#superman would just tell ma and pa kent to not be too sad if something happens

[sunlitlemonade]

what would be the consequence of stealing martian manhunter's oreo stash?

[such-expensive-mistakes]

Superpham AU (part 7)

Masterpost

A short one today, but I thought this section was funny (until it got sad again).

-----

It’s a quiet evening in the Lane-Kent household: Lois is trying to turn her notes into an article, Clark is going over Jon’s math homework, and Jon is watching a show Lois is only half-following.  It features lots of gunfire and explosions, though Lois’s— unfortunately extensive— experience with witnessing real violence makes the version on TV look cartoonish.  She suspects that is part of the show’s appeal.

Danny is paying about as much attention to the TV as Lois is, engrossed in something on his phone.  At least he’s in the same room as the rest of them, instead of sequestering himself away.

“Hey Lois?” Danny suddenly asks.

Lois looks up from her work.  “What’s up?”

“Did you know the internet thinks you’re Superman’s girlfriend?”

Lois knows that if she looks at Clark, he’ll be turning red, the way he always does whenever this particular subject comes up.  Lois herself is barely holding back a laugh.  Jon’s wrinkling his nose, looking thoroughly embarrassed by his parents.

“Well, I am,” she says, barely keeping herself composed.

“No, I mean—” Danny begins.

“You mean people say that I’m dating Superman and married to Clark?”  Lois glances at Clark, who is now hiding his face in his hands.  “Someone forgot to check for cameras after rescuing me a few years back, and we got caught kissing on film.  It was let people think Superman is a homewrecker or let them think I’m in a polyamorous relationship with my husband and his alter ego.”  

“That’s… really weird.”  Danny is giving her the kind of judgmental look only teenagers can give.  

Lois does laugh at that.  “It is, a bit.  But it helps protect Clark’s secret identity, so I don’t mind.”

“Don’t listen to her,” Clark finally says.  “There were other ways to handle that situation; she just thinks this is funny.”

“Even your parents think it’s funny,” Lois says.  Clark just sighs, faux-aggrieved.  

“It’s not even the weirdest thing on the internet about Superman,” Danny says.  “It’s just the weirdest thing everyone agrees is true.”

“Please do not tell me what else you’ve found,” Clark says.  

“You can tell me,” Lois says.  “We can just make Clark leave for a bit.”  Reading conspiracy theories about Superman is her guilty pleasure, though if anyone asks, she does it to keep tabs on anyone who might have a viable way of hurting him.  

Danny just laughs, and something in Lois’s chest seizes up.  Is this the first time she’s heard him laugh since he came back?  She thinks it might be.

She doesn’t want to call attention to it; like as not, that would just make him pull away again.  Instead she says, “Superman doesn’t even get the best conspiracy theories.  Those are all Batman.”  That’s because Bruce purposefully cultivates them, of course, but that’s not important.

“Which one is he, again?” Danny asks.  

It’s not that Lois ever forgets that Danny has spent most of his life in another dimension.  But little offhand comments like that… they really drive it home.  There are plenty of superheroes, even Justice League members, that most of the general public has never heard of— but Batman is not one of them.

She's saved from answering by Clark.

"You'll meet him eventually," Clark says.  "He's a good friend of mine.  And Jon and Kon are close to his two youngest sons, Robin and Red Robin."

Danny nods thoughtfully.  "Right.  I think Red Robin's in the group chat Kon added me to."

Lois reminds herself to thank Kon next time she sees him.  He and Danny seem to have connected, and Kon seems to have made it his personal mission to keep Danny from slipping too far into one of his funks again.

"Speaking of Kon," Clark begins.  "Ma and Pa want to know when we'll be able to make it to Smallville to visit."

They've been trying not to overwhelm Danny by introducing him to too many new people at once, but maybe that was the wrong choice.  Maybe they should be pushing him to get out more, to connect with this dimension.  Besides, Kon spends most of his time in Smallville, and they already know that he and Danny get along.

Lois re-evaluates the article she’s been working on.  Perry would probably appreciate it sooner rather than later, but if she turns in a smaller article this week, she can probably swing a weekend off.  If not, she can always work on it from Kansas.

“This weekend should work,” Lois says.  “If that’s alright with you, Danny.”

Danny looks a little surprised to be consulted.  “I— yeah, that works.  Not like I have anywhere else to be.”  He laughs a little, but the joke falls flat, and Lois resolves to double down on helping Danny connect with more people here in this dimension.

