RatCreature's Journal

When I asked what next to read from my waiting comic pile, Y: The Last Man topped the list, followed by All Star Superman and Fables. Since of these three All Star Superman didn't involve me remembering the place where I stopped and previous plots, I decided to go with that firstt.

All Star Superman #1-8 (written by Grant Morrison, pencils by Frank Quietly, inks by Jamie Grant)

I am less enamored with this than I thought I'd be. It is a lot of fun, but I think it is a bit too whimsical for my taste. Or rather... it's not that I mind the absurd, but I think I miss the underlying angst that I appreciate in mainstream superhero comics, which is strangely absent, and that despite the overarching plot being Superman facing his death from Lex Luthor's cunning plan to overload his system with solar radiation, and subplots like flashbacks to when Jonathan Kent died. Also, the art is okay, but not outstanding, that is, I can't really find anything wrong with it, but it didn't grab me on a visceral level or really connected with me.

That said, the series is definitely entertaining to read, and there's a lot of humor, both in the dialog and in visual jokes. From the start we get hilarious lines, like Luthor's exploding monster telling Superman "The purpose of my existence is to explode! You have no right to limit my ambitions, fascist! No right at all to stand in the way of my self-realization!" or the visual jokes, like when Clark, without disguise, saves people by being clumsy, e.g. when he saves someone from a dropping part of a flying vehicle by stumbling into him, without anyone even realizing it. Or the punchline with the key to his fortress being regularly sized (for being more secure) but actually turning out to be superdense and thus even heavier, and impossible to lift by anyone but him etc. The series is packed with funny details.

And I enjoyed the wacky hijinks in the plots, like the dinosaurs at earth's center, the Frankenstein scientist in a rainbow coat, who is actually kind of creepy if you stop to think about what he does, Jimmy Olsen crossdressing, the Bizarros zombiefying lots of people... and while I wasn't too impressed with the art, it does very well with illustrating all the quirky and bizarre stuff, like that Chronovore rampaging through Smallville.

Anyway, if you like wacky and funny superhero comics, and don't need baseline angst in the genre, this series is perfect.

After a few people commented on how disturbing Superman!Kermit was, I'd like to point out that even though I was unaware of it when I first drew him, TPTB have cast Kermit and Piggy in these roles long before me, as this image from the the 1982 Miss Piggy Calendar shows. And for the record, IMO Kermit as Batman Frogman (as seen here from the 1997 Muppet Parody Calendar: The Sequel) is far more terrifying.

The observation you make in comic fandom that TPTB will always have produced weirder stuff than you could ever come up with and will have done it first apparently holds true for Muppets as well. :)

Since Superman Returns has opened here Thursday I now finally got to watch the movie too. I don't have any great comments or insights to offer, but I enjoyed it a lot. *squeeing noises*

Also because (almost) everybody else got to watch it months earlier, I missed all the fic that has been probably posted, so if you have any recs for Superman Returns fic, maybe you could point me?

I've read Superman #204 (written by Brian Azzarello, pencils by Jim Lee, inks by Scott Williams), and I liked it. Okay, it is a bit of trick to start telling your story starting at the end to hook readers so that they wonder what brought the characters there, and Azzarello does it both on the level of this issue, with not revealing for quite some time what the monumental event Superman and the priest were both referring to was (I know I'm kind of vague, but I don't want to spoil), and for the cliffhanger, because we still don't know what Superman did exactly, and I guess the tension will be kept up for a bit in that fashion. But the trick with the narrative structure totally worked. I'm thoroughly hooked.

The art is very much eye candy, the way Superman is often backlit with lots of shadows gives him a great look, and Lee has the iconic poses down pat. Gorgeous.

So naturally I couldn't resist and have icons for your enjoyment, the usual rules apply, comment if you claim one, say if you're willing to share, otherwise the icon belongs to the first person to claim it, and of course you can modify them in any way you want:

( twenty Superman icons from #204 )

You remember how a short while ago I brought to you some Elseworld scans, among them that wacky Batman SM outfit? And thought that couldn't be topped? Well I'm just now reading a Superman Elseworld trade, Superman: The Dark Side (written by John Francis Moore, pencils by Kieron Dwyer, inks by Hilary Barta), and the plot isn't really all that important to these three panel scans. All I have to say is, if you ever wanted to see Lex Luthor naked (well okay he has a loin cloth), gagged and wearing a dog collar, while a huge dominatrix wielding a whip towers over him (you see bloody whip marks too), you should take a look behind this cut tag.
( you'd think I was kidding, but I am not )

You know, each time I think that there are certainly things I'd only ever see in fanfiction not in the comic books, I'm proven wrong.

