| Author | Topic: Superman in The Sixties |
| Super
Monkey Member |
 posted March 28,
2003 06:10 PM 
I wish DC would reprint all of the 80 page gaints and annuals from the Sliver Age in TPB collections, there few a LOT of them : Silver Age Superman Annuals 80pg. GIANT (I) 80pg. GIANT (II) 80pg. GIANT (III) 80pg. GIANT (IV) 80pg. GIANT (V) 80pg. GIANT (VI) 80pg. GIANT (VII) 80pg. GIANT (VIII) 80pg. GIANT (IX) ------------------ IP: Logged |
| Wayne1776 Member |
posted March 28,
2003 09:26 PM 
quote: Over on the DC UNIVERSE ARCHIVES Message Board I posted a thread on a similar topic one time. I want DC to reprint these too, but individually, and on a monthly basis. I also want Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer 1962-'63. Going beyond the 80 Page Annuals/Giants you mentioned, DC also has a
wealth of already reprinted materials (some reprinted more than once as DC
likes to reprint reprints). Archives is (I hope) the way to get the closest to a true reprint - although there have been errors there too. The biggest is the inclusion of the edited panel in the World's Finest Archive Vol. 1 in the story reprinted from Superman #76, May-June 1952. The panel had been relettered when the stoy was reprinted to reflect the contents of the story that preceeded it in World's Finest 80 Page Giant G-52, Oct.-Nov. 1968. I once thought that since it will be literally years before the
contents were reached (and still will be) that Superman Annuals
#1-3, would have made a perfect Archive. These would be followed up
with other Archives in a similar format. I never wrote the letter to DC,
and Bob Greenberger (Senior Reprint Editor at DC) has said that there was
never any intention to make the replica Annuals ongoing, so I guess I
still could write the letter, but it would be a waste of time. One of the future "Lost Annuals" is supposed to be a sort of Archives Sampler. I wonder what will be in that one? I would guess it will be all Golden Age. IP: Logged |
| Continental Op Member |
posted April 10,
2003 04:22 PM
SUPERBOY #85 (December, 1960) "The Impossible Mission!" Writer: Jerry Siegel
"What a pity such a great American was murdered!", says Pa Kent. Despite the somber tone of the occasion, young Clark's face is almost sporting a grin that he keeps to himself. For a fantastic idea has occurred to him; one so fantastic that he is unwilling to share it even with his family yet. That night, Clark changes to his Superboy costume and flies through the time barrier at super-speed, journeying into the past on a mission he is uncertain even his alien powers can complete. If he succeeds, he will change history itself! (The time barrier is here depicted as giant floating calendar pages that Superboy tears through. Personally I prefer the multi-ringed "tunnel" of other stories.) The Boy of Steel materializes back in normal time on Good Friday, April 14, 1865... the very day that Abraham Lincoln was assassinated. His mission is to save Lincoln's life. Hovering far above the White House, Superboy uses his super-hearing to eavesdrop on Mrs. Lincoln, who is telling her son (Tad?) that the President has taken a room at a hotel called Petersen House to be alone with his thoughts for awhile. Then he flies to the hotel and x-ray scans its ledger to learn where Lincoln is staying. A handwritten note says that "Mister L" in Room 309 is not to be disturbed, so he swiftly flies through the window of that room to warn the President of the upcoming attempt on his life. Instead he is confronted by his arch-enemy Lex Luthor... an older Luthor than the one he knows! Luthor is just as surprised to see the arrival of Superboy, but only because he was anticipating trouble from SuperMAN. (Luthor is based on the late 50s Wayne Boring version here, a bit on the chubby side... and he wears a sportcoat and necktie that would seem a bit anachronistic in the 1860s. This is the outfit he generally favored between his "white lab coat" and "gray prison uniform" phases.) Thinking quickly, Luthor flings open a lead box that had been lying atop his bed, and produces a glowing chunk of Red Kryptonite. He knows that the substance always has a different, unpredictable effect on Kryptonians each time they are exposed to any particular specimen. This time, the effect on Superboy is total paralysis, freezing him in place as immobile as a statue. "So you can't move, eh, while you're under the spell of this RED KRYPTONITE? Good! This should be amusing!" (May I point out that it seems like a pretty stupid move on Luthor's part, exposing his enemy to the stuff WITHOUT knowing HOW it will affect him this time?? What if it had