[loisinherlane]

4, 15, 18!

rimi ily <3 <3 <3 <3

4. Do you outline before you start writing? If so, how far do you stray from that outline?

Sometimes! Sometimes I don’t use an outline at all, and sometimes I outline while I write. If it’s a shorter fic, I probably won’t use an outline unless I get pretty far into it and need to stop. And then I usually scribble down which scenes I plan to write. I definitely need an outline for longer fics, but I sometimes start writing first so I have a better sense of what the fic is going to feel like. How far I stray really depends on when I outline. If I outline first, I may stray for pacing or plot purposes. If I outlined in the middle, I might stray a little when I realize I want more scenes.

15. A Hollywood producer tells you that they want to film just one of your fics. Which fic would you want it to be? 

Ohhhh, that’s so hard. Maybe Past Tensions? I wrote it as kind of a commentary on superhero stuff, so I feel like it would translate relatively well. On the other hand, I would absolutely love to see the Single Dad Clark AU adapted. Yes, it’s not “one” fic, but it’s kind of still. one fic.

18. What is a line/scene you’re really proud of? Give us the DVD commentary for that scene.

:3c This question excites me so much. I had to skim through a few fics to decide just one, but I did it... even if it’s a long scene, so it’s under a cut. (Scene from Infinity and Apple Pie, very spoilery!)

When Brainiac took Metropolis, Kon had been in Hawaii. He couldn’t enjoy the sunshine or the waves, but he could sit there and remember how they’d felt. Some days, that was enough.

I really wanted to drive home how being a ghost feels, especially since I hadn’t addressed it much in the fic. Kon hadn’t really thought about the problems before because it hadn’t really sunk in what being dead entailed. And by this point, he’s really starting to miss being alive, seeing how little he actually gets by hanging around. But he’s still doing.

He didn’t hear a thing about Metropolis until one of the families started a ruckus.

“Mom! Mama! Metropolis is gone!” The kid on their phone yelled until their moms came rushing over. Kon could hear the video from his spot on the sand.

Gay, gay, homosexual, gay.

  “—aerial view reveals that Metropolis, home of Superman, has vanished without a trace. A clear line marks the area, through bridges and—”

Kon shot up.

  “It’s as of yet unknown whether Superman was in Metropolis at the time—”

Even if he wasn’t, Lois and Jon Samuel probably were. Kon flew to Metropolis first—or rather, where Metropolis was supposed to be. Just as the news reports had said, it was gone, leaving nothing but a sunken patch of dirt and dozens of crumbling bridges. Other heroes from neighboring cities had already sprung into action.

“Let them save everyone,” Kon hoped and turned for Smallville instead.

I’m not very good at writing action scenes, so I was hoping for a minimalist effect in describing the damage.

Kon remembered the first time he’d been in Smallville during tornado season. Ma and Pa had settled in the living room, peeking outside every so often to look at the clouds. The meteorologist had warned everyone to settle in a room without windows, a basement preferably. But they insisted.

“We’ll know when it’s time to go underground. We can’t keep an eye on it down there,” Pa had scoffed.

Tornado Alley rights! Bitches love watching tornados!

It wasn’t surprising to find them on the porch for this, the sky less green clouds of a thunderstorm and more a pink-gray haze. Unnatural but just as fascinating.

“Our boy will save the day,” Pa promised now, clutching Ma to his chest. Kon found himself filled with the urge to fly back to Gotham, find Tim, just in case—

But Kon didn’t go anywhere. He stared at the sky and waited. After all, Superman would save the day.

When the clouds receded, Pa turned to Ma and grinned. “Everything’s going to be alright now,” he promised. Then he froze. He lifted his right hand to clutch at his left arm.

“Jonathan,” Ma said. She looked up at the sky. “Clark!”

Tim had made everyone on Young Justice take first aid. Kon recognized the signs too easily. He couldn’t do a thing to change it.

So, this was where I really wanted Lara’s warning to come into effect. Like, yes, she had been warning about everything else Kon had watched. Yes, he’d had to watch his girlfriend join a cult. Yes, he’d had to see Tim try to clone him. Yes, Bart died. But I think there’s something really scary about seeing a family member in pain like this. And the difference between the Kents and the superhero world is how mundane this is. Pa has a heart attack. In canon, he dies because Clark can’t get there in time. Here, Kon has to watch, and it’s so different.

“Do you want to watch this?” Lara asked. She sat on the Kents’ porch swing, a real picture in her Kryptonian garb, all finery against cracked wood.

