![]() In the aftermath of Superman’s death, a few Superman “pretenders” cropped up in Metropolis, with varying success. And how did Superman come back from the dead? Underneath all the drama, though, it’s fair to admit that what happens is that a monster shows up and he and Superman punch each other to death. The two meet in the middle of the city, and with a mighty simultaneous punch that shatters windows for blocks around they battle each other into mutual defeat. ![]() Superman is the only force on Earth that can slow him down, and as the monster carves a swathe of destruction pointing directly to Metropolis, their showdown becomes inevitable. He dispatches the entire Justice League in minutes, punching Booster Gold so hard he flies into space. How Superman dies is actually pretty simple: A mysterious and terrible monster known only as Doomsday arrives on Earth, with the apparent goal of nothing but destroying everything in his path. How did Superman die? Image: Dan Jurgens, Brett Breeding/DC Comics If Superman couldn’t get married, he’d have to die. And writer Jerry Ordway made a joke - “Let’s just kill him.” - that became less and less funny and more and more plausible as Lois and Clark’s success pushed its wedding further and further into the future.įinally, DC editorial gave in. In the meantime, the comics had to do something instead of a wedding story - a year’s worth of planning had just been put on hold pending the eternity of a television production schedule. (It wouldn’t actually happen until 1997.) was developing a new Superman television series that would have the romance between Lois and Clark as its primary element, and the temptation of a simultaneous wedding between the comic book versions of the characters and the TV versions was too tempting. The 8 greatest Superman comics of all time Why the Man of Steel is more relevant than everīut their wedding wound up being editorially postponed for cross-corporate synergy. Clark proposed marriage to her, and then revealed that he was Superman. ![]() In an effort to halt that slide, editorial had upped the romance in the book, but with a bit of a twist - this time around, Lois found herself finally falling for Clark Kent instead of Superman. See, Superman hadn’t been selling particularly well in the early ’90s, since the departure of writer-artist John Byrne, who had successfully redefined the character for the modern era after the Crisis on Infinite Earths. ![]() hadn’t made Lois and Clark and a DC writer hadn’t made a joke. But why kill Superman?įun fact: Superman probably would not have died in 1992 if Warner Bros. The heel turn of Hal Jordan, the greatest of the Green Lanterns, into the fear-based villain Parallax, has its roots in the events of Death of Superman. Most of the new characters invented just for The Death of Superman and its follow ups are still prominent in the DCU today, and its reverberations were felt in completely different pillars of the setting. The aftermath of The Death of Superman was given enough time and space to really count, allowing the fallout from his absence to make a gigantic mark on DC continuity. Superman #75 gives full page spreads simply to Jimmy and Lois looking on in horror, or Ma and Pa Kent hugging desperately as they watch the live coverage on TV - until the reader gets to two, final double page spreads of Lois Lane cradling Superman’s lifeless body in the wreckage of his city, his tattered cape blowing like a flag of surrender from a nearby girder.Īnd DC’s creators didn’t stop there. ![]() In the final issue, Superman #75, Superman and Doomsday go mano-a-mano in downtown Metropolis in an entire issue composed only in full-page splash panels.ĭoomsday may have been slight, as a villain, but The Death of Superman succeeded by diving deep into what his death would mean for a DC Universe where he’d been beloved and depended on for years. The third-to-last comic in the arc had only three panels on each page the second-to-last, only two. But overall, it was a story that strove to be much more than a gimmick, in story and visuals.Īs Doomsday and Superman came closer to clashing, the reader’s window into the comics page literally got bigger. The Death of Superman was a 1992 crossover between DC Comics’ multiple Superman titles in which Superman tragically died saving Metropolis from an admittedly gimmicky space monster called Doomsday. Dan Jurgens, Bret Breeding, John Kalisz/DC Comics ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |