Future State is here. Here’s a spot to have a spoiler discussion on individual titles, with Future State: Superman of Metropolis. Tell us your thoughts on this book
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This is the first Future State book that I have less than 100% glowing reaction to. Which is odd, since it features Jonathan Kent as Superman was seemingly slam dunk for me. I’ll start with the good of the main story, John Timms’ on pencils. This book looks dynamic, the figures are detailed with a slight anime influence. Theres’ not a panel that isn’t first rate. The story itself starts fast and moves along, but I definitely had a mixed reaction to it. It is interesting but I’m not on Superman’s side. He committed an act of war against an American city. He bottles Metropolis because he’s worried about damage from a fight? Metropolis gets damaged every time someone goes there to pick a fight with a cape, and pops never bottled the city because of it. His actions were rash and not thought through. I realize Kara is being influenced to some extent, but she’s right to try and take Jon down. I am interested in seeing part II, but it’s weird not to be on superman’s side.
The backup stories were mixed for me too. Mister Miracle is okay, but nothing really pulls me in. He has a power suit, which isn’t exactly original and there’s nothing that’s uniquely “Greatest Escape Artists” about his actions. Guardian, however, I really liked. He feels like a real street level hero, intergrated into his community looking out for their welfare and trying to keep everyone’s junk in one piece until this whole bottle thing is figured out. And, in just a few pages we get a nice supporting character in Rosa. I’ll give Guardian an A.
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Given my tendency to not like the concept of passing the mantle so much… my reaction is more positive than I would have expected. Agree with you on the art and on the quick pace of the story. I also didn’t support Jon so much on his hasty decision. However, I also don’t mind stories that show that heroes are not infallible. I mean this looks like it’s gonna be a pretty big screw-up, but I do want to see what happens next to be honest; I want to see how he deals with it. I also feel like we’re thrown into the story just as Jon is about to break and bottle up Metropolis. We didn’t see all that happened before that and the machinations of Brain Cells (did I get that name right? I mean the Brainiac ball with lotsa mouths 
) that pushed Jon to act the way he did. Jon here, for some reason, reminds me a bit of New 52 Supes. Young, a bit brash; I like it! Some interesting world build-up in showing future Metropolis with its new technologies, streets, diners and the way the three stories tie in to each other. I also really like Kara’s costume design and her overall depiction here, even while she’s under some kind of mind influence from the villain. Looking forward to her Superwoman story in this line. Overall I was entertained. Not feeling negative about this, which is a lot to say for me reading a Superman story without Clark Kent 
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Sorry, took me too long to type that out!
I think you captured a lot of my thinking and expanded on it. Again, I didn’t dislike reading the story, I was just more judgmental of Jon than you were, but you’re right the writer purposely hasn’t let us in on everything. I also liked the New 52’ish feel of a younger, less sure of his actions Superman. Hopefully, he either learns something or we find out more that puts his actions into a better light.
I didn’t even think to mention Kara much. Agree, love the uniform. Also, in the current continuity she’s the older cousin but they’re more contemporaries, here she feels like the older more mature experienced hero. Looking forward to part II
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Took the words right outta my mouth.
Love the positivity from a long time Supes fan 
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I want to chime in because I really wanted to like this book more than I did. I loved the concept of Jonathan Kent acting rash and ticking off Kara when I read the synopsis online. Overall I think that Jonathan thinking of high concept solutions that don’t pan out would be a good direction to take the character given his time working with the legion of superheroes- like he should be a little out of time even in the near future. Anyway, I have been catching up on my Superman family for like months now. So I was primed to like the book and didn’t really.
What really lost me was the dialogue. It was especially clunky during the showdown at the fortress, which I was surprised not to find in the Bermuda Triangle. Speaking of the controversial Bendis run, I thought the author missed an opportunity to recall the destruction of bottled Kandor. I feel like referencing it could have added some serious motivation for Kara and underscore the rashness of Jon’s decision.
Overall I think I preferred the back up stories. I thought the action in bottled metropolis in the Mr. Miracle and Guardian stories were both stronger than the showdown with the “military” in the main story. I agree that Rosa was a great supporting character for guardian @msgtv. She had a great voice and I dug the old cop in a diner vibe. Brain Cellls the Brainiac ball kind of worked for me @moro. It was just the right amount of ridiculous. Still I think I might catch the finale online for this one unless you guys rave about it next month.
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I’m going to pick it up, but for me I’m still kinda on the fence on how I feel about it.
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Spreading your bets around the new characters and writers seems like part of the future state fun. I am sure DC wants me to buy them all but I can’t I might jump on GL just to check out Thorne.