I've been wondering when and how Batman and Superman reveal (or find out) each other's secret identities as Bruce Wayne and Clark Kent (in current comic continuity), and which issue(s) tell of this. The version of their first meeting as it is told in Man of Steel (mini-series) #3 (Nov 1986) -- I don't know if there are others -- doesn't have a mutual revelation of secret identities.

I did some web research, but what I found surprise me, mostly because I previously thought that Superman and Batman found out about each other early. The Superman FAQ has a question on who knows of his secret identity and says that "Batman discovered the secret (ADVENTURES #440, May 88)". I then browsed that site some more and found a three part article Superman & Batman: World's Finest Team, that takes a closer look at their relationship.

That article tells a bit more Adventures of Superman #440. It's apparently continued from Action Comics #594:

Superman asks for his help in trying to determine who has been keeping a scrapbook of his feats before his official debut as Superman (unknown to Superman, Ma Kent had been saving clippings, and her book had been stolen).

Batman brings Robin along to meet Superman. It isn't clear whether this Robin is supposed to be Dick Grayson or Jason Todd. While Robin stands slack-jawed (repeatedly saying "wow!"), the two discuss the scrapbook.
[...]
Superman checks back with Batman in Adventures of Superman #440 for three pages. The meeting is made a bit edgier this time. Batman is in his Dark Knight persona, wondering where Superman is. "I don't like standing idle like this. Gotham is a garden that needs constant weeding". Batman doesn't bring Robin this time and he is abrupt with Superman ("As usual, your humor eludes me, Superman.").

As to the scrapbook, Batman says that he wasn't able to come up with anything except, "the only absolute fact I was able to glean from the thing ... is that you're Clark Kent". Humorously, Superman's first thought is "Maybe I should have enlisted the help of the world's *second* greatest detective!" Batman adds that as a matter of "professional courtesy" he won't reveal Superman's dual identity to anyone.

Superman shows that there are some brains with the muscles when he replies, "Oh, I'm quite sure you won't do that ... Mr. Wayne." Batman almost slips off his batrope as he thinks, "and to think I took all that effort to line my cowl with lead foil."

(quoted from Superman & Batman: World's Finest Team - Part 1 (of 3) by Sean Hogan)

Reading this summary confused me a bit. Both the Unofficial Guide to the DCU site as well as the Unofficial Chronology Site put this in present day, and make the Robin Jason Todd. Thus Batman didn't know Superman's identity until Year Seven (in the ultra compressed "official" DC timeline that seems to have a bizarre "10 years rule" ever more compressing events as time goes on) or even Year Nine (in the timeline constructed by the Unofficial Chronology Site, which attempts to be consistent wrt to actual events unlike the SF&O timelines), which is the year Jason becomes Robin.

While this is consistent with Legends of the DC Universe #6 which tells of the first meeting of Dick Grayson with Superman (and it isn't that scrapbook case), somehow I always imagined them finding out about each other much earlier. I vaguely remember reading stories set before Batman teamed up with the first Robin, where he still knew of Superman's identity. Right now I can only find ones which aren't all that central to other continuity and probably weigh less heavy, e.g. LotDK #24-26, Flyer, a story set explicitly 18 months after his debut as Batman, when he refers to Superman as Clark (LotDK #24 p.17), which I didn't even read until recently, yet I thought they learned each of other's identities early on even before reading that. And I'm not sure to what extent the World's Finest mini-series from 1990 written by Dave Gibbons was intended as in continuity or as standalone, but reading that fit with my impression (which apparently I can't fully trace right now) that Batman and Superman found out each other's identities early, because there's also no Robin, yet they know each other.

Are there other versions that explore the identity thing further or retell the version from 1987? I haven't read the World's Finest twelve issue maxi-series, does that one maybe cover it? I'd really like to read relevant issues covering this more in-depth than the Adventures of Superman issue mentioned above seems to do, though I guess I'm going to look for it too. So if anyone has further reading suggestions and/or more insight into this, it would be much appreciated.

(Note: I first posted about this a while ago, but moments later noticed I'd overlooked things, so I deleted that post and reposted after having read more, just in case you saw the previous post appearing and then vanishing on your flist and wondered about it.)

For seemingly days now (okay it's just since late Saturday, it feels longer though) I've been seeing all these posts on my flist about Hereafter, more squee, and fic, and discussion than usual after a JL ep, and I can't participate yet, nor do I have any clue what the excitement is about (preferring to remain unspoiled, so please don't say). And worse, so far I haven't found an encode of the frelling episode online in the places I usually get the JL episodes. This sucks. I want to watch it too.