a beneficial effect instead for once, such as making him MORE invulnerable? Or if it just gave him cat-whiskers or something? Or what if it made him EVIL and he just decided to KILL Luthor? Oh well. ) Anyway, the triumphant Luthor explains that he had used a time-machine of his own invention to flee into the past from his enemy, the Superman of the year 1960. (The time-machine looks like a giant hollow diamond containing a roller coaster seat.) He took the Red K sample with him as insurance in case he was followed, and admits to being a bit puzzled why the SuperBOY from his youth has tracked him down instead. Of course, all Superboy can think about (silently) is Lincoln's approaching doom. His only hope is that the unpredictable effect of the Red Kryptonite will wear off in time for him to warn Lincoln. Luthor announces that he might as well make himself comfortable, and stretches out on the bed to continue gloating. One floor below, President Lincoln exits the hotel to join his wife, who will be attending a play with him later that night at nearby Ford's Theatre. Pacing the room in deep thought, Luthor decides that Superman must have somehow relayed a message to his own past self and sent Superboy back in time instead. "Oh no! That's not it at all!", Superboy inwardly moans. "Oh, if only I could TELL you the real reason I've come back to the past, to this particular day! Maybe even YOU would let me go!" Meanwhile, the Bald Brigand decides to have a celebratory smoke, and strikes a match on Superboy's invulnerable nose. Then he blows cigar smoke in the enraged Boy of Steel's face. Even more infuriatingly, he flings spitballs (made from a torn Ford's Theatre ticket; nice touch, Papp) at his paralyzed enemy to pass the time. And the clock keeps ticking. Hours later, the Lincolns are across the street, watching the performance of "Our American Cousin" from the Presidential Box at Ford's. The fatal moment draws near, and Superboy still can't so much as twitch a muscle, no matter how much he struggles to move, since the Kryptonite still lies nearby in the open box. Suddenly, Luthor's mood changes from mocking to anger. he shakes his fist and starts ranting. "Listen to me, UNSUPERBOY! I've got plenty to say to you! You aroused my wrath, as a youth, by thwarting my greatness as a scientist! And so I turned to crime!" "That's not true!", thinks Superboy. "I tried to help you! If you became a criminal, it was because of your twisted mania for power at any cost!" "I grew up to become your greatest foe!", snarls Luthor, wagging a finger in Superboy's face. "Despite all of Superman's super-powers, my super-science has become his greatest threat! Someday I'll destroy him! Think that over, you stupid, helpless statue! Ha... SUFFER!" "You devil!" fumes Superboy. "While you're raving like a lunatic, Lincoln's life is in peril! I could save him... except for your fiendish RED KRYPTONITE!" Across the street, John Wilkes Booth slips into the Presidential Box and, as history recorded, shoots Lincoln in the head before leaping to the stage below. (No blood is seen; the Comics Code wouldn't have permitted it at the time even as a matter of historical accuracy.) Luthor soon hears a ruckus in the streets outside, and peers out his hotel room window to see the wounded Lincoln being carried from the theatre. A look of absolute shock appears on Luthor's face now, and tears are flowing from the paralyzed Superboy's eyes. The terrible truth dawns on Luthor as he realizes that Superboy's mission was not to capture him but to save Lincoln. The horrified arch-criminal snatches up the box of Red Kryptonite and runs from the tiny hotel room. "I didn't know!", shouts Luthor over his shoulder. "Blast you, don't stare at me like that! I had nothing against Lincoln! I may be evil- - but I had no hate for HIM!" Soon, the tormented Luthor is back aboard his time-machine, hurtling through the temporal barrier to his proper place in the 20th Century era. He slumps over the controls, practically weeping, as his thoughts are in turmoil. "Why did fate choose ME to prevent Superboy from saving the life of Lincoln, a great man? I'm responsible for many crimes, but THIS is the worst of all! Lincoln's blood is on my hands! I-I'm sorry... sorry... sorry..." *******
One day not long after, the Kent family visits the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, DC. Gazing up at the slain leader's image, Clark ponders sadly. "I TRIED, Mr. Lincoln! I tried awfully hard! But I learned... no mere mortal, not even a SUPERBOY, can change fate... and htere's no use going back in time again to do so!" Choke. The End.
