Superman Suggestion Thread

[Jimmy Bond]

I think with all the retroactive changes in Superman's history since Infinite Crisis, it's hard to give a continuity-nit series of trades that chronicles Superman's career. Like with Batman, you can read Year One, and work your way down to he meets his rogues and supporting cast.

1. Secret Origin
2. Kryptonite
3. Ending Battle
4. Lex Luthor: Man of Steel
5. Superman/Batman: Public Enemies
6. Superman/Batman: Supergirl
7. Up, Up, and Away
8. Last Son
9. Superman and the Legion of Superheroes
10. Brainiac

I would say 1 and 7-10 will definitely help with the current Superman. Don't know how essential Kryptonite and Ending Battle are, though.

[BuddhaGautam]

Thanks for the great help.

[Brannon]

What about the Byrne reboot is still in continuity and what isn't exactly?

Also, I've heard good things about the Stern and Ordway runs that followed Byrne's. Are these runs still generally admired among Superman fandom?

[ManofTheAtom]

What about the Byrne reboot is still in continuity and what isn't exactly?

Also, I've heard good things about the Stern and Ordway runs that followed Byrne's. Are these runs still generally admired among Superman fandom?

Focusing on Man of Steel alone

Issue 1

Pages 1 through 8 (the Krypton sequence) not part of continuity anymore

Pages 9 through 18 (Pa shows Clark the birthring matrix, Dr. Vale spies on them, Clark first discovers he is invulnerable) not part of continuity anymore.

Pages 19 through 28 (Clark rescues the Constitution in civilian clothes) somewhat in continuity, though not quite. Now the costume comes before the rescue of the plane - which is idiotic and makes Superman a 30 year old man who wears clothes for a 12 year old child.

Pages 29 through 32 (Clark and the Kents come up with the Superman costume, Lois comes up with the name Superman) Lois may or may not have still come up with the name Superman based on the S, I'm not sure. As mentioned above, the Kents no longer come up with the costume as a responsse to the rescue of the space plane, now they came up with it for Clark to wear as a child when he was in Smallville - primarily to pander to nostalgia for when he was Superboy, not to provide anything of real worth to the story.

[ManofTheAtom]

Issue 2

Pages 1 through 3 (Lex comes after Lois), not in continuity anymore. Their romantic relationship is no longer part of canon.

Pages 4 through 12 (Clark stops bank robers) may or may not be part of continuity. This is a standard "Superman in action" thing that, to my knowledge, has not been contradicted.

Pages 13 through 20 (Lois chases Superman across Metropolis, stages a fake accident to get an interview with him)... I'm not sure, but I would say that it is no longer part of continuity. Parts of it are, particularly Lois chasing Superman, but I don't know if the fake accident, subsequent rescue, and interview, still are.

Pages 21 and 22 (Clark scoops Lois on the story of the century)... I'm not sure, but I'm gonna say that it's not part of continuity anymore.

[ManofTheAtom]

Issue 3, the Batman issue, MAY or may not be part of continuity anymore. It was in Superman/Batman #1, but that was over five years and three reboots ago.

[ManofTheAtom]

Issue 4

Pages 1 through 5 (Clark as a metropolian man who has weights in his apartment to explain his muscular physique), not in continuity anymore. Clark is an idiot who behaves like he was hit over the head by a mule so people don't confuse him with Superman.

Pages 6 through 22 (the party on Lex's yatch, the fake terrorist attack, the first meeting between Clark and Lex and Superman and Lex, Lex's arrest, Lex's threat against Superman), it's a safe bet that none of it is in continuity anymore as Clark and Lex knew each other in Smallville, and now the first meeting between Superman and Lex was during the demonstration of the Metallo machine as seen in Secret Origin. Since the arrest and threat came as a result of the fake terrorist attack, it's likely that those aren't canon anymore. For all I know Lex hates Superman because he burned his hair, or peed in his Cheerios, or some other lame Silver Age-style reasoning for why a super villain should hate a super hero.

[ManofTheAtom]

Issue 5

Pages 1 through 3 (Superman confronts Lex in his office while holding on to a Lexcorp employee in a suit of armor), may or may not be part of canon. I don't remember seeing anything that would directly invalidate it.

Pages 4 through 6 (the origin of Bizarro), who the frak knows? This character has been rebooted multiple times in the last decade, just like Superman, so whatever origin is valid today is just that, the latest origin that is valid today. Tomorrow it may change again.

Pages 7 through 23 (Lucy Lane trying to kill herself, Bizarro's rescue, Bizarro goes to the Daily Planet, Bizarro vs Superman, Bizarro sacrifices himself and restores Lucy's eyesight) same as above, who the frak knows? What was valid yesterday is no longer valid today and what is valid today may not be valid tomorrow.

