#frank berkowitz

[superman86to99]

Action Comics #0 (October 1994)

"Peer Pressure," Finale! The climactic showdown between Superman and his childhood pal Kenny Braverman, who now has cables all over his body and calls himself "Conduit." Oh, and he can shoot kryptonite rays. Adventures #0 ended with Superman getting knocked down by Conduit (see: kryptonite rays) and sinking underwater, suggesting that perhaps he's... dead again? Nah, that'd be ridiculous. This issue starts with Superman thinking "Lois...!" and dramatically emerging from the water, which means he either found strength in his love for her or he just remembered she owes him money.

While Superman checks in on Lois, Conduit goes to the secret headquarters of his also-secret organization, Pipeline. Yeah, he has an entire criminal enterprise staffed by more people than a mall, which he created for the specific purpose of murdering one bespectacled reporter.

(I like that they seem to have a bunch of people in a Zoom call in there, presumably about the most efficient way to kill Clark Kent.)

We now reach the part when Conduit goes into another series of flashbacks detailing his life story. Last time, we found out how he joined the CIA as a lab rat and then rose to agent by unintentionally botching a terrorist attack. We skip ahead a few years and see Kenny (already in his final Conduit form) performing a hit for the CIA but getting carried away and killing a ton more people. His superior tries to tell him to take it easy with the killings, but Kenny intimidates him into shutting up. This doesn't strike me as a wise career strategy, but I've never worked for the CIA so what do I know.

Next, Kenny is at a CIA base, looking at photos of his hated high school rival, as every well-adjusted adult does once or twice a day...

...when masked gunmen show up and try to kill him. Before killing them right back, Kenny finds out they were sent by *gasp!* the superior he threatened earlier. For a second, Kenny seems genuinely hurt that he'd do this to him ("But you... you were almost a... father to me!"), but he quickly gets over it and blows up the guy's office. This also counts as his formal resignation from the CIA.

Meanwhile, in the present, the Daily Planet staff takes part in a nice ceremony to celebrate the paper's reopening after it was destroyed by Lex Luthor's missiles in Action #700. Unfortunately, only a few seconds into Mayor Berkowitz's speech, everything starts exploding again, courtesy of Kenny and his Bravermen (Pipeline operatives).

Clark pretends to fall into a hole in the pavement so he can change into Superman and fight Conduit at the city's traditional "empty buildings set for demolition" district. However, some homeless people happen to be squatting in those buildings, so Superman panics and leads Kenny to the nearest empty space: Centennial Park. You know, the place with that big Superman statue that used to be his tomb, which has evidently lost its appeal as a tourist attraction since there's no one in it now. Yep, that thing sure is empty.

Superman seems to be falling to Conduit's kryptonite rays again... but he was only playing possum so he could surprise Conduit and crush the blasters on his suit. The fight ends with Superman pushing Conduit through the base of the statue, leaving him unconscious. Later, as the Special Crimes Unit takes Kenny away (in some sort of net that I guess neutralizes kryptonite-based powers), he makes it clear that he now hates Clark Kent and Superman equally. Oh well. Maybe he can still be buds with Kal-El?

Later still, as a cleaning crew takes care of the debris left around the statue, they look inside Superman's tomb and find... Superman?!

Did he decide to take a little nap in there after that exhausting fight? What's with that unusually pale skin tone? Is he pretending to be a Dracula? And, more importantly, why would he cut his totally rad long hair?! We'll find out the answers to these questions in the next storyline, ominously titled: DEAD AGAIN.

Plotline-Watch:

I kinda like that they never spell out the fact that Kenny got his powers from being born right next to the place where Superman's baby rocket landed in Smallville, showering him in just enough Kryptonian radiation to mutate a baby. We all guessed that the moment we saw that scene in Man of Steel #0.

A non-plot essential but still interesting flashback shows Clark running into Kenny during his college days. The interesting part is that Clark is hanging out with his gal pal Ruby the waitress, from John Byrne's World of Metropolis #3 (1988). Kenny immediately starts putting the moves on Ruby, which Clark claims not to mind because they're "just friends" (I did not get that impression in her first appearance). Within a few weeks, Kenny and Ruby are engaged, but then she accidentally sees the cables on his chest and Kenny absolutely loses his shit. Did he plan to go through an entire marriage without showing his wife his freaky metal muscles? Whatever the case, he threatens to kill everyone she's ever loved if she tells Clark about this, and they break up. Poor Ruby. At least we know from WoM #3 that she ended up married to some other dude (presumably with regular human skin).

