IDENTITY CRISIS epilogue: ADVENTURES OF SUPERMAN #636.

[starwolf_oakley]

ADVENTURES OF SUPERMAN #636 was an epilogue of IDENTITY CRISIS, and also set up some of what would become INFINITE CRISIS. It was (also) drawn by Rags Morales with the story by Greg Rucka.



At the time, Wonder Woman is blind from fighting Medusa and the Fortress of Solitude is in a Tesseract.
























For years, the idea was the Marvel Heroes were hated by the general public and the DC Heroes were loved by the general public. IDENTITY CRISIS started the idea that the general public is WRONG to love the DC Heroes. And in the Nu52, the General Public does NOT love the DCnU heroes.


retro_nouveau remixed the last few panels:


This also is a lead-up to SACRIFICE, where Wonder Woman kills Max Lord so he won't mind-control Superman into killing Batman. It had to be done and it got done. The fact that Superman and Batman just didn't know what else could be done to stop Max Lord (when their whole *thing* is finding another way than killing a bad guy) is what bothered them so much.

I bet Batman thought "Am I really willing to let a murderer use Superman to kill me to hold onto my principles?" Batman has a lot of principles, but he isn't Gandhi.

As much as we all (justifiably) gripe about IDENTITY CRISIS, it led to stories where the DC heroes, especially Batman, would have to "put up or shut up."

Comments

[thatnickguy]

The strange thing is, of all characters, I have the least problem with Wonder Woman killing. She's an amazon. She's a warrior. She's trained to fight and trained to kill. She may do everything in her power in order to prevent having to go to that resort, but she IS willing to cross that line.

[ozaline]

That is something I like about her character in general... But I liked Gail Simone's characterization where she is willing to kill, but not a helpless captive. She specifically addressed this in the arc where Wonder Woman goes up against genocide. Her talking about killing Ruin as the go-to solution doesn't ring true.

[bradygirl_12]

I agree. As an Amazon warrior, she would recognize this option. What sets her and the Amazons apart (at least before the reboot) is their willingness to find a peaceful solution before resorting to their warrior ways.

[q99]

I also like that of the three, she's the one that is the first to go to diplomacy and use peaceful solutions. Wonder Woman simply has the widest range depending on the foes in question.

[sadoeuphemist]

I've never understood what "she's a warrior" even means. She grew up in an isolationist society magically separated from the outside world. They didn't even have any wars to fight!

[dr_archeville]

I'm a big fan of Wonder Woman's "don't kill if you can wound, don't wound if you can subdue, don't subdue if you can pacify, and don't raise your hand at all until you've first extended it" philosophy.

But I also have zero problem with Wonder Woman calling for the death of an unrepentant rapist.

[mrstatham]

This. A good take on Diana places the 'killing' line pretty far out of her reach and intent, but never rules it out entirely.

[ablackraptor]

I think part of it comes from the fact that, in the cast of the Trinity, Wondy is the one without any reason not to.

While Bruce has the whole 'if he took a life he'd be making a call he has no right to make' thing, justifying his no killing rule, and Clark has the fact he simply never needs to kill, and is unwilling to put himself in position that puts himself above human law, Diana doesn't deal with that. They have conceavable reasons why they should never take a life while she doesn't, and thus, her being willing to kill makes sense.

Its similarly why I didn't have a problem with Arrow's first season having Green Arrow kill people. Given he never had a particularly compelling reason not to kill beyond the fact 'good guys don't kill', and his origin pretty much meant that it was illogical for him to be against killing when necessary.

[big_daddy_d]

I've always saw Wonder Woman as the type to kill but as last resort or when she feels she has to rather than just be willy nilly, Punisher about it.

[jaybee3]

>>>>IDENTITY CRISIS started the idea that the general public is WRONG to love the DC Heroes. And in the Nu52, the General Public does NOT love the DCnU heroes.<<<<

The main problem with the Didio-era DC Comics in a nutshell. I keep going back to Busiek's JLA vs Avengers where the MU heroes were astonished at being in a world that celebrated its heroes (Flash museums, Starman statues, superhero merch sold everywhere, you name it) and I thought to myself - that's why I love DC over Marvel. Because in the real world you WOULD look up to someone like Superman and Wonder Woman and even Booster Gold and not treat them like crap. And then Didio/Meltzer and Co. basically said "Enough of that."

Also - Batman's mindwipe is again never mentioned. In fact outside of issues with Zatanna written by Dini, it's never mentioned by any other hero past Geoff John's JLA:Crisis of Conscience arc. Batman himself never brings it up even when he has reason to (when Hal chewed him out in GL, Ollie in GA and Outsiders or Black Canary in BoP) and even though it's not exactly in character for him to let things like that slide.

