Guess Stern missed a memo.
'The Batman' was what most people called him in the 70s and pre-Crisis 80s.

The two part domestic abuse storyline that comes right before Death of Superman is.....charged but I like to think it handles things in a sensitive way. There are some problems that Superman can't just brute force. Sometimes a friend is needed.

Superman, The Man of Steel #16 (October 1992)



"Hard Knocks" (Crisis At Hand, Part 1)

Script: Louise Simonson
Pencils: Jon Bogdanove (layouts); Dennis Janke (finishes)
Inks: Dennis Janke
Colors: Glenn Whitmore
Letters: Bill Oakley

Grade: A


And here it is, the story that inevitably had to be told and which has the potential to be the pinnacle of everything this Superman Office is striving to achieve.

I don't just mean that Clark's neighbor, Andrea, has been hanging around in the background for over three years now, nor that the abuse she has been enduring was teased recently in both STMOS #14 and Adventures of Superman #493. Instead, consider that some of the greatest strengths of this office are:

1. Interpersonal relationships and side characters with meaningful development
2. Emphasis on Clark as the center of the Superman character and on problems that can't be solved with powers alone.
3. Tackling real-world social issues
4. Strong continuity

So developing a background character like Andrea, using her abusive relationship as a contrast to the healthy exemplar of Clark and Lois, creating a socially relevant crisis for Superman that he absolutely cannot use his powers to stop, and pulling inspiration from Superman's VERY first appearance all at the same time


from Action Comics #1


this issue

seems both like a stroke of genius and like an inevitable story that had to happen sooner or later. And, while I personally would have handed it to anyone other than this office's weakest writing and penciling team, Weezy and Boggy manage to do a great job with it, anyway.



Personally, I would have given this to Dan Jurgens as one of his poignant and socially relevent annual Christmas stories, but I give Carlin and the team credit for making this into a two parter across two titles instead. Whatever else can be said about Carlin's alleged issues with women, this was a bold move from his office



especially in realistically depicting a battered woman who doesn't want saving,



but it also answers an essential question about this Post-Crisis Superman. Ever since we were first given clues that Clark's next door neighbor was being abused, I've been asking where the heck his super hearing has been. It seems absurd that Superman, of all people, could fail to note what's happening. I'd hoped the Superman Office would turn that into a message about how we all choose not to see what's happening around us, but Simonson takes a different route, instead exploring the larger issue of how a morally righteous man who can hear EVERYTHING manages to maintain his sanity at all:



Though, by the end of the story, these boundaries are up for renegotiation:




I truly worry. There's been a disconnect between Simonson and the rest of the writers from day one, and inconsistencies across multi-part stories have been widespread as a result. I truly want to see someone bring a satisfying conclusion to the interpersonal journey Simonson has laid down for Clark, here. I hope that's what we'll get next issue.


Important Details:

1. The spousal abuse incident from Action Comics #1 is still in continuity and happened about a week after Clark publicly became Superman, though the details have changed.



Please note that this is not Andrea and her husband, but rather a similar event Clark experienced years earlier.


2. This is now the second time in two issues that events from the Pre-Crisis are said to have still happened in Post-Crisis continuity, something this office has never done prior to last week!


3. During his first week as Superman, Clark was overextending himself in an effort to help everyone until The Kents helped him set some boundaries for his own sanity.






Minor Details:

1. While Superman's long-time address of 344 Clinton Street has already been reaffirmed in the Post Crisis continuity, this is the first time we are shown that Brown Blvd. is the cross-street. Is this a nod to someone?




2. Speaking of nods, I enjoyed this one to Phyllis Coates:



There have been multiple moves as of late (and largely in this title) to acknowledge Superman's rich history outside of comics, including both the Adventures of Superman television series of the 1950s and the Fleischer cartoons of the 1940s.


3. Boggy is getting better (or at least his blunders are getting masked better by Janke's inks) but he still has major issues with consistent proportions.




4. I absolutely cannot get enough of the chemistry between Clark and Lois, especially when it feels believable. I may not enjoy the "Babe" this and "Babe" that going on, but I really like how realistically Simonson makes Clark's powers a meaningful part of their exchanges.



Of course, if he can hear Jay Leno's monologue several floors up and through external walls, then why the hell couldn't he hear Andrea getting annihilated next door?


5. I also love the contrast drawn between Clark and Lois' relationship and that of Andrea and her husband.



I think I've mentioned here before that Clark and Lois' relationship really helped shape my expectations for a romantic partner and for myself in a romantic relationship while at a critically impressionable age. Kids needed this message.


6. This kid, totally unrelated to the main plot, ended up making for the most poignant part of the story.



Too bad that, in a story that resounds so hard with realness, Simonson had to take this route with it:



And, seriously? This was the best face Boggy could draw?





