Post-Crisis Superman

[The Laughing Fish]

Am I the only who gets the impression that Post-Crisis Superman is underappreciated these days? Am I wrong to question if it was ever appreciated at all? I'm asking because of all the fuss and the debate I've seen people arguing how Superman should be presented over the years. Not just in film but it seems in all media.

I understand when John Byrne wrote his Man of Steel mini-series back in 1986, some fans took issue with how Superman was depowered and faced with dilemmas to make him grounded in some sort of realism. I suppose some thought it made the stories boring, and simply didn't like it from an subjective point of view. But I prefer a story like MOS, Hunter/Prey and so on, than a lot of the Silver Age stuff. I find it more fascinating reading how Superman faces personal problems and crises that show him in a more humane light, rather than the flawless protector image people look at him.

For example, when Clark outs himself in public for the first time when rescuing the crashing space plane carrying Lois - shortly before he had created the Superman costume and persona -, he felt overwhelmed by the attention and expectations of everybody, and feared how his life would be affected because of it. Of course, his parents' help in creating the secret identity gave him a sense of normality and put his mind at ease so he can live both lives as Clark and Superman. But the point is, Clark felt some trepidation over the idea of becoming this celebrity, or a "God" who can solve all the world's ills. Compare this to a comic you may see in - say, the 1950s - it's definitely a change for Clark to experience some sort of existentialist problem. To sum it up, it reminds me of a line that stood out in one of the STAS episodes: "I am Clark. I need to be Clark. I'll go crazy if I have to be Superman all the time".

But perhaps this sort of story isn't really appreciated well by people who see the character as a fairy tale. Some critics dismiss it from an ideological point of view. For instance, this particular blog took issue with a lot of creative choices made by Byrne for MOS. Specifically, the blogger projects his experience as a migrant in America as an allegory of other migrants pledging their allegiance to the country and belittling where they come from.

http://www.comicscube.com/2011/08/why-i-cant-stand-john-byrnes-superman.html

Personally, I don't buy the blogger's assessment over Superman "not honouring his Kryptonian heritage". I don't see how that happened at all. When Jor-El's ghost telepathically linked to Superman and taught him everything about Krypton, it's quite clear the final page of the series showed Clark feeling grateful for discovering his true origins. He didn't disown Krypton. It's just that his gratitude for living on Earth is much stronger because that was his adopted home – the only place he ever grew to know intimately. Never mind the fact that it was the Kents - NOT Jor-El like in movie adaptations - that helped shape Clark's identity as Superman, as well as the fact Clark didn't learn anything about Krypton until several years after he became Superman. While I can understand how one's self-loathing of their heritage in the real world may encourage casual racism, that's not what Man of Steel was about.

By the way, you got to love the parallels between Byrne's mini-series and Snyder's DCEU films:

The conception of Kal-El's birth in the birthing matrix compared to the animating glyph of the infant during Lara giving birth.


The AI following around - Kelor and Kelex.


The reference to the mountain top in Tibet to Clark seeking refuge following the Capitol bombin in BvS.


As a matter of fact, I recommend checking out this Twitter account showing more Post-Crisis and Earth One references in MOS and BvS:

https://twitter.com/zack_know

[thecolorsblend]

The Post-Crisis Superman has had certain staying power. Lex Luthor as a business tycoon? Lois as an Army brat? Both Kent parents surviving into Clark's adult years? A cold, aloof Krypton? That stuff all came from Byrne's MOS. And a lot of it has really stuck around.

Still, I do consider DC Post-Crisis in general and MOS in particular to be a kind of sad, unacknowledged defeat for DC. It was the moment when DC stopped trying to be DC and started trying to be Marvel. Arguably, DC has never truly recovered from that decision.

As for MOS, there are some creative decisions Byrne made that I adore and some other ones that I really disagree with. Since DC insisted that Byrne reboot the character, I have no choice but to look for the good in what he did. And there is plenty of good. And a lot of GREAT.

He made Superman less mythic in certain ways. I don't see how that's a controversial statement. MOS just doesn't have the same mythic resonance that the Pre-Crisis Superman had. In its place is Clark portrayed as a fairly relatable everyman, though different in most ways from Peter Parker. This Clark had dreams he wants to come true rather than personal struggles to overcome.