[q99]

Yep.

And Didio I don't think recognizes that stripping away this aspect also reduces some of the iconic weight of the big ones. They're so respected for having found a third option so often and having earned the trust of the people. If you don't have that earned-trust as so center, then what's so special about Superman and Wonder Woman and Batman specifically as opposed to any other strong hero?

[mrstatham]

Yeah, the only time it's brought up is, surprise surprise, opposite Zatanna during Under the Hood, with the infamous shitty "I needed someone I could trust, I had to settle for *you*," line.

[ablackraptor]

*Because in the real world you WOULD look up to someone like Superman and Wonder Woman and even Booster Gold and not treat them like crap.*

I would say that's what I like about *both* Marvel and DC. Because, really, both reactions have grounds in real life. It makes perfect sense to be amazed and idolize a selfless being who helps protect the world from all sorts of terror, in an idealistic sense. At the same time, it also makes sense to not trust someone who has the power to stand above the law and can't be taken down by normal means, in a cynical sense.
Both responses are both equally realistic, depending on which perspective you have. Which, also fits rather well with the fact that, in real life, America is basically split between people who support and idolize the army/police/government, and those who question and distrust them. For all intents and purposes, so long as the stories are written well, DC's 'idealism' and Marvel's 'Cynicism' approach are both realistic in differing ways.

[ekrolo2]

"For years, the idea was the Marvel Heroes were hated by the general public and the DC Heroes were loved by the general public. IDENTITY CRISIS started the idea that the general public is WRONG to love the DC Heroes. And in the Nu52, the General Public does NOT love the DCnU heroes."

You misspelled the X-Men being the ones feared and hated. The loved heroes are the ones who've been the true bastards in that continuity but since Marvel civilians are morons, they tend to ignore this and unconditionally love them anyway.

Still, DCs guys being feared makes far more sense to me than most of the ones who're hated in Marvel. Any one member of the League can take over the world if they so choose to and should be feared. Superman? See Injustice, Wonder Woman? See Flashpoint. Aquaman? See Flashpoint or just use common sense when the guy controls the worlds oceans.

[fredneil.livejournal.com]

This is an interesting coincidence. Rucka is creating a new character who coincidentally has the same name and a similar costume and powers that a character from the 40s had. You can tell it's not supposed to be the same character because the character from the 40s would not have gone to "you should kill him" as the first plan. Actually, the character from the 40s would probably never have gone there at all, since she was created to be an alternative to superheros who automatically went to the violent solution. Ironically, her alternative often involved changing the personality of criminals through a combination of persuasion and comic book tech.

And, yes, killing someone is more immoral than changing his personality. The new character calls Dr. Light a monster. Is she saying that being a monster is a natural state for human beings? If it isn't, and is the product of a mental illness, does that mean that physical illnesses can be cured, but mental illnesses cant? Or should we not cure physical illnesses either. This would be a clearer question if they hadn't screwed up the cure.

But what do I know? I'm still trying to figure out why they didn't just wipe his mind of everyone's identities and the names of the people they knew, like they said the had done with others before.

[starwolf_oakley]

But what do I know? I'm still trying to figure out why they didn't just wipe his mind of everyone's identities and the names of the people they knew, like they said the had done with others before.

And in IDENTITY CRISIS, Dr. Light didn't *say* "I know you're really Hal, Barry, Ray, etc." The BIG THING, villains knowing the heroes' identities, was NOT the case with Dr. Light.

[lego_joker]

And, yes, killing someone is more immoral than changing his personality.

This... is a point of great contention among a lot of geeks I know. I know one fellow in particular who states that he considers the former a sign of respect in the "I respect your individual choices, but I refuse to live in a world with your opinion in it", while the latter (if done through magical means) is basically killing someone anyways and dancing around in their skin like a sadistic puppeteer.

I don't particularly agree with him, mind you. I'm kinda neutral on the issue myself.

[q99]

Btw, I wouldn't say it's Rucka creating the character. This is direct lead-up to the Geoff Johns penned Infinite Crisis, meaning editorial had mandates for the direction in place, and Geoff Johns pushed this angle on WW hard, he really didn't get her.

This is near the tail end of the Rucka run.


And yes, a lot of modern writers really seem to miss the part about WW seeking alternative peaceful solutions.

[grumman]

And, yes, killing someone is more immoral than changing his personality. The new character calls Dr. Light a monster. Is she saying that being a monster is a natural state for human beings?