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| Aldous Member |
posted April 10,
2003 07:55 PM
Luthor shouldn't be so hard on himself. He didn't squeeze the trigger. I wonder if this is one of the first stories to give Luthor that certain depth... that he isn't all bad... that his "evil" nature isn't so cut-and-dried? IP: Logged |
| Osgood
Peabody Member |
posted April 11,
2003 09:14 AM
Great story and review. And to add to what Aldous said, I think this story came just a few months after "How Luthor Met Superboy", which I think is one of the pivotal stories of the Weisinger era, as it attempted for the first time to give Luthor a motive for his undying hatred. Interesting that in this story Superboy's confronted by the adult Luthor, and therefore must also come away with the knowledge that his attempts to rehabilitate him are doomed. It's also an early example of the old time travel prime directive - you can't change the past - which became part of Weisinger lore, and later Schwartz. IP: Logged |
| Continental Op Member |
posted April 15,
2003 03:59 PM
Here’s a little gem of a story that shows how Luthor could be written as an interesting, three-dimensional character even without necessarily playing up his "good side". ACTION COMICS # 277 (June, 1961) "The Conquest of Superman!" In a cell block at Metropolis Prison, Lex Luthor is being taunted by a couple of wise-guy inmates locked up across the hall from him. "Hey, LUTHOR, I hear SUPERMAN keeps sending you back to jail so much,
the warden’s gonna install a revolving door!" "SHUT UP!", snarls Luthor. "SHUT UP!" Alone in his cell that night, the criminal genius stands silently brooding, with the shadow of prison bars falling over his still form. "Revenge upon SUPERMAN!", he silently rages. "That’s all that matters to me now! But first I must be free... to work... to plan..." He gets his chance sooner than he anticipated, when the warden arrives to have him released from his cell. A highly dangerous emergency has arisen, and with Superman currently off in outer space on a mission, the authorities feel that Luthor is the only one who might be able to help instead! Under heavy armed guard, the sinister scientist is rushed to a government airport, where a military cargo jet has been trapped circling overhead. Its landing gear has malfunctioned, and a deadly hydrogen bomb on board could explode and kill millions if the jet crashes. Luthor comes up with a solution almost immediately. He has the authorities bring him certain scientific materials that he had been using in his recent experiments with anti-gravity. Luthor quickly assembles a device that resembles a giant searchlight, but is actually capable of projecting an anti-gravity ray. He shines the ray on the overhead aircraft, “reducing its mass” until it is light enough to descend safely to the ground as softly as a feather. Once that’s done, Luthor suddenly swings the beam around and uses it to irradiate his guards, who are left floating helplessly in the air until the effect wears off. (You’d think they would have expected as much! Birds gotta fly, fish gotta swim, evil scientists gotta escape from prison. ) Luthor makes a break for freedom and, by one of those comic-booky coincidences, reporter Lois Lane happens to be arriving at just that moment to cover the H-bomb story, driving her canary-yellow convertible. Luthor pulls an improvised carjacking and has Lois scoot over to the passenger seat at gunpoint. As they drive away from the airport, Lois insists that Lex will never get away with this. "You won’t get far! Once SUPERMAN gets back, he’ll catch up to you as her always does!" "SUPERMAN! I’m sick of hearing the name of your muscle-bound boyfriend! I’m going to make a super-sap out of that guy!" He stops the car and makes Lois get out, warning her that he now intends to pull the greatest crime in history right under Superman’s nose, so that he can never live down the disgrace. **** Once darkness falls over the city of Metropolis, and the streets are all but deserted, we see Luthor and a "trusted crony" quietly approaching an ornate, abandoned building that once served as a museum. A sign declares this edifice, which resembles a mansion of the old Roman Empire, to be awaiting future demolition, but Luthor knows better. He explains that he bought the place long ago under an assumed name, and knows the way to activate a secret entrance near a piece of statuary by the front door. "A shake of the hand of ‘Caesar’ is the fitting way into my little ‘empire’!" Luthor’s Lair, as he calls it, serves the arch-criminal in much that same way that Superman’s Fortress of Solitude serves his enemy. It is a combination secret getaway for recreation and contemplation, laboratory, and museum of his exploits. The entire