Superman Space Age

 Superman Space Age, by Mark Russell and Mike and Laura Allred, is an illustration that a limited scope is not an impediment to telling a good story. The art is reminiscent of X-Statix, an unusual look for a Superman story, but this is a particular Superman on an Earth which does not have the privilege of being one which survives the Crisis on Infinite Earths. This is not a true spoiler: the first pages are set in 1985. This Superman's floruit is in the 1960s; the inciting incident, therefore, is the assassination of President Kennedy. This Earth's Clark Kent has a relation with his Earth father which is closer to that of the Man of Steel movie than any television adaptation. The assassination spurs Clark, Lois, Luthor, Bruce, and Hal into action which will lead to the conclusion. Despite the decade, Pariah, the multiverse-hopping herald of cosmic oblivion, arrives and the world does not immediately end in a wave of white blankness. Some may view this as breaking canon. This premature arrival prompts Superman to value the time left and rally the proto-league of this Earth. 

This version of the Superman story is geared for a generation who knows that disaster is coming within their lifetime and must decide how to manage both the catastrophe and their emotions. It is worth reading, and the development within the limited framework will be intriguing.

Superman '78 Mini-Series Review and Analysis

 To me, Superman will always be Christopher Reeve. I was excited, therefore, to read the six-issue mini-series Superman '78. 

Robert Venditti is the writer. Wilfred Torres is the artist. The colorist is Jordie Bellaire, and Dave Lamphear of A Better World (DC's main earth, perhaps) is the letter. Torres does an excellent job rendering the characters to resemble the actors, and Venditti captures the dialogue admirably. I am, however, more interested in how the mini-series' themes allow it to serve as the third volume and conclusion to the first two movies. This is absolutely worth reading, but my analysis below includes spoilers, as an ending in a trilogy would, so be forewarned. Even better, buy it wherever you get your comics.

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The goal of the Superman movies can be summed up in Jor-El's words to Kal-El: "They can be a great people, they wish to be. They only lack the light to show the way. For this reason above all, their capacity for good, I have sent them you ... my only son." (Superman: The Movie) Jor-El's world is doomed, with an absence of hope, but he can share hope with another civilization. Superman in the first movie learns how to be human from his adoptive parents and about Kryptonian civilization from the Fortress of Solitude; unlike the Kryptonians, however, he learned about it without the sterility or Jor-El's despair. He learns that he can literally change the course of history. In the second movie, Superman faces off against Zod and his goons. Zod's goal is to exploit others, whether they be the doomed Kryptonians or humans under Kal-El's protection. Superman learns that the capacity for evil is as present in Kryptonians as it is in humans, and that this nature must be incorporated and overcome because it cannot be eliminated.

Since the first movie had Luthor as a villain and the second had Zod, the mini-series uses Brainiac. The movie universe has a simple mythology, so Brainiac is doing what he always does: bottling cities and destroyed civilizations. This obsession, of course, makes Superman a rare prize. This Brainiac is not the organic one of the Silver Age, not the mechanical skull of the Post-Crisis era, but a more movie-suitable transitional one - appropriate for the period in which Brainiac was moving from organic to artificial. Brainiac himself is the sole survivor of his civilization, but lacks the empathy of Superman and Jor-El. It is not clear whether this is the result of eons of loneliness or a defect in his species' psychology. Brainiac doesn't even have a '70s space monkey for company. His "solution" to his loneliness is not to settle somewhere for a time, or even communicate extensively with various civilizations, but rather to preserve each in his bottles. This preservation leads to resignation at best, and despair at worst for the cities in flight; thus Brainiac is spreading despair rather than hope. 

