Adventures of Superman #500 (June 1993)
Adventures of Superman #500 (June 1993)
OVERSIZED ANNIVERSARY ISSUE! Featuring the return of Superman! And Superman! And Superman, and also, Superman! But first: The Badass Adventures of Pa Kent in Hell. The last time we saw ol' Pa, he'd just had a heart attack and seen a ghostly vision of his dead son (that's Superman, for those joining us), who grabbed his hand and pulled Pa towards him. Now Ghost Superman is like, "Whelp, nice seeing you dad, gotta go."
Superman is taken "into the light" by a couple of demons disguised as robed Kryptonian ladies. However, Pa refuses to give up on his son and follows them, only to find himself in a battlefield covered with corpses – those of his Korean War buddies. Pa is (understandably) confused and thinks he's back in the war, carrying out a mission to rescue some captured "airman". Private Pa then comes across a farm littered with more dead people, including one that reminds him of his brother Harry… mainly because that's exactly who it is.
In case you hadn't noticed, something fishy is going on here. A demonic-looking enemy soldier tries to kick Pa out of wherever the hell this is (get it? hell?), but Pa just punches him into oblivion and soldiers on. Sometimes you just gotta punch some Nazis, folks.
Next up, Pa runs into Lady Blaze, the satanic mistress/recurring Superman baddie. Blaze generously offers to help Pa find his son in exchange for one million do– I mean, his soul. Pa apparently thinks "eh, I don't love him that much" and prefers to jump into the void beneath him.
At this point, Pa is saved from pinballing from sad memory to sad memory for all eternity by Kismet, the nice cosmic entity Superman met a while back ("our favourite naked outer space lady in a cape", as Don Sparrow puts it). With Kismet's guidance, Pa finally finds Superman, but he's in the middle of some sort of weird funeral procession carried out by more demons disguised as Kryptonians (and Superman's old furry friend, the Cleric).
Superman has completely fallen for the show these guys put on, and is prepared to let them take him to the "Kryptonian afterlife", but Pa eventually breaks the spell with his hollering. More punching ensues!
Superman gets rid of the demons, but he still thinks that Pa should go back to the land of living without him. He's been gone for too long, and it's not his place to deny death. Superman's Kryptonian father Jor-El suddenly shows up to reinforce this notion, telling Superman to join him and his biological mother, Lara, in the afterlife. It is the natural way of things.
Naturally, Pa Kent ain't having any of that.
Pa practically carries Superman through the portal in front of them. Cut to: Pa waking up in a hospital bed in Smallville, whispering "Clark is back" to a freaked out Ma Kent and Lois Lane.
Suddenly, Superman sightings are reported all over Metropolis – it's like he's in four places at once! Lois refuses to give herself any false hopes, but just to make double-sure her fiancee is still dead, she decides to take a peek inside his tomb. Inspector Henderson opens the casket for her, and it's… empty?!
TO BE CONTINUED! But first…
Epilogue 1: Two rival gangs are fighting over turf when one pulls out some futuristic super-weapons that literally blow the other guys to pieces. As the cops roll in, out of the rubble emerges a hulking figure saying "DOOMSDAY! GOTTA STOP DOOMSDAY!" Holy shit, it's Superman! He's back! Also, black!
Epilogue 2: As an evildoer tries to carjack an innocent citizen, a caped figure flies to the rescue… and blasts the absolute crap out of the would-be thief with some energy blasts, throwing him off the roof of a building. The familiar figure explains that he's"risen from the dead" and been changed by "the fire and darkness" – OK, that has to be Superman. There's no other explanation.
Epilogue 3: There's an emergency at Project Cadmus, the genetic experimentation facility that recently held Superman's corpse: some type of secret cloning experiment has broken out before it/he was ready. We see this brash young clone being led to the outside world by the Newsboy Legion, and upon hearing the way they refer to him, he exclaims: "DON'T EVER CALL ME SUPERBOY!" Because he's actually Superman! Oh my God!