building is lead-lined to shield from Superman’s x-ray vision, and the eyes of the giant Titan statue atop the roof are actually cameras that scan the skies for any sign of his foe. Luthor continues guiding his henchman on a tour of the place. "My Hall of Heroes!" proclaims Luthor, as they enter a room displaying a row of menacing wax figures. "Life-like statues of ATTILA THE HUN-- GENGHIS KHAN-- CAPTAIN KIDD--- AL CAPONE! Many times when I’ve felt discouraged, I’ve come here-- and gone away uplifted, inspired to go on with my work!" Just as Superman’s Fortress guards the miniaturized Bottle City of Kandor, Luthor’s Lair also contains a bottled land. While probing an alien dimension, Luthor captured and shrank part of a strange alien jungle. He pauses to watch two tiny dragon-like creatures fighting each other within. "Cute little pets, aren’t they?" Yet another room is wall-papered with dozens of old calendar pages, most of them defaced with large red X-marks. "I call this my REMINDER ROOM! Those crossed-out calendar days remind me how many years I’ve spent in prison because of SUPERMAN... and that I must never lag in my war against him!" Finally comes Luthor’s workshop, crammed with scientific apparatus that he will use to construct his latest criminal invention... one he will use in "my forthcoming CONQUEST OF SUPERMAN!" Later that night, Luthor drifts off to sleep in his large ornate bed, and smiles as he begins dreaming. In his dream, Luthor stealthily enters the editorial office room of the Daily Planet building, and confronts Superman, who is chatting there with his closest friends: Lois Lane, Jimmy Olsen and Perry White. Before any of them can react, Luthor blasts all four with a fantastic ray-gun device that shrinks them all to the size of tiny dolls. "Now your little size matches your little minds!", laughs Luthor, scooping them up in both hands. He tosses the others aside contemptuously, but gloats over the helpless Superman in his grasp. "The ray has robbed you of your super-powers! Ha Ha! One squeeze, and I could snap you like a twig!" "No, LUTHOR—PLEASE! DON’T!", begs Superman, who in the dream is revealed as a pathetic coward at heart. Luthor taunts his foe with being hung inside a birdcage, and then dangles him over the open hatchway of a familiar model rocket that inexplicably has appeared nearby. "Or perhaps I’ll exile you from Earth! The rocket that brought you here from KRYPTON can hurl you back into infinite space-- to drift forever amid the dust of your shattered planet!" "Please, LUTHOR", whines Superman cravenly, "Spare me and I swear I’ll let the world know you’re my master!" Suddenly, Luthor wakes up in his bed and realizes it was all just a dream. But he vows to make his dream come true tomorrow...
**** Sure enough, a soldier at Fort Knox, Kentucky soon reports to his commander that Luthor and his men are driving up to the place in strange machines, intent on stealing the entire federal gold bullion reserve stored there. The commander is flabbergasted. "Our tanks and artillery will stop that upstart right in his tracks!" But Luthor has prepared for this, and demonstrates that he has recreated the shrinking weapon from his dream. At the flip of a switch, his device reduces all the advancing troops to tiny size, too small to lift their rifles or operate their tanks. (Apparently the shrinking effect works only on living or once-living matter, since their uniforms shrink with the troops but their weaponry doesn’t.) As a last resort, the military flashes an urgent distress signal far across the world to the Arctic wastes, where it is received at Superman’s Fortress of Solitude. Within mere instants, the familiar caped figure of Superman is seen streaking to answer the summons in the skies above Fort Knox. Luthor’s men get nervous, but the malevolent mastermind stays supremely confident. He flips another switch on his strange tractor-like vehicle, and it fires a glowing green sphere at his enemy, who cautiously swerves out of its path. Luthor calls out to Superman, gloating that his invention is able to instantly create synthetic kryptonite of ANY kind, and laughs as he bombards his opponent with dozens of multi-colored globes from the device. Soon the sky is filled with spheres of green, red, blue, white, and even the previously unknown yellow (NOT gold) kryptonite! Don’t ask me why Lex bothered with colors that don’t even affect Kryptonians... maybe he just got carried away. In any event, these globes cluster themselves into a floating multi-colored "cage" that surrounds his nemesis completely. Free from super-powered interference, Luthor next materializes a gigantic, hovering robot arm and hand, which reaches down to uproot Fort Knox from its foundations. This "Fourth-Dimensional Arm" scoops huge