[ManofTheAtom]

Issue 6 (Clark learns his Kryptonian origin, embraces his upbringing on Earth, flashback to when he told Lana about his powers), the scenes themselves may no longer be part of the origin, same for the aesthetics of the Kryptonian culture, but the general gists of these things is still part of canon, it's just the specifics that have been mucked with over the last decade again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again.

[ManofTheAtom]

I would say, and others may disagree, that the Stern stuff is the backbone of the romantic relationship between Clark and Lois that culminated with their marriage (Clark didn't start to court Lois until after Stern took over, I believe in issue 24, 25, or 26 - whichever one opens with Clark waiting for Lois with flowers in his hand), so as long as they are married, the Stern stuff that focuses on the romantic relationship should be considered canon.

What is no longer canon is what Stern did with Lex Luthor and Lex Luthor II.

[JusticeOrigins]

I love the feel of Superman in All-Star, Smallville's 9th season, and Birthright. Maybe that feel could be put into the comics?

[ManofTheAtom]

I love the feel of Superman in All-Star, Smallville's 9th season, and Birthright. Maybe that feel could be put into the comics?

Why can't those things be their own thing?

The strangest thing about Birthright was how Waid wanted to make it canon, as if existing in its own contained self somehow negated the very thing.

This is the guy who was one of the architects of Hypertime, which stated that all stories were equally valid and existed equally.

Had he let BR be what Didio originally wanted it to be (Ultimate Superman, set outside canon, just like ASS and the upcoming Earth One), then BR would have probably been better accepted than it ultimately was, and not been as detrimental to canon as it ended up being.

The idea that everything has to fit canon is ridicolous. It's like what they are doing with the Young Justice toon. Earth 16, really? It's idiotic.

[JusticeOrigins]

Why can't those things be their own thing?

The strangest thing about Birthright was how Waid wanted to make it canon, as if existing in its own contained self somehow negated the very thing.

This is the guy who was one of the architects of Hypertime, which stated that all stories were equally valid and existed equally.

Had he let BR be what Didio originally wanted it to be (Ultimate Superman, set outside canon, just like ASS and the upcoming Earth One), then BR would have probably been better accepted than it ultimately was, and not been as detrimental to canon as it ended up being.

The idea that everything has to fit canon is ridicolous. It's like what they are doing with the Young Justice toon. Earth 16, really? It's idiotic.

I don't like a long continuity in comics, I think 50-80 issues is the most they should be, there's a high chance that after about 80 issues, writers get bored and artists change so it all goes downhill. I respect Waid for his choice on that, he did a masterpiece that he didn't want ruined because of a dumb continuity to it.

[ManofTheAtom]

I don't like a long continuity in comics, I think 50-80 issues is the most they should be, there's a high chance that after about 80 issues, writers get bored and artists change so it all goes downhill. I respect Waid for his choice on that, he did a masterpiece that he didn't want ruined because of a dumb continuity to it.

It was his choice to make it continuity instead of let it stand on its own.

BR is a mix of ideas that people other than Waid came up with for movies, comics, novels, cartoons, TV shows, and other versions of Superman. There is very little, if anything, original in it that could be credited to him.

If the writers get bored then get new writers. That's not a reason to disrupt the story.

I remember when Superman died Wizard published a special issue that focused on the history of the character up to that point. Each page had a small footnote with some random piece of info about certain elements about the character, or Kryptonite, or some such.

In time, that is what Birthright will be, a footnote that will read something like "From July 2003 to July 2005, Birthright was the definite origin of Superman, until it was replaced by the other definitive origin of Superman, Secret Origin".

I wonder if the people at DC know what the word definitive means.

[Brannon]

Thanks for the info ManoftheAtom. Those are things I've been wondering for years since Byrne's run is the only extended Superman run that I'm familiar with. (I still need to get the Adventure of Superman issues that were constantly crossing over during that period.)

It's interesting that Byrne didn't originally want to do a reboot. He states that he wanted to simply start with Pre-Crisis Superman and slowly move him to the Superman that we got with his eventual Post-Crisis version.

I'm one of those casual Superman fans that has always been biased for the Byrne's version and the WB animated version (though I had gripes with them going overboard with the depowering in spots) and biased against the Silver Age stuff. I recently got my hands on the first four volumes of Superman Archives and Superman in the Fifties. I of course "know of" those wacky Silver-Aged shenanigans, but I thought it would be fun to read some of the stories and see how I felt about that era first hand.