Epilogue 4: A tourist family stops in front of the Daily Planet and reflects solemnly on the plaque marking the spot where Superman died… until a man in blue tights lands from the sky, rips out the plaque, and burns it with his heat vision. We then see that he's got robot parts all over his body; you know, as if he'd been brought back to life after being pummeled to death by a monster. Whelp, that's it. That's Superman, right there.
Character-Watch:
First appearance of these four mysterious Supermen: Black Superman, Blind Superman, Brat Superman, and Beep-Bop-I'm-a-Robot Superman. Or is it?!
Creator-Watch:
This is a suitably epic finale for Jerry Ordway's original Superman run, which started way back in 1987. Ordway went from artist to co-plotter to writer/artist to just writer, along the way pioneering the house style that all Superman series will use throughout the ‘90s. This is often called the "Byrne" and/or "Jurgens" era, but I'd argue that Ordway was the single most influential creator involved in this period, and although what comes directly after his departure is cool as hell, we'll definitely miss the heart, humor and realism he brought to even the most obscure background characters.
Speaking of which, this wouldn't be an Ordway comic without a shit-ton of subplots, so here we go…
Plotline-Watch:
One detail I never caught as a kid: one of the "Superman sightings" at the end of the issue is clearly a drunken Bibbo in a Superman shirt.
The Final Misadventure of Jose Degaldo: He's been beaten, burned, broken (literally), had buildings dropped on him, and dumped by both Lois Lane and Cat Grant, but Jose "Gangbuster" Delgado has finally had enough – he's ditching Metropolis. A regular crime-punching adventure goes wrong when Jose accidentally beats up an undercover cop posing as a drug dealer. Upon learning there's a warrant for his ass and getting shot by another cop, Jose decides to call it quits and leave town (using the bus ticket Inspector Henderson recently gave him). He's actually going to Fawcett City along with his creator – he'll show up again in Jerry Ordway's Power of Shazam, but that's it for Jose in these pages! Goodbye, Suicide Slum's rose.
Incidentally, Cat Grant is feeling rather down since she split with Jose, and her boss Vinnie Edge uses the opportunity to invite her to dinner. She agrees, even though A) her relationship with Vinnie's son did not end well, and B) he's a disgusting perv who just grabbed her butt. Don Sparrow says: "The interplay between Cat Grant and Vinnie Edge hasn't aged well – though in some ways it seems timelier than ever."
The "favor" Vinnie mentions above is not what you might think: he wants Cat to talk to Jimmy Olsen, who has neglected his duties as star of the hit Turtle Boy TV series ever since a certain pal of Jimmy's was violently killed. Jimmy isn't in the mood for light-hearted TMNT copyright infringement, though, so the series is currently on reruns.
Those Turtle Boy reruns are watched by the cellmate of Oswald Loomis – aka Superman's least intimidating rogue, The Prankster. Loomis, once a children's entertainer himself, doesn't appreciate ‘90s television and tries to electrocute said cellmate (who, in my memory, was Vinnie's son Morgan Edge, making this scene slightly less random).
Pa Kent smashing the ghostly Jor-El with a shovel that materializes out of nowhere is, of course, a shout out to John Byrne's classic Man of Steel #6, when he does the same thing. I want a full series about Pa dispatching Kryptonian ghosts the same way. His maligned brother Harry was also mentioned in a Byrne comic, World of Smallville #1.
As usual, I'm forgetting or lazily leaving out plenty of important details, so check out Don Sparrow's section after the jump for way more!
Art-Watch (by @donsparrow):
Even more than Superman #75, it's this issue (and the storyline that follows) that most define this, my most beloved era of Superman comics for me. Perhaps it's because I was actually opposed to Superman's death, rather than excited about it, whereas with this issue, I was only completely excited, and totally curious about how they'd bring Superman back.
Still more nerdy background: as we've mentioned in previous blogposts, I live in the same city as Super-teamster Tom Grummett, so the fact that he drew this comic was big, big deal in my hometown. Our local comic store (which sat below Tom Grummett's art studio upstairs) had Tom in on the day it was released to sign copies, so it was a major event. Though I was only a lad of 13 at the time, both that day, and in the years since, I bought enough copies of Adventures of Superman #500 to insulate my house with them (and so did the rest of the world, making the resale value not quite what Superman #75 was). How big of a deal was Superman's return in my hometown? Well, we made the evening news..
