Action Comics #662 (February 1991)
Action Comics #662 (February 1991)
Yes, it’s the moment Superman fans had been waiting decades and decades for: THE RETURN OF SILVER BANSHEE! FINALLY! Oh, and Superman tells Lois Lane his secret identity and stuff.
Clark is about to share the big secret with Lois in her apartment, when someone knocks at the door – it’s the Silver Banshee, looking for a Superman to kill. She grabs Superman by the neck but then, get this, she doesn’t recognize him because he has glasses on. Again! Haha, what kind of dope falls for that disguise more than once?
Oh. Anyway, the confused Banshee goes off to look for Superman elsewhere. Clark also leaves to “tell Superman” about Banshee, or so he says to his fiancee (the same fiancee he was about to confess the truth to one second ago). Superman finds Banshee terrorizing some poor Daily Planet workers – she felt his “energy” there, no doubt by the desk of one C. Kent. It turns out that Banshee is suddenly more powerful than before, so she knocks out Supes and drags his body to the ruins of Metropolis’ old St. Christopher’s church, where a voice tells her to kill Superman with a magic ax. The voice, of course, is Blaze, the satanic being/night club owner who hates Superman for burning down her house.
Superman wakes up just as he’s about to get decapitated and quickly defeats Silver Banshee, who is forsaken by Blaze for failing her mission (Blaze was the one who gave Banshee extra powers to kill Superman). Clark returns to the date with Lois and, having ran out of excuses to put this off, he finally shows her what he looks like without his glasses:
And then th- HOLY CRAP, CLARK KENT IS SUPERMAN! OH MY GOD.
Character-Watch:
The last time we saw Silver Banshee (Superman #23), it seemed like she had broken her curse and retired to the afterlife, but Blaze tempted her back into the dark side by offering to give her enough power to defeat the magical crone who cursed her in the first place. It’s interesting that Banshee still hesitates before trying to jam that ax into Superman’s face, so she’s not completely evil. Her deal with Blaze and her character in general will be explored in more depth in 1994’s Legends of the World’s Finest miniseries.
Also, a character debut! I believe this is the first appearance of Lois’ cat, Elroy, who usually pops up whenever she’s worrying about Clark in her apartment. Is this the post-Crisis version of Streaky the Supercat?
Plotline-Watch:
So, that secret identity thing is a pretty big deal, for obvious and less obvious reasons. This marks the last time Superman lies to Lois, which isn’t just a big change in the plot but in the way that plot is told. Up till now, Superman is only really “himself” in his inner narration or when he’s with his parents in Smallville – 90% of the time, he’s just putting on a show for everyone, either by pretending to be a normal human or pretending not to be Clark Kent. We get some moments like that in this issue:
But by telling Lois his identity, the real Superman/Clark is stepping out from those thought balloons into the main part of the comic. Now he has someone to talk about Superman-stuff and Clark-stuff, which makes for different types of stories. The engagement/secret identity thing, coupled with Luthor’s death, has created a whole new (and much more interesting) status quo in just a few issues. Also, not being fooled all the time makes Lois a stronger, more realistic character. I don’t know if it’s intentional, but in this issue we get a taste of all the worrying she’ll be doing from now on:
Of course, we still haven’t seen how she’ll react to being fooled in the first place…
Other plots:
Lex Luthor’s will is found! And he named an heir! Now they just find to find him and hope he’s a super-genius like Luthor himself who will save the company. What are the odds of that happening, though?
The infernal power summoned by Blaze is felt by Baron Sunday, that voodoo dude who fought Superman when he was impersonating Gangbuster (Superman #26). Of course, he can’t do anything to seize that power since he’s in jail and all. That seems like a pretty random cameo, but Sunday is actually coming back in an upcoming issue.
The church where Superman is almost sacrificed is the same one where Skyhook turned children into monsters (Superman #15), Jimmy Olsen got shot by drug dealers (Adventures #469), and some people burned to death (Superman #47). All of which was Blaze’s doing. Presumably she has a friend in Mayor Berkowitz’ office, otherwise they would have torn down that place long ago.
Reference-Watch:
I’m pretty sure it’s not Clark that Lois is looking at on the cover – it’s John Byrne’s alternate cover to Man of Steel #1:
This explains her shock. “UH-OH! BYRNE IS BACK!”