Superman #42 (April 1990)
Superman #42 (April 1990)
Day of the Krypton Man, Part 4! Superman fully abandons his humanity while embracing his Kryptonian heritage and becomes… Krypton Man. Shouldn’t that be Krypton Kryptonian? Either way, when he takes off his Clark Kent clothes to attend an emergency, he finds that once again his Superman costume has been magically replaced by a suit based on those futuristic nun habits people on Krypton wore. This time, Superman doesn’t seem very alarmed by this development and just goes with it.
The emergency: Draaga, the grumpy alien gladiator that Superman shamed by refusing to kill in combat (Action Annual #2) has crashed into New York City in a space taxicab, demanding a rematch to the death. Superman is like “okay” and beats the crap out of Draaga all over New York, until they end up wrestling right on top of the Statue of Liberty.
Meanwhile, Professor Hamilton is watching the fight on TV and worries about all the property damage Superman and Draaga could cause, so he devises a perfectly logical plan to transport them to his roof via TV signals and then trap them in a force field (what’s with this guy and trapping people in force fields?). Unfortunately, just when Hamilton is trying to do this, the satellite signal is diverted by a NASA shuttle doing experiments in space, which results in Superman and Draaga getting transported to the moon. Oh, and Draaga’s cabbie too. And half the Statue of Liberty.
Yep, TO BE CONTINUED!
Plotline-Watch:
Superman is really neglecting his Clark Kent side right now. Not only is he about to get fired from his fancy new job for being mean to everyone, but he forgot to pay his rent and we see that he got an eviction notice. A concerned Ma and Pa Kent have been trying to reach him on the phone, but he’s too busy being a jerk to call them back.
The Misadventures of Jose Delgado: We haven’t seen Jose in a while, so what has the former Gangbuster been up to since he got dumped by Lois Lane? Oh, the usual: he’s about to get evicted from his apartment, like Clark, but unfortunately he doesn’t have a giant fortress in the antarctic he can move to if that happens. Also, he’s unemployed and practically unhirable due to his tendency to end up in the hospital every ten issues or so. However, we see that Jose got a letter from Joe Morgan, who happens to be the ex-husband of…
Cat Grant and her son Adam Morgan are back on Intergang’s hit list, against Morgan Edge’s specific orders, simply because Edge’s second in command “Ugly” Mannheim is tired of Edge’s whiney bullshit. I’m actually surprised those two are still on speaking terms. Didn’t Mannheim try to kill Edge back in Superman #35? Also, how come Morgan is still using that office if his dad took over his company?
Six-Fifty: K'raamdyn, the space cabbie that took Draaga to Earth, ironically has to take a regular cab to get him closer to Liberty Island when Superman and Draaga go there. Then K'raamdyn leaves without paying and the human cabbie goes “Hey, where’s my $6.50?!” Yes, the vast cab prices conspiracy extends to New York City, too.
The shuttle doing those sunspot activity experiments, the Excalibur, has four passengers on board. We don’t see them in person in this issue, but one of them will become a major supervillain/genocidal maniac who still bugs Superman to this day.
No Jimmy Olsen this issue (awwww), but we see Perry White thinking about how Jimmy would do anything to rescue his dad (like sneaking into a government facility, as seen last issue), while his own son Jerry doesn’t give a crap about him. Perry wishes Jerry could be more like Jimmy. Actually, the opposite is gonna happen…
Metropolis Mailbag:
Speaking of Jimmy, donsparrow said: “Your Jimmy hatred always cracks me up! Like him or not, I do miss him (and the Planet cast) being a large part of the story. I always think of Jimmy as Peter Parker if he never got powers.”
I actually like Jimmy! I think being annoying is part of his charm. However, I do think Jerry Ordway went a little overboard with the “Jimmy hates Superman” plot: Jimmy’s characterization in these issues always got on my nerves, and he’s about to get worse. Fortunately, his next big storyline made him a lot more sympathetic. (Or maybe I just like it because he’s gonna have an even worse time there.)
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