“Pa’s having a heart attack! I can’t just leave!” Kon snapped. “I have to be able to do something! Clark can’t hear him. He’d be here by now if—”

“Clark!” Ma wailed, a little louder.

“Kon-El. There is nothing you can do,” Lara said firmly. “Please, stop torturing yourself.”

Ma couldn’t hold Pa up by herself. They’d both slumped on the ground. Pa’s head lolled to the side. He stared at the porch, eyes squinted. “C— Conner…”

Kon’s face went white. “He—”

I know someone asked me about this, but yes, Pa sees Kon because he’s dying. :) This would be very effective in an actual comic, I think.

“You don’t have to watch,” Lara said.

“No!” Kon shouted. “I’m not letting go. Pa can’t die. I’m still here for a reason!”

“Because you refuse to—”

“That’s right. I refuse.”  Kon stood a little straighter before taking flight down the road into Smallville proper.

There was only one hospital in Smallville, and the EMTs sat outside the ambulance bay to watch the storm. Kon sunk to his knees in front of the first.

“Help me,” he begged. “Please, please hear me. We need help. At the Kent farm. Jonathan Kent had a heart attack. Please.”

“What a storm,” the first said.

“Prob’ly one of those alien attacks again. You saw that report on Metropolis, right?” The second lifted her phone and started scrolling.

“Listen to me! Please, you have to help! At the Kent farm. Please!”

The third leaned to look. “It’s back now?”

“Weird,” said the first.

“Please,” Kon said. “Please. My grandpa is dying!” He slumped forward.

“Did you hear that?”

Kon lifted his head. The second EMT had narrowed her eyes, skimming the area.

“Please,” he said more frantically, “my grandpa is dying! He’s had a heart attack. At the Kent farm! Hurry!”

“We… we have to go to the Kent farm,” the second EMT said, standing up. “Now.”

“What?” the third asked. “We haven’t gotten a call—”

“We have to go,” she said firmly.

I considered having Kon track an ambulance down on the road, but I was like, wait, how would I make it clear he’s not taking an ambulance from someone else who needed one? How would he even find an ambulance? Would Smallville have more than one? This seemed neater.

Kon let out a breath of relief and rode in the back of the ambulance all the way back to the farm. When the sirens reached the front of the house, Ma looked up and sobbed in relief.

“Help! My husband—” she yelled.

The EMTs started their work without hesitation, and Kon’s eyes watered.

“I did it,” he said.

“Did you?” Lara asked. She hummed. “Your medicine is so primitive. I hope it’s effective.”

“Don’t start that right now,” Kon snapped.

Lara tilted her head. “I’m… not. I hope you can save your grandfather’s life.”

Kon stared at her, twenty-five and never growing older, a woman with so much potential who had lost everything save the opportunity to see her son. “You never moved on,” he said.

Lara smiled. “No. I must admit that I… find enough gratification in seeing my family,” she said. “And Jonathan Kent cared for my son when I could not. I will never have enough gratitude to the people who loved him as much as I do.”

Honestly, I wasn’t sure what I was trying to do with Lara at first. The longer I built up the “afterlife” in this world, the more I realized I didn’t have a good excuse for her to be there. After all, Bart and Kon weren’t staying dead when they moved on. They were coming back to life at the right time. I didn’t really want to answer any actual afterlife questions either, so I didn’t want to say Lara was coming back and forth just to visit Kon and help him.

Then I wrote this scene, and it hit me. Lara is watching over Clark. It’s interesting to build her character because she’s so often neglected for Jor-El. I wanted her to be a slightly awkward, clinical mind. And I really wanted to drive home her loss in comparison to the Kents. If Pa died, it would be sad, but he’s also not a young man. Anyway, this fic kind of works if you consider any Mr. Oz stories as a possibility because Jor-El isn’t even really mentioned. Lara is dead for sure. But Jor... Who knows?

Clark arrived just as the EMTs had loaded Pa into the back of the ambulance, an old flannel and jeans thrown on. “Ma, is Pa okay?”

In canon, he arrives as Superman, but he couldn’t do that here.

“They’re taking him to the hospital. But he’s— he’s—” Ma sobbed and dabbed at her eyes with her handkerchief. “Oh, I don’t even know how they knew to be here. Praise the Lord.”

The second EMT ushered them both into the back of the ambulance. “It’s funny that you say that,” she said. “I… I could have sworn I heard a boy yelling. ‘My grandpa had a heart attack. On the Kent farm. Please help!’ Something like that.”

Clark and Ma exchanged looks.

