Adventures of Superman #461 (December 1989)
Adventures of Superman #461 (December 1989)
Superman (maybe?) travels back in time and meets his birth parents. Unfortunately, they can’t catch up properly with their son because they’re busy being murdered by their exploding planet. Also, because Superman’s mom thinks he’s gross.
Let’s backtrack: on Superman #38, the whole planet is hit by bizarre natural disasters, including a tidal wave that turns Metropolis into Venice. Now we find out what was behind all of it: that pesky Kryptonian Eradicator that Superman brought from space, dumped in Antarctica, and then forgot all about (because the thing erased itself from Superman’s mind). Superman remembers the Eradicator just in time to find it melting the ice caps in an attempt to turn Earth into Krypton 2.0. When Superman’s usual approach to problem-solving (punching things) fails, he goes into the portal where the Eradicator is getting all its construction materials and finds himself in a sort of “Phantom Zone” filled with Kryptonian junk. Also in there is the sort-of ghost of Superman’s xenophobic ancestor Kem-L.
Kem-L tells Superman that in order to control the Eradicator, he must first pass the Kryptonian “Rite of Passage,” which is like their Bar Mitzvah. In order to do that Superman enters another portal that sends him back in time to the beginning of Man of Steel #1, when his biological parents Jor-El and Lara have just sent his rocket into space. Jor-El helps Superman do the Rite of Passage (while Lara presumably barfs in a corner), which involves putting on a headband and seeing a vision of a scientist murdering a caveman.
Once that’s done, Krypton’s explosion propels Superman back through both portals (conveniently destroying them) and back to the Eradicator, which he’s finally able to control – as a result, the Eradicator apparently winds down, and Superman is left with a new Antarctic base full of Kryptonian memorabilia. A Fortress of Solitude, if you will.
Plotline-Watch:
During the “Return to Krypton” sequence, Superman acts as if he’s actually traveling back in time and meeting his parents (he even wonders if he can stop Krypton from exploding), but I’m gonna assume the intent here was that these are AI simulations like Kem-L. That’s probably for the best, since those first few pages from Man of Steel #1 are already getting a little crowded: World of Krypton #4 added some more dialogue, Action Annual #2 added Jor-El and Lara using the Kryptonian Death Chant (which is also used here), and now it turns out a time-traveling Superman might have been running around the place, too.
On the surface it might seem like this whole plot was just an excuse to bring back the Fortress of Solitude into the Superman mythos, but that weird vision with a scientist murdering a caveman (both of which are Superman) is more significant than you might think, and foreshadows a major upcoming saga.
You might recognize some of those Kryptonian artifacts from the World of Krypton miniseries, especially the Awesome Kryptonian Battle Robot, which Superman will make good use of during Reign of the Supermen.
At the Planet, Clark Kent finally meets Colin Thornton, the guy who wants to offer him a job at his magazine. Clark says “nope” but does seem a little intrigued. Meanwhile, there are more hints about Alice the Intern’s dark secret (she’s running a meth lab):
As a side-effect of forgetting the Eradicator, Superman also forgets all about Jimmy Olsen. That must have been the best day of his life. It’s during a visit to Professor Hamilton to search for the missing Jimmy that Superman remembers the Eradicator and goes “never mind that little brat, gotta go deal with this first.”
WTF-Watch:
While on that subject, I love how exasperated nice old Professor Hamilton gets with Superman for neglecting Jimmy. Dude, you were threatening to blow up hookers when Superman met you. Shut up.
Metropolis Mailbag:
vivvav said: “Baldy award? What?”
The Baldy Award was a sort of no-prize that the Superman comics gave out to letter writers in the ‘90s. Apparently it was a postcard signed by Lex Luthor and featuring his portrait from the cover of Lex Luthor: The Unauthorized Biography. Did anyone reading this ever get their hands on one? (Remember people, I can’t reply to comments if you leave them through the dashboard, for some reason.)
See comments on Tumblr: https://superman86to99.tumblr.com/post/82324256886/adventures-of-superman-461-december-1989#disqus_thread
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