It's not? We are all born as creatures who care for nothing but our own needs. Ideally, as we grow older, stronger and more capable of doing harm to those around us, we also develop a sense of empathy that makes us value the wellbeing of others as well as our own. If that fails, we must fall back on the threat that we personally will suffer for causing the suffering of others - whether in the afterlife, in the judicial system or merely in the eyes of others.

For some people, neither of these work. When somebody is not unwilling to rape and murder because it is the wrong thing to do, and is not unwilling to rape and murder because they will be punished if anyone finds out, they must be rendered incapable, whether by containment or by their destruction.

If it isn't, and is the product of a mental illness, does that mean that physical illnesses can be cured, but mental illnesses cant?

A broken leg, smallpox and arterial plaque have nothing in common except that they cause a body to function at less than full capacity. Just because you can cure one does not mean you can cure another. Mental illness is no different. An indifference to the wellbeing of others is not physical trauma from repeated concussions is not an obsession with a trivial threat, and beyond the common thread that they stop you thinking "correctly", they have nothing in common, and any cure would similarly have nothing in common.

[bradygirl_12]

"For years, the idea was the Marvel Heroes were hated by the general public and the DC Heroes were loved by the general public."

*nods*

It was one of the reasons I felt more at home in the DC universe than Marvel's.

[q99]

And nowadays, we have the public cheer for the Mighty Avengers while an invasion is going on, we have Scott Summers showing up for rallies where normal people are fighting for Mutant/Human equality and holding him up as an icon, and similar.

[sagrada]

It's a fatal error to introduce pseudo-dilemmas like this into superhero comics. They're ridiculously ill-suited to handling them, as their decades-long obsession with Nazis, their own supervillains and actual monsters like Darkseid can attest.

You remember Darkseid, right comrades? The self-named God of Tyranny who has ground countless lives under his heel, endorses unconscionable deeds on an hourly basis, devotes his entire being to finding a way to impose his will on every living thing? Who Wondy considered it entirely right and reasonable to infect him with a part of her soul to torment him with a faintly-nagging conscience that could very well grow into a real change of heart for one of the most loathsome beings in the known multiverse?

What's the difference between what Darkseid plans to do (and briefly achieved!) and what Light did, since both effectively want to turn other people into playthings whose wills are meaningless except in supplying an exciting struggle. Is it that so far Darkseid hasn't sexually attacked anyone Wondy knows or cares about yet?

[q99]

-It's a fatal error to introduce pseudo-dilemmas like this into superhero comics. They're ridiculously ill-suited to handling them, as their decades-long obsession with Nazis, their own supervillains and actual monsters like Darkseid can attest. -

Eyup. And at the least, if you do bring them up, you must resolve them in some way (even if you leave the characters ambiguous about whether it's the right choice), rather than just kinda have things trail off.


I know indie comics that still have a fairly light tone who're willing to pull the trigger on having characters make a choice if it's brought up.

[steverodgers5]

That panel of Diana asking 'How could you be so stupid?' almost looks* like she's addressing the writing on a meta level.
(*No pun intended)

[q99]

-This also is a lead-up to SACRIFICE, where Wonder Woman kills Max Lord so he won't mind-control Superman into killing Batman. It had to be done and it got done. The fact that Superman and Batman just didn't know what else could be done to stop Max Lord (when their whole *thing* is finding another way than killing a bad guy) is what bothered them so much.-

And one thing that strikes me is: That is never resolved, not really. At the end of Infinite Crisis, they get back together again. Wonder Woman I guess feels guilty for a bit, but does not change her stance, and the three just seem to decide not to talk about it.

[doodleboy]

Yeah... Rucka talked about this bit of the story alot in interviews. Mostly it was kind of where Rucka wanted to take the characters versus where the editors wanted to take them.

The goal of this story was to give Superman a bigger "sin" during Infinite Crisis. Batman's was OMAC, Wonder-Woman's was killing Maxwell Lord, judging by this story Superman's was going to be letting the mind-wipe happen. DC then backpedaled.

Rucka also wanted to follow-up on the killing of Maxwell Lord, but then he was taken off the book. Rucka wanted to show how Wonder-woman differentiated from the other big two in her philosophy of violence, DC wanted her to be a female Superman.

So the fallout of Maxwell Lord's death was mostly ignored.

[dr_archeville]

Ah, Ruin. A villain that could've been quite good but was instead stunningly idiotic.

At one point it was believed Ruin was really Pete Ross, one of Clark’s longtime friends. But this was a ruse by Ruin, who turned out to be… Professor Emil Hamilton, the S.T.A.R. Labs employee who’d helped Superman on many cases, and had become a close confidant.