There's a short scene where Ron Troupe asks Clark if he's ever heard of Bhutran, a "little Asian country" that's "not even on some maps." Apparently, they just "aced LexCorp out of a big contract," whatever that means. This is setup for a Bhutranese character who will debut soon and is sure to become a long-lasting part of the Superman mythos!

Shout Outs-Watch:

Kryptonite-irradiated shout outs to our SUPporters, Aaron, Chris “Ace” Hendrix, britneyspearsatemyshorts, Patrick D. Ryall, Mark Syp, Ryan Bush, Raphael Fischer, Kit, Dave Shevlin, Dave Blosser, and Bryan! Join them (and get extra articles... which I've been slacking on, but got some good ones coming) via Patreon or our newsletter’s “pay what you want” mode! Both of those also have free tiers, if you just wanna get posts like this one in your inbox.

And now: it's the Don Sparrow Super Show. Let's-a go:

Art-Watch (by @donsparrow):

We start with the cover, and similar to the other Zero issues, it’s a fairly straightforward simple cover, and a good one at that.  The shadow of Superman’s belt, and the stretch between his hand all the way to his toe is a great piece of dynamic foreshortening.

The longer Denis Rodier inks Jackson Guice, the thicker and looser his lines get. Don’t get me wrong—I love my fellow Canadian Rodier’s inks generally, very confident and brushy, but it’s an imperfect marriage between the lighter, scratchy line I associate with Guice.  The shot of Superman soaring out of a very flat Metropolis river has a good energy to it.

Guice has long excelled at Lois Lane, and that’s apparent here, too, as the still-workout-clothes-clad Lois sweeps up from the assassination attempt from last issue.      

The final battle with Superman and Conduit ends pretty abruptly, and a little sketchily (particularly that last panel of Kenny’s face poking through). [Max: Always thought he looked pretty funny there. Doesn't help that Kenny's helmet now surrounds his face like the parka of his South Park namesake.]

Overall a little disappointing how quickly this big deal character came and went (though it’s setting up for the big storyline around issue 100). Finally we get the big reveal of the next storyline, as a surprisingly well preserved (and open coffin?) Super-corpse is found by city repair workers. 

SPEEDING BULLETS:

GODWATCH:  On page 4, Lois thanks God Clark’s alright after their encounter with Conduit last issue.

There’s a lot of manpower associated with “Pipeline”, Conduit’s clandestine organization of influence and assassination—perhaps too many to plausibly believe they could remain in the shadows without anyone slipping about any of their activities.  I had a similar thought about Luthorcorp in the mostly great most recent Superman movie—who are all those dorks that program Ultraman’s moves?  They just punch in, commit enormous crimes, and then punch out and go home to a pizza pocket? And tell no one about what they did all day?

More Ron Troupe praise.  Again, apart from his sartorial endeavours, I don’t have anything against Ron, except a dislike of duplication--the cub journalist slot available in this comic is better filled with the better established and less personality-challenged Jimmy Olsen.  But in the next few years there will be a number of duplicate characters for this grumpy old fan.

Lots of lazy shoutouts in the flashback crowd scenes, as “several years ago” Clark and Ruby have their choice of shopping at Kesel-Mart (named for Karl Kesel) or playing an arcade console called Bog Beast (named for Jon Bogdanove). [Max: "Critter Hitter" is a pretty good name for an arcade game, though. I'm gonna look that up on MAME.]

I don’t pretend to know that much about women, but I think Braverman is a bit off the mark jumping immediately to threats like “I’ll kill everyone you’ve ever loved!” Might a simple, “Hey Ruby, I’m a bit embarrassed about my appearance with the shirt off” have sufficed? [Max: Or he could have worn one of those fake muscle suits, like Michael Cera in Arrested Development, and impressed Ruby with his massive pecs.]

The photographer’s professor is a professor Parker, perhaps a nod to another famous photojournalist from a different Marvelous universe. [Max: Definitely a nod, since David Michelinie did write that guy for a good while.]

I wonder if the photography student’s t-shirt was meant to have a logo of some kind in the script, which got interpreted by the letterer as literally those same words, when it was meant to be a drawing by the artist.

Good note on the abandoned building Superman felt fine about destroying having been full of unhomed people—that “abandoned building” trope pops up a lot in comics.

Missed an issue? Looking for an old storyline? Check out our new chronological issue index!

[superman86to99]

Action Comics #699 (May 1994)

"THE BATTLE FOR METROPOLIS" STARTS HERE! Well, not here here, since most of the issue is actually just the setup for the battle itself, but this still counts as the first part of the storyline that will reshape the City of Tomorrow forever (in comic book terms, so "for a few months").

