Wow, that's some serious bland art there, especially Angstrom. His head looks too small for his massive body. Why bother giving him hair at all if that's the best that it's going to look?

Did Superman break his wrist to force him into dropping Sam Lane? That's what it looks like happening in that panel.

And what's up with the all the same color green? The drug dealer is wearing a green jacket/vest. The Intergang members are wearing the same green suit. Lois' mom's green dress.

I usually respect Lois' reasons for not dating Luthor but Jeb Friedman makes the cut instead? Okay, I would not have seen that happening.

The premise of this issue gives Bogdanove a nice pass since Angstrom is constantly changing/mutating. Lousy drawing can easily be dismissed as a further mutation.




I have to admit I didn't catch that.



Yes. It's obvious Simonson is just looking to create tension in Lois and Clark's relationship, but it feels so forced.

Updated to include 1992...

A Breakdown of the Changing Creative Teams and Editorial Policies that Shaped the Post-Crisis Superman

By 1989 (and likely earlier), annual "Super Summits" were being held in which editor and creative teams would work together to shape the coming year's worth of Superman stories. During these summits, policies and visions were shaped, and sometimes old policies and visions were scrapped entirely. Here's my best understanding of how those visions and policies looked from year to year:

1986-1987: The Initial Relaunch

The original concept for the Superman reboot came from Frank Miller and Steve Gerber and envisioned a depowered Superman, some of the more fantastic elements of the mythos (for example: Superboy) being removed from continuity, and Lex Luthor as a business tycoon. Marv Wolfman fought hard to get on the project but knew that DC wanted a bigger powerhouse creative talent on the book, so he recommended John Byrne. Wolfman and editor Andrew Helfer shared the original pitched vision for a Superman reboot (source: Amazing Heroes #96, 1986), but Byrne, a longtime Superman fan, wanted the campier/more fantastic elements back in continuity. Thus, while the initial emphasis is on a depowered/less perfect Superman facing depowered, less fantastic enemies, Byrne begins reintroducing those more fantastic elements (including Mxyzptlk and a Pocket Universe Superboy) by the fall of 1987.

At this point, Superman is the core title, written and drawn by Byrne, while Wolfman and Jerry Ordway control Adventures of Superman, and Action Comics is a Byrne-controlled team-up title. Wolfman does not seem allowed to utilize Lex Luthor in his stories.

A drastic ideological difference develops between Byrne's and Wolfman's handling of Superman. Wolfman tries to "depower" Superman by placing him in morally and existentially difficult circumstances, where Byrne tries more to "depower" him by depicting Superman as having the personality of an average person -- quick to anger, succumb to temptations, and make mistakes, and also falling into decidedly un-heroic situations. The Action Comics storyline in which Superman and Barda fall under the hypnotic spell of a pornographer is practically infamous today and turned many fans away from the Post-Crisis Superman that Byrne was writing.



1988: The Byrne Implosion

1988 is a year of massive shake-ups for the Superman Office. It begins without Marv Wolfman, leaving presumably due to creative differences with John Byrne, who is increasingly shaping the franchise to suit his own vision. Editor Andrew Helfer soon follows suit, replaced with Mike Carlin. Byrne introduces a series of limited runs throughout 1988 (World of Krypton, World of Smallville, World of Metropolis) that further flesh out his vision of the Post-Crisis Superman Universe and culminates the year with the arrival of the Pocket Universe Supergirl, as well as the controversial moment in which Superman executes the rogue Kryptonians who destroyed the Pocket Universe Earth. In June, Byrne loses control of Action Comics in favor of the Action Comics Weekly experiment. Byrne then departs (seemingly abruptly) in the Fall, claiming that DC was constraining him too much.



