Re-Week: Action Comics #687

[skjam]

It's time for another Re-Week post (looking forward to seeing everyone else's!)

This time we look at Re-ign of the Supermen and the re-turn of...well, you'll see.



7 & 1/3 pages of 22.



Okay, so back in 1993, DC Comics killed off Superman. Huge event, made all the papers. But of course everyone knew perfectly well that there was no way in the multiverse that Superman was going to *stay* dead. So the next big plotline in the Superman-related comics was dedicated to just how exactly Superman was going to come back. Or was he?

It's Tuesday, and some researchers in Antarctica as observing an unusually intense aurora australias and out of season lightning storm. This is the most interesting weather they've had in ten years. It might be the hole in the ozone layer, but the region it's centered in is known for unusual electromagnetic phenomena already.

In the Fortress of Solitude, the Kryptonese robots are using an energy globe to regather the essence of a fallen being. They've only gathered 98% of this essence, but it gives decent odds of recorporation.

In side the globe, a vaguely humanoid energy being snaps into self-awareness. Its memories are vague, but it recalls a battle and needs to get ourside.



The figure is immaterial, but can affect energy-run gadgets, like the monitor Professor Hamilton modified to record satellite transmissions. The playback gives a quick recap of the whole Doomsday event, and Superman's death. The figure is upset by this, then realizes the true power of Superman must still be in the body.

At Centennial Park, 4:27 AM, the crowds around the Superman Memorial have thinned down to a cop, a religious fellow, and a homeless woman. The cop is called away by crime, the religious fellow wraps up his prayer, and the homeless woman is so pleased to be borrowing one of the pretty flowers mourners left behind that she doesn't notice the glowing energy being.



The figure is now solid and has blue-black hair. It takes the cape, then discovers a secret passage outside the tomb. The passage is lit, and the figure is gravely concerned when that light hurts its eyes. After all, "I have stared into the sun!" It decides to head back to the Fortress to investigate.

Meanwhile, Bibbo is talking to Superman up in Heaven. He's still haunted by his failure to restart Superman's heart. As he opens a box of Superman merchandise, Bibbo recalls how his favorite superhero decided to give all the money from it to charity. Violent crime and clinical depression are rising in Metropolis, and no matter how hard Supergirl and Gangbuster try, it doesn't seem to be enough.



You go, Bibbo.

The mysterious figure praises Krypton and the House of El. Despite his newfound inability to absorb solar radiation, the Fortress' regeneration matrix keeps him powered up. He's found a visor to protect his no longer supernormal eyes, Instead of heat vision, he now has energy blasts, and can thankfully still fly. He needs to be a bit more careful exactly what he's blasting though; damaged the Fortress.

The news from Metropolis is grim. Violent crime, suicide, out of control fires, nutty cultists worshiping Superman's corpse... If only Superman would return!



Back in Metropolis, a ski-masked thug is assaulting a woman, and apparently about to rape her. Superman bursts in through the wall, and proves to be immune to bullets.



"I mean, it's not like there's going to be this huge event where anyone who's died in the DC Universe comes back as a superpowered zombie, right?"

A carjacker gets third-degree burns and several broken bones. A boat smuggling heroin is sunk with all hands. A cat burglar gets off lucky with just being tied to a seventh-story flagpole.

And Superman's body is missing! Could it be that the more violent and judgemental Superman we're seeing is the real resurrected deal? Lex Luthor, Jr. (secretly Lex Luthor Sr. in a cloned body) sure wants to know. Especially as his spy cameras have a twenty-four hour blank space where the robbing of Superman's tomb should be. Supergirl (Matrix) storms into the office despite the best efforts of Lexcorp guards.



A plane is about to crash, but Superman is able to bring it down gently. Less gentle is his assessment of the pilot--"He cannot be revived." People surround Superman looking for answers, but only Lois Lane gets flown away with.




In hindsight, of course, we know this is actually the Eradicator, a Kryptonian artificial intelligence who grows into something closer to a genuine hero.

And a special treat, the poster that came with the issue:





Your thoughts and comments?

Comments

For the record....