We start with Lex Luthor Jr. being interviewed on a panel-style TV show that conveniently recaps all the relevant plot points: Lex Jr. is at war with Project Cadmus because he blames them for the virus that's killing all the clones in Metropolis (including Lex Jr. himself, because he's actually Lex Sr. in a clone body). The Underworld clones living in Metropolis' sewers also blame Cadmus for their malaise and have been voicing their displeasure by breaking Cadmus shit all over the city, using big '90s-type weapons Lex secretly provided.

During the interview, Lex points out that Metropolis' so-called protector hasn't been terribly helpful during the current crisis, but that's because Superman's been occupied dealing with his power issues -- as in, his superpowers going out of whack, not that his landlord cut off his electricity or something. Fortunately, Superman managed to get rid of his excess powers last issue by just letting the Parasite absorb them (which turned the Parasite into a big-ass monster, but that's a problem for another storyline).

After recovering from his fight with the (now-missing) Parasite and confirming with Professor Hamilton that his powers are completely back to normal, Superman catches up with Lois Lane, who recently lost her job due to Lex's h4xx0r skillz. Talking to Lois, Superman finally learns the shocking truth about Lex Luthor Jr. = Lex Luthor Sr., and he also finally connects the dots between the clones of Metropolis getting sick and Lex suddenly looking old and frail.

When Superman goes to confront Lex, he sees that a kinkily dressed-Supergirl is about to kill him and has to stop her (see the Supergirl miniseries for more details on how the heck that happened).

Once Supergirl leaves, Superman goes after her, apparently forgetting what he came to LexCorp for (or deciding to give poor Lex a break, given his frail state). Lex's faithful medical team, Drs. Kelley and Packard, end up putting him in a "hyperbaric chamber"/big healing tube and chopper him to his private yacht so he can recover.

Meanwhile, the city is being evacuated and things are tense between the various groups that are supposed to protect it. A fight is about to break out between members of Team Luthor, the Special Crimes Unit, and Project Cadmus, when some nasty Underworlders suddenly emerge from the ground and attack the Cadmus guys. Superman drops by to reason with the Underworlders, and they actually seem to be listening to him... until Lex, from the safety of his yacht, remotely fires one of those sci-fi guns he gave the Underworlders, and all hell breaks loose. OK, now we can say the battle has started. TO BE CONTINUED!

Plotline-Watch:

We get an appearance from Jimmy Olsen's mom AND Bibbo in the same page?! Oh boy. Unfortunately, Jimmy himself appears too (along with Ron Troupe, both riding Bibbo's bike straight into the danger zone). Interesting that Jimmy has an Uncle Fred and Aunt Lynn in the city, yet he still ended up living in his car for a while. Is there a a deleted scene where he asked if he could crash with them and they just laughed for ten minutes?

Lex publicly blames Cadmus for destroying his private homes all over the world, but those who read the Supergirl mini know that was actually S-Girl subtly letting him know she's breaking up with him. Incidentally, in Supergirl #4, she actually throws Lex through his office's window and Superman rescues him, but in this issue, Superman arrives before she can throw him. Continuity error... or an anomaly caused by a certain time crisis looming in the horizon?!

When Superman is having his check-up with Professor Hamilton, he notices Hamilton seems distraught -- Hambone claims it's because of the chaos going on in the city, but I think it's clearly because Superman didn't even comment on the fact that he just dyed his hair brown at some point since his last appearance.

What with the city being under martial law and all, Perry White moves the Planet's city room to the newspaper's printing plant on the edge of town, and thinks to himself: "I've endured fires, blackouts, and riots, but I've never been forced to evacuate my own city room... until now." He might be talking about the fires, blackouts, and riots that happened during and around the "Blackout" storyline, when Metropolis was going through a Lex-triggered economic crisis.

Incidentally, Perry also seems to notice for the first time that all of the Planet's computer equipment was made by his biggest enemy's company, so he asks to see a test run of anything that's printed from now on. Don Sparrow says: "Interesting that Perry White, no longer a reporter, is the first to have the notion of checking the presses while investigating the wacky headlines Lois was purportedly creating. Lois and Clark are both intrepid newshounds, and neither of them thought of that? I suppose Clark was busy being enormous at the time."

Mayor Berkowitz, usually a level-headed chap, sides with Luthor and says on TV that Cadmus is intentionally creating all that chaos as revenge for that time he and Lex didn't let them steal Superman's corpse (during "Funeral for a Friend"). Surely this means Lex will finally forgive Berkowitz for having him arrested way back in The Man of Steel #4, right? (Spoilers: haha, no.)