1989: The Clean-up Year

The remaining people in the Superman office -- fill-in writer Roger Stern, Adventures of Superman co-plotter and artist Jerry Ordway, and new editor Mike Carlin -- shift from following Byrne's vision to suddenly having to cultivate one of their own. After playing out Byrne's intended direction for Superman in the wake of his execution of the rogue Kryptonians, the Superman Office spend four months attempting to restrategize while Superman (literally) wanders aimlessly in space, ultimately reorganizing for the second half of 1989 with George Perez as lead creator, and Roger Stern and Jerry Ordway plotting beside him, while Dan Jurgens and Kerry Gammill handle penciling chores. After taking on Mogul and Warworld, Superman returns to Earth to coincide with Action Comics reverting to a monthly Superman book. The titles are reorganized so that Action Comics focuses on Superman's adventures, The Superman title gives greater emphasis to the supporting cast and Superman's life as Clark Kent, and Adventures of Superman focuses on Superman's Kryptonian heritage.

Most of the emphasis throughout 1989 is on cleaning up and completing old Byrne plot points still left hanging. But, most importantly, Perez pushes for a return to Superman's more classic characterization (which Stern and Ordway had already been subtly working at) and reverses the original idea of keeping the more fantastic Pre-Crisis elements out of Post-Crisis continuity. We get a Fortress of Solitude, Red Kryptonite, several homages to Pre-Crisis storylines, and a clear acknowledgement that this Superman has been as much the patriarch of the DC superheroes as his Pre-Crisis counterpart.

Unfortunately, Perez's involvement in the new direction quickly downshifts from lead creator to marginal contributor, both due to over-commitment on other projects and health issues. As a result, Dan Jurgens is soon upgraded to writer/penciler and comes into his own beside Ordway and Stern.



1990: New Directions and Multi-Title Crossovers

1990 marks yet another restructuring of the Superman titles as the previous narrow focuses imposed by George Perez are now lifted, allowing for multi-part story arcs regularly sweeping across all three titles. In addition, with most of Byrne's old storylines resolved, the franchise begins moving in bold new directions, including two major deaths and the quick acceleration of Clark and Lois' relationship into territory the Pre-Crisis couple never arrived at. Additionally, the tense relationship between Batman and Superman, established in Dark Knight Returns and supported by both the Batman and Superman offices, gets undone with the Dark Knight over Metropolis storyline.



1991: The Year-Long Event

Publishing numbers were up, and the reformed Superman Office under Ordway, Stern, and Jurgens was now packing some serious clout. Thus, in 1991, they took the ambition that had already brought them such success in 1990 and went bigger. 1991 was laid out as one single year-long, (initially) 36-part story, beginning immediately after the death of Lex Luthor and ending with the introduction of Lex Luthor II. Inbetween was the story of what happens to Metropolis without its evil benefactor, and possibly an over-arching conflict in which Intergang slowly moved in to seize control over the city.

Unfortunately, the Superman Office's new success was also its undoing in 1991. As DC continued to lose ground to Marvel, the Superman Office was twice called upon to quickly change course in an effort to compete. The first of these abrupt changes was the release of a fourth monthly title in order to keep pace with Spider-Man's fourth title, introduced in late 1990, that had generated tremendous sales and success for the company. The letter columns didn't even have a working name for this fourth title until just before its release. Ordway, Stern, and Jurgens thus had to scramble to adapt an intended 36-part story into a 42-part story with a fourth writer at the table.

At the same time, DC was looking at Marvel's Annual crossover events and tapping Dan Jurgens to help create one for DC. There's some evidence to suggest that Armageddon 2001 was actually the original idea for Time and Time Again, one of the only two major events to come out of the Superman Office in 1991. What made it to the page instead for Time and Time Again was a hastily considered, badly executed half-idea. From that moment on, 1991 seemed to consist of rushed, half-considered concepts as the four writers at the helm struggled to maintain alignment with each other, catch up on deadlines after presumably having to re-plot Time and Time Again, losing much of Jurgens' time to Armageddon 2001 (twice -- the second issue had to be re-plotted after the ending was leaked), and completely changing the overall shape of the year with the introduction of a fourth title helmed by two creators who didn't know the office very well.

As a result, "1991" never really hits a stride. The Intergang plot gets rushed, and what we get in its place are a lot of forgettable stand-alone stories and entirely too much spent on Ma and Pa Kent's vacation cruise. The talent and ideas are still there, but the execution stumbles.