Superman is willing to sacrifice himself to save the Earth, but Metropolis is bottled anyway. The existence of Kandor is a surprise for Superman, but not to anyone who knows the Brainiac mythos. The bigger surprise is that Jor-El and Lara are in Kandor. They are delighted to see their son, but Jor-El, whose words were so inspiring to young Clark Kent, has given into despair and seeks only to ensure the continued existence of Kandor, the last remnant of Krypton. Superman does not accept this and wins Jor-El over with his optimism borne of sources unavailable on Krypton. The sterility of Brainiac's ship is fundamentally no different from the sterility of Krypton. Superman fights Brainiac, but the fight also includes a discussion of how one reacts to the destruction and other terrors of the universe, whether the hope of action or the despair of inaction is the appropriate response. Brainiac choses to die rather than live among lesser mortals; he also choses death for all the bottled cities and the lesser mortals who live therein. Even if suicide is a legitimate choice for Brainiac, he not only has no right to choose for others, but he is also making the opposite choice of the citizens of the two cities featured in the mini-series. The look on his last uploaded body suggests that Brainiac realized his error after he could no longer avoid the consequences. 

Superman saves Kandor and Metropolis, the latter of which has apparently not set to permanent miniaturization, but the bigger surprise is that he saves most or all of the other cities as well. Perhaps this is as close to the Cosmic Zoo as the movie universe can come, but the more likely reason is that the victory over despair would ring hollow if only the cities of the hero and his loved ones survived. Although Brainiac's technology is lost, the cities and their inhabitants are safe, protected by a guardian who wants to restore them rather than a specimen collector who wants to preserve them. Hope triumphs over despair.

Archon 35: A Personal Retrospective

I'd better write this before I begin to forget the details!

I'd dipped my toes into Wondercon several times (whenever I wasn't camping that weekend), and I recently went to WorldCon in Reno; I'd even been to St Louis before. This was, however, my first Archon. I didn't announce my status ahead of time too publically - too many horror stories about maltreatment of noobs. I loaded up on books in the hallway, but didn't buy so much in the dealer's room - I'm a bibliophile, not a collector. The Science Fiction Poetry Handbook by Suzette Haden Elgin is good! I'm also caught up on Avengers history in time for the movie, in case there are any continuity nods. I had a nice chat with Sara Harvey, whose book Convent of the Pure I bought at WorldCon but have not read yet (the cover is far too salacious to display in public). I also bought a modern pulp hero story - the equivalent of steampunk. Unfortunately, pulp heros tend to be popular in rough economic times.

The panels I attended had the following themes: Superman, Firefly, Dr. Who, steampunk, and writing panels. The Superman panel proposed that he was a distillation of several characters (Hugo Danner, Doc Savage, etc.) and not original at all. But then, that is also the description of Casablanca! The Who panel was more interesting for meeting people (I am tired of Rory and Amy!),  especially Paul, Rosemary, and Beth, but the Firefly panel was livelier. Firefly is a good example of a show where the quality made a short run a lasting work. The steampunk panels were fascinating, and, as I posted on the FB Archon site, taught me an appreciation of steampunk. The writing panels were very informative - Rachel Neumeier had interesting points, and I may have to thank Michael Tiedemann for his advice on non-monetary social status markers. One of the downsides of the panels, however, was the level of rudeness among the audience. Such poorly socialized convention members are one of the reason that science fiction, fantasy, and gaming are in public disrepute.

The costumes! O the costumes! The costumes were fantastic. The emphasis was fantasy or steampunk. Some of them were ill-advised or made when the wearer was thinner. There was a lot of cross-dressing (most notably the group who dressed as the X-Women), but Beth reminded me that I live in a strange little bubble where cross-dressing is more acceptable than other cities. I watched the Masquerade, which was amazing - some contestants must have spent a fortune. My favorite costume was a tie between the Weeeping Angel and Kasey MacKenzie's Kaylee (Firefly) outfit.

The parties went into the early morning, but my disdain for drunken idiots and my inability (even in college) to pull an all-nighter prevented me from partaking much.

If people left Sunday, they missed the flying shark.

The Doubletree, where I stayed, was nice, connected to the Gateway Center (sans Aboriginal teleporter) by a bridge over a ditch. Nothing fancy, but flyover country seems to remember that it is a hospitality industry.