I mentioned in our post about Man of Steel #33 that the nonchalant way in which Lois told Superman about Lex Jr. being a clone kinda bugged me. It was so nonchalant, in fact, that Superman didn't even seem to remember that bit of information in this issue, since he exclaims "What?!" when Lois mentions it again. Or maybe he thinks Lex Jr. being a clone was predictable but it's the part about him having Lex Sr.'s brain that took him by surprise? Either way, I'm actually glad we got a do-over on that moment, even if it still wasn't as dramatic as I would have hoped for.

Patreon-Watch:

This post was published today and not in like three months thanks to the Superman '86 to '99 Patreon gang, Aaron, Chris “Ace” Hendrix, britneyspearsatemyshorts, Patrick D. Ryall, Bheki Latha, Mark Syp, Ryan Bush, Raphael Fischer, Kit, Sam, and Bol. You rule!

You know who also rules? Don Sparrow, who has more commentary on this issue after the jump...

Art-Watch (by @donsparrow):

We start off with the cover, and it’s a very blocky, Kirby-like pose, of Superman fast-walking into gunfire.  I love the one eye in shadow, which gives the pose an intimidating and mysterious air we’re not used to seeing with Superman.  As always, Guice’s Superman seems to have the longest Tarzan locks (at least until Stuart Immonen joins the team) and that’s true here.

Inside the issue we get extremely '90s guest artwork by Norman Felchle and James Pascoe, and while it’s not my cup of tea, he is remarkably consistent throughout.  Felchle would go on to do storyboard work for Pixar, Netflix, Marvel and others, so hopefully he isn’t sweating the criticism from a never-was like myself! The opening splash page is a good example of the 90’s style “extreme” stylization, as we see a computer-generated Lex Junior with a big old curly tress blocking his eye.

The length of this stylization changes panel to panel.  We get more extreme linework a page later as Perry White’s disapproving expression makes his forehead look like cracking clay. [Max: Are we sure this isn't Darkseid posing as Perry as part of some nefarious plan?] After this argument, we get our first look at Superman himself, and it’s not bad overall—the S-shield is consistent throughout, and his wavy hair is well rendered.  One of the main things that bug me about this art style (apart from when he attempts regular clothing, but we’ll get to that) is that every male character has an identical nose, particularly from the front view.  Once I noticed it, I couldn’t stop seeing it. [Max: Dang, can't unsee it either.]

A few pages later, as Superman trails the Parasite underground, we get an example of Felchle’s penchant for perhaps-unnecessary detail.  Rather than the gritty cement he has at the top of the panel, the Metropolis sewer is drawn to have been made up of European cobblestone, which is both pleasing to look at, and an unlikely building material, especially some 20 feet below the ground.  Felchle does excel at motion—there’s a great image of Superman flying away from Professor Hamilton’s apartment.

It’s followed immediately, however, by the strange physics of Lois Lane dislodging a cathode ray television set with a couch pillow! The following page is the best example in the book of Felchle’s aforementioned weakest point—drawing regular humans in regular human fabric.  Lois’ green sweater clings in such an unnatural and revealing way to her body that it appears to be made of cellophane (there was a similar instance earlier in the book when a beat cop’s uniform appeared to have been painted on, and again in a few pages on poor old silver-haired Sarah Olsen). [Max: To be fair, Byrne did establish early on that Mrs. Olsen is actually pretty young and attractive, but her hair greyed prematurely.] Sadly for the industry, this kind of cheap fan service depiction of women would become the norm rather than the exception in the decade to come, but in this era, it is a real deviation from the naturalistic look we’ve gotten used to. 

A few pages later we get a tiny glimpse into the concurrently running Supergirl mini-series, where Superman talks Supergirl out of taking her vengeance on Lex Jr. too far.  This whole scene is a little blasé for my tastes, as the stuff Supergirl describes (attempted murder, cloning experiments) is as bad or worse than the stuff Lex Jr. has been pulling on Lois.  As Guardian looks for the Underworlders, we get still more of Felchle’s unique brickwork, this time above ground, at least.  Lastly, we get a pretty lean and mean Superman on the final couple of pages as the Underworlder/Cadmus conflict becomes a shooting war.  The three-fingered mutant firing on Superman recalls a couple Byrne panels, starting with flesh-suit Metallo getting (temporarily) blown away by S.W.A.T team members in Superman #1, and also Superman getting shot at by Bloodsport a few issues later in Superman #4. 