“Jon Samuel is—”

“In Metropolis, with Lois,” Clark said. “No, he’s not— He couldn’t have—”

The best/worst part of writing is trying to use as few words to say something as possible. Clark and Ma know something is up, but they don’t know how to address it. They know it’s not Jon. But also, how could it be anyone else? Especially considering the complicated familial relationships Kon has, it was fun to try to put together the right words.

Lara held out her hand for Kon. This time, he took it.

[batmomhoe]

Little SuperBat

Requested by an anon

Summary: Batmom is Superman’s little sister & pregnant. Mixed emotions are expressed when the news is revealed!

Disclaimer: I’m not too familiar with details of Superman’s arcs, so we’re going to pretend Ma & Pa Kent are happy grandparents.

Warning(s): Slight Mentions of NSFW

Word Count: 1,030

“Clark, all I want is to have lunch with everyone I love. No super-hero talk! Plus, Ma and Pa already said they’re coming! Just a nice, relaxing lunch, okay?” Your words flowed into the telephone as you tried to convince Clark to come to lunch at the mansion.

~”They’re coming all the way to Gotham from Smallville?”~ His concerned tone annoyed you slightly and you huffed a sigh.

“They’ve visited you in Metropolis from Smallville! And Gotham’s not that much farther! Look, just please come, okay? Bring Lois and Jon! Please?”

~”Fine, we’ll be there.”~

The day of the lunch couldn’t come soon enough. Your parents arrived a few days earlier in order to spend time with you and the mysterious Bruce Wayne… and all of their grandchildren. Those days were the best of your life, but it would have been better if you didn’t have to keep such a secret the whole time. The little life growing inside of you seemed to taunt your mind, willing you to bring it into conversation at every possible moment.

Thankfully, it had been obvious that your birth controls fluked(or rather the stress of Bruce’s last mission caused you to forget to take them.) So you were able to take a pregnancy test the day after Bruce came home(and the day after you had ‘I’m so thankful you’re alive sex’.) It confirmed your suspicions and you and Bruce set out to find a way to tell everyone before Clark flew in on his own and demanded to know why he heard a little heartbeat connected to yours.

Finally, the day came and you couldn’t help but have a smile plastered to your face after you hung up the phone from Lois telling you they were leaving. Nervously, you busied yourself in the kitchen, happily helping Alfred and your mother(who refused to NOT bake a pie) prepare things for the picnic lunch. It kept your mind off things and kept your heart rate from racing.

The doorbell rang and your body tensed as you glanced at your mother. A smile spread across Martha’s face before she wiped her hands on her apron. Eagerly you set your knife down and followed her out of the kitchen, excitedly scurrying to the front door. Along the way you met other members of the family, also gravitating towards the door in anticipation.

An hour later the lunch picnic was well under way, Damian and Jon having “endurance” races while Steph and Jason threw a football trying to be the next Odell Beckham Jr. and catch it with one hand. Cass was showing Gramma Kent her ballet routine, with Dick choking back proud older brother tears. Alfred talked passionately with your father about his vegetable garden. Babs, you, and Lois talked about whatever, while watching Clark harass Bruce with concerned brother questions as Bruce tried to barbeque. 

When lunch was served everyone sat down at the custom picnic bench and started passing food around. Before long, you shared a look with Bruce, knowing what it was time to do.

“Sooo,” You cleared your throat, “Bruce and I have something to announce.”

Immediately you saw everyone tense, some in fear and other’s in excitement, before your mother, eyes twinkling, spoke up, “Well, what it is, darling?”

You shared another glance with Bruce, “I’m pregnant!”

Your parents lit up excitedly but not before Clark stood up, the bench he was sitting on being pushed back with his movement, “What?!”

Lois put a hand on his arm to try and calm him down but in a huff he turned away from the table and towards the woods behind the mansion. With a sad sigh you got up and announced that you’d go after him. It thankfully didn’t take long to find him slumped over near the bank of the creek. You sat down next to him and sighed again.

“Are you not happy about this?”

Clark’s head snapped up to look at you, “No! I mean, I am happy for you. But… another bat running around? (Y/N), what if something bad happens just because it’s yours and Bruce’s kid, or more importantly, batman’s kid.”

You raised an eyebrow, “Clark, that didn’t stop you or Lois. And it’s not going to stop Bruce and I. Plus, we have quite a few older siblings willing to protect our little one.”

