What if Krypton exploded a generation earlier?

[arbre_rieur.insanejournal.com]

In this Elseworlds-type story, it's an infant Jor-El and Lara who are rocketed to and raised on Earth.

The two men are Jor-El I and Lor-Van, Superman's paternal and maternal grandfathers, respectively.









Jumping ahead some years...













This is from Superman Family 192-193, incidentally.

Comments

[kamino_neko.insanejournal.com]

Either Jack Kent is officially the smartest kid in Smallville, or someone dumped something in the water before this generation reproduced, since he seems to have actually gotten the hint Laura dropped on him, a feat which would forever escape Lana Lang, Pete Ross, etc, when they and Clark came around.

[icon_uk.insanejournal.com]

To be fair, Pete Ross always knew, but was smart enough to never let on that he knew, even to Clark.

Poor Nim-El got royally screwed in this story, no?

Oh, and I love that interstellar spacecraft are a fact, but DNA profiling is still a notional pipedream.

[kamino_neko.insanejournal.com]

To be fair, Pete Ross always knew, but was smart enough to never let on that he knew, even to Clark.

Point. Though that really only moves the dummy flag off of Pete and onto Clark.

Oh, and I love that interstellar spacecraft are a fact, but DNA profiling is still a notional pipedream.

Doubly funny is the speed of it all - Jack moves it from theory to practical application, then gets an answer...all in the course of his conversation with Supergirl.

(Although...given this is when Jor-El and Lara were teenagers, and assuming Superman an adult in 1980, that puts this back to the 40s, so 'notional pipe dream' it would be, if Jack weren't a comic book super-genius.)

[halloweenjack.insanejournal.com]

Poor Nim-El got royally screwed in this story, no?

Well, consider the alternative: either you'd have a Super-Triangle, or a Super-Menage-a-Trois. Not that there's anything wrong with that, necessarily.

[icon_uk.insanejournal.com]

Just wait until they hit maturity and discovered that Nim-El would have been a binnaum (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenctonese#Reproduction)

[foxhack.insanejournal.com]

Okay, you know what? This is cracky AND cute. Too bad about Nim. Why couldn't they stick him in the ship too?

[arbre_rieur.insanejournal.com]

Only two life support pods were ready, maybe?

[jarodrussell.insanejournal.com]

That's actually kind of cool. The story, yes, but the last panel. I like the idea of Superman surfing probable realities to make sure he exists in all of them. It's...such a Batman thing to do.

[salamangkiero.insanejournal.com]

Batman would be creepier...checking to see how many times his mother's peral necklace hits the pavement...

[halloweenjack.insanejournal.com]

In one reality, it's a necklace made of garnets... and Bruce Wayne creates an Xavier-style orphanage/school for costumed vigilantes.

[arbre_rieur.insanejournal.com]

It's even Batman-ish given his stated reason for doing so at the start of the story: For research purposes, so he'll be more prepared if one of his enemies ever tries to use time travel to erase him from existence.

[stig.insanejournal.com]

That final panel is begging to be an anti-motivational poster.

"Love? Superman Laughs At Your Love!"

[kusonaga.insanejournal.com]

I wish we could have a monthly like this again. Thanks for posting.

[arbre_rieur.insanejournal.com]

No prob.

(old man voice)

[jlroberson.insanejournal.com]

In the old days we called 'em imaginary stories, 'cause they was made up, see. UNLIKE the regular stories, which we known was REAL!

Why, I remember the time me and my whole family were in a fire, waiting for Superman. They was all incinerated in horrible screamin' agony an' I had third degree burns that left me freakishly scarred to this day. And that was the way it was and we liked it! We LOVED it!

Re: (old man voice)

[halloweenjack.insanejournal.com]

He was busy getting busy with a she-centaur in the third millenium BC. He can't be everywhere at once, you know.

[aaron_bourque.insanejournal.com]

Damn, this was actually really really good. What year was this?

Let me count the good:

1) The story progresses logically, with minimum Silver Age lunacy.
2) The Clarks make the logical assumption that the two kids in the rocket are brother and sister. Again, logic! It's perplexing that they would actually split the family up, but it's actually genuinely justified.
3) Lara is the superhero.
4) The family knows who the superhero is.
5) Genetic fingerprinting! A far fetched notion! Awesome.
6) Jack Kent figures out who the superhero is from the "subtle" clues she drops.

We need more like THIS!

