I read the Superman: The Man of Steel vol. 7 TPB reprinting Superman #13-15, Adventures of Superman #436-438, and Action Comics #596-597, picking up where I left off on Superman reading a few weeks back. I've read most of these issues before, but not Superman #15 and maybe not Adventures of Superman #438 either.

With the departure of Marv Wolfman and John Byrne taking over as scripter and co-plotter (along with Jerry Ordway adding co-plotting to his penciling chores) the three titles are a lot more integrated. In addition, Action stories here drawn into ongoing plot lines whereas previous issues tended to be more of self-contained one-offs. Part of this is no doubt because all the Superman crossovers to Millennium are contained here.

Superman #13 features the post-Crisis Toyman and an homage to the Avengers (the British TV series, not the other one). We get a nice bit of subplot slow burn as Luthor complains in pain in his hand. Luthor out-thinks Superman though, because a warning from Superman is probably what clues Lex into the need to capture the Toyman. The Millennium tie-in is at the end of the issue when Manhunter agent Lana Lang attempts to expose Clark as Superman. I used to think it was a plot-induced coincidence that Clark wasn't wearing his costume under his clothes, but now I've read a previous issue where Superman's super-speed costume change involves putting on his costume. So it's established that sometimes he's not wearing it. Over in the other Super-titles, we then get a story of long-term Manhunter infiltration of Smallville which manages to thread the needle between allowing Supes to have a high profile Manhunter agent, while allowing Lana to be a human and be redeemed from her brainwashing. It's an interesting story, allowing I don't get why there would be the massive monitoring operation directed at a Kryptonian with no action taken until now. Ordway's art is much improved over earlier issues.

Superman #14 is a like an Action Comics issue, as it has a Supes/Hal Jordan GL team-up versus the Highmaster as part of the Millennium storyline, while Action #597 is more of a Superman issue as despite an ostensible Lois Lane/Lana Lang "team-up," it's really just the aftermath of the Smallville situation as a vehicle for exploring elements of the supporting cast, Clark's backstory, and personal subplots. In the middle is a supposed Millennium crossover, although the framing sequence of Lex Luthor inviting Celia Windward of the chosen humans from Millennium is really just a pretext to revisit the Gangbuster subplot. As Celia is Jamaican-British, is the last name Windward a sly reference to the Windrush Generation? Credit to Byrne for continuing existing Adventures subplots (Gangbuster, Lex Corp's experiments on young gang members, etc.) instead of just dumping them when he took over. The tragedy of Gangbuster, as he reaps the consequences of superheroing being a tough job for a sudden amateur pursuit, but I don't think the issues gimmicks of points of view gets the payoff that was intended. The point of Luthor's version of events is muddled, and what's the point of a point of view when he acknowledges it's just a hypothetical he invented.

Action #597 features inks by Leonard Starr and Keith Williams. I'm guessing Williams inks the backgrounds as credited in prior issues when Byrne himself and Williams split inking duties. Starr gives the people a softer romance comic type feel that a marked changes from other issues of the Superman titles. Lana is on to the bizarre coincidences involving Superman, Lana, Clark, Smallville, and aliens. Lois comes right out and asks if Clark is Superman. Ma and Pa Ken show to try to salvage the situation with a cover story that the raised Superman alongside Clark, but that complex lie arguably makes things worse. It contradicts Clark's story that although he knows Superman and sometimes collaborates with him, they're not particularly close. It also shows a lack of confidence by everyone is Lois that they are a lie that still closely connects Superman with the Kents and is so hard to maintain, just to have her keep believing Superman isn't Clark himself. Sometimes I wonder how people really would react in these strange comic book scenarios. Lois is angry and thinks Clark and Superman just gave away stories to her. I'm guessing she would be angry at being lied to, but I'm not sure I think the rest is the most probable scenario. Why would she assume she didn't earn her stories? After all, if Clark isn't Superman, he can't be everywhere at once. Also, as a driven reporter, Lois might have grudging admiration for how Clark supposedly protected a source and got great stories however he could.