The direct market edition cover features a stunner of a painting by the great Jerry Ordway, of a ghostly Superman reaching out to Pa Kent from beyond the void. It was billed as being a removable translucent screen, but I don't know anyone who was successfully able to remove the vellum without ruining their cover, but the softening of the add-on is very effective. The newsstand edition (remember when comics could be purchased on newsstands?) has a decidedly story-driven cover, which must have perplexed the many non-regular Superman readers who came out in droves for this big issue. It features Superman and Pa Kent floating over a background of enemies (including the demonic Blaze, which, to the uninitiated, must have been pretty spooky) with Pa Kent inexplicably in a Challengers of the Unknown looking jumpsuit. Confusion aside, it's still a great cover, and a nice hint at all the zip-a-tone goodness we'll find inside.
Throughout the issue, the real world and the afterlife are given very distinct visual styles, with the ‘real’ world being inked and coloured normally, and the spirit world with lots of zip-a-tone shadows and gleaming bright colours. It's such an effective way to delineate the storylines, and man, I love how the extra shading looks on the afterlife pages. It'll be hard to single out only a few pages, because, honestly, this is one of the best drawn comics of the era.
In the first few pages, I was struck that, despite seeing Superman in full uniform at the end of Superman #77, the Superman Jonathan Kent sees on the ‘other’ side is Clark Kent, which is a telling note about how he sees his identity. The image of Pa stripping away his Clark garb is a great one, with the mist and swirling clouds establishing we are indeed, not in Kansas anymore.
The direct market edition also has some differences within the book, in addition to the difference in cover--it has a number of full page splashes inserted into the storyline, which are missing from the newsstand edition, and each one is a stunner. The first one is Gangbuster descending a fire escape on page 6, having ignored the warnings he got from Inspector Henderson in the Superman specials that preceded this issue.
The most interesting thing about these splashes, aside from how just about every one of them would have made for some killer poster art, is how seamlessly Jerry Ordway matches the scripts. Many of the splashes contain dialogue, but if those sentences are removed (as they are in the newsstand edition) the story still makes sense, which must have been a real challenge. [Max: Oddly enough, the one flaw I've found in my giant Death and Return of Superman omnibus so far is that some of the dialogue from these pages is duplicated, presumably from combining pages from both editions.]
Page 9 features another great Gangbuster image, and the fight choreography in the pages that follow has a real sense of place and pace.
As we return to Pa Kent's near death experience, the visuals go a good job of selling the story's dreamlike conceit--"reality" is pretty flexible where he is, so as Jonathan spends time there, his thoughts get muddled in with memory, and he can lose his purpose. It really feels like a dream in that way. Also, having heard about Jonathan's brother previously, I thought he'd look a lot worse. There's a strange cutaway to the Prankster in these pages, and while it's a funny little scene, it has no bearing on the story, and Prankster doesn't pop up again in these pages for a very long time—if memory serves, until the ill-fitting reboot of his look some 80 issues later. [Max: We saw him during the Dominus storyline, but I'm not sure if that counts.]
I also love how Grummett seems to draw Prankster as looking like UK comedian Terry Thomas, which is a great fit. It's always tricky to translate such goofy-looking characters into real people, and here, perhaps for the first time, Prankster looks like a human being and not a doughier Alfred E Neuman. (Do prisoners really get their own portable TVs? Surely this scene demonstrates the danger of such a luxury!)
The scenes of Pa Kent falling into a pit and being pulled out by Blaze are chilling, but, like the rest of the issue, doesn't it just make you fall in love with tough, no nonsense Jonathan Kent? It's a mini-Godwatch when he pulls a Luke Skywalker and choose oblivion over joining forces with Blaze. (Extra points for Jonathan asking the question on the minds of a lot of Superman readers--is Blaze the devil or what?)
Next up is an appearance by what would seem to be Blaze's opposite number, Kismet, our favourite naked outer space lady in a cape. Both sides of the two-page splash are pretty stunning here.