[khaosworks.insanejournal.com]

Cover-dated Jun-Jul 1980 and Aug-Sep 1980, respectively.

[icon_uk.insanejournal.com]

That's actually a lot later than I'd have guessed.

[khaosworks.insanejournal.com]

Understandable, really - it's the Kurt Schaffenberger art that probably threw you off. But the style of the dialogue places it at least in the late 70s.

[thandrak.insanejournal.com]

What I call the S! era. Lot of good stuff from right then.

[aaron_bourque.insanejournal.com]

Ah, Bronze Age. That explains it!

[khaosworks.insanejournal.com]

Wasn't exactly an Elseworlds, since it had a framing sequence - that of Kal using the Fortress supercomputer to find out what might happen if Krypton exploded a generation before he was born, just in case. After all, he has enemies who can time travel. The first part was titled, "My Father... Superman!" Written by Gerry Conway, in case people are interested.

And as another side note, this is the story where Conway "reveals" (in a footnote, no less!) the true story behind the Super-Sons. They, too, were computer simulations using this very program!

I never read part 2, but part 1 ended quite poignantly and a bit sadly, with Kal shutting off the viewer just as Henry Clark decides to adopt Lara because the emotions and the possibilities - that Jor-El could have become Superman, maybe met Lara, fall in love and then produced him - are overwhelming him. It was actually a very good ending: to the point where I wasn't even aware that there was a part 2 till now!

The line that ends part 1 has always stuck with me all these years: "Even a Superman can grow weary... of might have beens. Even a Superman can grow weary... with remembered pain."

[schala_kid.insanejournal.com]

What happened to Nim-El was messed up, couldn't they have squished him there? seriously that' awful.

[aaron_bourque.insanejournal.com]

It makes heartrending sense, the same sort of sense that kept Jor-El and Lara from journeying with baby Kal in some early retellings: there wasn't enough time.

[jlroberson.insanejournal.com]

That wasn't why Superman laughed. He was just looking at a church and made it burn.

[pyrotwilight.insanejournal.com]

And the Eradicator's design was born!

I like the idea of Kal's mom being a superhero before his dad would've.

[khaosworks.insanejournal.com]

And it's even true - Lara Lor-Van was the more direct, the more aggressive of the couple. People who never read the whole "Tales of Krypton" stories don't know that Bronze Age Lara was kickass. She was an astronaut trainee when she met Jor-El, and it was she who did most of the chasing in the beginning. Jor-El at that point was bookish, almost awkward, and the times when he was spurred to action were usually when Lara got herself into trouble. Superman got his smarts from his father, but his drive and determination... that's all Lara.

[sistermagpie.insanejournal.com]

That was freakin' awesome! I was actually surprised at the Laura Clark reveal and thought it was fabulous.

[retro_nouveau.insanejournal.com]

Imaginary? Somewhere in the multiverse, it happened just like that. Except Nim-El was never born in the first place, or there was room for him too. Of course, that opens up new problems, and no Kara.

Wonder why Jack isn't also faster than a speeding bullet, able to leap tall buildings, yada yada.

[blake_reitz.insanejournal.com]

He does mention that he can do things other boys can't, which makes me think he was just hiding his powers.

But you know where I thought this was going?

"Hey Johnathan, come check out my basement laboratory, where I'm making amazing inventions to help mankind. OH NO, MY HAIR CAUGHT FIRE. OH NO, I AM BALD. A combination of baldness, my adoptive parents (the Luthors), and spurned romantic interest in Supergirl can only mean one thing! TIME TO BE A SUPERVILLAIN!"

That would have been great.

[cricharddavies.insanejournal.com]

Of course, that opens up new problems, and no Kara.

Not ... necessarily.

Argo is still going to be thrown into space by the explosion (or whatever actually happened.) Given that, it's not impossible that a branch of the El family will be there. Given that, it's not impossible that they'll name their son Zor-El, and that they'll rocket him and Alura to Earth when the bedrock turns into Anti-K when they're young adults ... and that they'll arrive and be found by Jor-El and Lara ... and their child will be Kal-El's cousin.

[blake_reitz.insanejournal.com]

I dig matchmaker Johnathan Kent there. He's clearly been trying to hook up these two crazy cats since forever. Also dig Lara as Supergirl. Even the outfit is a nice, if subtle, change.

That laugh at the end is kind of creepy. "NO MATTER WHAT, I EXIST! HA HA HA HA! NOTHING CAN STOP SUPERMAN!"