That's good for maintaining a month-to-month audience but I think history can be a cruel mistress sometimes. This Superman isn't as fondly remembered in part because it doesn't strive to make Superman a Big American Mythic Hero. In grounding Superman, his powers, his world and his supporting cast, Byrne did much to humanize him. But by definition, that means making him less iconic and mythic in a lot of ways.

It is a trade-off. And it's a great era for Superman, imo.

As a matter of fact (though not to change the subject), I'm a lot more furious about Alan Moore's Whatever Happened To The Man Of Tomorrow? than I could EVER be about Byrne's MOS.

Side note: It seems clear that DC regards this as a mistake. On at least two separate occasions, they tried deleting Byrne's concepts from continuity before force-feeding Infinite Crisis down readers' throats. It's rare for DC to admit a mistake. It's rarer still for fan backlash to stop them (twice). Superman's history from 1986 to 2006 is actually a kind of fascinating story.

[The Laughing Fish]

As a matter of fact (though not to change the subject), I'm a lot more furious about Alan Moore's Whatever Happened To The Man Of Tomorrow? than I could EVER be about Byrne's MOS.

I've never understood the appeal over that story by Alan Moore. It's so bleak than a lot of people care to admit, and Superman relinquishing his powers because he killed a maniacal Mr Mxyzptlk never sat well with me. Sure, on one hand, Superman upholds his belief that killing is wrong and doesn't try to cop out. But on the other hand, if you think about it too much, this would only give alien warlords like Mongul and Darkseid the encouragement to attack the Earth now its greatest champion is gone.

I just look at that story as Superman's equivalent to a Marvel "What If..." scenario, and leave it at that.

[The Dark Knight]

He made Superman less mythic in certain ways. I don't see how that's a controversial statement. MOS just doesn't have the same mythic resonance that the Pre-Crisis Superman had. In its place is Clark portrayed as a fairly relatable everyman, though different in most ways from Peter Parker. This Clark had dreams he wants to come true rather than personal struggles to overcome.

That's good for maintaining a month-to-month audience but I think history can be a cruel mistress sometimes. This Superman isn't as fondly remembered in part because it doesn't strive to make Superman a Big American Mythic Hero. In grounding Superman, his powers, his world and his supporting cast, Byrne did much to humanize him. But by definition, that means making him less iconic and mythic in a lot of ways.

It is a trade-off. And it's a great era for Superman, imo.

The STAS/Byrne approach is my preferred interpretation of the character. I think he works best this way, in terms of creating ongoing storylines and making the character more interesting. One of my first experiences with the character was the Mad Scientist episode, with Superman punching the beam. He never gave up despite being pushed back numerous times. That's the kind of stuff I like to see, rather than lifting massive islands into space ala Superman Returns. Snyder captured Superman really well in the sense he had Superman admired as a mythic deity in parts (the Day of the Dead crowd, the extended arm during the flood) but he also grounded his mythic status with media hounding and self doubt. That's the way a character should be - three dimensional. Otherwise we're left with a mascot, an idea and a caricature, rather than a character. That has been the problem for so long now. Superman should be a hero, but if he is not challenged the brand becomes stale and predictable. I think the recent Rebirth comics went a long way in establishing how Superman should be by highlighting his country boy, family man roots. In terms of Superman being an American Mythic Hero, I place that at the top of the tree.

[The Joker]

The funny thing about Crisis on Infinite Earths, which brought about Post-Crisis Superman, is that it was intended as a complete reboot for the entire DC Comics universe. Which turned out to be anything but. Why's that? Evidently, not everyone at DC Comics wanted to play ball, and absolutely refused to do away with decades worth of continuity, despite the COIE storyline being implemented in the first place to do just that. Now was COIE necessary? Not really. Talk of reboots was not really a thing back in 1984/1985, and despite DC believing their continuity was too "confusing" for new readers, this notion could have been easily remedied by simply not using their alternate earth's/characters for an extended period of time. In addition to this, John Byrne could have been brought in to give Superman not a reboot, but a new direction. As he was a very popular creator at the time, and this would have been not unlike Dennis O'Neil/Neal Adams on Batman, Frank Miller on Daredevil, ect.

