The Superman Thread

Superboy: Man of Tomorrow 1 was great! The book is off to a strong start!

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Well, if we’re tossing Kon-El content on to this thread as well, they released promotional posters for the Titans finale. Here’s Conner’s:

@millernumber1 I’m also looking forward to SB-MOT (and since I voted for it, I’m glad it won), but still have a heck of a lot of packing to do and have appointments tomorrow I cannot put off. So I’m not going to get a chance to even skin it for a bit. Superman Lost I’m very curious about but I’ll likely wait till it’s collected, versus trying to read at we go along, especially now that I know it’s 10 issues - I had thought it was going to be 3 or 4, like most of the prestige format and Black Label stuff turns out to be. I didn’t notice the first issue the last time I was at an LCS, but now that I am reminded of it, I’ll probably look for it later this month when I go and see if any of The Flash movie figures are available in the wild.

@moro Well, you’re coupled, which makes sense, unless you did date nights for movies.

And, as for me, I don’t have the movie memorized, it’s likely been more than a decade since I’ve seen more than clips of it, and even though this particular theater doesn’t have Atmos, I’m also looking forward to hearing the soundtrack in a huge theater, which is another reason for me to go. I had wanted to go to the Hollywood Bowl celebration for Williams a few years back but it was too expensive for my tastes, especially since I could not convince anyone else to go. So this will also somewhat make up for that.

And while I watch a lot of stuff at home, I definitely go to see at least one movie a month, on average and sometimes more. Don’t forget that the urban areas in California had closed theaters longer than other parts of the country and even when they reopened, only allowed partial seats to be sold - which is why I missed WW’87 and to this day have not seen it, as I am hoping it will come back to a theater (The Batpatinson is about to play a local theater next week (one night only), as is Tenant in two weeks at another, both movies I missed that I’d like to see on a big screen - I will miss one due to a dinner meeting I cannot postpone, but I might go see the other.

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Yeah I live in California too, so I’m familiar with that. I think a side effect of the pandemic is I don’t feel the itch to go to the movies as much as I used to.

Good point on hearing the John Williams music on loud speakers. One thing I’ve always wanted to do is attend a live orchestra performance of that. Maybe one day :slightly_smiling_face:

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Good to see some other proud Superboy Round Robin voters out here in the wild! It looks like they’re not doing a third year of Round Robin, which I think is probably wise, but I liked the first two years of comics, and if Blue Beetle wasn’t for me, that’s fine! I hope it finds its audience!

I hope when you get a chance, you’ll share your thoughts on Superboy and Lost here!

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Some cool news! The Superman: Birthright sequel is finally announced, starting in July! Called “The Last Days of Lex Luthor”, it’s about Superman trying to save Lex Luthor. I’m actually really curious about this storyline, as I think it could have a lot of unexpected depth! Plus, Birthright is my absolute favorite Superman origin story! And Bryan Hitch has so much goodwill from me for his beautiful work on Hawkman.

I do think it’s…a bit questionable to launch two Teen Titans/Titans books at the same time. Especially when I wish they’d let Jeremy Adams do a Superkids book instead…

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@millernumber1

Just read Superman Lost #2, and thought it was wonderful.

  • The “breathing” theme was quite powerful. It really hit me early on when Lois had to remind Clark to breath because he’s so accustomed to holding his breath in space for the past 20 years. I mean ouch; the need to get re-accustomed with something so simple. The theme kept repeating throughout the issue, with what happened on the alien ship (those little guys were funny), the ravaged planet, and Clark building the makeshift liquid oxygen tank for space travel. I thought it was a cool way to connect the present with the past.

  • What’s with the recurring lasso panel? Wasn’t sure what to read into that. Does it just represent him thinking of the moment he had to let go, or is there something deeper there?

  • Lois saying “I know whose fault it was”. What do you mean Lois? Penny for your thoughts!

  • I kinda want to learn more about “Kansas”. I wouldn’t mind reading a series based on that world, with “Victor” and the “Mud People”. Have a feeling I’ll be saying that about many of these worlds Clark will be visiting.

  • Love the art. Pagulayan is officially on my radar.

If this was a trade, I know I wouldn’t be able to put it down until I was finished. Really really loving it.

On a separate note, I haven’t read Superboy yet, but I will be. I voted for it, after all!

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Great news! Gotta go back and re-read Birthright before July.

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All the stuff about “breath” is really cool - I’ll have to reread it as a repeated element - thanks for highlighting that!

Priest loves to think about HOW things happen, rather than always relying on the rule of cool. He loves cool things a much as the next guy, but he also thinks it’s cool thinking about what it actually would be LIKE to be Superman, stuck in space for 20 years!

I am hopeful that the lasso flashbacks will become more important - it’s so rich with symbolism as it is - the lasso being truth, and also his lifeline to everything he loves.

Lois is clearly mad, but we’re still a bit in the dark about why. And I think it’s really interesting that Priest continues to follow up about the car full of money from the first issue! Nothing throwaway here!

The structure of this series reminds me of one of my other all time favorite Superman stories - Up in the Sky - where Superman goes on another space odyssey, and has so many adventures I’d love to know more about as well! Priest and King are going to make me a DC cosmic fan yet!