1992: Panic in the Sales Department

After a year of adjustments, the Superman Office was ready to make 1992 its strongest year yet, firing off with the major Panic in the Sky inter-title event, taking Lex Luthor II and Matrix Supergirl in exciting new directions, and finally leaving each title some space to develop new stories and conclude old plot points on their own (a freedom they hadn't enjoyed since mid 1990). However, a lot had changed since 1990, and the Superman office soon learned the hard way that a major inter-title event was not enough to trigger a boost in sales and readership in an age of polybagged, foil-embossed covers, of hyper speculation, and in which Image (and soon Valiant) was waging a revolution against the old guard of publishing. Thus, likely in response to Panic in the Sky's disappointing sales, a major change of course is planned for the winter and the subsequent year involving the death of Superman.

(this post will be updated as my reviews progress past 1992 )

Superman: The Man of Steel #5 (November 1991)



"The Curse of the Atomic Skull"

Script: Louise Simonson
Pencils: Curt Swan and Jon Bogdanove
Inks: Dennis Janke
Colors: Glenn Whitmore
Letters: Bill Oakley

Grade: C-

The visual concept for this one is quite fun. The villain believes he is a hero in an old movie serial, so the book is published horizontally, with one side being what happens in the serial (drawn by Swan), and one side being what is actually happening in Superman's world (drawn by Bogdanove). It's quite visually striking:



though it definitely wears thin as the story progresses. The movie serial is neither particularly compelling nor especially important to the plot, so I found myself speed-reading through it, just trying to get back to the main plot.

Beyond the unique visuals, what becomes immediately apparent is that there was some sort of miscommunication in the DC Office this time around. This otherwise extremely tight-run office has been making blunders left and right in 1991, and the worst of them seem to happen with Simonson, the new guy (gal) on the block. This time around, she has a very different idea of what happened last week in Action Comics #670 than we do. We saw Superman first encounter The Atomic Skull at the very end of the issue. Simonson thinks they had a whole previous battle:



In fact, Lois and the police seem to already know all about The Skull within seconds of their first (brief) encounter, once again reiterating the idea that there'd been some previous battle we never saw:



Beyond that, Simonson falls into many of the same blunders I noted in her previous issue:

1. Laziness. The last bad guy she invented was a well-meaning guy named Joe who becomes radioactive at STAR Labs. This bad guy is a well-meaning guy named Joe whose powers first activate at STAR Labs. To make it worse, Action #670 explicitly told us that his powers come from his unique genetic make-up, but here Simonson has him radioactive too!




2. Pacing and over-explaining. Once again, ordinary, non-powered people are having complex thoughts about abstract problems when they should be panicking and wondering if they're about to die:




3. Convenience. This conflict should have been resolved in five seconds. Even Lois notes this:



as does Superman:



and increasingly stupid things have to happen to keep it going:



The second fastest person in the DCU, possessing super fast mental processing, as well as super fast reflexes, as well as super hearing, can't stop in time to avoid hitting a truck he didn't see??


4. Horrible logic lapses, especially involving radiation. In Simonson's last issue, Lois chose to get this close to a radioactive mutant whose radiation levels were posing a threat to the entire city without any medical repercussions whatsoever:



This issue, she gets on a bike with a villain that Superman clearly notes was experiencing significant radioactive decay:



and then Professor Hamilton goes on to haphazardly handle a nuclear control rod (which has presumably already absorbed radioactivity from whatever it was previously being used for) without a protective mask:



which he immediately figured out would stop The Atomic Skull while inexplicably knowing the nature of his powers within (literally) seconds of Superman conveniently stumbling across him and the wreckage of STAR Labs while battling the Skull, AND Professor Hamilton knows exactly where to find a nuclear carbon rod amidst the wreckage:



(Note: in all the cleanup we saw last week in Action #670 no one was wearing hazmat suits!)