Course we know how this course of action turned out. Superman and Wonder Woman received hard reboots. Batman? Not so much. Flash continued on with Wally West as the Flash, and not Barry Allen. From what I understand, it took years for some Flash readers to really accept Barry was gone. Green Lantern and Aquaman I am not too sure about. I can only assume their books were fairly mediocre until "Emerald Twilight" with GL, and Peter David began writing Aquaman. Hawkman turned into an absolute mess due to the aforementioned continuity problems. ect. I don't think it was even 10 years following COIE that another DC event titled "Zero Hour" was created in order to clean up the mess left over by COIE, which in turned created more problems with Post-Crisis history being wiped out and/or retconned.

With Post-Crisis Superman, I think there was a lot of good that came out of his era. Although I like the whimsical/fantastical Pre-Crisis Superman books, I tend to gravitate more towards the more grounded Post-Crisis approach that Byrne brought forward during the Man of Steel miniseries back in 1986. Not to mention the Post-Crisis version certainly had it's influential appeal on Superman outside of comics during the 1990s with the Lois & Clark tv show, along with Superman TAS, of course. And as a kid growing up in that time, Post-Crisis Superman was basically "my" Superman. I believe another reason why this particular version continues to endure and influence, is that the guys like Dan Jurgens/Jerry Ordway, ect who came on following Byrne's run, essentially stayed the course and didn't go nuts with wanting to retcon everything Byrne's regime created. Which as a reader, I appreciated. No. That kind of thinking really started taking hold during the late 1990's, where creators continually wanted to do "their" version, and put "their" stamp on the character, and it's been, as far as I can tell over the years, detrimental to the character ever since. Exactly how many origins have we've gotten since the early-mid 2000's anyways? That kind of inconsistency in origin/character/continuity just breeds apathy.

Still waiting on that John Byrne Superman Omnibus.

[thecolorsblend]

The funny thing about Crisis on Infinite Earths, which brought about Post-Crisis Superman, is that it was intended as a complete reboot for the entire DC Comics universe.

Not really. The purpose of Crisis on Infinite Earths was to eliminate the multiverse because The Powers That Were thought all those alternate Earths were a turnoff to newbies.

Some titles (such as Superman, Wonder Woman and, to a lesser degree, Batman) used the occasion to launch reboots. But those were a byproduct of Crisis. The main purpose of the series was to merge all the alternate earths into one universe.

Since we're talking about Post-Crisis Superman though, I largely enjoy Byrne's reboot. However, the one major alteration Byrne made that I disagree with is subtracting Superboy from Superman's history. For one thing, this again made the character less mythic.

But for two, deleting Superboy from continuity really screwed things up for the Legion Of Super-Heroes. My view is that the Legion STILL hasn't recovered from losing Superboy as their inspiration. And at this point, I don't think the Legion ever will recover.

[The Joker]

Not really. The purpose of Crisis on Infinite Earths was to eliminate the multiverse because The Powers That Were thought all those alternate Earths were a turnoff to newbies.

Some titles (such as Superman, Wonder Woman and, to a lesser degree, Batman) used the occasion to launch reboots. But those were a byproduct of Crisis. The main purpose of the series was to merge all the alternate earths into one universe.

Per John Byrne's website:

Some time in the early 1980s -- I can't pinpoint the exact date, but I do recall that I was attending a convention in Atlanta -- DC's then-EiC Dick Giordano approached me about writing and drawing something that had the working title "The History of the DC Universe". This was proposed as a 12 issue "maxi-series" which would use the first 11 issues to lay out all the established DC lore, doing the best that could be done to shuffle all the conflicting details into some kind of cohesive whole, Then, in the 12th issue, everything would "blow up" due to some terrible cosmic catastrophe, and the next month all the DC books would "restart" with first issues.

I had another reason for declining. As I told Dick, I had a reputation for knowing all the minutia of the DC and Marvel universes, but what I really knew was the phone numbers of Roger Stern and Peter Sanderson!
So the project went elsewhere, and turned into CRISIS. The truly bizarre thing was that DC seemed unwilling to let go of the original idea, tho, and so did THE HISTORY OF THE DC UNIVERSE, but after CRISIS!

The real problem with CRISIS is that it was not what it was claimed to be: a house cleaning. There were too many middle-aged fanboys involved, at all levels, for the broom to truly sweep clean. The only way for CRISIS to have truly "worked" would have been if NONE of the Golden Age characters survived into the "new" universe. Barry Allen was the only Flash, and always had been. Hal Jordan was the only Green Lantern. Ray Palmer the only Atom. Etc, etc.