fistfuls of gold from the underground vaults and deposits them swiftly into waiting trucks manned by Luthor’s gang. As the criminals race away from the site in triumph, Luthor’s humiliated opponent can do nothing but watch helplessly from inside his glowing cage. "If only I could break through-- but I cannot! If only I were free to act-- but I cannot!" *****
"Yes—but the big joke is that SUPERMAN COULD HAVE stopped me, but didn’t know it! I tricked him! Those 'kryptonite' globes were FAKES! HARMLESS FAKES! When the world learns the truth, he’ll never live down the shame! HA! Ha! Ha! Ha! All the gold in the world couldn’t buy me this feeling of triumph-- this sweet revenge! Ha!Ha! Ha! Ha!" "When you hate a guy, you hate ALL THE WAY!", says his butt-kissing henchman. "This is a moment for all time!", exclaims Luthor proudly, as he positions a life-sized statue of himself alongside the villains in his Hall. "Now at last I feel I’ve earned the right to place my own image with these all-time greats!" "Boss", declares his chief toady, "you’re the greatest of ‘em all!" Luthor can hardly wait to read the newspaper headlines announcing his triumph to the world. But when he holds in his hands the latest edition of the DAILY PLANET, his expression turns to astonishment instead. The headline reads: LUTHOR ROBS FORT KNOX "'SUPERMAN ROBOT'? This says Superman is still away on his mission to another planet-- and that his ROBOT answered the Fort Knox S.O.S.! I only outsmarted a ROBOT! No wonder I tricked it so easily!" Flying into a rage, Luthor hurls one of the stolen gold bars at the statue made in his image, shattering it to pieces. "Even though I won a victory, I really lost! I didn’t triumph over SUPERMAN, only a mechanical man! My sweet revenge has turned sour! All my work-- all my plans-- gone for nothing!" When Luthor’s henchmen point out that he still has the gold, he only grows angrier. "The gold! Bah! You fool! The gold was to be a symbol of my conquest of SUPERMAN-- but now it’s not that anymore! Now the gold can only remind me of my defeat! I’m going to GIVE THE GOLD BACK!" The rest of the gang is horrified at the idea, but Luthor will not be defied. "You stupid dolts! With my machines I can always steal enough loot to satisfy your greed! Have you forgotten I am LUTHOR-- the MASTER CRIMINAL? I gave an order--- and I want it obeyed!" And so, when the real Superman returns to Earth the next day, he is soon summoned to an open field by the police. There they have found every bar of the stolen gold neatly stacked and waiting, exactly where Luthor’s phone call told them to find it. The police can’t believe Luthor simply returned such a treasure, but the reason is obvious to Superman. "He felt that stealing the gold when I wasn’t around to interfere was like stealing candy from a baby!" Later, back at his Fortress, Superman’s loyal robot hangs its head in shame while reporting its defeat. The robot had wanted to break through the kryptonite cage, but could not bring itself to violate its programming. "I’m glad you didn’t!" explains the genuine Superman. "Often, as CLARK KENT, I cannot be elsewhere as SUPERMAN, so I must summon a robot. In order that the impersonation never be suspected, the robot must ALWAYS react to KRYPTONITE as I would! You did your job well!" "I was away with SUPERGIRL and my other robots-- and only you were here-- a newly built ROBOT-IN-TRAINING! But now, because you obeyed my commands, your training period is over! You may now join the other robots!" The adventurous automaton does so with pride, but the real Man of Tomorrow pauses for a moment to sit and reflect silently elsewhere in his Fortress, and muses to himself. "As for LUTHOR, I’ll be waiting for our next battle..." At that very same moment, on another continent, within his hidden Lair, the frustrated Luthor is also sitting in silence and musing to himself. "As for SUPERMAN, I’ll be waiting for our next battle..." ******* I've seen this story credited to Bill Finger several times. Although Finger was much better known as a writer of Batman stories (and as de facto co-creator of Batman, but don't get me started...) he did write a script here and there for Mort Weisinger on the Superman family of titles. There are parts of the story that seem like Finger... his Batman stories often used the idea of the villain breaking out of jail to prove himself after being taunted by the other inmates, for example. But certain parts of this story almost scream Jerry Siegel at me. I'm tempted to speculate whether Weisinger brought Siegel in to "punch up" a Finger script in need of work, or vice versa. And frankly, the whole concept seems more like something one would expect Hamilton to come up with. But Finger is the one I've usually seen cited, so there you go.