The ersatz Kryptonian funeral is pretty interesting too. Here, Grummett walks a fine line, having the Kryptonian stuff accurate enough that we know what it's supposed to be, but just off enough that we know something strange is going on.
Once Clark figures out that the wraiths mean him harm (has there ever been a nice wraith?) it's so, so great to see him back in action after all these months without him. Major kudos to the colourist, here especially, but throughout the book, for the unique colours which look great here on Superman's uniform. Plus, I always like the times when Superman loses his cape.
The visual effect of the portal back to reality is just amazing, and from their perspective, probably pretty accurate. Next to the blinding light of the afterlife, earthly life would probably seem pretty dark. That last image from the direct edition, of Superman flying through the void with Pa Kent is just such a stunner. And from a story standpoint, this is just so definitive of the Super-team. That a story about bringing back Superman is told in the most personal, meaningful way, with a chubby, balding old farmer as more or less the lead character. It's a total rejection of the grit teeth and substance-less Image comics trend of the era in its' wholesomeness. And I love this is how they chose to bring him back. My very favourite detail, that I came back to again and again was that the heartbeat that returns to Pa Kent's monitor goes across his panel, into the panel of Superman's tomb. So subtle, and so, so awesome.
The four page previews kicking off the Reign storyline are almost an issue unto themselves, but I love how all the eye-witness accounts from page 45 are later seen within issues, and give clues to very different Supermen.
If you'll allow me just a little more nerdiness, DC sent comic shops some previews of this issue to create excitement, and these pages included scans of the end section with the new Supermen. The only catch was, on these previews the figures were totally whited out, so you couldn't see what he looked like. So having read those short previews, I thought they were all referring to ONE new Superman, who I assumed had been changed by his experience with Doomsday. It wasn't until I got the issue home that I realized they were launching four different storylines.
The art on these is pretty interesting. This is really the point where Jon Bogdanove shifts into a really loose, less constrained style, which honestly works quite well for the larger than life character of John Henry Irons. And that first look at him--you can definitely see why they thought that Shaquille O'Neal would work for this character.
Next is a spooky look at the Last Son of Krypton, who I 100% believed was the real Superman, mainly because of his appearance. The panel of Superman lowering to finish off the thug is a great, eerie look, and I dig the Gandalf the White style dialogue here, too.
I love everything about the "Metropolis Kid" section, because it's all built-in, and even gives us hints of this character's "tactile telekinesis" with the grating not being damaged from his blow. Maybe it's just nostalgia, but man, it's a great costume too.
Lastly, the Man of Tomorrow segment, which is such great, great storytelling, as, until the very last second, you don't realize anything is amiss, in spite of the facial expressions of the tourists. [Max: This guy freaked me out even before I saw his full face, and I just realized why: the panel of him turning to face the family reminds me the end of this traumatizing BTAS episode.]
STRAY OBSERVATIONS:
It's interesting to me that this issue establishes that Jonathan Kent fought in the Korean conflict, and not, as was established in the World of Smallville mini-series, World War II. It's amazing that enough time had passed by this point, that they had to move the timeline up. I suppose if Pa Kent were still in modern stories, he'd have been a Vietnam veteran by now. I'll admit being surprised watching Smallville that Jonathan Kent had never been in any war--I thought for sure they'd have made him a Gulf War veteran or something.
Even completely in shock and grief and confusion, Lois Lane really rocks those stretchpants.
GODWATCH: This is the big one, where, as hinted to in past issues, the belief system that the Kents raised Clark within is made explicit. First on page 22, in a moment of despair, Lois admits she wishes her faith were stronger, and Martha relates that their beliefs included Heaven, and that Clark himself, to her knowledge, subscribed to those beliefs. Finally, when Pa stabilizes, Ma Kent thanks the Lord, on page 42. [Max: I also find Pa's theory that Clark only ended up in this limbo because he'd been raised as a mortal pretty interesting.]
"Sure--have some of my hootch, why don'tcha?" A very funny exchange. [Max: I forgot to mention High Pocket's essential contribution to this issue, when he fishes Jose out of the river, gives him booze, and tries to recruit him for some larceny! Shame on me.]
