SuperChat is Back With Superman’s Family and His New Friend… Lex Luthor?

A new day dawns, and Superman is facing all new challenges. Mainly, a little voice in his ear trying to lead him down a darker path. Lex Luthor has decided to ally himself  with Superman — but his help might be worse than his hindrance. Was this team-up doomed to failure from the start? We find out, in Superman #1, written by Joshua Williamson, drawn by Jamal Campbell and lettered by Ariana Maher.

In the meantime, the Super-Family is growing closer than ever — not that that helps them against a Kryptonite-powered,super strong cyborg. But wait, wasn’t Metallo hired by Luthor? Isn’t Luthor working with Superman now? There’s more than meets the eye in Action Comics #1,052, written by Phillip Kennedy Johnson, drawn by Rafa Sandoval, colored by Matt Herms, and lettered by Dave Sharpe.

The issue includes two back up stories – one following the adventures of a pre-Flashpoint Superman-in-hiding in “Home Again,” written by Dan Jurgens, drawn by Lee Weeks, colored by Elizabeth Breitweiser and lettered by Rob Leigh.

The other sees Power Girl continue to flex her new telepathic powers with her multiversal counterpart, Supergirl, in ‘Head Like a Whole,” written by Leah Williams, drawn by Marguerite Sauvage and lettered by Becca Carey.

Armaan Babu: Harsher, Tony. A sharp opening statement will impact our readers strongly, setting their expectations for a mean-mouthed review. Follow it up with strong personal feelings about the state of Superman comics in general, and then target important plot holes. 

Ignore the artwork for now; it is unassailably good.

We can tear Superman #1 down, but we need to work together on this.

Tony Thornley: Hush.

Armaan: No one hushes me! I’m sending Metallo after you now, just you wait.

What’s Old Is New Again (Superman #1)

Armaan: We begin, as we so often do, with Superman stopping an attack from Livewire. I kinda love Livewire as a stock opener villain — someone flashy to make the art pop, pissed-off enough at the world to contrast Superman’s calm, reassuring demeanor, but unthreatening enough for us to not be too invested in the fight. We can just focus on the new status quo, and in this case, it’s Lex’s backseat superheroing, trying to encourage Superman to be more brutally efficient. Emphasis on brutal.

Tony: Livewire is a great villain because she can be both a weenie opener villain and a longform threat. I was glad to see her in the opening here, because she can pop up again soon. She’s also a great counterpoint to Clark- the chaotic evil radio shockjock and famehog against the heroic neutral good crusader.

Armaan: I know I’m reading a comic about a man who can fly, but even so, my suspension of disbelief is being sorely tested here. Lex is arrogant, sure…but there is a history between the two. I get not wanting to dive too much into that history in a #1 comic designed to draw in as many new readers as possible — but talking to Superman like it’s Supes’ first day on the job feels odd to me. Especially since Livewire’s barely a threat to a nigh-invulnerable man with superspeed; Lex has to know that there’s no motivation for Superman to go brutal — or that Superman would never let innocent bystanders come to harm if he can help it.

This is a take that I think might work better if it was told in the early days of Superman’s career. If the two only barely knew each other. Maybe.

Tony: I like what we see here, but I think you’re absolutely right. It would be something that could work with the right tweaks. Leaning into their established relationship a lot more. But then you might be able to take that as Luthor’s arrogance. Of course, Lex knows how experienced Clark is, but he knows a better way, maybe? Even though Superman’s way has worked all this time.

Armaan: Here’s the other thing that bothers me about this storyline: we’re seeing Superman being pressured to do things we know he would never do. It’s exhausting when comics present empty stakes like that. At this moment, Lex is simply being annoying — and while that leads to a minor chuckle or two at some points, I have a feeling it may quickly wear thin.

I know, however, you enjoyed this issue a lot more than I did — tell us about that, Tony, bring back the light.

Tony: Story-wise I think a lot was derivative of past Superman stories, but there’s a ton to like. The Daily Planet scenes were fantastic. I like Williamson’s Clark Kent and Lois Lane, both as individuals and as a couple. And oh my hell, this art is fabulous. I know Campbell is not an artist that can do 12 issues a year, but they need to keep him as long as they can (and give him a complementary art partner for the issues he can’t do).

I mean, the way Campbell depicts Clark’s cape alone is fantastic.

Armaan: I do agree with you there. The art was such a joy. Such energy everywhere, and everything so dramatically lit. Every page is alive, and filled with joy — even the darker pages are just filled with over-the-top enough zeal to make the whole thing so much fun. The art paves over any problems I have with the writing. It’s bringing up my enjoyment levels of the comic so much — I feel it’s going to plummet when the art changes. 

I do kind of like the idea of a Supercorp, though. Not because I enjoy Superman being attached to a large corporation…but I actually really enjoy the idea of Superman working with a bunch of relatively ordinary people who have been inspired by him. More than Lex Luthor, I think there’s a lot of potential there, and I’m hoping that team gets more of a spotlight as the series goes on.

