sign in sign up
<<
Home , Bizarro, Bizarro (Supergirl), Bob Smith (comics), Curt Swan, Daily Planet, Dave Gibbons

Read Ebook {PDF EPUB} Zone by 20 best Superman of all time. This early Superman is still a Super Liberal: deciding that society is to blame for juvenile delinquency he physically demolishes the slums of with his bare hands. City Hall rehouses the poor in “splendid housing conditions” and kids are no longer forced into crime. Problem solved – in twelve raw, primitive, socially-conscious pages. AR. 19. The Girl Who Didn’t Believe In Superman Writer: Artist: Run: Superman issue 96 (1955) Buy: Pick up Superman In The Fifties. Alice Norton won’t believe Superman exists unless she sees him with her own eyes. Only problem is: she’s blind. A charming little fable about faith, healing and growing up, which hints at the religious overtones of the Superman legend without rubbing our noses in it. AR. 18. Superman’s Return to Writer: Artist: Wayne Boring Run: Superman issue 141 (1960) Buy: Pick up Superman: The Greatest Stories Ever Told Vol 2. “The flames within the planet are like cold glaciers compared with the mighty love blazing between Superman of and Lyla Lerrol of Krypton…” Superman accidentally goes back in time, meets his parents, falls in love, knowing all along that the planet is doomed. Totally tragic melodrama, plus silly costumes and pink -breathing monsters AR. 17. : Man Of Writer: Artist: Lee Bermejo Run: Lex Luthor: Man Of Steel issue 1-5 (2005) Buy: Pick up Lex Luthor: Man Of Steel. Lex Luthor: Man Of Steel , or Luthor as it’s been rebranded in more recent collected editions, is a Superman story from the point of view of his greatest enemy. Brian Azzarello allows us to see the true logic of Lex Luthor as a political , and why Superman’s existence is such a destructive contradiction to his interpretation of the world; it’s a convincingly bleak look at the iconic character that is tonally very different to the other books on this list. Thankfully, this is a portrayal of the more effective scheming genius Lex Luthor as opposed to the snarling maniac in a green power suit, with Lee Bermejo’s hyper-detailed artwork bringing Superman down to our level in memorably cynical fashion. Also of note in this volume: Bruce Wayne’s appearance for a brief fight with Superman offers a fantastic, spot-on contrast between his Dark Knight and billionaire playboy personas. SR. 16. Meets Writer: Artist: Run: Superboy issue 80 (1960) Buy: Currently unavailable in collected form. Superman confides to Supergirl that his childhood was sad because he didn’t have a Superplaymate — so Kara goes back in time to visit him in back in . They playing hide and seek in the and “catch” with lunar satellites, and then she has to go home. Touching, magical, innocent…and sad. Like Peter Pan with X-Ray . AR. 15. The Old Man Of Metropolis Writer: Otto Binder Artist: Curt Swan Run: Comics issue 270 (1960) Buy: Pick up Presents Supergirl Vol 1 for £8.96 from Amazon.co.uk. What will the world we like when Supergirl grows up? Well, Lois will be a bitter old maid; Jimmy will have no time for his Superfriend; Superman will be a broken down has-been…And then the dog catcher will take off to the pound. OK, it turns out to be a dream, but it’s still the bleakest Superman story ever. AR. 14. Zone Writer: Steve Gerber Artist: Run: The issue 1-4 (1982) Buy: Pick up Superman Presents The Phantom Zone for £9.79 from Amazon.co.uk. A baffling bit of Jungian landscaping from the one of the oft-overlooked power duos of the late Silver Age, Steve Gerber and Gene Colan, bundles together all of the previous decade’s as they torment the ’s Charlie Kweeskill like spectres from the Phantom Zone. Poor Kweeskill sets into motion a chain of events that drags Superman into this hellish otherworld, while the Kryptonian villains unleash havok on earth. Last seen over a decade early, Kweeskill is in fact the wrongly imprisoned Kryptonian scientist Quex-Ul who has a pretty poor history in terms of being a dupe for more powerful villains. Fantastic Seventies sci-fi dreamscapes Colan, and spectacularly bleak and ponderous writing from Gerber make this a deranged classic that pre-empts for mining the obscure history of the Man of Steel. JH. 13. Superman For All Seasons Writer: Artist: Tim Sale Run: Superman For All Seasons issue 1-4 (1998) Buy: Pick up Superman Presents The Phantom Zone for £9.79 from Amazon.co.uk. An evocative and nostalgic sort-of origin story for , this gorgeous book essentially tracks Superman’s journey from a young man coming to grips with his to the fully-matured Man Of Steel, told across the four different seasons by the various people in his life. There’s an aching sense of longing to For All Seasons , particularly in its opening Smallville-set chapter, where Clark’s parents are contemplating their son’s finite days in his innocent country town bubble. While Jeph Loeb’s dialogue relays a strong and passionate knowledge of Superman’s cast of characters, it’s the extraordinary artwork by Tim Sale and colourist Bjarne Hansen