Adventures of Superman #511 (April 1994)
Adventures of Superman #511 (April 1994)
Superman returns to Metropolis after the events of “Bizarro’s World” and finds that… there’s no Metropolis. It’s completely gone. Did someone pull a Coast City on it? Is Brainiac back to his Pre-Crisis city-stealing ways? Superman flies down to take a closer look at the nothignness, only for the buildings to suddenly re-appear right in front of him, making him clumsily crash into one. And right in front of some hot ‘90s babes, too. How embarrassing.
Turns out Metropolis wasn’t gone: Superman’s powers are so out of control (as seen in recent months) that he didn’t realize his X-Ray vision was making him see through the entire city. Superman tries to rescue the people falling off that building with the old “air cushion” trick, but he ends up creating a mini-tornado and injures more people. When Maggie Sawyer and the Special Crimes Unit show up to find out who’s been going around destroying buildings and injuring pedestrians, Superman volunteers to be arrested for everyone's safety, but Maggie is like “eh, let’s just pretend this didn’t happen… this time.”
She does encourage Superman to go get his condition checked out by a specialist ASAP (which, come to think of it, he should have done weeks ago). Superman goes to Professor Hamilton, who determines that his internal solar battery has gone out of whack and is making him absorb too much energy after being exposed to some sort of kryptonite-like substance. And when was the last time Superman encountered kryptonite? At the end of “Reign of the Supermen,” when a big blast of it passed through the Eradicator first and instantly gave Superman his powers back. “A bit of foreshadowing,” as the Professor says.
According to Hamilton, Superman’s powers will keep increasing until his body can’t contain them anymore and, I guess, explode. The Professor does suggest a possible solution: taking Superman’s excess energy and giving it to those sick Underworld clones who have been dying off all over Metropolis (as part of that OTHER long-ass storyline we’ve been seeing recently). Superman likes the idea but decides that a massive government agency would be better equipped to make it happen than some ex-con in a run down building (sorry, Hambone), so he flies over to Project Cadmus to tell them about it.
Like two minutes after Superman arrives at Cadmus, the place is attacked by some Underworlders who believe Cadmus created the illness that’s killing them. Superman and the Guardian team up to stop the clones, but it isn’t a terribly long fight, since the Underworlders are dropping off like flies. Very big flies.
Meanwhile, we find out that LexCorp is currently being attacked by OTHER clones and Lex Luthor Jr. is trapped inside. Lex sends a televised message blaming Cadmus for the attack and promising to “deal” with them “once and for all.” In other words: WAR. TO BE CONTINUED!
Plotline-Watch:
Of course, those clones attacking LexCorp weren’t sent by Cadmus, they were sent by the mad scientist living UNDER Cadmus, Dabney Donovan. Earlier in the issue, Dabney snooped into a heated Zoom call between Lex Jr. and Cadmus’ Director Westfield where the latter refused to join forces to cure the Clone Plague, because he thinks Lex would just steal their tech. Lex indignantly accuses Westfield of putting lives at stake (meaning HIS life specifically, since he secretly lives in a clone body). Dabney worries that Lex might attack Cadmus and thus endanger his own operation, so he… attacks Lex and makes it look like it was Cadmus? They don’t call him “mad” for nothing.
Westfield’s comment about Kryptonian DNA is obviously a reference to Cadmus’ troubles attempting to clone Superman after his death, which resulted in them giving up and creating Superboy. Incidentally, Superman asks Guardian how Superboy is doing, given the whole "clones dying" thing (the Newsboy Legion kids are in pretty bad shape), and Guardian just says he’s “been through a lot lately.” In other words: buy his solo series if you want to know if he’s dying too, kids!
Back to Lex, he instructs Dr. Happersen (still wearing bandages over his head after Bizarro burned him) to contact the Underworlders, presumably with nefarious purposes. In the same scene, we learn that Lex has a virus in LexCorp computers that alerts him to any mention of his name. And guess who happens to be using a LexCorp computer to write an article about how Lex murdered his personal trainer?
We’ve been following Lois Lane’s investigation into the Sasha Green murder for a while, but I’m a little confused about the “father” part above. Does that mean Lois knows Lex Jr. is Lex Sr.? When did she find out? Did she put two and two together after learning clones are getting sick and seeing Lex all frail last issue?
