Kevin. In my 30ās. (B-day: Nov 1st). Bi. Autistic. Still learning. Male. White. Wisconsin. KPop fan. RIP my cat. Nerd. Podcast fan. Progressive. Open minded. Tumblr-aholic. Has a never ending list of faves. I pay for ad-free tumblr š«¤
Superman #149 is a story that never happened. I didnāt read it, and Iām not going to tell you about it. Iām not even here, I never existed. Youāre not reading these words, youāre doing something productive with your time, like math. Welcome toā¦ nowhere.
Silver Age DC comics had a tradition of printing what they called āImaginary Stories.ā These would be issues that took place outside of the normal continuity of events and could diverge wildly from the status quo present throughout the rest of the book. Often these would be used to tell stories where Superman finally gave up his secret identity and married one of his various gal-pals, or stories set in the future starring the charactersā children. There was a recurring feature where Alfred would write Batman fanfic about Bruce Wayne getting married to Kathy Kane and having a kid who became the Robin to Dick Graysonās Batman. Sit with that for a moment.
Bruce Wayne regularly came home to find his trusted manservant, confidante, and surrogate father writing RPF about him and a woman who was later retconned into being his aunt. This fanfiction, if it ever saw the light of day, would reveal his secret identity to the world and compromise his whole crimefighting operation. Everyone he knew and loved would be violently murdered by clowns or penguins and the ensuing gang war would be apocalyptically destructive and absolutely ridiculous. Batman is completely fine with this. The Silver Age was a wild time.
I generally donāt talk about these Imaginary Stories because Iām interested in continuity and character development, and these stories rank slightly below āit was all just a dreamā in those areas. But they do present some unique qualities that are worth celebrating. If you assume that the characters are the same and itās only their situation that has changed, an imaginary story can reveal what a character might do in a scenario that is otherwise alien to them. More importantly, they can actually tell a complete story with an ending, something thatās anathema to the practice of cranking these things out on a monthly basis and never have Lois figure out how Clark Kentās glasses work.
So weāre going to look at a story thatās often considered one of the best Imaginary Stories in the Imaginary Canon. The Death of Superman (Not that one). This story begins with Lex Luthor discovering a strange, glowing rock in the prison rock pile. He starts a fight in order to get put on hard labor, in order to examine the rock, which he determines to be a meteor. Surprisingly, this magic space rock is not a new flavor of Kryptonite, but a substance called āElement Z.ā Begging the prison warden for use of the laboratory facilities for 24 hours, Lex uses the Element Z toā¦ cure cancer? No, no, this canāt be right. Whereās the evil scheme? Itās not a Superman comic unless Lex Luthor has an evil scheme!
Surprisingly, Lex is on the level, as his cancer cure works instantly and permanently. Superman, wanting to believe in the goodness of his former friend, goes to work facilitating everything Lex needs to completely eradicate cancer, gathering enough space rocks to fill a school bus and even speaking on his nemesisā behalf to the parole board. Lex in turn invites Superman back to his evil lair to smash up all his crime statues, and the two share a good laugh about all the absurd ways that Lex tried to destroy him. Itās rather sweet to see them talk like this, and you can tell that there is still a friendship buried underneath decades of giant robot fights and hair angst.
Luthor may be a hero now, but his underworld contacts think heās betrayed them and try to have him rubbed out. However, Lex Luthor has taken Jimmy Olsenās place as Supermanās Best Friend, symbolized by Superman giving him a fancy new signal watch. Superman gets so overwhelmed by having to save Luthorās life every single day that he builds him an impenetrable space laboratory to do his work unmolested. If he did need help, all Lex would have to do is send a distress flare and Superman would be there instantaneously.
All is well until Luthor calls for aid, and Superman comes rushing to his rescue. Luthor reassures him that everything is fineā¦ but not for you! Luthor turns on the Kryptonite rays and straps Superman to a lab table to be slowly irradiated to death. The whole thing, curing cancer, becoming a hero to mankind, alienating all of his criminal contacts, all of that were just steps in his plan to finally murder Superman. He even kidnapped all of Supermanās supporting cast just so they could watch him die. Lex Luthor got the kind of life that any normal man would dream of and all of it was just a diversion to lower Supermanās guard. Nobody on Julius Schwartzās green earth has ever hated like Lex Luthor hates Superman.