STRAY OBSERVATIONS: 

There’s just a ton of stories going on here, perhaps too many to comfortably deal with in a single issue.  We have the abrupt end of the Super-giant storyline (with no sighting of the Parasite that Superman crashed to Earth with), the who-cares war between Cadmus and the Underworlders [Max: I care, Don! I care!!], the Lois-bonkers headline storyline, the Lex-is-dying storyline, and then even a glimpse at Supergirl’s mini-series.  It’s no wonder this issue feels quite long, but also incomplete.

It’s nice to see a little more of the Daily Planet’s operations, but the introduction to plant manager Jeff (no last name) and Jane (no last name) are so quick, and staged so distantly, we really get no sense of them as people. [Max: Jane Stewart, Don! Big fan of Jane Stewart, who appears for all of three panels. I don't know if she ever shows up again, but I'm giving her a tag on the blog anyway.]

Without saying too much, they’re certainly telegraphing who the mole in Lex’s organization is.  Whenever this character appears in this issue they’re either admonishing Lex, or revealing details of Lex’s life to underlings.  The reveal they’re setting up for really doesn’t feel so shocking after all this. [Max: Is it Vekko? I bet it's Vekko.]

[superman86to99]

Superman: The Man of Steel #33 (May 1994)

An unfortunate series of events has turned Superman so grotesquely swole that he now looks like he’s, well, a character in a ‘90s superhero comic. Last issue, his rapidly growing powers simply made him slightly taller, but by now he's basically a head drowning in a mass of comically large muscles (I’m amazed his costume hasn’t burst yet; props to Ma Kent’s stitching abilities). Another unfortunate side effect of his ordeal is that he’s afraid to even breathe near Lois Lane because he thinks he might kill her.

Superman asks his friends at Project Cadmus to come up with a way to turn him back to normal and they oblige, despite having their hands kinda full with the army of sewer mutants currently trying to invade them (more on that in the plotlines section below). Their idea is to put Superman near the Parasite, the superpower-stealing supervillain, so that he’ll absorb Superman’s excess energy. Wouldn’t that make the Parasite super-strong and stuff? No, you see, because they’ll put him near some “siphoning coils” that will drain the excess energy from him.

Within a few seconds of the experiment starting, the siphoning coils fail to siphon the excess energy (you had one job, siphoning coils) and the Parasite becomes super-strong and stuff. He immediately breaks free and starts killing Cadmus people as Superman tries to stay away from him so he doesn’t become even more powerful. Then Superman realizes “Hey, wait a minute, I’m even more ridiculously overpowered!” and does this:

Superman pushed the Parasite into the ground so fast and with so much strength that the rock melted from the friction and crystalized, trapping him in a “glass prison,” just as Superman planned -- he may look like the Hulk now, but he’s no brute.

Since that plan to cure Superman failed, Cadmus decides to take a page from him and do what he does whenever he has a problem he doesn’t know how to solve: just chuck it into space. As in, they strap Super-Superman to a big-ass rocket and launch it to a space station orbiting the Earth’s dark side so that he won’t be able to absorb any more energy from the sun.

For once, I sympathize with Cadmus’ Director Westfield when he asks if all that expense was really necessary (couldn’t Superman have flown himself there?). Anyway, TO BE CONTINUED!

Plotline-Watch:

As mentioned, the Clone Plague storyline escalates dramatically when the sick and dying Underworlders invade Cadmus en masse and actually manage to break in before they’re shot down by soldiers. We then see the dramatic death of Rambeau, the ram-headed Underworlder we met at the start of the “Doomsday!” storyline, who dies right in front of the (also sick) Newsboy Legion kids after warning them that they’re next. We’ll miss you, Rambeau... or maybe not so much since, according to the “Death of Superman” video game, he’s got like 40 identical cousins.

Last issue, master hacker Lex Luthor Jr. hacked into Lois Lane’s computer to rewrite her exposé on him so that no one would believe her ever again, and now we see what he came up with: a front-page article accusing Luthor of being a “SPACE-ALIEN CLONE” who “WILL SLAY EARTH’S WOMEN.” He also bribed (and later murdered) the Daily Planet’s night editor so he’d let the article through. Everyone from Director Westfield to a random traffic cop makes fun of Lois for her story, but Don Sparrow points out: “In a world where every major American city is guarded by super-powered off-worlders, is Lois Lane’s ‘alien clone’ headline that laughable?” Yeah, perhaps the most incredible part here is that this wouldn’t really be front-page news if true.