Part of the reason this was dumb was because of Hamilton’s face-heel turn. He’d gone villainous earlier, partly out of feeling hurt over Superman relying on Steel more and more for scientific & technical matters, and partly due to influence from his Brainiac-13-altered cybernetic arm. The arm’s influence was eventually ended, and Superman apologized for sidelining him, so that should have been the end of that silliness.

The other reason why Hamilton-as-Ruin was so mind-bogglingly stupid was Hamilton’s reasoning for going after Superman and trying to force him off Earth. According to Hamilton, Superman’s presence was draining energy from the Sun at an accelerated rate, and that if he stayed on Earth, the Sun would get so weak it would threaten all life on Earth… in 4.5 billion years.

4.5 billion years.

Let me repeat that: 4,500,000,000 years.

So either the writer had no sense of scale — which isn’t unheard of — or the writer was trying to portray Hamilton as completely insane. Because A] most scientists who study such things predict that our Sun would become a red giant in 4-5 billion years, at the very least engulfing Mercury and Venus and boiling off Earth’s seas, so according to Hamilton Superman’s presence dooms us to freeze to death instead of fry (which… really isn’t that big a difference), and B] several DC comics — like the Legion of Super-Heroes — shows that in a mere thousand years or so, humanity will have moved beyond Earth and colonized several planets, so the loss of Earth as a viable habitat, while sad, wouldn’t be the end of humanity.

You know who would’ve made a better Ruin? A better armored maniac who would go after both Superman and Clark Kent’s loved one?

The father of Kenny "Conduit" Braverman.

Kenny was a childhood rival of Kent’s, who was born at the same time Kal-El’s craft crashed/landed on Earth. Exposure to K-radiation made him somewhat sickly, but his father pushed and pushed him to become an athlete, though he always fell second to Clark. In time Kenny found he could emit and manipulate low levels of Kryptonite radiation -- the only comic character to gain powers from K-radiation, I believe, unlike on Smallville were people were gaining powers from it on a weekly basis -- and he acquired a suit of power armor that enhanced/channeled this ability. Kenny eventually discovered Clark/Superman’s identity, and went about attacking Clark’s friends and family. Kenny was eventually killed in a battle with Superman, electrocuted when his suit overloaded. Superman returned Kenny’s body to his father.

Kenny’s father could have access to his son’s info on who Clark/Superman is, and use his son’s suit (altered/enhanced by any number of villainous tech-heads). Maybe even harvest some of his son’s DNA to grant himself Kryptonite Radiation Manipulation powers… and if LexCorp is what ultimately helped him in this, what they did to Braverman could be a precursor to their ExoGene program seen in 52. He’d have a far more poignant and personal reason ("You made my son a sick freak, and then killed him!") for killing Supes than Hamilton ("Your presence here will make the Sun die in 4.5 billion years because you’re sucking out all the energy!" "… and?"), the knowledge needed to go after Superman’s/Clark’s loved one, and powers custom made for taking on Superman.

Of course, with the DCnU, who knows if Conduit ever existed, or if Hamilton ever went cuckoo-bananas.

[md84]

"So either the writer had no sense of scale — which isn’t unheard of — or the writer was trying to portray Hamilton as completely insane."

Not that I disagree that Hamilton being Ruin was a poor decision, but that does seem to be what the writer was going for. The cop whom Hamilton mentioned this to even called Hamilton nuts after a beat. My personal take is that he hadn't really gotten over feeling sidelined and became a villain solely so he could still have a place in Superman's life.

Edit:

Kenny's father wouldn't have become a supervillain to avenge Kenny -- mainly because the jerk never liked Kenny in the first place, always comparing him negatively to Clark Kent. The entire reason Kenny was so messed up was because he spent his whole life trying and failing to earn his father's approval. Kenny's final fatal battle with Clark took place in an old football stadium filled with robotic doubles of Kenny's father cheering him on -- that's how broken he was. The kicker? Even after Kenny's death, his father continued to badmouth him, saying Clark was better. He said that while standing over his own son's grave. Kenny's dad becoming Ruin to avenge Kenny would arguably make even less sense than Hamilton being Ruin.

[remial]

Ok, wait, Batman says don't kill, that's pretty much his whole deal, sure.

but am I the only one who remembers him locking the KGBeast in a room in the sewers, and then not telling ANYONE else where that room was?

[lego_joker]

Marv Wolfman retconned that in a hot second as soon as he got hold of the Batman title.