But no one at DC was prepared to do that. Hell, this was the mindset, after all, that wanted to list the Superman of MAN OF STEEL in WHO'S WHO as "Superman III". Talk about not getting it!!

I don't know, considering John Byrne's comments, it sure sounds like DC intended Crisis to be a complete reboot, but got cold feet and was then unwilling to implement such a bold arrangement due to not everyone at DC being on board with a absolute "clean slate" (similar to every other DC reboot we've had over the subsequent years). Resulting in the one condensed universe thing. John Byrne complied. George Perez complied. Batman? Not so much. Flash? Not so much. Green Lantern? Not so much. Hawkman? Sorta, but then got hilariously mired in confusionville. ect.

Crisis was doomed to fail right from the jump due to the people working on the books not having the stones to fully implement the intended reboot. We've seen this time and time again, but if the company doesn't have the commitment to really grab that new broom and sweep clean, bits and pieces of the old continuity hang on. As story and character elements will, ultimately, continue to be peppered in that depend on what came before.

I think Byrne said it best when he once mentioned that, following Crisis, DC Comics really needed somebody with the mania and iron hand to make what Crisis was intended to be. This was really a time when DC could have used their very own Jim Shooter!

[thecolorsblend]

Not really. The purpose of Crisis on Infinite Earths was to eliminate the multiverse because The Powers That Were thought all those alternate Earths were a turnoff to newbies.

Some titles (such as Superman, Wonder Woman and, to a lesser degree, Batman) used the occasion to launch reboots. But those were a byproduct of Crisis. The main purpose of the series was to merge all the alternate earths into one universe.

Per John Byrne's website:

Some time in the early 1980s -- I can't pinpoint the exact date, but I do recall that I was attending a convention in Atlanta -- DC's then-EiC Dick Giordano approached me about writing and drawing something that had the working title "The History of the DC Universe". This was proposed as a 12 issue "maxi-series" which would use the first 11 issues to lay out all the established DC lore, doing the best that could be done to shuffle all the conflicting details into some kind of cohesive whole, Then, in the 12th issue, everything would "blow up" due to some terrible cosmic catastrophe, and the next month all the DC books would "restart" with first issues.

I had another reason for declining. As I told Dick, I had a reputation for knowing all the minutia of the DC and Marvel universes, but what I really knew was the phone numbers of Roger Stern and Peter Sanderson!
So the project went elsewhere, and turned into CRISIS. The truly bizarre thing was that DC seemed unwilling to let go of the original idea, tho, and so did THE HISTORY OF THE DC UNIVERSE, but after CRISIS!

The real problem with CRISIS is that it was not what it was claimed to be: a house cleaning. There were too many middle-aged fanboys involved, at all levels, for the broom to truly sweep clean. The only way for CRISIS to have truly "worked" would have been if NONE of the Golden Age characters survived into the "new" universe. Barry Allen was the only Flash, and always had been. Hal Jordan was the only Green Lantern. Ray Palmer the only Atom. Etc, etc.

But no one at DC was prepared to do that. Hell, this was the mindset, after all, that wanted to list the Superman of MAN OF STEEL in WHO'S WHO as "Superman III". Talk about not getting it!!

I don't know, considering John Byrne's comments, it sure sounds like DC intended Crisis to be a complete reboot, but got cold feet and was then unwilling to implement such a bold arrangement due to not everyone at DC being on board with a absolute "clean slate" (similar to every other DC reboot we've had over the subsequent years). Resulting in the one condensed universe thing. John Byrne complied. George Perez complied. Batman? Not so much. Flash? Not so much. Green Lantern? Not so much. Hawkman? Sorta, but then got hilariously mired in confusionville. ect.

Crisis was doomed to fail right from the jump due to the people working on the books not having the stones to fully implement the intended reboot. We've seen this time and time again, but if the company doesn't have the commitment to really grab that new broom and sweep clean, bits and pieces of the old continuity hang on. As story and character elements will, ultimately, continue to be peppered in that depend on what came before.

I think Byrne said it best when he once mentioned that, following Crisis, DC Comics really needed somebody with the mania and iron hand to make what Crisis was intended to be. This was really a time when DC could have used their very own Jim Shooter!

"In the beginning there was only one. A single black infinitude ... so cold and dark for so very long ... that even the burning light was imperceptible. But the light grew, and the infinitude shuddered ... and the darkness finally ... screamed, as much in pain as in relief. For in that instant, a multiverse was born. A multiverse of worlds vibrating and replicating ... and a multiverse that should have been one, became many."