Finally, Superman's solution of bending the control rod around the Atomic Skull's head doesn't crush his skull in once his powers dissipate:



...and he somehow now has hair again. Don't try to tell me it was just a visual illusion or anything either. We literally saw his hair fall out in Action #670.



At this point, I feel like Simonson is wasting my time. Whereas the other three Superman titles reward me for diligently paying attention to what they are doing, Simonson feels like the teacher who repeatedly forgets to prepare a lesson plan. Just sit there and nod; don't ask questions.



As for Bogdanove, I have to admit his art improved dramatically this issue. In addition to these horrendous panels (cue that Benny Hill theme again):










we get a few truly beautiful/striking ones as well, most memorably this:



He seems to be having fun with the format of this particular issue. I hope to see more of this from him. Honestly, I can handle bad art, and I can handle bad writing, but getting both together on the first four issues of this title were soul-deadening. Simonson's writing may be getting worse, but at least the art is sometimes pleasing now.


Important Details:

In the letters page, Carlin finally provides his vision/explanation for the four inter-locking Superman titles functioning as one:



I like it, and I mostly agree.

(though I would caution him that the rise in sales is an artificial boost stemming from Man of Steel #1)



Minor Details:

1. Joe Martin, the Post-Crisis Atomic Skull, is cured by a nuclear control rod.

2. Nice homage to the Rocketeer, which had been in theaters only eight months earlier:

Adventures of Superman #484 (November 1991)



"Blackout"
Script: Dennis Janke (plot); Jerry Ordway (plot, script)
Pencils: Tom Grummett
Inks: Doug Hazlewood
Colors: Glenn Whitmore
Letters: Albert DeGuzman

Grade: D+

It's been a haphazard year for the usually meticulously-planned Superman Office, but whether the craziness was due to the last minute introduction of a fourth title and new creative team, last minute involvement in the Armageddon 2001 event, last minute rewrites of the Armageddon 2001 event, creative team shuffling, or (likely) all of the above, Carlin's office is ready to bring it on home with a major event crossing over all four titles.

So what do we know about "Blackout" after the initial chapter? Not much. Metropolis has been blacked out and (presumably) so has Superman. We've seen Superman forget who he is and become someone else twice now over the past three years (Gangbuster and The Krypton Man), so I sincerely hope Ordway, Stern, Jergens, and Simonson have something different planned for us this time around.

I'm also hoping this mega event won't spend too much time on Mr. Z.

The Superman Office seemed to have three major goals for 1991 (perhaps one pitched by each writer): Deal with the fallout from Luthor's death and set up the intoduction of Lex Luthor II, develop and complicate Clark and Lois' relationship as fiances, and introduce some new villains for Superman, most prominently Mr. Z.

Mr. Z was introduced in the very first Superman comic of 1991, created by Ordway, and was intended to be a sort of enigma that would leave us craving more. He then showed up again three months later in 1940s Nazi Germany (another issue written by Ordway) during the Time and Time Again event which, again, was intended to make us crave more information. Personally, I was just annoyed to see a forgettable villain demanding more attention from us. He had a diamond that could trap people in it and, apparently, hadn't aged since at least the 1940s. That wasn't enough to entice me. And now, here he is again, eight months later, in another Ordway story, and I couldn't care less:



And some questions about him are finally answered:

1. Why does he trap people in his crystal?
Because he gets lonely

2. Why was he alive in the 1940s?
Apparently, he is immortal, and this has nothing to do with the crystal and the people it captures.

Both really disappointing answers for a character who was already pretty disappointing and only had mystery going for him. I guess we still don't know why he's immortal or how he got the crystal, but I can't say I care either.


As for the story itself, it's pretty bad. Ordway is usually my favorite writer of the bunch; he captures the humanity of characters and juggles multiple plotlines so effortlessly (heck, he lays them all out for us on the front page of The Daily Star at the start of this issue:



but the plot of this issue is just so thoroughly idiotic. Professor Hamilton is preparing a helmet for Superman that will enable him to see what a satellite above his Fortress of Solitude sees via a video screen. It's probably "Ham"'s least impressive invention to date in that real technology in 1991 could have done this, and it's not even practical for Superman. Somehow, with Superman coming over to test it the next day, "Ham" was going to have it miniaturized into a headset by then. Instead, Mr. Z shows up, inexplicably brainwashes "Ham", and that's when things REALLY get screwy. Somehow, Mr. Z assumes that Ham can reprogram the thing to see into Superman's brain and show his thoughts through the view window of the helmet within 24 hours and while brainwashed, and (of course), "Ham" does.