Tony: I like the idea, I don’t like the execution. Johnson is establishing Steelworks in Action Comics (Clark even references it in dialogue). Supercorp is a great idea, and looks to be not dissimilar to the Horizon Labs concept from Spider-Man or Stark Enterprises when writers really look at going fantastical with Iron Man. But why set up two competing super-science corporations?

The concept though? Mercy Graves as an ally is a fantastic concept, and Superman leading advancement and innovation is so cool. It’ll be a return to Superman the super-scientist from the Silver Age too. I’ll be very interested in seeing how both those aspects of the issue are used moving forward.

What did you think of the final page reveal? I think for me it made what you were saying about Luthor a lot easier to take. 

Armaan: That is it exactly. It’s what makes this hook a lot easier to swallow. Luthor’s using Superman to rid himself of Luthor’s enemies. It is utterly selfish, arrogant and kind of a devil’s bargain, which works a lot more for me. 

Also. It looks like we’re getting some more Bizzaro coming up. Me no love that useless uninteresting villain. Also the teases for stories coming up are showing some Superman stories that seem to be focusing more on the silliness than anything else. And you know what?

I can kind of get on board with that.

Tony: And a slightly different take on Parasite. I also love the idea that Luthor has these scary villains. It kind of positions him similarly to Doctor Doom, which was already a very apt comparison. Giving him creepy super-science villains makes it even more so!

Armaan: Luthor is a great villain. Luthor is no Doom. Talk to me when he gets a cape. 

It’s All About Family (Action Comics #1,052)

Armaan: This, I enjoyed a lot more, though I was confused for a little bit. We’ve been building up Lex Luthor as a villain in this series who blackmails Metallo into attacking Superman. Which…is heavily at odds with the Luthor we see in Superman #1. We get some clarification later in this issue, though — it’s implied that there’s something in Metallo that is only pretending to be Lex Luthor.

It doesn’t quite fit with the lead-up we’ve had, though, so I can’t help but wonder if this was a bit of a last minute change. If it’s not, then it’s been awkwardly done. 

That aside, though, I’m glad to see a Super-family being celebrated. We’re half a step away from this being a Wayne Family Adventures comic, and as far as I’m concerned that’s a plus. I also adore the coloring on this. Beautifully saturated, bright and bold, every page sings. I like the art during the action scenes, but not so much for the casual scenes for one reason: out of costume, it is really hard to tell who is who. And there’s a lot of the family just hanging about in the Kent home.

Tony: This is exactly what I like about what we’re seeing. This feels like a family that is full of in-jokes, that barbeque together on the weekends and have two different group texts going on at all times (one for conversation, one for memes). Jon calling Kara “Aunt Kara” is something that feels so Kent. There’s such depth to these dynamics too.

Conner and Jon are basically peers, which could send up an interesting friendly competitive relationship. Steel and Kara are the adults in the room. The Twins are still getting used to Earth (that panel of them sleeping on the floor was heartbreaking!). When you add the relationship between Power Girl and Supergirl in the back-up story, this could go on for such a long time. It makes me wish that we were getting this in the Batman family concurrently.

Armaan: You know what I appreciated the most in this comic? It’s a weird thing, but something about the toothbrushing scene really got to me. I feel like Sandoval could do a better job of individualizing faces, but he makes a home really feel like a home. There’s a certain feel to making yourself at home in a bathroom in a completely different country, especially at that age — which is what Osul and Otho are going through. There’s a coziness here. A sense of family that’s captured well. It’s a very simple but heartening skill.

I feel like for all that Phillip Kennedy Johnson just cannot let go of the Warworld stuff well past its time, his greatest strength is in making the Super-family feeling like family. Putting the heart into relationships between siblings, parents, cousin-likes (clones count as cousins) — even people who are just family friends from way (waaay) out of town.

Not to get all Fast & Furious on you, but this book really has all become about family. Right now we get cozy vibes only with such a large cast — I can’t help but wonder how much focus we’re going to get on individual characters as the series goes on, or is everyone going to feel a little lost in the crowd?

Tony: I mean, Conner, Jon and Steels are getting their own series in the coming months, so if they do get lost, they’re at least getting those. My concern is for Kara and Kenan, but maybe that just means they’re going to be at the forefront? But it’s weird Kara doesn’t have a series right now, right? I mean, Kara is one of those characters that DC should always have headlining a book, but seems to put on the backburner too often.

Armaan: Honestly, I worry Kenan and Kara-El (which one, d’you reckon, loves orange soda?) are going to be the ones taking a back seat. There’s a lot of ground to cover in Action Comics, especially considering that Johnson has some major Warworld lore he’s set up that he’s clearly not willing to let go of. I’m mostly done with Warworld whatnot, but as long as the Super-Family is involved, I’m okay being along for the ride.

Unless, of course, they get more focus in the back-ups. Speaking of which…

The Back-Ups!

