s scientist could get to Kryptonian DNA.[/li][li]A dark, brutral, visored superman revived by kryptonian technology, and later revealed to be the Eradicator, a senteint Kryptonian machine[/li][li]Steel- A fellow inspired by Clark’s actions, so he built himself a nifty exoskeleton and welded an “S” shield to the chest. Steel had the unique claim that he wasn’t actually claiming to be the rightful heir of Superman.[/li][li]A Cyborg. The writers hinted hardcore that he was actually the rightful Superman (he had fragmented memories of Clark’s personal life, was the most noble, ect.). Turned out evil.[/li][/list=1] The Cyborg, teamning up with an alien warlord named Mongul (who also had a grudge against Superman), destroyed Coast City in Phase 1 of their earth domination plan. The others, along with the real Superman (who was slowly being regenerated in teh fortress of solitude by the visored Superman), Supergirl, and Green Lantern (who called Coast City home, ouch), kicked their collective asses.

The Eradicator was more or less destroyed, but he showed up a few more times.

Superboy and Steel both got their own books.

The Cyborg, also apparently killed, became a recurring villain. I think he was finally killed by Green Lantern, who went insane after the destruction of his city, in one of the most regrettable decisions in comics history.

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I’m not nearly as down on the post-Crisis Superman as, for instance, Fenris is (although I never really read any Supes until a few years ago, but have since read a lot of the older stuff as well as current). The decision to keep Ma and Pa Kent alive is much better than having them dead – they’re a real source of strength to the character and they help explain why he’s so heroic (in addition to being so powerful). Also, although as a former nerd myself I understand the power fantasy the pre-Crisis Superman represented, I also like Clark better the way he is now – the way he was in the TV show. He’s a stand-up guy, but no milquetoast.

–Cliffy

11

Quick hijack: What happened to Mongul after the “Reign of the Supermen” storyline? From the comic it seemed that Green Lantern killed him while the others were hunting for the Cyborg (the whole “the voices say AVENGE ME . . . at last the voices fall silent” thing hinted that Lantern had to kill Mongul to satisfy his sense of justice) . . . but I’m sure I’ve seen Mongul pop up since. Was he “revived” or did I just misinterpret the confrontation?

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It’s his son.

And if you want to get something cool Qadgop , go here:

get one! :smiley:

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Just for the sake of conversation: the last pre-Crisis appearance of Mongul was in a Superman Annual story titled “For The Man Who Has Everything” by Alan Moore & Dave Gibbons, the Watchmen guys.

The story encaspsulates most of the pre-Crisis Krypton elements and it has a predictable but amazing ending.