Hey there, everyone. I’m sorry to just barge in like this with what’s probably a pretty stupid question(I’m more or less comic book illiterate), but I’ve recently taken an interest in Superman and was wondering if there’s any essential reading, so to speak, that could get me up to speed on the character’s history as he’s being portrayed now.
Goody is the best one to answer, but I can try to give an answer for recent stuff.
Superman: Earth One was just recently released, and it’s a new Origin story for him on Earth and the like. Personally I don’t know how I feel about it, and most comic readers are mixed on it (From what I’ve seen).
All-Star Superman. Not “our” Superman exactly, but it’s a comic often cited as the best Superman work in a long time (Or even ever) should get your fix well enough.
“For the man who has everything” is a personal favorite of mine, and a great break-down of Superman that shows a variety of emotions. It’s an amazing piece of work for it’s time, and holds up very well. It was first published in Superman Annual #11, but it’s not particularly hard to find.
Like I said Goody is the best for this stuff, outside of the animated world I hardly follow Superman in a solo setting. A lot of people can’t seem to write him that well or fumble a lot, so I just read select titles here and there or anything in a group setting (Morrison’s JLA for example, amazing Superman work in there).
I’m patient. I can wait. I appreciate your promptness, though. I think my roommate might actually have a copy of All-Star Superman laying around.
Definitely read All-Star.
You should check out Kingdom Come too. It’s basically an alternate future Superman story with a lot of guest stars, great artwork and a Chun-Li look alike hiding in the backgrounds. :tup:
Avoid Kingdom Come 2 like the plague though. :wasted:
I did brief reviews of a whole bunch of Superman comics, shows, and movies a while back. You’ll find some worthy reading there:
I Evolved Into This!? Blog Archive Superman Review Retrospective, First Half
I Evolved Into This!? Blog Archive Superman Review Retrospective, Second Half
As for what’s going on right now in the main books, I can’t help you there. I am hilariously out of touch with that stuff.
Kingdom Come is the reason why I’m interested in Superman in the first place. Holy shit, what a good book. x_x
Hey, good shit. Much obliged there, mister.
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Anyone seen this?
It looks pretty cool IMO…
Never seen it before. I liked it. Had that old Fleischer feeling to it. Thanks!
That is some good-ass shit.
Still… they could have made it that last little bit more authentic by incorporating Joe Shuster’s facial designs for Superman and Lois, which, to me, define the characters just as much as the clothes that they wear. That’s what the Fleischers did, anyway.
But yeah. I’m not even sure you can call that a fan film. The quality is too good.
EDIT:
John Newton as Supes. Could this be John Haymes Newton, the first actor to play Superboy in the late 80s/early 90s TV series?
EDIT:
It is! The behind-the-scenes stuff after the credits confirms.
The All Star Superman animated movie was bad realy bad it’s like they took out all the stuff that made the comic so great
The suicidical emo girl Earth-Q and the comparsion between Superman and God(well all issue #10 was taken out), Zibarro, the Supermen from the future, even the bridges to fix the broken moon and alot more stuff just got left out
Dissapointing
So, Superman: Secret Origin isn’t half bad. It’s not great, but what flaws it has seem to be at the level of execution. A refreshing change from the boatloads of other Superman origin rehash, which tend to be flawed at the fundamental idea level. Johns and Frank are pointed in the right direction, even if they’re doing brain surgery with a pipe wrench.
Copy and pastied from the DC thread, IE laziness lol -
I liked the All-Star Superman animated movie myself. The comic is better by leaps and bounds but that has more to do with them having 12 issues as opposed to 80 minutes. A lot of stuff is missing and sure I wish were some things in there but they managed to boil everything down to one cohesive story. It does not replace reading the comic but it is rather enjoyable I thought.
Oh and if anyone is thinking about renting it or picking it up absolutely go for the Blu-Ray or 2 disc edition for the special features. You get to hear Morrison talk on two different specials and he even does commentary on the movie. You get to see Morrison draw too. He’s actually a really good artist! :wow:
In the commentary Morrison said he enjoyed the animated movie and it’s his third favorite superhero movie. The other two are Unbreakable and Disney’s Hercules. Yep Disney’s Hercules. 
Morrison’s awesome. 
I’ve listened to a couple interviews with him. He’s very, very intelligent, but occasionally indecipherable.
Interestingly, I think the Justice League: Unlimited episode “For the Man Who Has Everything” might be the only time I’ve ever heard Alan Moore say something nice about an adaptation of one of his stories.
For their next trick, Timm & Co. will tackle… Asterios Polyp! (Not really, but…)
Re: All-Star Superman
I read the comic in its entirety last year, and thought several things about it:
a) This comic is weird. Like fuckin’ Ultron got turned into a woman weird. Like when The Escapist’s MovieBob says “COMICS. ARE. WEIRD.” in his Big Picture video segment. Bizarro World, and especially Zibarro, really assaulted my grasp on reality.
b) This comic is a tale about Superman’s final preparations before death, and shows Superman to be exactly what he is: an emotional man. So then… why is he not going through the five stages of grief? Why is he even not hitting one or two of those stages? Why did he jump from hearing the news about his radiation poisoning to Stage 5: Acceptance, when going through those phases would have been very much in-character and applicable?
The comic read like a love letter to Superman, which is fine and all… but I had my grievances with it. I still enjoyed it.
Yesterday I saw the animated All-Star Superman feature, which is very faithful to the comic… except for having the puzzling 75 minute run-time the DC cartoon movies insist upon require the removal of a few issues. So stuff like Zibarro didn’t happen (which is probably for the best: dude was CREEPY AS FUCK) but it tagged the necessary checkpoints.
However, the film was very episodic, like The Animatrix, Halo Legends, Batman: Gotham Knight, or Paris/New York I Love You. That’s fine, given that it’s trying to faithfully adapt issues of the comic, but I felt that, if the movie was going to do this, it should have broken up those episodes more appropriately (like in the 5 films I just mentioned), instead of trying to run the whole thing like a single movie.
Still enjoyable. Still delightfully weird. Not better than Under the Red Hood, though.
Got around to watching the All Star Superman DTV yesterday. Here are my remarks, c’n’p’ed from elsewhere:
Amazing write up Goody!
Superman declaring himself no longer being a citizen of the United States, but a citizen of the world in Action Comics #900 actually made the news on TV last night. I wonder if this is a ploy so people can stop complaining about a British guy playing Superman in the next movie… :lol:
Yeah, there’s a heated argument about it at the James Randi Educational Foundation forum, of all places.
Some of the remarks made there have finally managed to coax me out of lurking.
(If anybody ever wants to goad me into anything, just try to pull the whole “Batman is more interesting because he doesn’t have any superpowers” argument.)
Hate Supes New outfit.
I like it @3@, at least it doesn’t have the uh overpants-
Heck I just see it as his normal outfit minus the red ‘overpants’
The “Overpants” is actually a design necessity to break up what would be otherwise a monotonous blue outfit (the red belt ain’t enough)
and supes “more than anyone” should be able to get away with the underwear thing. though it’s obvious different strokes for diff peeps
My preference for what i find a design aesthetic takes precedence over what i consider a ridiculed cliched perspective. of course others will see it differently
to each his own.