[dasnordlicht91]

those shades make the Eradicator look positively 90s. But, then again, this is the story-arc that had Superboy wearing an equally 90s-tastic leather coat and sunglasses, so, erm, yeah.

(Oh, and hi.)

Re: For the record....

[skjam]

Hi!

True, this is a very "Nineties" comic book.

Re: For the record....

[aaron_bourque]

Well, it was from the 90s.

Re: For the record....

[fifthie]

I've always thought the four supermen were meant to be parodying the 90s, just like... in a really staid, Superman Comicsy kind of way where they then treated it all totally seriously, because going around PARODYING things is just NOT the way we DO THINGS, here at D. Detective C. Comics Comics-book Company, A Division of Time Warner Enterprises Entertainment Conglomerated, Inc.

Re: For the record....

[naebler]

Save the cape I actually liked this costume the black and blue.

As for 90s superboy... get rid of the fade and the belt the costume wouldn't be that bad.

Re: For the record....

[fifthie]

Like basically if you take Superboy's first costume, and then, turn it into Superboy's second costume, you have pretty much the (almost) perfect Superboy costume. (the yellow bands and finger gloves were still kind of dopey)

Then they went all tshirtandjeans about it and ehhh

Re: For the record....

[lieut_kettch]

Don't forget the buzzcut. On second thought forget the buzzcut. I know I've tried to.

[pyrotwilight]

Hee. Love Eradicator. Hope he gets to show up more in the future. (Though why they made a second one who was from New Krypton with a copy mind of the original and not just use the original still boggles my mind)

[qalchemist]

What I always wondered about this..


- SPOILERS FOR AN EVENT FROM OVER TEN YEARS AGO -


...so the 'real' superman was recovering in the Fortress, right?

So... what body was the Eradicator /in/?

[skjam]

Looking at the issue again--it does not show the body in the coffin after Eradicator absorbs its energy/DNA matrix--but it doesn't show the coffin empty, either. So it's possible that the Eradicator's body isn't the same as the one in the coffin, just a near-duplicate. Then someone or thing stole the corpse after Eradicator left, but before anyone checked to see if the tomb had been tampered with.

[shanejayell]

My understanding was that the Eradicator had transformed energy into matter to create his new body. He ended up being kind of bio-technological, I think.

[akodo_rokku]

It was eventually discovered that a substantial chunk of the slab Superman's coffin was lying on was gone -- that's what the Eradicator built his body out of.

[proteus_lives]

Blast from the ever-loving past.

[dasnordlicht91]

I take it that poster connects to make one big image of the Supermen posing in front of a statue of Supes?

[eyz]

I just noticed...I miss Bibbo :(

[icon_uk]

Could you outline what "Re-Week" is, I don't recall us ever having one before.

[skjam]

Using DC's upcoming relaunch as an excuse to post previous returns, reboots, reimaginings and other comics-related "re"-word images. I think most people missed the announcements.

[glprime]

One of, if not the first comic I ever got my hands on.

Oddly enough, I can hardly stand Superman comics these days. There have been a few pretty decent arcs, but often the wider, Metropolis-based arcs I've found dull. Superman IN SPACE is a lot more interesting.

[wizardru]

Ah, yes...Reign of the Supermen. Say what you will, but for my money, this was a damn well executed story series. The Death of Superman was more of an excuse to do a year's worth of really good comics. There was definitely a lot of obfuscation: is HE the 'real' Superman? Or him?

I liked, for example, that Steel never even pretended he was Superman...he was quite vocal that he wasn't even trying to act as if he was. These comics made for a weekly story that was both interesting and hung together really well. Sure it's very '90's' at points...but it's still some really solid superhero comics throughout. Would that most crossover/mega-events would work as well.

[thatnickguy]

Like Wizardru, I fully believe this is a damn well executed story. Has a lot of the dialogue become rather dated? Absolultey. But overall, the story itself is still compelling with a lot of twists and turns.

Personally, the Death of Superman was the thing that got me back into comics. Which is ironic, given my now current hatred of all events, death fake-outs and unnecessary returns (Barry Allen).

