Best (and worst) of superman?

[shadowkitty]

So, miss ignorant asking, what are the best superman storylines out there? (both current and past.) (and..if you suggest any books/issues)

And what are the issues you felt what don't even deserve the honor of being used as barf bags?

I read the Death of Superman and the Return of Superman. God, with steel and Superboy (he was so annoying at the time) I felt like I wasted my money. The death was ok, nothing fantastic. No remembered moments or anything.

[Dustin Griffin]

I've said this before, but: a lot of the issues written by Dan Jurgens can be used as air sick bags. I always hated his interpretation of Superman, Why DC put him in charge of Zero Hour and now The History of the DCU is completely beyond me.

That being said; I really like his art.

For good stories: I actually have a soft spot for "Our Worlds at War"

[marshal99]

So, miss ignorant asking, what are the best superman storylines out there? (both current and past.) (and..if you suggest any books/issues)

And what are the issues you felt what don't even deserve the honor of being used as barf bags?

I read the Death of Superman and the Return of Superman. God, with steel and Superboy (he was so annoying at the time) I felt like I wasted my money. The death was ok, nothing fantastic. No remembered moments or anything.

Only because it had no impact on you , you were not around when the event happened.

The event was huge and attracted national media attention worldwide when it was said that superman was going to die , it was probably the biggest mainstream coverage that DC has had in the media.
And after superman died , he did not come back straight away.
Superman was gone from the shelf for nearly 4 months . it was a very good story that kept you guessing when it returned with the 4 superman , steel & superboy you know were not the real deal , visor superman was assumed to be the eradicator but i think nobody knew what cyborg superman story was.

[JulianPerez]

THE BEST:

Cary Bates's "The Secret Guardian of Smallville," SUPERMAN #284, who discovers that one of the Superboy Robots had survived and was still protecting Smallville; I always liked this story because it (and the "Mysterio, Super-Rival" story) did more things with as cool a concept as the Superman Robots, apart from using them to protect his secret identity, one of the more boring. There was also another great tale in SUPERBOY by Frank Robbins where Superboy has to fight all of his Superboy robots at once.

Another good Cary Bates story ran in ACTION COMICS #471-473 (1977), featuring the first appearance of the most dangerous Phantom Zoner, Faora, who developed the ability to enter and leave the Zone at will, who succeeds in not only defeating Superman and making him flee to the Phantom Zone, but also the entire population of the earth as well, triggering a mass Phantom Zone jailbreak!

ACTION COMICS #455 (1976) by one of Superman's best writers, Elliot S! Maggin, is one of the best Superman team-ups with him, Green Arrow and the Atom battling a robot made entirely of junk that threatens Kandor. The image of the Atom parachuting into the bottled city is worth the price alone!

Speaking of Maggin, put down any Maggin story where Maggin writes Supergirl; he only did five or six, I think, but they were worth reading, because he truly understood the character and her personality, and how distinct she was from Superman. The best Maggin Supergirl story I can think of off the top of my head is SUPERMAN FAMILY #165 (1974) "Princess of the Golden Sun," which features an Aztec Princess (!) attacking Supergirl when she first moved to Florida.

The best Jimmy Olsen "Mr. Action" tough-guy story I'd have to say is appearance of Diana Savage, who was Jimmy Olsen's own personal little Lex Luthor, especially SUPERMAN'S PAL JIMMY OLSEN #162, written by Leo Dorfman.

SUPERMAN SPECIAL #3 (E. Nelson Bridwell) (1985). Of all the Bronze Age Superman vs. Amazo stories, this one was the last and the best.

Earth's Sister Planet," ACTION COMICS #576 (1985), by William Wolfolk, and with art by the brilliant Kurt Schaffenberger, one of the better Superman artists in my view, who is less remembered only because he lives in the shadow of that genius giant, Curt Swan. This one is by the most Flash Gordon-y of all the Superman stories, with Superman racing to intercept a planet hurtling on a collision course with earth, only to discover that it is inhabited by a race of dinosaurs that evolved, who doubt any warm blooded life exists. It features Superman getting out of a high-gravity deathtrap about to be fed to giant ugly purple beak mastodons {"SUMMON the HYVULTS! It should be their FEEDING time! Heh HEH heh..."), Superman fighting a horde of flying intelligent Pterodactyl men, and a planet converted into a spaceship that acquires its heat by geothermal energy...wow. This was old school comic book cool at its very finest.


THE WORST:

The ending of ACTION COMICS #502. Read it and see how it gimmicked away one of the greatest "oh, crap" moments in comics history

And your feelings about the godawful, overall retarded "Death of Superman" summarizes my feelings on that whole mess too.