Luthor’s revenge on Lois doesn’t end there: throughout the issue we see that he went full Kingpin on her, ruining her credit cards, emptying her bank account, bribing that traffic officer so she’d fail a breathalyzer test, and making it look like she’s having a nervous breakdown. The credit thing is the worst part, because it embarrasses Lois as she’s paying for a meal with Mayor Berkowitz in a fancy restaurant. Don again: “I know that it’s to set up her online financial problems, but was Lois really picking up the cheque while dining with the Mayor? Or were they going Dutch?”

Speaking of Lois, this issue includes another variation of the cute scene where Superman wakes her up by lightly tapping on her window, only this one isn’t so cute because he’s so strong that his “light” taps break the window and Lois cuts her feet.

Superman asks the Cadmus folks to meet him at the tree city of Habitat, which has been in ruins since Doomsday rampaged through it, because at least he can’t do any more damage there. I wonder if they ever explained how it went back to normal in future issues. Did the Hairies rebuild it? Did it just grow back? Zatanna?

The Parasite had been captured in S.T.A.R. Labs since way back in October 1991. In this issue we’re told that Westfield “acquired” him from S.T.A.R., and of course the first thing he does is pump him full of super-energy and let him kill an employee. He almost kills Big Words of the Newsadult Legion, too (it would have been pretty funny if he had and then suddenly started using big words).

One thing that bugs me about this issue is how casually Lois reveals to Superman that, oh yeah, Lex Luthor Jr. is a clone of Lex Luthor Sr., meaning that his greatest enemy isn’t really dead and had been pretending to be a friend for years. That’s a big deal! Superman’s like “sorry, I’m too swole to care about this right now.” I’m also iffy about the part where she says she implicated Luthor in his trainer’s attempted murder; he DID murder her, but then aliens brought her back to life. Is “attempted” the correct legal term in that case?

What I do like is how the creative teams have handled Lex’s slow transition from smooth Australian philanthropist to full-on supervillain as his body and mind deteriorate due to the Clone Plague. The issue ends with a frail Lex (in some sort of medical gown that looks like his Pre-Crisis mad scientist suit) meeting with Clawster of the Underworlders to give him bombs and weapons to use not just in Cadmus, but in all of Metropolis, because if he's dying from the Plague then he wants to take it with him. It’s fitting that just as he’s starting to look like the classic Lex, he suddenly has an excuse to behave like him too.

Patreon-Watch:

This appropriately swole post was made possible (and partly previewed) by Superman ‘86 to ‘99′s Pals, Aaron, Chris “Ace” Hendrix, britneyspearsatemyshorts, Patrick D. Ryall, Bheki Latha, Mark Syp, Ryan Bush, Raphael Fischer, Kit, Sam, and Bol. Join them here if you wish: https://www.patreon.com/superman86to99

And now, more from Don after the jump!

Art-Watch (by @donsparrow​):

We start with the cover, and it’s an interesting one.  A common complaint about Jon Bogdanove’s style is that the superheroic bodies have impossibly huge muscles, with tiny little pin heads. So it’s on some level a little “meta” that we see this hulking, veiny version of Superman from this artist with a rep for exaggerated physiques.  There was also something about the pose (and slatted office window) that reminded me of Jerry Ordway’s incredible cover to an early Adventures issue, though I think the similarities are unintentional.

Once we get into the issue, we are thrown into a shooting war between Cadmus and its own creations, and no one seems to draw the  misbegotten Underworlders with as much panache as Bogdanove.  There’s an interesting thatching sort of ink technique we see on Guardian in that first page, which had previously been used only on Steel, to indicate a metallic chrome finish.  But clearly, Janke enjoys this inking style, so we see it a little more often now.

Page 2 and 3 we’re treated to a large splash page, featuring our gargantuan Superman outside Lois’ terrace door.  Though this particular spread has a lack of comparative context for Superman’s size, apart from his swollen musculature, the pose indicates discomfort and monstrosity.  Bogdanove also excels at a very cute Lois in a Margot Tenenbaum-style nightdress. The next few pages, Superman’s bizarre physicality is even more flaring, as his limbs really do appear as though they’re inflated.

As we return to Guardian battling it out with the Underworlders, the “Thing”-like texture of Clawster’s face is well-drawn.  Then later, while Superman is himself at Cadmus, he cuts a very Conan-like figure (and in case anyone was wondering, it appears it isn’t just his limbs that have swollen—yipes!). [Max: It’s true, his neck does look pretty swollen too.] A page later, the shine on Parasite’s transparent cage is a nice touch.  A little later, as the energy transfer begins, we get some nice Kirby-crackles. 

I like Lois’ sophisticated driving look as she’s pulled over for yet more “The Net” style persecution by Luthor.  Speaking of, his twisted and sickly pose on the last page is a really good bit of gesture, as he’s looking even rougher than the last time we saw him.