Now it was Clark’s turn to sigh as he took in your words, knowing you were right. At the end of the day you couldn’t have been more satisfied by everyone’s reactions. Even if Clark got a little bit more overprotective than you liked, it was to be expected and it’s not as if he was the only overprotective one in the family.

Nine months later and Clark was unsurprisingly the first one by your bed side having heard your first sounds of distress. Bruce was second to come to your side. When you got to the hospital Bruce was rather thankful he didn’t have to ask Clark to stay in the waiting room and not go in the delivery room with you two. Clark paced back and forth for the entire 13 hours you were labor.

If you hadn’t been completely drained of energy and over excited at the same time you would’ve cracked some joke about how you would’ve hated to see what Clark was like when Lois was delivering. Luckily, Bruce was there to make the joke for you. Your baby rested in your tired arms perfectly and Bruce slumped in the chair next to your bed when Clark was finally let into the room.

Clark’s face lit up in a smile the second he walked into his face lit up at the sight of his tiny niece. Gently you slid your newborn into your brother’s arms and watched as tears came to his eyes after you told him she was named after both Bruce’s and your mothers. As Clark looked down at his niece, dwarfed in his muscular arms he thought maybe, just maybe, another bat might not hurt the world. After all, this one wasn’t just a bat, this little girl was a SuperBat.

[superman86to99]

Adventures of Superman #500 (June 1993)

OVERSIZED ANNIVERSARY ISSUE! Featuring the return of Superman! And Superman! And Superman, and also, Superman! But first: The Badass Adventures of Pa Kent in Hell. The last time we saw ol’ Pa, he’d just had a heart attack and seen a ghostly vision of his dead son (that’s Superman, for those joining us), who grabbed his hand and pulled Pa towards him. Now Ghost Superman is like, “Whelp, nice seeing you dad, gotta go.”

Superman is taken “into the light” by a couple of demons disguised as robed Kryptonian ladies. However, Pa refuses to give up on his son and follows them, only to find himself in a battlefield covered with corpses -- those of his Korean War buddies. Pa is (understandably) confused and thinks he’s back in the war, carrying out a mission to rescue some captured “airman”. Private Pa then comes across a farm littered with more dead people, including one that reminds him of his brother Harry... mainly because that’s exactly who it is.

In case you hadn’t noticed, something fishy is going on here. A demonic-looking enemy soldier tries to kick Pa out of wherever the hell this is (get it? hell?), but Pa just punches him into oblivion and soldiers on. Sometimes you just gotta punch some Nazis, folks.

Next up, Pa runs into Lady Blaze, the satanic mistress/recurring Superman baddie. Blaze generously offers to help Pa find his son in exchange for one million do-- I mean, his soul. Pa apparently thinks “eh, I don’t love him that much” and prefers to jump into the void beneath him.

At this point, Pa is saved from pinballing from sad memory to sad memory for all eternity by Kismet, the nice cosmic entity Superman met a while back (“our favourite naked outer space lady in a cape”, as Don Sparrow puts it). With Kismet’s guidance, Pa finally finds Superman, but he’s in the middle of some sort of weird funeral procession carried out by more demons disguised as Kryptonians (and Superman’s old furry friend, the Cleric).

Superman has completely fallen for the show these guys put on, and is prepared to let them take him to the “Kryptonian afterlife”, but Pa eventually breaks the spell with his hollering. More punching ensues!

Superman gets rid of the demons, but he still thinks that Pa should go back to the land of living without him. He’s been gone for too long, and it’s not his place to deny death. Superman’s Kryptonian father Jor-El suddenly shows up to reinforce this notion, telling Superman to join him and his biological mother, Lara, in the afterlife. It is the natural way of things.

Naturally, Pa Kent ain’t having any of that.

Pa practically carries Superman through the portal in front of them. Cut to: Pa waking up in a hospital bed in Smallville, whispering “Clark is back” to a freaked out Ma Kent and Lois Lane.

Suddenly, Superman sightings are reported all over Metropolis -- it’s like he’s in four places at once! Lois refuses to give herself any false hopes, but just to make double-sure her fiancee is still dead, she decides to take a peek inside his tomb. Inspector Henderson opens the casket for her, and it’s... empty?!

TO BE CONTINUED! But first...

Epilogue 1: Two rival gangs are fighting over turf when one pulls out some futuristic super-weapons that literally blow the other guys to pieces. As the cops roll in, out of the rubble emerges a hulking figure saying “DOOMSDAY! GOTTA STOP DOOMSDAY!” Holy shit, it’s Superman! He’s back! Also, black!