Pagulayan was actually how I discovered Priest! I fell in love with his amazing Batman and Robin Eternal covers (Batman & Robin Eternal particularly issues #13 and #23), and followed him over to Deathstroke in Rebirth, and I fell completely under Priest’s spell! :slight_smile:

Same! Best origin! :slight_smile: DC UNIVERSE INFINITE

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Just read Superboy: The Man of Tomorrow #1 and… it was alright! It hasn’t fully hooked me yet, but it’s only the first issue. There was enough cool stuff in there to show some promise. To start, it leaned on the tried and true method of: When you don’t know what to do with a member of the Super Family, send them to space! And there were a lot of nice DC space references here. The Khunds were name-dropped and the Dominators acted as the antagonists which leant some Legion of Superheroes credentials to this story. The Dominator clone soldiers were also interesting. 101 seemed to be a Kalonorian hybrid while 103 resembled a Durlan hybrid. The appearance of The Cosmoteers at the end sets up a philosophical battle between killing vs. showing mercy. I liked the Star Trek uniforms The Cosmoteers were rocking and one of them appeared to be a Xudarian. So, there were definitely some cool elements and references in this issue that show promise. It was also great to see Conner showing off some of that classic swagger and referencing his Tactile Telekinesis (drink every time he mentions it) like in the old days. Since this was a frame-setting issue, there wasn’t enough to fully convince me that this will be great, but there was enough to make me optimistic.

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Superman: The Movie on the big screen is absolutely worth the trip, good sir.

Trust me, I’m embarking on trip #4 next Tuesday. :wink:

On-deck in my reading at-bat: Superboy: The Man of Tomorrow #1 and Superman: Lost #1.

The Last Days of Lex Luthor sounds good…as does Waid’s other upcoming mini, World’s Finest: Teen Titans.

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Oh I know. Objectively speaking of course it is. It’s one of the greatest movies ever made.

I hope my personal reduced interest in theaters didn’t make me come across otherwise.

Enjoy the show :slightly_smiling_face:

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I couldn’t agree more!

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Nah, of course not. You do you, mon frere. :slight_smile:

Should you change your mind however, there are theaters in CA I can vouch for that are playing STM next Tuesday (and for only $5 a ticket).

leaves the Superman-flavored catnip dangling as he returns to work

Thank you, fellow :superman:uper-fan. I shall indeed.

This viewing won’t be in laser 4K or Dolby Atmos like my third go-around (the best of the bunch, so far) was, but it will still kick ample amounts of presentation booty all the same.

When the opening credits whoosh over you in a giant, sold-out, Atmos-enabled theater, its pure and absolute :superman:uper-Heaven.

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As much as I love Superman and Superman II (they’d both make my admittedly weird list of favorite movies of all-time), like @moro, I also wouldn’t pay to see them in theaters. I don’t care enough about the theater atmosphere/experience to feel like it’s worth the money, but I appreciate why others do.

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Okay, Superman: Lost #1… so, like I said, I have mixed feelings about Priest. Like with my favorite creator Grant Morrison, I appreciate the risks Priest takes with his stories. However, unlike my favorite creator Grant Morrison, I’m not always convinced that those risks pay off. There was some of that here.

For example, Priest, in his current form, has become a bit obsessed with writing his dialogue in a way that models how people ACTUALLY talk. The problem with this is that reading a conversation isn’t the same as hearing it. Hearing/seeing a conversation irl gives you things like voice intonation, speech pace/pattern, and change in facial expression that add meaning to the words that are actually spoken. You don’t get that reading dialogue off a comic page. So, when Priest does this, his dialogue becomes a bit more dense to read through and you may have to slow down/ go back to get full meaning. Sometimes there is sufficient pay-off to this like when he did it in his Black Adam series with the character of Malik White. Malik’s speech pattern introduced readers to a dialect they may not have a chance to run into day-to-day and makes a statement about code switching when you compare how Malik speaks in some contexts than he does in others. I consider this a good use of realistic dialogue because it adds something to the story that wouldn’t have otherwise been there.

In contrast, Lost #1 contained a dialogue between Clark and Lois in their kitchen that felt needlessly realistic. What I mean was, it was complexly structured like a real, fast-paced conversation between spouses, but that made it dense and clunky to read off the page. This was a piece of exposition dialogue, so it being engineered in this way didn’t add much to the plot or the themes than it would have if it had been presented in a more straight-forward way. Therefore, it was kind of obnoxious in the same way that Bendis’ dialogue is, sometimes, kind of obnoxious. Anyway, I’m trying to point out that I see the art in what Priest does, but I’m not always sure it pays off more than it hurts his story flow. This felt like a good example.

Overall, though, I really liked this first issue. The theme that really made me enamored with this issue was the concept of, what I would call, “ego death.” Priest quotes Kierkegaard to explain that this is a concept of losing one’s sense of self, losing the image of who you think you are. This is exemplified by the reference to the Senator who is forced to resign in shame over a scandal. One day, he proudly sees himself as an important politician, the next he is a public pariah who will have a hard time showing his face. To some, including Kierkegaard, ego death is worse than physical death since losing your sense of self makes life less fulfilling while physical death merely end it. This is heavy, heady stuff and it’s not every week that a superhero comic references Soren Kierkegaard, so this is what sold me on the story. I’m hoping that this theme gets fully explored throughout the Lost series.

Another stray thought: The concept of a superhero getting sucked into a space warp and losing time is reminiscent of Priest’s Justice League: Task Force character Triumph. It’s not exactly the same but it does make me wonder if Triumph somehow inspired this story.

Anyway, so far, so good! I hope Priest keeps it up!

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Even at only five bucks?

Come on, you’d fork out a fiver. :wink:

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In this economy???

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Superman doesn’t like cheapskates. :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

Kidding, of course. :slight_smile:

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