You can also detect the influence on Maggin's later Superman novels here. There is the exploration of Luthor's psychological obsessions, and the hint of his secret vast wealth and multiple assumed identities, as well as the editorial decision that Luthor wasn't going to care much about crime for its own sake anymore... from 1960 onward, Luthor was almost always uninterested in stealing loot or conquering the world. Instead, it was all about his personal feud with the Man of Steel. Speaking of insights, I think Luthor's dream sequence is fascinating. It's only one page, and I'm no doubt reading MUCH more into it than the writer intended, but you can find a ton of symbolism there if you so choose. For one thing, when Luthor confronts Superman and the Daily Planet staff, the ONLY friend of Superman's who isn't there is Clark Kent. I have to wonder if this is a subtle hint that, subconsciously, Luthor has figured out Superman's secret identity. Even more unnerving is the panel where he threatens tiny Superman with the rocket. Luthor is usurping the role of father figure to dominate his enemy. The rocket that he uses to intimidate him, well, we know what Freud would interpret the large cylindrical shape as... obviously, Luthor is trying to prove he's the "bigger man" in more ways than one... Not bad for that silly ol' Silver Age, eh?
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| Aldous Member |
posted April 15,
2003 05:37 PM
What a cool review, mate. I wish I had the comic.
quote: One of the most telling and important remarks Superman has ever made about Lex, surely.
quote: I have no doubt a lot of the symbolism to be found was intended. I have a lot of admiration for the Silver Age writers... They were severely restricted in some ways, but their powers of imagination seemed to find ways to wink and nod to us in some innocuous fashion.
quote: Lex Luthor is such a rich character if you want him to be (no pun intended). IP: Logged |
| Super
Monkey Member |
posted April 15,
2003 08:03 PM
quote: Think again! Many of these writers were from outside comic books and were used to writing Science Fiction novels. ------------------ IP: Logged |
| Continental Op Member |
posted April 17,
2003 04:15 PM
It sounds to me, Super Monkey, that Aldous was in agreement with you... that the symbolism was intended to be there. Those Luthor stories were both reprinted in an issue I bought recently at a convention: 80-PAGE GIANT #11 - dated June,1965. (I always make sure to go buying comics only on the last day of conventions; the dealers don't want to carry so many boxes back home, and you can find lots of 50- and even 60-percent markdowns on the inflated prices by then.) I paid twenty dollars for the issue in question... which is more money that I ever would have paid for a comic just a few years ago. By today's standards,it was a bargain of sorts and I couldn't pass it by. I don't see any need to regret my decision. The Giant issues are very hard to come by now. And this one is a real treasure, with a bit of shine still on the cover and hardly any yellowing of the pages. I'm sure plenty of rip-off artists would be charging three figures for this comic in this condition if I tried to locate it online. Returning to the subject: The cover says 80-PG. GIANT FEATURING SUPERMAN, but that's not exactly accurate. Superman isn't the real star here. It could easily be called "Luthor's Greatest Hits". Except for the Golden Age stories (which weren't reprinted much at the time) and the very recent epics of the mid-60s (mostly, the Lexor stories), that's exactly what are collected here. Certainly there would be a number of candidates here for a trade paperback titled THE GREATEST LEX LUTHOR STORIES EVER TOLD. ****
* "The Kryptonite Man!" (1959)-- (Luthor invents a serum that causes
him to emit kryptonite radiation.Highlight of the story is Clark Kent
almost being killed by a monkey.) ****
* A text feature on SUPERMAN'S SUPER VISION, listing: X-RAY VISION__ Enables Superman to see through stone,steel, wood or any