STRAY OBSERVATIONS:

I must admit, even with how familiar I am with these stories, I find myself straining to remember just why Superman’s power level is surging like this.  I remember having a theory as a kid that the black and silver recovery suit from the Return of Superman storyline was to blame.  That it was designed to funnel as much solar energy as possible in order to restore its wearer to full strength, and it kept doing so despite Supergirl’s molecular reassembly of the suit?  Am I close?  Why is this happening? [Max: I kinda like the explanation from last issue blaming that big blast of Eradicator-filtered kryptonite at the end of ‘Reign,’ mainly because it’s such a cool moment and I like that it had consequences.]

Perry White is awfully chill about such an insane headline adorning his beloved newspaper.  I might have thought he’d be the one “apoplectic” rather than the publisher.  It does feel a little bit unlikely that the paper could get so widely printed and distributed with no one along the line raising an eyebrow at the intentionally goofy headline.

I feel like the state trooper’s assertion that Lois had been “driven to drink by people’s reactions to the article (she) wrote about Mr. Luthor” is a reach.  And a mouthful.

It’s helpful that we are reminded that Lois has an inside informant about Luthor, which will come to matter in the issues ahead. [Max: I think this might be the first mention of Lois’ current informant, which makes sense since she knows her previous one got thrown off a bridge by superpowered hitmen, so she has to be careful about this stuff.]

[superman86to99]

Superman #78 (June 1993)

REIGN OF THE SUPERMEN! The grand debut of the Cyborg Superman, the one that looks like Superman’s mom was having an affair with Kelex! Is that too obscure? That’s probably too obscure. Let’s go with “a toaster”, then, though I’m not sure if they had something like that on Krypton. Are there any Superman stories depicting his ancestors eating any type of bread? Backstage photos of Marlon Brando in a Jor-El costume eating a footlong don’t count.

Moving on, the issue opens with Lois Lane interviewing a nuclear plant worker who says a somehow non-dead Superman prevented a disaster there. Lois is skeptical (she did, after all, just meet two other guys claiming to be the late Man of Steel), until she sees a photo of the incident:

Meanwhile, this mysterious Superman (who’s apparently kind of emo, since he loves leaving half his body under shadows) has shown up at S.T.A.R. Labs demanding they give him Doomsday’s corpse. Unfortunately, the body has been repossessed by Project Cadmus, because “stealing dead aliens” is apparently a big part of their business model. The new Superman flies into Cadmus, and after shrugging off all their defenses, we finally see his face: it’s... the same robot face you already saw on the cover! And at the end of Adventures #500! HOLY CRAP!

Cyborg Superman is able to use the robotic parts of his body to interface with Cadmus’ computers and gain access to the ultra-secret section where they’re keeping Doomsday’s bod -- and he didn’t even buy the computers dinner first. Saying that Doomsday is too dangerous to be kept in a government cloning facility (a fair point), the Cyborg grabs the body and flies off into space. He then ties Doomsday to an asteroid, attaches a device to it (supposedly to alert him if anyone messes with the body), and throws the whole package into an orbit where no one will ever run into it. Wait, solving problems by just throwing them into space? Holy crap, this IS Superman!

Anyway, when Cyborg Superman returns to earth, Lois is waiting for him there (she figured out he was at Cadmus because... she’s Lois Lane). Cyborg says he doesn’t remember much of his life, or even who put him back together with robot parts, but one thing he knows for sure is that he’s definitely Superman.

The Cyborg remembers enough (the name “Kent”, something about a farm in Kansas) to intrigue Lois. She takes him to Professor Hamilton, who has done his fair share of poking at Superman’s things in the past. Ham confirms that the Cyborg’s robot parts are Kryptonian technology, and that his fleshy bits match Superman’s DNA. The Professor has no doubt that this is the real deal right here. HE’S BACK, BABY!

IMPORTANT! Plug-Watch:

As I mentioned the other day, Karl Kesel and Tom Grummett have a Kickstarter to publish/continue their Section Zero series! I’ve been waiting to read this story literally this entire century, so please help them make this happen! The campaign is on its last 24 hours, so hurry up. Here’s the link once again:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1227066666/section-zero

And even if you’ve never read a comic by Kesel and Grummett, trust me, you'll want to kick yourself for not backing this project once this blog goes over the next issues of Adventures. (Yeah, I’m pretty mad at myself for slowing down and not getting to those earlier.)