Weezy and Boggy still have their flaws and remain my least favorite part of this Superman Office, but (a few odd moments aside) they did incredibly well on this one.

The second part is honestly something I think sticks the landing

Superman #72 (October 1992)



"Rage" (Crisis At Hand, Part 2)

Script: Dan Jurgens
Pencils: Dan Jurgens (layouts); Brad Vancata (finishes)
Inks: Brad Vancata
Colors: Glenn Whitmore
Letters: John Costanza


Grade: A++


In spite of my fears last issue, this one certainly did not fail in bringing "Crisis At Hand" to a powerful close. Inevitably, Dan Jurgens was the right person with whom to entrust this story. For three years now, he's been using Superman Christmas stories to advance awareness of social issues, and the stories/messages have always been powerful and memorable. But this one is bigger than a stand-alone holiday tale, tying directly into Superman's origin/development as a hero three full months before we'll be seeing any mention of Christmas in these pages. Here, Jurgens shows us how a tragic miscalculation from Superman's past forced him to start using his head in addition to his fists:



as well as the importance of trusting the system and not taking matters into his own hands:



In some ways, this is very similar to what Jurgens did with his 1991 Christmas story, "Face To Face With Yesterday", where a poor decision on young Clark's part results in our seeing his moral compass begin to develop on panel:




It's powerful and utterly human to show Clark repeatedly faced with difficult decisions, failing to make the right call, and developing as a hero in response. Jurgens may not be my favorite writer in this office, but in these moments I think he gets Superman best.

And I can't help but think this whole thing was Jurgens' baby. Everything that happened last issue was setup to get us to this point in which Clark knows he can't get involved in the domestic abuse occurring next door, but also knows he can't sit by and do nothing. it also gives Jurgens space to finally show us the end result of that early adventure in which he tried to threaten an abusive husband into leaving his wife alone:



Holy geez is that a powerful scene.

And so is what happens here, where the final moral seems to be that you can't get involved until the abused wants you to:



but then it's incredibly significant that it's Clark and Lois, two ordinary neighbors (and not Superman), that get involved and do something about it:



It's a powerful call to action for us all, and it doesn't shy away from the muddy complexities of such a situation either:





Heck, Jurgens even takes a page to explore the husband's perspective with serious realism:



How far we've come in this moment from the simplicity of that minor episode in Action Comics #1:




Brad Vancata is an up-and-comer at this point. From what I can tell, he'd only done a smattering of coloring for Marvel and inking for DC by this point, but Jurgens and/or Carlin let him do finishing art AND inks, and it really really works, right from the first page.



And even Glen Whitmore seems to get the importance of this story and turns in possibly his most striking work yet at the start of this story, where Clark is lost and in darkness, but Pa Kent help him gain insight just as the dawn approaches:



Just...wow.


Even Simonson managed to maintain consistency with someone else's story for once, as almost everything Jurgens writes here is an accurate summation of Simonson's script last issue:



...except the kids last issue definitely didn't look "hysterical" to me:



Oh well. Everything else lined up.



Important Details:

1. Clark and Superman's first meetings with Inspector Henderson both occurred as a result of the murder of the abused wife roughly a week into his dual career as Superman and reporter for the Daily Planet.




2. That murder taught Superman to use his brain more than his fists and to prioritize the law over his own sense of right and wrong.



Minor Details:

1. Okay, so for three years now, I've been tracking the appearances of Clark's neighbor, Andrea, who the writers seemed to have big plans for and then abruptly forgot about until she resurfaced recently, but a lot more than Andrea's appearance has changed in that time.

Andrea three years ago:


from Adventures of Superman #457


Andrea now:


from Adventures of Superman #493


Back then, Andrea was implied to be single, and the letters page was strongly hinting she was a potential future love interest for Clark. Here, she has adolescent children, suggesting she's been married for well over a decade. More significantly, her full name (as of Adventures of Superman #465) was Andrea McElroy, but here her husband's last name is Johnson, and there's just no way that guy would have allowed his wife to keep her maiden name. So have Carlin and the writers just been careless, or is this an entirely different neighbor at this point?


2. Once again, I can't get enough of Clark and Lois' relationship, especially as it realistically acknowledges how his powers affect their everyday life together:




3. And I absolutely cannot believe they brought back this running gag from ages back:



"Six-fifty" was a running joke that began in Action Comics #650 in which an alien driving a cab on the cover proclaims, "That'll be six-fifty, pal", presumably in honor of the anniversary issue number. It was then the exact cab fare in these stories countless times afterward, regardless of destination, until the cover price went up to a dollar and so, as a final joke, the cab fare went up as well. Only in the Superman Office is such attention paid to past continuity that a flashback inevitably has to incorporate an old and long-since-forgotten running gag in the office.

Just checked: six issues 'til Doomsday...