Epilogue 2: As an evildoer tries to carjack an innocent citizen, a caped figure flies to the rescue... and blasts the absolute crap out of the would-be thief with some energy blasts, throwing him off the roof of a building. The familiar figure explains that he’s “risen from the dead” and been changed by “the fire and darkness” -- OK, that has to be Superman. There’s no other explanation.

Epilogue 3: There’s an emergency at Project Cadmus, the genetic experimentation facility that recently held Superman’s corpse: some type of secret cloning experiment has broken out before it/he was ready. We see this brash young clone being led to the outside world by the Newsboy Legion, and upon hearing the way they refer to him, he exclaims: “DON’T EVER CALL ME SUPERBOY!” Because he’s actually Superman! Oh my God!

Epilogue 4: A tourist family stops in front of the Daily Planet and reflects solemnly on the plaque marking the spot where Superman died... until a man in blue tights lands from the sky, rips out the plaque, and burns it with his heat vision. We then see that he’s got robot parts all over his body; you know, as if he’d been brought back to life after being pummelled to death by a monster. Whelp, that’s it. That’s Superman, right there.

Character-Watch:

First appearance of these four mysterious Supermen: Black Superman, Blind Superman, Brat Superman, and Beep-Bop-I’m-a-Robot Superman. Or is it?!

Creator-Watch:

This is a suitably epic finale for Jerry Ordway’s original Superman run, which started way back in 1987. Ordway went from artist to co-plotter to writer/artist to just writer, along the way pioneering the house style that all Superman series will use throughout the ‘90s. This is often called the “Byrne” and/or “Jurgens” era, but I’d argue that Ordway was the single most influential creator involved in this period, and although what comes directly after his departure is cool as hell, we’ll definitely miss the heart, humor and realism he brought to even the most obscure background characters.

Speaking of which, this wouldn’t be an Ordway comic without a shit-ton of subplots, so here we go...

Plotline-Watch:

One detail I never caught as a kid: one of the “Superman sightings” at the end of the issue is clearly a drunken Bibbo in a Superman shirt.

The Final Misadventure of Jose Degaldo: He’s been beaten, burned, broken (literally), had buildings dropped on him, and dumped by both Lois Lane and Cat Grant, but Jose “Gangbuster” Delgado has finally had enough -- he’s ditching Metropolis. A regular crime-punching adventure goes wrong when Jose accidentally beats up an undercover cop posing as a drug dealer. Upon learning there’s a warrant for his ass and getting shot by another cop, Jose decides to call it quits and leave town (using the bus ticket Inspector Henderson recently gave him). He’s actually going to Fawcett City along with his creator -- he’ll show up again in Jerry Ordway’s Power of Shazam, but that’s it for Jose in these pages! Goodbye, Suicide Slum’s rose.

Incidentally, Cat Grant is feeling rather down since she split with Jose, and her boss Vinnie Edge uses the opportunity to invite her to dinner. She agrees, even though A) her relationship with Vinnie’s son did not end well, and B) he’s a disgusting perv who just grabbed her butt. Don Sparrow says: “The interplay between Cat Grant and Vinnie Edge hasn’t aged well -- though in some ways it seems timelier than ever.”

The “favor” Vinnie mentions above is not what you might think: he wants Cat to talk to Jimmy Olsen, who has neglected his duties as star of the hit Turtle Boy TV series ever since a certain pal of Jimmy’s was violently killed. Jimmy isn’t in the mood for light-hearted TMNT copyright infringement, though, so the series is currently on reruns.

Those Turtle Boy reruns are watched by the cellmate of Oswald Loomis -- aka Superman’s least intimidating rogue, The Prankster. Loomis, once a children’s entertainer himself, doesn’t appreciate ‘90s television and tries to electrocute said cellmate (who, in my memory, was Vinnie’s son Morgan Edge, making this scene slightly less random).

Pa Kent smashing the ghostly Jor-El with a shovel that materializes out of nowhere is, of course, a shout out to John Byrne’s classic Man of Steel #6, when he does the same thing. I want a full series about Pa dispatching Kryptonian ghosts the same way. His maligned brother Harry was also mentioned in a Byrne comic, World of Smallville #1.

As usual, I’m forgetting or lazily leaving out plenty of important details, so check out Don Sparrow’s section after the jump for way more!

Art-Watch (by @donsparrow​):

Even more than Superman #75, it’s this issue (and the storyline that follows) that most define this, my most beloved era of Superman comics for me.  Perhaps it’s because I was actually opposed to Superman’s death, rather than excited about it, whereas with this issue, I was only completely excited, and totally curious about how they’d bring Superman back.