If this was an ordinary story, this is where we would reveal that Superman secretly always knew that Luthorās plan was a trap, and he had some escape plan ready to pull out of his bright red trunks. Luthor even comments on this, that he checks to make sure Superman isnāt just playing dead or secretly replaced by a robot or is just three fifth-dimensional imps in a trenchcoat. They donāt even call Supergirl for help, which would actually be a non-bullshit escape from this deathtrap.
But no, Superman is not only merely dead, he is really, most sincerely, dead. They have a funeral and everything with him lying in state in a glass coffin like heās Vladimir Lenin. This is one of the few times that other superheroes even appear in a Superman comic, but here it really sells how impactful this event must be for the entire world. Hell, itās so impactful that we actually get to see people who arenāt white!
Lex Luthor and his criminal companions are celebrating their victory, talking about selling commemorative superman death statues, when Superman himself bursts through the wall and starts wrecking shit from beyond the grave. This lasts just long enough for Luthor to absolutely shit himself, and then āSupermanā tears off his costume to reveal Supergirl in disguise. She formally reveals herself to the general public, and carts Luthor off to the shrunken city of Kandor to be tried for murder by a Kryptonian court. Luthor, however, has a cunning plan: he pleads guilty to all charges.
The judge immediately sentences him to imprisonment in the Phantom Zone, which is when Lex springs the second part of his plan. If they will commute his sentence, he offers to use his massive science brain to invent an embiggening ray that will permanently embiggen Kandor. And you want to be big, donāt you, tiny little bottle city? You wanna be the big, big men, donāt you, little men? The judgeās immediate response is āfuck that and fuck you.ā The Judge completely rejects Luthorās deal, and outright says that he is the greatest villain since Adolf Eichmann. This comic came out in 1961, as Eichmann was being tried for Nazi war crimes in Israel, making this a shockingly dark reference to drop into a Superman comic.
The story ends with Supergirl taking up Supermanās mantle as the protector of the Earth, signalling the end of one story but the dawn of another. Although this story is just imaginary, a fiction within a fiction, itās become a keystone in the character of Lex Luthor, showing just how far he will go and how much he will sacrifice for the sake of finally seeing the light fade from Supermanās eyes. We also get to see how much Superman means to the Earth, with the story slowing down for several pages to show expressions of grief from all over the world. Itās a very somber moment that you donāt often get in comics of this era.
On the other hand, we donāt ever get any acknowledgment of Supermanās identity as Clark Kent. If anyone ever found out after his death that Superman and Clark Kent were the same, we donāt see it. I would have loved to see Lois having to accept that the milquetoast smallville coward she so often looked down on was the same person she so passionately admired. Maybe as soon as they found out he was secretly Clark Kent, everyone who ever met him was like āyeah, that explains everything.ā
This story may not have, strictly speaking, happened. Itās the farthest thing from canon in a continuity thatās been whitewashed more times than a serial killerās unfinished basement. But, you can read this as a story about Superman without being tied down by any of that continuity garbage I love so much and still come away with an emotionally fulfilling experience. It earns its place in the literary canon of Superman stories simply by being just that good. Until next time!
I forgot exactly how ridiculous Dr. Cox's apartment is at first, good lord.
The majority of Scrubs was filmed in a decommissioned hospital. Some frequent locations like JD and Turk's apartment were permanently built into a room of the hospital and renovated pretty convincingly. When they got to Cox's apartment, I guess the budget was running low, because it's just "operating room, but we added a sofa."
They hang a lantern on it but it's hilarious. The aggressive ceiling lights, the outlets are all 5ft off the ground, the "bar cart" Is a utility cart, the frosted windows to nowhere, yes hello welcome to my normal home. :)
It does get a mid-season facelift - warmer lighting, window blinds, and some actual furniture, so at least it looks more "upscale modern apartment" and less "a psychopath lives here."
Disney+ is dropping a totally new director's cut of I Want to Believe June 11th. Chris Carter said he went back into the editing room to restore his original R-rated horror version. It's supposed to be way darker, scarier, and actually has the gore and psychological stuff that the studio forced him to cut back in 2008.
This isn't even the old extended DVD version, it's a completely new overhaul.
Disney+ is dropping a totally new director's cut of I Want to Believe June 11th. Chris Carter said he went back into the editing room to restore his original R-rated horror version. It's supposed to be way darker, scarier, and actually has the gore and psychological stuff that the studio forced him to cut back in 2008.
This isn't even the old extended DVD version, it's a completely new overhaul.
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