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Rated the books #8, #9, and #7 this week on my review.
Rough
#9 Mister Miracle part 1 (Superman of Metropolis #1) → I guess it happened? I have a lot of questions and not a lot of answers. It wasn’t my favorite art, and a lot of it just didn’t make sense, but it was fine. Some interesting ideas for who this Mister Miracle is, but often I couldn’t tell what was going on and things didn’t make much sense.
Okay
#8 The Guardian Part 1 (Superman of Metropolis #1) → This issue did a great job world building, but frankly it left me underwhelmed. I guess looking at it there’s some cool stuff, and some cool ideas, but a lot of story choices didn’t work for me. The world building was awesome, but the guardian characterization was confusing and rough. When it focused on Metropolis’s status quo, it was doing really cool insightful stuff. When it wasn’t, it wasn’t clicking for me.
Good
#7 Superman of Metropolis #1 An adult Jon with a personality? I’ll take it. There are a lot of ideas that only sorta make sense. There’s a perception that s*** went down and now Jon is struggling. Facing self doubt and trying to figure out any solution to his problem. He’s desperate, but most importantly, he’s not Clark 2.0. In fact the story goes out of it’s way to make that clear, and as such, this is the most interesting take on “adult” Jon I’ve seen and that alone makes it worth it. Do I think it’s an amazing take? No. But it’s a believable take that gives him something. I’ll take it.
Full Review:
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Interesting that you hit on Jon not being Clark 2.0, hadn’t really considered that but completely true.
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I mean it’s the first time since Adult Jon began that the character had any sort of personality, so it gets credit for that. Does it capture why I like Jon? NO. Was it better than 2018-2020… hell yeah.
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I agree that the choice to bottle Metropolis was…odd, but I think part of the reason why is that I don’t know if the story really properly explains the situation with Brain Cells or whatever it’s name was. I think if we knew more of the history that happened with this character and what it’s capable of, we might be able to at least see why Jon made the decision, even if we think it’s probably bad in the long term.
I think while the creators involved have said that Future State isn’t meant to be fully dystopic or awful futures, they are using the opportunity to show off how things can go wrong in some places. I imagine that we might see some of the stuff that leads to this in Phillip Kennedy Johnson’s upcoming run on Superman/Action, but certain other things will happen to make it so that Jon doesn’t end up bottling Metropolis.
Speaking of, I will say that this main story definitely makes me curious about that run, especially when they mention some of these new groups: The Five Empires? The Golden Gods of Creon? The Time Luchadores?
I’m definitely getting a Johnathan Hickman Avengers/X-Men vibe from what is going on here and I’m frankly here for it.
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We definitely need more Brainiac Mouth Ball
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I’ve got a lot of catching up to do on adult Jon. I just finished the material available on the DCU app: Legion/Action/Superman.
Are there any aspects of his character that have come through in the past year that you didn’t see in the future state?
I am looking forward to closing the gap on my Jon knowledge.
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Adult Jon really has had exactly 0 interesting things done with him…He’s had no personality…and I say this having LOVED Super Sons and Jon being one of my favorite characters. (I may have found a superboy jacket and everything). But the Bendis Jon? He’s just a superman clone. I mean he’s clark without any interesting ideas to seperate himself or a legacy of relationships. Future State: Superman of Metropolis was the first interesting story with adult Jon and the choices aren’t the best…
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Which sucks because I feel like Bendis had an interesting idea with the character, but kind of executed it in the most boring way possible.
Like, our lovable little Cousin Oliver Jon being chucked on Earth 3 all alone to fend for himself? That has a LOT of potential. What does the son of Superman, a kid who wants to do everything he can to emulate his father and be someone his father would be proud of, do in a world where literally everything is flipped upside down and evil always wins, and is literally lead by twisted mirror versions of his parents? We could have seen him become part of a team of younger heroes that are villains in his world, eventually leading them, making big changes to stop the Crime Syndicate.
But no. Jon was just…stuck in an underground volcano for a few years, occasionally getting Ultraman to come down and rant and cry at him. LAAAAAAAAAAAAAAME.
Anyway. Sorry if you have seen/listened to this already, but Phillip Kennedy Johnson actually did an interview about his upcoming work with Superman, in which Jon is talked about a lot, and I think he’s going to be doing what you want to see with this older Jon.
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I agree. I haven’t read all of the Bendis stuff yet, but it seems like there were plenty of ways to make Jon weird in a good way. I mean from creepy grandpa to volcano torture to the 30th century. That might have had an impact on a character. It’s a shame that didn’t pan out.
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I’m a big fan of the back-up stories.
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