other solid material. However, x-rays cannot penetrate lead. (Interesting to see how the terminology was evolving, and notice what stayed official and what didn't. Just a few years earlier, heat vision had been "the heat of x-ray vision", for example. Super-vision became a general blanket term for all the vision powers, and "photographic vision" was usually just "super-memory" or "total recall". Plus, I don't see why heat vision wouldn't melt lead, once it became a separate power.) * A full-page portrait of the "Superman Family" with Swan/Klein art depicting the lineup of: "Bottom left corner: SUPER-MONKEY; Right corner: LORI the MERMAID; Across middle of page, from left to right: MARTHA KENT, JONATHAN KENT, JIMMY OLSEN, LUCY LANE, PERRY WHITE, LOIS LANE, LANA LANG, SUPERMAN; SUPERGIRL, PROFESSOR POTTER, BIZARRO No.1, LARA, JOR-EL; At top of page, from left to right: KRYPTO, STREAKY, SUPER-HORSE, MR. MXYZPTLK, and the following members of the LEGION of SUPER-HEROES: SUN BOY, COSMIC BOY, LIGHTNING LAD, SATURN GIRL, CHAMELEON BOY. (Omitted for lack of room are: MON-EL, BOUNCING BOY, PHANTOM GIRL, SHRINKING VIOLET, INVISIBLE KID, COLOSSAL BOY, BRAINIAC 5, TRIPLICATE GIRL, ULTRA-BOY, MATTER-EATER LAD. Also PETE ROSS, LENA THORUL, MR. and MRS. DANVERS, residents of the bottle city of KANDOR, LYLA LERROL, outlaws in the PHANTOM ZONE, TITANO the APE, LEX LUTHOR and the original BRAINIAC." (Poor Sally Selwyn; supposed love of Superman's life and she didn't even rate a mention!)
KAL-EL, JOR-EL, LARA, KRYPTO, ZOR-EL, ALLURA, KARA, NIM-EL, BEPPO, KANDOR, KRYPTONOPOLIS, ARGO CITY, FORT ROZZ, KRU-EL, DON-EL, VAN-ZEE, VOL-DON, ZOL-LAR, AR-RONE, NOR-KAN, LYLA LERROL, JAX-UR, GENERAL ZOD, and PROFESSOR VAKOX. (One thing I thought was a scream was the fact that Van-Zee is Superman's lookalike Kandorian double, yet Vol-Don is "Clark Kent's" lookalike Kandorian double. The idea of Kandorian lookalikes existing for Supes and every one of his friends was insane enough, but we're supposed to swallow that one of them even wears GLASSES?) Like I said, it was worth every penny. Some of the reprints from the Fifties aren't very good, despite some fine Wayne Boring art, but then the Fifties weren't a very interesting decade for Luthor stories anyway.
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| Aldous Member |
posted April 17,
2003 08:07 PM
A Luthor trade paperback? The closest thing I have to this is a little DC Blue Ribbon Digest, No. 27 from August 1982, "Superman versus Luthor." It's difficult to enjoy the comics because they are reprinted on a very small scale. We have: The Luthor Nobody Knows by Maggin, Swan &
Oksner. IP: Logged |
| Aldous Member |
posted April 18,
2003 05:06 PM
Then I come across these other little paperbacks from Marvel. Similar format to the DC Blue Ribbon Digests. "Spider-Man Comics Magazine" No. 4 (July 1987), No. 5 (September 1987) and No. 6 (November 1987). Each one reprints three Amazing Spider-Man comics, starting with Spidey No. 62 (1968), "Make Way For... Medusa!" For guys like me on the wrong side of the world for collecting old American comics, digests like this can sometimes be a Godsend. Why? For example... I had "The Madness of Mysterio" from Amazing Spidey No. 66 ever since I was a little kid. I loved it. The story ends on a hell of a cliffhanger, and I never knew for years and years how it turned out, because I didn't have ASM No. 67. But then, circa 1987, I pick up this little digest thing and HEY! The concluding chapter, "To Squash a Spider!" by Stan, Johnny, Jim M. and (one of my very favourite letterers) Artie. IP: Logged |
| India
Ink Member |
posted April 27,
2003 06:00 PM
Since the BIG CHANGE is supposed to happen soon, I thought it prudent to give this thread a bump NOW. IP: Logged |
| Super
Monkey Member |
posted April 27,
2003 06:33 PM
Great thinking Mr.Ink, I just saved this whole thread as a rtf file just in case. Thanks for teh heads up! 
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| India
Ink Member |
posted April 27,
2003 07:10 PM
I'm also saving the latest pages of these threads so I can add them to my cd files--just in case we do lose these topics. IP: Logged |