Armaan: We have two back-ups here. One continuing a glimpse backwards into that odd little slice of continuity where pre-52 Superman and family were having secret adventures while the new-52 Superman flew around unawares — at least until both Supermen merged into a single canon. Comics!

I had a soft spot for that run. It scratched that part of my brain that was itching for aspects of a pre-Flashpoint world, and the part that deals with messy continuity without needing to go meta. It’s the series that was ultimately responsible, I believe, for cementing the idea of Superman as a dad, which I think is one of the best moves for Superman comics that have been done in years.

I also love the art here. It’s rough, and aged, especially with the coloring. It’s got adventure, and strangeness, and brings a sense of romance to them both. The story is pretty basic — Jon finds an alien woman from a somewhat militant planet, seeking the help of a Kryptonian, all while another man is turning into Doomsday — but the art brings me back to a time when stories like that didn’t just feel like random ideas chucked into a script just to keep the monthlies going on. Breitwiser’s sense of night time, and soft glows from alien energies that she fills the night with, all remind me of when comics filled me with a sense of wonder. 

It probably helps that our POV character is Jon, who’s currently around the same age I was when I was most deeply into discovering whatever fantastical stories I could get my hands on. 

Tony: I’m going to be blunt. I don’t like the flashback story. I have no problem with nostalgia and looking backwards. This just feels so slight and pointless though. It’s just filling in a gap that in my opinion doesn’t really need it, because it gets confusing. It’s not additive. 

Last issue, it seemed like it was meant to fill in the altered timeline, but the status quo points to the surviving Superman from Convergence instead. Beyond that, it’s also like we’ve said about Jon Kent as a kid- while we wish we didn’t move past that so quickly, we have. Let’s move forward.

But I don’t disagree that the art’s real good.

Armaan: The other story we have continues Power Girl’s strange new forays into telepathic therapy. This is…a dense comic, with a lot of ideas crammed in and not a lot of space for any of it to breathe. Normally, this is a major complaint for me…but the team behind this book makes it work, honestly, it’s just that at a glance the pages look like a lot to go through.

Leah Williams has weird ideas. And a great handle on bringing out the best of characters who have been around for ages but whose voices can get lost in the shadow of more popular ones. So far, I have consistently enjoyed the way she’s brought these things together over at Marvel, and it’s great to see her doing the same thing here. 

This issue, we see Power Girl help Supergirl out — both of them messes of continuity, Super-women of different origins with important overlaps. They’re multiversal sisters in a way, but Power Girl has never quite found a place in this world the way Kara has.

They have a lot to talk about. Which, given that Kara has somehow lost the ability to speak, would be a problem…but Power Girl has telepathy, now!

Tony: I love the hostile relationship between them. And why wouldn’t they be tense around each other- they’re the same person! It’s a wrinkle that adds to them both, and for me that’s a plus. You’re exactly right about this being an ideas story. Williams has some fantastic concepts, and she’s able to execute on them on a level that not a lot of writers are able to.

As far as the relationship between Kara and Karen, I hope after this particular chapter in Karen’s story ends, we see her join the main story. Kara is drowning in testosterone, and having a sister around would help her step to the forefront. Karen should be more involved with her family anyways, even if it is an alternate Earth.

Armaan: The art is gorgeous. There’s a softness, and a fanciness, to Marguerite Sauvage’s art; it is extremely pretty. Dainty, even, but with psychic landscapes there’s plenty of room to play with images that aren’t completely straightforward. It’s the colors that sing here, most of all. It’s a weird thing to say, but stay with me on this; there’s a kindness to Sauvage’s color choices.

Even at the height of Kara’s rage, we see more blues, pinks and whites than a traditional harsh red. Bright cheery greens after. A home in the real world with bright whites and pastel accents. For a back-up story about a more…direct form of therapy, the art here seems to be aiming to soothe, energize and refresh.

I also want to call out that despite looking nearly identical, I never once had any trouble distinguishing Kara from Karen, even in close-ups that cut most of their costumes from the panel. Sandoval could learn a thing or two!

Tony: Oh no kidding. This is a gorgeous looking story, and Sauvage is such a good character artist. She’s basically drawing sisters here, and she makes them feel like it. It’s not just in telling them apart, but the looks they give each other, the body language they have towards one another.

This story is one I want more of, especially in comparison to its sister story that preceded it.

Daily Planet Headlines

• As far as complementary artists to Campbell, if I was editing, I’d be hiring David Marquez.
• Think after one of these back-ups wraps up, we’ll see the Metropolis knights from early in the Infinite Frontier era? I think the new status quo would give at least some fodder for stories there. Hell, I could write three or four of them.
• With Power Girl wearing one of those S-shield jackets, why aren’t we seeing her in the primary story at all?
• Also where can we get those jackets. DC, please. Let us buy those jackets!
• Can’t wait for the Steelworks series, just for more John Henry and Nat!