But this? Man, I remember having long, fanboy discussions with a friend of mine about who was the real Superman.

Plus, this whole story resulted in the introduction of one of my favourite superheroes (certainly in my top 5): Steel.

[crazycomiccult.blogspot.com]

I liked the Eradicator because his character was basically Superman if Clark had never been raised by the Kents. It provided a great contrast to the real Superman because a Superman who's alien and apart from humanity is not Superman at all.

[bewareofgeek]

*looks at the plans for the DCnu Superman*
*weeps*

[an_idol_mind]

The rebooted Superman was still raised by the Kents as far as I can tell. He just doesn't have them around as support now, a la the Pre-Crisis Superman.

[bewareofgeek]

"This Superman is very much an alien, one struggling to adjust to his adopted home. In the series, he must come to terms with both the loss of his home world, as well as the loss of both of his adopted parents. He is more Kal-El from the planet Krypton than Clark Kent from Kansas. He’s a loner trying to find his place in the world."

http://dcu.blog.dccomics.com/2011/07/18/the-new-man-of-tomorrow/

Nice icon, BTW.

[richardak]

Ah, a stroll down memory lane. I remember thinking at the time that, of the four Superman titles then being published, Action had the best writing but the worst art. It's funny, because I've seen other things that Guice has drawn since then that I thought were fine, but I did not, and do not, like his work on this title, although my reaction isn't as visceral looking at it now. But like I said, I thought Stern was doing the best writing of the four.

Which was a shame, because I also thought that the Eradicator-Superman, a.k.a. the Last Son of Krypton, had the best design of the four. In fact, if it were up to me to modernize Superman's costume, this would be the direction I'd go (definitely not those idiotic-looking armored booties).

This era of Superman comics also had by far my favorite version of Supergirl. I really miss the Matrix-Supergirl. She had a great origin story, a pretty unique power set (shape-shifting and psychokinesis), and she was simultaneously Clark's little sister and Lex' lover. Her having a foot in both camps made it possible to tell some really interesting and unique stories about her, and I have always thought that DC never fully realized the character's potential.

For that matter, they also more or less got rid of the Eradicator after this story-line. He basically died at the end, but then his body came back with an entirely new personality, which kind of missed the point of the character. He/it was a fascinating character as well. Of course, he really had a second life, so to speak, as Brainiac, because the versions of Brainiac used in Superman: The Animated Series and in Smallville were really much more closely based on the Eradicator than on any version of Brainiac that had ever appeared in the comics to that point.

Anyway, sorry for the long and rambling comment. What can I say? (Too much, I know.) You really triggered my nostalgia. Thanks for posting this.

[fifthie]

Hahaha oh man, Bibbo! God I miss Bibbo. There should be a law that every eighteen months at minimum you have got to do a Superman comic featuring Bibbo.

He's just like, the soul of all that's decent in the world.

[fifthie]

Bibbo is up there with like, Dan Turpin, and maybe a couple of other people I'm not thinking of rght now, on the list of Dudes Who Would Punch Darkseid in the Face, Not Because They Think It Will Do Any Good, But Because Punching Darkseid in the Face is Just What You are Supposed to Do.

[fifthie]

Like in fairness it's Darkseid so technically you could say that list could probably include Superman, but even at max-powered, most ridiculously unstoppably godly Darkseid, I'd have a hard time believing that Superman doesn't think that punching him in the face has at least a little bit of a chance of doing some good.

But like Bibbo man, Bibbo knows he's gonna walk up to Darkseid, and punch him in the face, and not accomplish jack shit by doin' it. And he's gonna do it anyway, because punching Darkseid in the face is just What You Are Supposed To Do.

[philippos42]

Yeah, I like that kind of character. When did they last do anything with Bibbo?

[team_mummy]

Return of Superman was my first trade I bought when I was like 8. Everybody was trying to step up in Superman's absence. Cyborg Supes came off legitimately scary. And Eradicator had the most balls out of everyone for sacrificing himself near the end, very cool how it was depicted. The whole thing rocked hard up until Superman comes back with a mullet lol.