Still more nerdy background:  as we’ve mentioned in previous blogposts, I live in the same city as Super-teamster Tom Grummett, so the fact that he drew this comic was big, big deal in my hometown.  Our local comic store (which sat below Tom Grummett’s art studio upstairs) had Tom in on the day it was released to sign copies, so it was a major event.  Though I was only a lad of 13 at the time, both that day, and in the years since, I bought enough copies of Adventures of Superman #500 to insulate my house with them (and so did the rest of the world, making the resale value not quite what Superman #75 was). How big of a deal was Superman’s return in my hometown?  Well, we made the evening news…

The direct market edition cover features a stunner of a painting by the great Jerry Ordway, of a ghostly Superman reaching out to Pa Kent from beyond the void.  It was billed as being a removable translucent screen, but I don’t know anyone who was successfully able to remove the vellum without ruining their cover, but the softening of the add-on is very effective.  The newsstand edition (remember when comics could be purchased on newsstands?) has a decidedly story-driven cover, which must have perplexed the many non-regular Superman readers who came out in droves for this big issue.  It features Superman and Pa Kent floating over a background of enemies (including the demonic Blaze, which, to the uninitiated, must have been pretty spooky) with Pa Kent inexplicably in a Challengers of the Unknown looking jumpsuit.   Confusion aside, it’s still a great cover, and a nice hint at all the zip-a-tone goodness we’ll find inside.

Throughout the issue, the real world and the afterlife are given very distinct visual styles, with the ‘real’ world being inked and coloured normally, and the spirit world with lots of zip-a-tone shadows and gleaming bright colours.  It’s such an effective way to delineate the storylines, and man, I love how the extra shading looks on the afterlife pages.  It’ll be hard to single out only a few pages, because, honestly, this is one of the best drawn comics of the era.    

In the first few pages, I was struck that, despite seeing Superman in full uniform at the end of Superman #77, the Superman Jonathan Kent sees on the ‘other’ side is Clark Kent, which is a telling note about how he sees his identity.  The image of Pa stripping away his Clark garb is a great one, with the mist and swirling clouds establishing we are indeed, not in Kansas anymore.

The direct market edition also has some differences within the book, in addition to the difference in cover—it has a number of full page splashes inserted into the storyline, which are missing from the newsstand edition, and each one is a stunner.  The first one is Gangbuster descending a fire escape on page 6, having ignored the warnings he got from Inspector Henderson in the Superman specials that preceded this issue. 

The most interesting thing about these splashes, aside from how just about every one of them would have made for some killer poster art, is how seamlessly Jerry Ordway matches the scripts.  Many of the splashes contain dialogue, but if those sentences are removed (as they are in the newsstand edition) the story still makes sense, which must have been a real challenge. [Max: Oddly enough, the one flaw I’ve found in my giant Death and Return of Superman omnibus so far is that some of the dialogue from these pages is duplicated, presumably from combining pages from both editions.]

Page 9 features another great Gangbuster image, and the fight choreography in the pages that follow has a real sense of place and pace.

As we return to Pa Kent’s near death experience, the visuals go a good job of selling the story’s dreamlike conceit—“reality” is pretty flexible where he is, so as Jonathan spends time there, his thoughts get muddled in with memory, and he can lose his purpose.  It really feels like a dream in that way. Also, having heard about Jonathan’s brother previously, I thought he’d look a lot worse. There’s a strange cutaway to the Prankster in these pages, and while it’s a funny little scene, it has no bearing on the story, and Prankster doesn’t pop up again in these pages for a very long time---if memory serves, until the ill-fitting reboot of his look some 80 issues later. [Max: We saw him during the Dominus storyline, but I’m not sure if that counts.]

I also love how Grummett seems to draw Prankster as looking like UK comedian Terry Thomas, which is a great fit.  It’s always tricky to translate such goofy-looking characters into real people, and here, perhaps for the first time, Prankster looks like a human being and not a doughier Alfred E Neuman.  (Do prisoners really get their own portable TVs? Surely this scene demonstrates the danger of such a luxury!)

The scenes of Pa Kent falling into a pit and being pulled out by Blaze are chilling, but, like the rest of the issue, doesn’t it just make you fall in love with tough, no nonsense Jonathan Kent?  It’s a mini-Godwatch when he pulls a Luke Skywalker and choose oblivion over joining forces with Blaze. (Extra points for Jonathan asking the question on the minds of a lot of Superman readers—is Blaze the devil or what?)