Plotline-Watch:

Oh, yeah, I guess this part is important: as a bit of a post-credits teaser, the issue ends with Doomsday’s tied up body floating in space... at which point he opens his eyes, looks at us, and starts laughing. (This moment always creeped me the hell out, but reading it in 2017, it just looks like a selfie.)

The nuclear worker who says he knows Superman wasn’t lying: he’s the exact same worker Superman met while preventing a meltdown way back in Superman #51, two years ago! Yessssss. I live for this stuff.

On that note (continuity details only I care about), Professor Hamilton studies Cyborg Superman by putting him inside the same “isolation chamber” where he examined Jimmy Olsen when he came down with an alien virus that turned him elastic. I figured Ham threw that thing out after all the inter-dimensional trouble it caused.

When Supeman smashes into Cadmus, Director “Asswipe” Westfield wonders if it’s “the kid” coming back. It may have been the Spanish translation, but when I read this as a kid myself, I figured he was talking about his son. As we’ll see next week, he... uh, kind of was (Geoff Johns retcons be damned).

I like this S.T.A.R. Labs worker who’s like “Holy shit, the MOST FAMOUS PERSON ON EARTH rose from the grave and is standing in front of me right now! Anyway, nope, you can’t see my boss.”

Given future revelations, a lot of people wonder if the Cyborg’s inner narration in this issue is inconsistent with the character. Don Sparrow says: “The captions as Superman steals Doomsday’s body are interesting, especially as we read this in hindsight. My guess is, he’s purposely thinking these thoughts since Dubbilex might be nearby. It seems telling to me that he mentions J’onn by name, and not Hal Jordan, or John Stewart.” (He says about Doomsday’s corpse: “Green Lantern could have atomized you with his ring. J’onn could have shattered your bones.”) I like that a lot, but there’s another possible explanation people never consider: this dude, bear with me here, might be a little nuts.

Speaking of psychopaths, there’s a Whit cameo in this issue, but that’s enough panels from now. More commentary from the great Don Sparrow after the jump!

Art-Watch (by @donsparrow):

As I was observing in the latter part of the Doomsday storyline, this is pretty much peak Jurgens and Breeding, as the art on these issues is just gorgeous, page after page.  The opening page splash is a great one, with a beautiful, wearied Lois, still prominently wearing the engagement ring from a dead man, who appears in the rain-streaked windshield.

This issue has the most suspense of the four introductions to the Superman, and I love how long it takes us to actually see him, instead showing us his insane power array through characters reacting to him. It’s great storytelling, and more than that, gives this character an ominous, threatening feel, which is reinforced when even a known good guy, Jim Harper, is horrified by The Man of Tomorrow’s appearance.

Speaking of horror, the expression on The Man of Tomorrow’s face as he sees Doomsday is very affecting, especially in contrast with his unmoving, non-reacting cybernetic eye.

There’s a sense of satisfaction as The Man of Tomorrow disposes of Doomsday’s body.  Again, it’s a great showcase for the new powers this Superman has, but if only for the moment, seeing a living Superman, and a dead Doomsday feels good.

What doesn’t feel good is the emotional ringer Lois is put through as The Man of Tomorrow makes his case to her.  Somehow he’s even more difficult to look at with his hair flattened by the rain. We’re in deep RoboCop territory when he describes snippets of his past life, hitting on one or two key phrases to make the reader believe this is really Clark.

And again, as Professor Hamilton seems to triumphantly declare this character’s legitimacy, there’s such a sense of horror to it, in such contrast from The Man of Tomorrow’s all-American pose. 

Lastly, that last page reveal is so haunting, so scary, and so cool, I love that it’s punctuated by a thank you to departing super-teamster (and my all-time favourite comics professional) Jerry Ordway, an enormous architect of this wonderful era of comics. [Max: I can’t believe they took out that little shout out to Ordway in some versions of the tradepaperback, so I was very glad to see it’s included in the big-ass omnibus I’m reading now.] The drawing of that insane eye peering through Doomsday’s ocular cage is just so, so freaky.  I love it.

This week’s mini-poster is another good one, again showing the unique nature of this new Superman’s powers.  The post is all Superman, but there’s just something off about it. 

STRAY OBSERVATIONS:

Godwatch:  Not so much this week.  Just a shocked “Lord” from Lois as she sees the surveillance photo of the Man of Tomorrow.

I like the callback of the very David Ben-Gurion looking scientist from Superman #51, if only because he’d be familiar with the original Superman.

I know the point of the exchange at the vault was to establish this mechanical Superman’s tech powers, but I find it hard to believe there’s ANY vault the original Superman couldn’t get into. [Max: Which supports my theory that this guy just likes “interfacing” with machines a little too much.]