[Ontir]

Of each, the best that come to mind are:

Best
The DC Comicss Presents (I dont' recall the title or issue #) where Superman goes to Rann to resolve some bizarre haunting. It turns out that Rann is passing through the same space Krypton was in, when it exploded, and Superman has the opportunity to commune with his lost people.

Worst
The entire Death of Superman/Doomsday storyline. Horrible, horrible crap, that derailed the series, and began years of what my friends and I came to refer as "the Annual Superman." He isn't what he was last year, but if you don't like it, don't worry, because he won't be this next year either!

[Ontir]

I like Jurgens' art, when he's inked by Art Thibert, but not very much the rest of the time. I enjoyed a good deal of his Superman run, until he screwed the pooch with "Death of." I really enjoyed the early part of his all-new, all-different Teen Titans, but it lost it when "CM3" came in. It just didn't work.

[JulianPerez]

Best
The DC Comicss Presents (I dont' recall the title or issue #) where Superman goes to Rann to resolve some bizarre haunting. It turns out that Rann is passing through the same space Krypton was in, when it exploded, and Superman has the opportunity to commune with his lost people.

Oh, the one where Alanna is possessed by a Kryptonian demoness named Zazura and the Kryptonian ghosts pop up around everywhere? That would be "The Ghosts of Krypton Past" in DC COMICS PRESENTS #82 (1985) by Cary Bates, and you are right, it is an absolutely fantastic story.

EDIT: The idea of Krypton taking up the same space as a different world is not a new one. According to SUPERMAN'S PAL JIMMY OLSEN #36 (1959), "How Jimmy Olsen First Met Superman," Krypton formerly occupied the same space Earth occupies now around the time of Superman's childhood.

[NotSuper]

You know, it's funny. The whole "Death and Return of Superman" storyline actually got me to start reading the comics when I was a kid. But looking back as an adult, they don't do anything for me. Aside from the whole sales gimmick premise, all of the four Supermen turned out to be fakes. That seemed (and still does) like a major cop-out to me. When the storyline was making news all over the place, people I knew would talk about which Superman would replace Kal-El--then the real deal showed up with long-hair in a black outfit. *cough* And even as a kid the Cyborg Superman turning out to be an obscure Reed Richards rip-off seemed creatively lacking to me. But at least we got Steel and Kon-El out of the mess, though. And I too liked Jurgens' art.

Anyway, I actually thought that the stuff FOLLOWING this storyline was among the worst. We were introduced to crap like Conduit, the Electric Superman, the unwanted re-appearances of the Cyborg Superman and Doomsday, the Millenium Giants...and I could go on.

[The Sentry]

Best :
Red Son.
Birthright.
Son of Superman.
Superman Adventures - Mark Millar issues.

Worst :
Death of Superman.

[dancj]

I thought The Return of Superman was great fun. A huge big sily fun story - and easily one of the best in-continuity Superman stories I can think of.

If you want the really good Superman stories though, you'll have to go out of continuity:
Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow
Superman: Red Son
Superman: The Dark Side
Last Son of Earth/Last Stand on Krypton
Son of Superman

Dan

[Lord of Denial]

Just like to add under the best

Action comics #775

This one issue sums up Superman and what he is about as a character and icon better than most.

[CTroutt]

Even though I know it's been both panned and lauded, I'm a huge Peace on Earth fan - to me, the most interesting Superman stories are the ones where he's fighting an idea moreso than a laser-friendly alien hell-bent on world domination/species extinction/etc.

[PanzerMega]

When Superman died, I had only been collecting DC comics for about 6 months. I was always a Marvel kid prior. But The Death of Return of Superman stories were pretty fun then, and really no worse than all of the terrible superhero comics around in the early 90s.

I didn't even mind the first year or so of "post-Return" issues. Things got really bad after that though. The era of Doomsday and Cyborg returning all the time, and space pirates, and Superman turning Electric Blue....ugh...that's my lowpoint.

Just bad writing and art everywhere you looked.

[dupersuper]

good; his appearances with Alan Moores' swamp thing (1 in Swamp thing, another in dccomics presents), pretty much anything JLA since Morisson revitalized it, Must there be a superman, For the man who has everything, whatever happened to the man of tomorrow, most of the loeb/kelly era supes books (especially action 775 & 800), birthright, man of steel, man for all seasons, jla year one, superman year 1 annuals, his appearance in hitman, dc 1,000,000, kingdom come, kingdom, spawn 10, sandmans' (dreams) funeral, legends of dcu where he meets robin, red son, jla the nail, jla superpower, eliot s maggin novels, action/superman 1 reprints, superman adventures 11 & 12, it's a bird, allstar Superman...
bad; should I make fun of superman & bugs bunny, or Superman & the quick bunnie here...?