In the Silver Age Superman died of a fungal infection. Sort of a Super Athlete’s foot. A planet mourned
Thankfully as his body was in a space coffin headed towards a sun (not the sun, he got the fungus while on vacation to some weird planet) it went past white kryptonite, which is deadly to all plant life. The White Krytonite killed the fungus. Superman, who all agreed was dead, got better.
A world rejoiced.
Superman would remain Fungus free until being touched by Alan Moore
What happened when Superman remembered his high school biology and realized that fungi aren’t plants?
In the Silver Age, high school level science books still used a 2-Kingdom taxonomic system. Fungi were classed, IIRC, as “saprophytic plants.” The average comic book writer of the time most likely had but little science education past the high school level.
I retract a couple things after more research:
The following link clears it all up. I do stand by my previous assertion that it was a fungal infection, despite it being named Virus X. Its dying to White Kryptonite does not leave another valid interpretation.
Base on his first appearance Superman went to High School as early as 1930. At that time Biology consisted of labeling things “rocks” and “not rocks” This is proof that he is Super Smart, as he independently discovered the following subcategories under “Not Rocks”: “Legs” and “No Legs”
And I think everyone who reads comics will agree, you haven’t really made it unless you died at least once. If resurrection was all you needed to be a messiah the entire DC line would be sold at Christian book stores.
And so ends the OP’s chance at getting a “What plant killed Superman?” trivia question past the geeks, alas.
Supes was clearly an inspiration for the pioneering work of Dr. Johnny Hart on clams.
Tengu:
And this is particularly significant, given that in the currently-running “Blackest Night” story, Nekron has a hold on those who were dead and were allowed back into life.
Thank you for giving me the idea of Mel Brooks as The 2,000-Year-Old Superman.
Which is clearly counting the Death of Superman, not Obsidian Age, since Wally West, despite my missing him in the earlier list, died in that storyline, but he’s not with Superman, Wonder Woman, Kid Flash, Superboy*, Donna Troy, Green Arrow, Animal Man and Ice (who were taken by Nekron), nor Hal Jordan and Barry Allen (who outran their black rings).
Nor is Kyle, but at about the same time, he was being pulled back from a legitimate black ring joining in a completely different location, so doesn’t count. (Wally was actually with the others.)
Superman’s not even the first character to come back from the dead in DC comics, being beaten by Lightning Lad (later retconned as the mind of Proty in his body…said retcon seems to have been ignored in the restoration of that continuity), Hector Hall (who, granted was ‘resurrected’ in a corner of the Dreaming, not coming back truly corporeally until sometime after Superman), and probably others. (I want to say Larry Trainor, but I don’t think his return was explained before the ‘he’s not really Larry’ explanation that currently exists, so it was possible to take it as a ‘fake death’, like the Chief’s or Cliff’s.)
That’s not including people like El Diablo, or (sort of) the Spectre, who have it as part of their origin.
Remember that scene in Raiders of the Lost Ark where the army guys are looking for answers about the Ark? Indy and Marcus are spouting all sorts of stuff about the Ark and one of the army guys says:
I’m feeling like the colonel. Which means you guys and gals are anal-retentive geeks. And I mean that affectionately. Thanks for all the help!
Neither of these were the one where it was Luther killed him, were they?
I recall one from about 1970, where Luther killed him, and X-rayed him to make sure he wasn’t a super robot, and he actually died. There was a march past his coffin, and even Superdog marched by, saying something like “You were a super master” and it was totally sad, and the plot was really good. Then, the very last panel said something like “This is how it could be” or “this is how it could be in an alternative universe” something like that. I lost it, of course.
Your saying “a planet mourned” made me think that it may be it, and the space coffin kind of rang a bell.
hh
The Death of Superman, from Superman #149, November 1961.
Notably, and oddly, the Kandorians try and condemn Luthor to the Phantom Zone, while claiming he’s the greatest villian since Adolph Eichmann (!). Eichmann’s trial in Israel was then in the news. How the Kandorians knew about him is unclear.
According to this excellent write up, it was Luthor’s fault, though through an intermediary:
I read all these tidbits and find myself looking forward to the next time Superman dies.
To make the answer Doomsday without any possible extra answers, just add the year.
How appropriate that this thread has been resurrected.
And since nobody said it the first time: We all know it was you and me.
Superman was killed by Doomsday. However, Doomsday has been called several different names and has been different versions. He was first the Ultimate.(I like this story the best). He was a prehistoric kryptonian that a mad alien scientist, Bertron, murdered 10’s of thousands of times making him completely invulnerable to death, including kryptonite and a complete psycho destroying every world he touches. In the episode Death of Superman they fought for a full day and both killed each other. However, Ultimate (now Doomsday) can regenerate and does. They strap him to an asteroid shoot him out in space, he gets freed by a cargo ship and he kills everyone that opposes him. Including the only being to ever defeat him the Radiant, which was an entire royal family becoming one and blowing up a huge part of their world just to blast him into a tear in space. Fans got so butt hurt about SM death that they made The Funeral episode and basically made it look like a doppelganger Superman ( that’s where all those parallels come in). And in my opinion just shabby writing that’s where we get cyborgish Superboy, Matrix (Supergirl), Android Superman, etc. Superman gets a distress signal from, I think it was Calatron, the planet the Radiant is from. Only to get there too late. Every time Doomsday regenerates he cannot be killed that way again. Superman dies again, this time for good, as does the Radiant, at the hands of Doomsday. But before he does chucks him into a time machine that warps him to the Death of the Universe, the void of space. Void from heat and energy source he can no longer return, but spends eternity there. This is kind of cool, because it’s the theory of the Death of the Universe that goes by actual Thermodynamic Equilibrium. Which is made up of real laws of physics. While there are many versions, there is only one version ok’d for DC COMICS. This one.
Oh Doomsday also annihilated the Justice League, killed the Green Lantern leader (the red devil looking guy) and 1000’s more green lanterns. So he is 250,000 plus years old, laid waste to our greatest superhero league, destroyed like a dozen planets, destroyed the Green Lanterns, and gets to live in entropy for eternity. Tell me that’s not a sick movie waiting to happen!
Cable.