Don Sparrow points out: “As far as I know, this issue’s billboard is the first appearance of Whitty Banter, the David Letterman of the DCU. It’s a confusing look, though, as he seems to be a blonde, musclebound Billy Batson lookalike, with John Lennon glasses, so apart from having a talk show, he doesn't greatly resemble any real world hosts. (A quick look into it indicates Banter's first in-person appearance is a few years later, in Superman #117. He also appears in Man of Steel #67, where the Letterman connection is made more explicit, though Banter's face doesn't appear in either issue.)" As we pointed out on Twitter, there was also a reference to Whitty in the letters page for Adventures #511, in answer to a letter praising his real life counterpart, colorist Glenn Whitmore.
Patreon-Watch:
This post was sneak peek'd at patreon.com/superman86to99 earlier this month! Shout out to patrons Aaron, Chris "Ace" Hendrix, britneyspearsatemyshorts, Patrick D. Ryall, Bheki Latha, Mark Syp, Ryan Bush, Raphael Fischer, Kit, Sam, and Bol; we are the Dabney Donovans leeching off of your Cadmus. We've been slacking on the exclusive Patreon material lately (other than the sneak peeks) but we hope to have more to show you in the next year, including more Elseworlds reviews and out-of-continuity stuff.
But right now: more Don Sparrow, under the jump!
Art-Watch (by @donsparrow):
We start with the cover, and it's a very good one, with a grim Superman and Guardian ready for battle. Perhaps a little generic, and lacking in background, but it's just a great drawing of the protectors of Metropolis, even if it doesn't give much of a hint to the actual story. Inside the book we are greeted almost immediately by the real reason people check in on this blog each and every week: wall to wall ass. Superman crashes through a skyscraper Zack Snyder style while a diverse group of sunbathers look on. This is fairly racy for a code book from 1994, so it's worth a mention.
I love Barry Kitson's art (even if the Jim Lee-style hatching is a bit overpowering at this time) so it's a challenge to narrow down outstanding panels, because it's all pretty great. But the drawing of Maggie Sawyer in full tactical gear is a highlight, as her boots, body suit, and armour all appear to have a different surface texture. Great stuff. There is lots of laboratory scenes in this issue, from Professor Hamilton's studio apartment to Project Cadmus, and all the technical equipment and wires look appropriately high-tech.
As the only action scene (Superman and Guardian battle a dying and apparently nameless Underworlder) unfolds, the image of Guardian shielding himself from an energy blast is well drawn and well coloured.
That scene is as close to we get to excitement in this story, which was definitely one of the less eventful issues I can remember. It moves the ongoing "B" stories (Superman is overpowered, Lois is investigating Sasha Green, the clones are all dying) without having much of an "A" story. Still there's always forward motion in this era, setting up for the next big thing.
STRAY OBSERVATIONS:
The idea that Lex is monitoring Lois Lane, and is in turn being monitored by Dabney Donovan is a trippy one, especially if we add in the layer that we, as readers are monitoring them all. One small detail I'd like to highlight here is that Dabney Donovan refers to himself while he monologues, which is quite helpful to new readers, who might be thinking, "who is this guy, and why isn't he fighting a blue hedgehog?"
Speaking of DCU analogues, apparently one of their daytime dramas is called Secret Hospital which sounds a lot more exclusive than our General Hospital.
I do love that for all his many sins, Lex II is about to be brought down by journalism, rather than superheroic fisticuffs.
The attacking Underworlder (if he got named, I missed it) seems like a riff on the Incredible Hulk, referring to the Cadmus agents he's fighting as "puny soldiers".
Slightly amusing to me that the Underworlder attacker refers to Newsboys and Superboy as "dogs on a leash", when Cadmus once had their own strike team flat out called the Bloodhounds (who are currently chilling with Doctor Stratos in the "never seen again" lounge). [Max: Actually, someone let us know recently that Doctor Stratos DID appear again in a Roger Stern Superman novel in the 2000s, to my shock… What if the Bloodhounds also have a novel we never learned of? Or an entire YA book series? It's possible.]