I did however get my comics on Saturday, except for the new Superman/Batman, that I thought was supposed to ship last week, but then again, that might be late everywhere. JLA/Avengers #3 was great, though I definitely need to reread it with some annotations, I didn't have a clue about many of the events that were referred to, especially those in Marvel continuity. I've also got an older comic (well slightly older, from 1998), a JLA Elseworld, The Nail (written and pencilled by Alan Davis, inked by Mark Farmer). It's no secret that I'm fond of AUs whether done by fans or by DC, so I have a soft spot for Elseworlds in general. I liked this one, and I have a couple of comments, unfortunately I'm going to lag behind with posting more indepth comic comments, both on the current issues as well as more on The Nail, (and probably blogging in general) due to obnoxious RL stuff that insists on intruding on my fannish time.

Still I wanted to mention that I'd love to see some fanfiction for The Nail Elseworld, in particular some that explores ( spoiler for what happened to Clark/Superman in this Elseworld )

I seem to be perpetually behind with my comic reviews, brief and incomplete as they are in the first place. Anyway, here are comments on comics from the last three weeks.

( comments on Amazing Spider-Man #500, Avengers/JLA #2, Arrowsmith #4, Batgirl #45, Batman #620, Batman/Joker: Switch, Birds of Prey #60, Detective Comics #788, Hulk Gray #2, Outsiders #5, Superman Birthright #5, Supreme Power #4, Teen Titans/Outsiders Secret Files & Origins, Wolverine #7, Wonder Woman #197 )

So I got my comic subscription this evening because tomorrow is a holiday, and I read some comics on my commute back. After I finished Supreme Power #3, and Superman: Birthright #4, I browsed through the Superman/Batman: Secret Files & Origins, and on one of the profile pages I read this: "he [Kon-El] recently discovered that he was cloned not only from the Man of Steel's D.N.A., but Lex Luthor's as well." I didn't know this. So it is canon that Clark and Lex have a kid together?!? Wow, who needs fanfic with canon like that? At least neither of the two was pregnant with Superboy -- small blessings I guess. Also the on-going Superman retcon seems to slowly coalesce into Lex and Clark meeting in Smallville even outside of the Birthright version, though the story with Lex at Smallville High is by Waid too, but after all it is included in a SF&O that's not connected to Birthright.

Also I still didn't get Batman: Tenses #2. :( When I asked this week, it turns out the issue did arrive last week after all but the shipment was damaged so they reordered. Whine.

Today I got a copy of Legends of the DCU #6 (written by Kelley Puckett, pencils by Dave Taylor, inks by Kevin Nolan), a story about the first meeting between Dick (as Robin) and Superman, and it was fun to read. Not truly outstanding or anything, but certainly worth the €1 I paid. And it has some nice character bits.

The whole story is told from Dick's POV. Batman is out of town for the night (we aren't told the reason for that), and in the opening sequence Robin deals with a group of burglars, who underestimate him at first. Dick notes that if he had half of Batman's rep they'd scatter at the sight of him, but of course they don't. The only thing I found odd was that he lets them run rather than tying them up for the police. But anyway, that's not really central, since the Batsignal then goes on. It turns out that Gordon turned it on because Superman is in Gotham, tracking down a gang who has stolen an experimental e.m. pulse rifle from S.T.A.R. Labs, but Superman wants permission before he operates in Gotham (because, as Dick puts it "My permission? Oh right. Batman's got that... thing... about superman operating here."). So since Batman isn't there he asks Robin, who looks for Commissioner Gordon for reassurance. Then follows lots of action adventure stuff, and Robin clearly enjoys working with Superman. I liked Dick's reaction to Superman, he thinks Superman and his abilities are "cool" but he isn't intimidated. I also liked how Superman trusts Dick to be competent and goes with Dick's tactical suggestions.

Interwoven with the main story are flashbacks to the time when Robin hadn't met Superman yet, but heard about him on the news. I enjoyed those a lot. Like when Dick, after watching some news footage about Superman in Gotham, and clearly exited about Superman being there, asks Batman "I saw! On the news! He was here! So... was he... I mean... what's he like?" and Batman replies "Lightening. Thunder. He's not human, Dick. Never forget that." But still Dick stays up late reading Lois Lane's articles about Superman and actually sleeps with that article on his pillow (it's kind of cute, IMO). Especially since that flashback panel comes right after the current day panel in which Superman invites Robin to Metropolis.

And I have to say that Superman's costume looks really garish against the backdrop of Gotham, not at least because the colorist chose to make the red and yellow of Robin's costume darker and more subdued than the red and yellow of Superman's costume.