Superman #15 is a story that continues the subplot of Maggie Sawyer's runaway daughter and mixes a creepy villain who is part Fagin and part bat named Skyhook. I'm not sure that she's ever shown up again. Maggie is divorced and her husband in Star City had sole custody before their daughter ran away. In a metafictional moment, Superman's thought balloons acknowledge that this subplot is a bit of a Cat Grant retread, but he also points out the difference. We also get a flashback that explains a lot of Maggie's backstory. I think there might have been slight hints that Maggie is a lesbian in a prior issue. Here, without stating it explicitly, Byrne's depiction of Byrne's backstory makes it obvious to just about any adult reader that Maggie is a lesbian. It's indirect enough that many kids may have missed it (or just been confused about how Maggie has to "comes to terms with myself"). As much as Byrne gets knocked (often with cause) for his political incorrectness, this seems a daring sympathetic story to tell in a comic marketed to kids in the late 80s. We get some ominous hints that all might not ends well with the daughter, Jamie Sawyer, even after she's rescued. I'm dying to know if anything ever came of that.

Adventures #438 features Clark, Jimmy, Cat, and Cat's son visiting the circus, so it turns Cat hasn't been written out despite hints at the end of Wolfman's run. We get the first bits of post-Crisis Braniac in the form of circus mentalist Milton Fine. He has visions of an alien from the planet Colu named Vril Dox. There's an unreliable narrator issue here, so I think it's left intentional ambiguous whether there really is an alien intelligence at work or if the post-Crisis Braniac is going to be totally different. I don't think I've read this issue before, but I did read one from a year or two later when Milton Fine shows up again. As a kid, I was used to the very cool robotic Braniac who I knew mostly from Super Powers (the toy and the cartoon), so Fine seemed lame by comparison. But I'll admit this issue manages to get a lot of ominous tension and creepiness out of the reimagining.

 

I've been reading some of the First run of Nexus, which I find really interesting. I've read it in bits and pieces forever, but haven't sat down and run a chunk until now. I'm wondering what people think is the best era...I think Rude's art soars in the early Dark Horse mini series (Origin, Alien Justice) but I can't recall how the stories read. There doesn't seem to be a consensus on what stories are the best, which I think speaks to how sttange the series is overall...

“Sins Past” is just stupid. Norman Osborne is a domineering, tyrannical wreck of a man who bullies Harry. And somehow, Gwen Stacy is turned on by the father who is treating her friend Harry very badly.

It only works if it’s a different universe where there’s people who look like Norman Osborne and Gwen Stacy and have the same names, but have completely different personalities.

And yet Norman did have moments when he was "normal" and a functioning member of society (not to mention a successful businessman). In his non-Goblin persona he was a bullish, domineering sociopath, yes, but he could also be smoothly charming. Plus, it's not like bullish sociopaths don't sometimes attract young impressionable women -- that actually happens with disappointing regularity, in my experience.

The affair is very much shown in "Sins Past" to be a surprising and tremendously ill-judged one-time indiscretion on Gwen's part, when she was emotionally vulnerable...and something that she bitterly regretted. Such things do, of course, happen in real life.

Plus, as I said earlier, Gwen's upbringing by a much older father, surrounded by his older male friends as she was growing up may have made her more comfortable with the idea of older men as objects of attraction (just my personal fan theory there, of course).

Something I am curious about though, Hoosier, is have you read "Sins Past"? I think a lot of folks who dismiss it out of hand haven't actually read it. I think it's one of those things where the big headline -- Norman Osborn f*cked Gwen Stacy!!! Reader's childhood ruined! -- sounds worse than it actually is in the context of the story. In fact, that revelation about Gwen and Norman isn't the main thrust of the story at all: it's much more about how Peter deals with these two superpowered kids that Gwen had who now want to kill him because they blame him for their mother's death (thanks to Osborn's brainwashing). And as I say, it's so well written and drawn, I find it hard to fathom why folks dislike the storyline so much.

Anyway, I'm not on a crusade to win hearts and minds over "Sins Past"; it annoys a lot of folk, I get that. But personally, I think that it's a really well told and very gripping story.

Sins Past is not available from the library. So I got it from comixology. I’ll be reading it over the next few days.

The first 20 issues or so are the best. Some of the Dark Horse minis from the 90's are also worth reading.

Crusher Creel! He loves life! He knows that every moment of life is pure joy!