This makes zero sense.

We also learn that the reprogrammed helmet renders Superman helpless and obedient to the commands of whoever holds the remote control. Note that Mr. Z presses no buttons to make Superman do things. Simply holding the control is enough:



If a writer had tried this crap in the 1940s, I would have called b.s., and it stinks far worse in a Copper Age story.

I at least give Ordway and Janke credit for once again considering the real-world toll that superhero shenanigans take on a city. This office has explored that many times throughout this year, and watching the entire city blackout in response to a daring gambit by "Ham" to stop Mr. Z feels almost authentic enough to make up for the nonsensical plot:



Of course, this reminds me that the early Byrne run depicted Metropolis as being technologically advanced to the point of seeming futuristic thanks to Lexcorp innovations. We've moved further and further from that vision, and so the idea of an aging power grid that can topple so easily seems accurate to the real world but divorced from the Metropolis Byrne initially gave us.


It's a problematic story in most respects, but we still don't really know what the central focus of "Blackout" is going to be just yet, and, with four more chapters to go, it can certainly redeem itself after this rough start.



Minor Details:

- Ordway's means of further developing the Clark and Lois relationship in this issue consists of Lois constantly being reminded that Clark has super powers.



Scenes like this would have made perfect sense a few months ago, but Lois has known Clark's secret since February, and if one month in our world equals one week in Superman's world, then she's still known for nine weeks by this point. Sure seems like she'd be used to his abilities by now.


- Ordway finally suggests that Professor Hamilton has a budget to consider when creating his wild inventions for Superman.



...but this then begs the question: whose budget. Is STAR Labs funding this work, is Superman funding this work, or is Emil paying for it himself out of the kindness of his heart? In an office in which every minor character gets a backstory and the inner workings and labor relations of the Daily Planet are a central focus, an office in which we consider things like power supply and collateral damage, it sure seems that the question of how "Ham" funds these projects should have been answered by now.


- We're not done running the Big Belly Burger gag into the ground yet:



In fact, a letter writer asks in this very issue if the Big Belly Burger mascot is supposed to be John Byrne. Dan Thorsland maintains it's Andy Helfer. I was ready to call foul on this as I was sure the resemblance between Byrne and the mascot was unmistakable


John Byrne:




Big Belly Burger Mascot:




whereas Helfer looks like this:




but I was fortunate enough to find a younger picture of Helfer, circa 1980, via Todd Klein's blog, in which Helfer looks like this:



so I'll concede defeat on this one.

I can see that. The Thaddeus Killgrave theory is particularly brilliant, and this may hold water as well. Could also be that, in the Superman Office's desperate gambit to find a fill-in villain for Luthor, they correctly determined that the most important quality of the Post-Crisis Luthor is his ability to remain composed while standing toe-to-toe with Superman and sure that he is still the one in control. Whereas Lex comes from a scientific and business background and represents the modern world, Mr. Z is the Lex Luthor of the old world (Europe, as well as the mystical and unexplained). Except that he ends up going down way too easily.



It might make more sense when considering that this is the first Mr. Z appearance not written by Ordway, perhaps. Maybe Stern was as sick of Ordway thrusting this guy on us as we were.



Exactly.




The only way I can find to justify it is that Mr. Z outright stated in the previous issue that the reason he captured souls was out of loneliness. Perhaps this is how he interacted with the souls he'd imprisoned.



That would make beautiful sense if the two scenes had occurred in the same issue. Extended over two issues, it's far easier to forget the first scene, and you have to wonder if Ordway and Stern were going to purposefully coordinate such a thing across their two books, why not make it more obvious/deliberate?