That bit of editorialization comes from Absolute Crisis. That's a pretty specific mission statement right there.

"I am actually not a fan of overarching continuity, and Crisis was partially conceived to wipe that all out and start fresh."
- Marv Wolfman, https://www.villagevoice.com/2011/08/31/marv-wolfman-on-whats-got-to-die-for-a-new-dc-world-to-live

Wolfman admits that reboot potential is self-evident but that's not the primary goal of Crisis.

"Writers like to complicate matters, and what began as a dream of a story—'Flash of Two Worlds'—had turned into a nightmare."
- Marv Wolfman, http://imagetext.english.ufl.edu/archives/v6_2/friedenthal

Still, the bigger imperative was the continuity snafus created by the multiverse. I'm not saying nobody was considering a reboot. Clearly that would've been Wolfman's preference on at least some things.

I'm just saying the primary motivator was nullifying the multiverse.

There's a strong argument that with the lessons learned from Crisis, DC should've known to use Zero Hour in 1994 for a line-wide, page 1 reboot. But then, they'd just finished up the Doomsday stuff with Superman and the Knightfall stuff with Batman so I can understand if there was no appetite for a line-wide reboot at that time.

Honestly, it seems like DC prefers retcons to reboots. When you think about it, reboots are a bit of a rarity in DC's publication history. Their preference is always to keep the stuff that's selling well while monkeying with everything else. It just creates problems.

Frankly though, these days I don't think continuity is the biggest problem facing DC. I think their problems are much bigger than that today.

[The Joker]

Yeah, I would say the entire industry itself has quite a few problems these days.

With Crisis, I'll go with what Wolfman states. Clearly, Byrne was only offered, in the very early stages, of what eventually became Crisis, and can only comment on what DC intentions were going in. By the time it got to Wolfman/Perez, evidently plans changed. Or at the very least, pulled back from what it was supposed to be. Which isn't at all surprising considering DC Comics publication history.

Personally, I think DC's problem is that they want it both ways. "Fresh" starts, but also keeping all the story and character elements that depend on what came before. Ultimately working against any initiative they want to implement in the first place. During the New52 deal, I vaguely remember reading somewhere that "The Death of Superman" story line happened, but not in the way we read... Yeah, that's outstanding stuff. Same goes for Green Lantern arcs like "Sinestro Corps War", and "Blackest Night". Where character's involved don't even exist in the New52, or in some cases, are not even the same person anymore. But these story lines still happened in Green Lantern's New52 history!

If there was ever going to be a company wide reboot, Crisis was it. Miller with Batman. Byrne with Superman. Perez with Wonder Woman. You got the trinity covered and in capable hands from the start. Unfortunately, DC was unwilling to pull the trigger on the original concept, and we got what we got. Zero Hour was bad timing, as I agree that DC rebooting following the then-recent story lines like "Death of Superman", and "Knightfall" just wasn't going to be in the cards. Plus, ZH was simply intended as a cleaning up of continuity problems aroused from Crisis anyways as far as I know. New52? Same deal. Doing away with Geoff Johns' work on Green Lantern, and Grant Morrison's work on Batman clearly was definitely not going to happen.

Rinse. Repeat. Same result.

[thecolorsblend]

Seriously. There was a point when everybody was crowding my balls about reading that Rebirth Superman thing. And it's like, if they don't restore the Bronze Age Superman or the Post-Crisis Superman... no. I'm not going for it. John Byrne was accorded a special honor by getting a chance to start totally fresh with Superman.

These days though, rebooting (retconning, really) Superman is considered practically a rite of passage for anybody who aspires to be a big name.

Anyway. So Rebirth Superman. To my understanding, it's not exactly Byrne's Superman. There are similarities. But his history is different, the particulars of relationship with Lois are different, all that. And that's not good enough.

If DC wants my business (which is a dumb thing to say because they obviously don't), either they can restore the Bronze Age Superman or they can restore the Post-Crisis Superman.  But I'm done with all these cheap retcons that will be history two years from now anyway.

What made the Post-Crisis Superman unique for me is that he had a clear and unambiguous starting point. Everything you need to know about him starts with MOS #01 and goes forward from there. No fuss, no muss.