Next up is an appearance by what would seem to be Blaze’s opposite number, Kismet, our favourite naked outer space lady in a cape.  Both sides of the two-page splash are pretty stunning here. 

The ersatz Kryptonian funeral is pretty interesting too.  Here, Grummett walks a fine line, having the Kryptonian stuff accurate enough that we know what it’s supposed to be, but just off enough that we know something strange is going on.

Once Clark figures out that the wraiths mean him harm (has there ever been a nice wraith?) it’s so, so great to see him back in action after all these months without him.  Major kudos to the colourist, here especially, but throughout the book, for the unique colours which look great here on Superman’s uniform.  Plus, I always like the times when Superman loses his cape.

The visual effect of the portal back to reality is just amazing, and from their perspective, probably pretty accurate. Next to the blinding light of the afterlife, earthly life would probably seem pretty dark. That last image from the direct edition, of Superman flying through the void with Pa Kent is just such a stunner. And from a story standpoint, this is just so definitive of the Super-team.  That a story about bringing back Superman is told in the most personal, meaningful way, with a chubby, balding old farmer as more or less the lead character.  It’s a total rejection of the grit teeth and substance-less Image comics trend of the era in its’ wholesomeness.  And I love this is how they chose to bring him back.  My very favourite detail, that I came back to again and again was that the heartbeat that returns to Pa Kent’s monitor goes across his panel, into the panel of Superman’s tomb.  So subtle, and so, so awesome.

The four page previews kicking off the Reign storyline are almost an issue unto themselves, but I love how all the eye-witness accounts from page 45 are later seen within issues, and give clues to very different Supermen.

If you’ll allow me just a little more nerdiness, DC sent comic shops some previews of this issue to create excitement, and these pages included scans of the end section with the new Supermen.  The only catch was, on these previews the figures were totally whited out, so you couldn’t see what he looked like.  So having read those short previews, I thought they were all referring to ONE new Superman, who I assumed had been changed by his experience with Doomsday.  It wasn’t until I got the issue home that I realized they were launching four different storylines.

The art on these is pretty interesting.  This is really the point where Jon Bogdanove shifts into a really loose, less constrained style, which honestly works quite well for the larger than life character of John Henry Irons. And that first look at him—you can definitely see why they thought that Shaquille O’Neal would work for this character.

Next is a spooky look at the Last Son of Krypton, who I 100% believed was the real Superman, mainly because of his appearance.  The panel of Superman lowering to finish off the thug is a great, eerie look, and I dig the Gandalf the White style dialogue here, too.

I love everything about the “Metropolis Kid” section, because it’s all built-in, and even gives us hints of this character’s “tactile telekinesis” with the grating not being damaged from his blow.  Maybe it’s just nostalgia, but man, it’s a great costume too.

Lastly, the Man of Tomorrow segment, which is such great, great storytelling, as, until the very last second, you don’t realize anything is amiss, in spite of the facial expressions of the tourists. [Max: This guy freaked me out even before I saw his full face, and I just realized why: the panel of him turning to face the family reminds me the end of this traumatizing BTAS episode.]

STRAY OBSERVATIONS:

It’s interesting to me that this issue establishes that Jonathan Kent fought in the Korean conflict, and not, as was established in the World of Smallville mini-series, World War II. It’s amazing that enough time had passed by this point, that they had to move the timeline up.  I suppose if Pa Kent were still in modern stories, he’d have been a Vietnam veteran by now.  I’ll admit being surprised watching Smallville that Jonathan Kent had never been in any war—I thought for sure they’d have made him a Gulf War veteran or something.

Even completely in shock and grief and confusion, Lois Lane really rocks those stretchpants. 

GODWATCH: This is the big one, where, as hinted to in past issues, the belief system that the Kents raised Clark within is made explicit.  First on page 22, in a moment of despair, Lois admits she wishes her faith were stronger, and Martha relates that their beliefs included Heaven, and that Clark himself, to her knowledge, subscribed to those beliefs. Finally, when Pa stabilizes, Ma Kent thanks the Lord, on page 42. [Max: I also find Pa’s theory that Clark only ended up in this limbo because he’d been raised as a mortal pretty interesting.]

“Sure—have some of my hootch, why don’tcha?” A very funny exchange. [Max: I forgot to mention High Pocket’s essential contribution to this issue, when he fishes Jose out of the river, gives him booze, and tries to recruit him for some larceny! Shame on me.]