superboy superfan! @mamawasatesttube - Tumblr Blog

Posts

hello!! today i present: an introductory lil powerpoint for those of you who may have seen '90s kon floating around, maybe heard a few things about him via dash osmosis, etc., but don't really know his deal, or why he's so different vibes-wise from t-shirt kon.

(the answer to that one is that t-shirt kon is the 2003 retcon i referred to in slide 6; in some ways he's an entirely different character before that!)

*note: i did kinda simplify the "is kon a metahuman clone or a kryptonian" thing. his early comics kinda contradict each other on this! for example, he's not depowered by the lack of sun during final night, but later after sins of youth it takes sunlight to charge him back up, etc.

some resources for getting into his comics:

a reading order for "reign of the supermen"

a general set of catch-all warnings for superboy '94

a detailed list of tie-ins and crossovers with sb94, with warnings for each (made by @radioactive-earthshine <3)

a list of his postcrisis era appearances, categorized by major and minor (note: this does leave out superman '87 #155, which is one of my favorite issues. it's set after superboy "hypertension" arc!)

a list of every single issue he's appeared in, including very minor appearances and cameos

i really only was able to barely scratch the surface and address a couple of common misconceptions in this powerpoint - i didn't even get into things like his feelings on clone rights, his scifi storylines, his relationship with steel, or the complicated depictions of abuse in sb94, so i heartily encourage everyone who's interested to jump into the comics, because there's SO much i didn't have space to mention!! and if you have any questions feel free to send me an ask!! i love to talk about this guy. happy reading!!!

#rimi talks #kon #i have been thinking about making this powerpoint for ages tbh. only now am i actually doing it #watch me remake it in a week bc i forgot something or other tho. such is life #superman #superfam #kon & clark

fredricwertham

I’m sorry but I laughed out loud

fredricwertham

this interview is from 2003 good god nobody has ever had an ounce of decorum or self control have they

starsapphire

#oh my god #gl

lemonlimestar

☆ ☆ ☆

#WAUAUUUAAAH MY SWEEPIES I MISS THEMMMM #happy hapy kon and smug ass tim. wahh #timkon #tim #kon

getanshi

sometimes as a nonwhite comic book fan i feel rather destabilized because i talk about race a lot in relation to comics. i talk a lot about current racism and i talk a lot about racism in the origins of these stories embedded into the foundation of these characters, and it’s because i see it everywhere. there is no detachment of the superhero comic from things like pulp fiction or world war two or the chopsocky wave or crime anxiety of the 80s or 9/11, and there’s no detachment of those things from their racism either. it’s recursive. so it’s this constant spectre that hangs omnipresent over comics and i see it constantly at every turn and i want to talk about it because its very rare to find people talk about it before me.

but a history of being alive and existing has also taught me that a white majority audience like that on tumblr has a very low threshold for being able to stomach discussion of racism. the first few times, sure. after the twelfth post where you point out the colonial roots of a plotline or the way a character acts is being informed by in-universe white privilege or something, it’s like you can physically feel yourself getting tuned out, where what was once deemed interesting and fresh analysis has become dreary, mood-killing, pedantic, and pointless. if racism is everywhere, why talk about it! it’s simply negativity! get a new line!

there’s no cute quip at the end. it’s just genuinely very isolating to be a fan of something and still be forced to reckon with its racism and to even be interested in doing so when it can feel like everyone else would rather move on from it

getanshi

hey so hi. funny thing. not only is this 1. completely missing the point of the post 2. uncalled for behavior with a lack of decorum since any tags on a post get sent to the original post 3. self demonstrating the exact kind of silencing tactics that make community spaces isolating and hostile to brown people! thank you of providing an example of fandom chauvinism so that any decent people with a scrap of decency may look upon your self-absorbed, self-soothing arrogance and learn how not to talk to people who speak about their own experiences with marginalization

notice, if you will, how this blogger has framed the argument in escapist terms: exhausting, fun, more going on in the world. comic books are framed as places where one can leave the pesky inconvenient things at the door and enjoy a space where they are freed of the burden of empathy. it is a part of the appeal to stop caring about your fellows, because caring has been framed as an active choice. this luxury of selective empathy and rest is notably not available to the people of color who are the ones directly impacted by artistic racism; there is no respite away from not only that which effects the world around us, but that which directly strikes at our cores, our histories, our families and ancestors.

also notice this blogger’s complete dismissal of the last section of the original post: i like talking about racism because i like analysis. it is a part of my world that, as discussed above, is nearly impossible to go without! it is interesting to me to talk about cultural attitudes like race and gender and sexuality and capital and nationalism because they are systems that shape both the world i live in and the work produced. even when it is psychologically wearing to read and research, i derive a great deal of satisfaction from analysis and discussion, which is why i continue to be in fandom spaces receptive to that. but it is precisely the attitude of people like this blogger that strip that satisfaction because we are told that speaking about our thoughts and reflections is a burden to them.

i find that funny. no thought is given to the burden taken on by the person who witnessed the racism, but only self-centered thought about second, third-hand discomfort. again, it illustrates the point that people do not care about racism beyond a mask for polite approval. to many people of color it is simply another part of our world that merits thought, but to those like this blogger, so accustomed to the luxury of comfort, it is something that is so heinous, so grievous, that it commits the ultimate sin of ruining the good mood, even when the tone of the post is otherwise neutral which the original post is not, because it was a small comment about my own vulnerable feelings about having to share an community with the likes of you.

somehow, i have the strangest little feeling that a post about, say, how a character is queer-coded because he battles restrictive masculine gender norms would go down so much smoother, despite sexism and homophobia also being a form of material oppression. heaven can only imagine why. perhaps it’s the audience.

clown-but-free

Ignore that i spelled adderall wrong

Rendering practice

#YUP #yj

lemonlimestar

i honestly think u need to unpack & unlearn some things if ur response to seeing people recognize that a canon relationship between a teenager and a grown adult that wasn’t demonize in canon is, in fact, pedophilic is to put the pedophile on a pedestal because she’s a woman of color. especially when there’s other brown people In the narrative who aren’t pedophiles! hello! i don’t think u actually see women of color as people

and it’s like. i think it’s fucked up that tana was essentially fridged while knockout was able to come back and also be bisexual (which. Maybe let’s read origins before we write a character so we don’t write a child predator as queer 🩷) but i think um. neither of them should get that kind of chance. bc they are pedophiles. hello. same way i need slade wilson strapped to a nuke and sent into space.

lemonlimestar

AND STOP COMPARING TANA TO TALIA ILL KILL U

#im so tired of tana glazers lmao