that gives this a American Golden Age quality – undoubtedly some of the best Superman imagery you will ever see. A superb story that reaches all the major touchstones of the character’s DNA. SR. 12. The Amazing Story Of Superman Red And Superman Blue Writer : Artist: Curt Swan Run: Superman issue 162 (1963) Buy: Currently unavailable in collected form. Superman loves …but he also loves ; he is human…but he’s also Kryptonian. Solution: split him into two , who together defeat Lex Luther, abolish crime, find a solution to all known illnesses, return to full size, reconstitute Krypton, and live happily ever after. The sort of bonkers universe-bending yarn that “imaginary stories” were invented for. AR. 11. Superman Vs The Amazing Spider-Man Writer: Artist: Run: Superman vs The Amazing Spider-Man one-shot (1976) Buy: Pick up Superman Presents The Phantom Zone for £9.79 from Amazon.co.uk. The first, and best, Marvel/DC . No jiggery pokery about parallel worlds: just take it for granted that Supes and Spidey end up and the same conference. Cool to see Doctor Octopus and Lex Luther sharing a cell; cool to see Superman stopping a tsunami; but supercool to see Jonah Jameson and moaning about their staff. (“Clerk Kent…sounds like Peter Parker. Good but…unreliable.”) AR. 10. Must There Be A Superman? Writer: Elliot S Maggin Artist: Curt Swan Run: Superman issue 247 (1972) Buy: Pick up Superman: The Greatest Stories Ever Told for £9.59 from Amazon.co.uk. It’s easy to think of the deconstruction as something that entered comics with , but a decade earlier anxiety about changing American society had spilled over into the way that artists, writers and readers saw their superheroes. Playing with a theme that would later come to the fore with books like Kingdom Come, Elliot S Maggin and Curt Swan brought Superman before the Corps’ Guardians of Oa who accuse him of stunting mankind’s growth by making them dependent upon their all-powerful, all- seeing Kryptonian . Stung by their criticism, to Earth and brushes off several cries for help, telling a a group of immigrant workers protesting against their abusive treatment and living conditions that “What you really need is a super-will to be guardians of your own destiny.” It’s an uncomfortable prelude to the scroungers-vs-strivers self-sufficiency of the coming Reagan/Thatcher era, simultaneously showing the conflict at the heart of a character this powerful, and positioning as the ultimate moral arbiter. It’s hard to read the Superman in ’s Dark Knight Returns or ’s Red Son without thinking of Must There Be A Superman? JH. 9. World’s Finest Writer: Artist: Run: World’s Finest #1-#3 (1990) Buy: Pick up World’s Finest for £13.25 from Amazon.co.uk. A perfect primer to not just the world of Superman, but too, as Dave Gibbons – then well and truly in ascent thanks to and – accompanied by the evocative splash pages of Steve Rude ( Nexus , The ), bring something of an perspective to the Dark Knight Detective and the Man Of Steel, distilling them to their basic commonalities and differences as Lex Luthor heads to Gotham, and the causes chaos in Metropolis, forcing the DC Universe’s leading lights together for the first time. Once you see that incredible introduction showing night in Gotham just as the rises in Metropolis on the opposite close, a cloud of bats in the former and doves in the latter, while chases down a mugger and Superman stops a crashing bus, it’ll with you for the rest of your life. JH. 8. For The Man Who Has Everything Writer: Alan Moore Artist: Dave Gibbons Run: Superman Annual #11 (1985) Buy: Pick up DC Universe: The Stories Of Alan Moore for £6.99 from Amazon.co.uk. That bloody British Invasion, eh? Johnny Yank spends 50-plus years working on Superman, and the mad monk of Northampton swans in with frequent collaborator Dave Gibbons, and with an equal helping of Silver Age filings (there’s blink-and-you’ll-miss-em cameos from and , , , Hyathis, Bolphunga the Unrelenting, and Warworld) and pulp sci-fi weirdness tells pretty much the best self-contained Superman story of the Pre-Crisis era. Superman’s closest Superfriends – including Superchum-era Batman and – gather in the Fortress Of to present him with birthday gifts, but one of them is a plant – literally and figuratively – from Mogul, that intoxicates him with dreams of his heart’s desire – a Krypton that hadn’t exploded. 7. Kingdom Come Writer: Artist: Run: Kingdom Come #1-4 (1996) Buy: Pick up Kingdom Come for £9.31 from Amazon.co.uk. Superman and the rest of the return to a world thrown into chaos by a swell of warring vigilantes, devoid of the values that the original heroes pioneered. While this isn’t strictly just a Superman story – indeed, it deals with the entirety of the DC Universe and its possible end – the Man of Steel is at the crux of the tale, with his values challenged by both his allies and enemies. Alex Ross richly reinterprets DC’s cast of icons, with Superman’s reappearance early in the story marking an especially visually stunning portrait of the character, as well as a moment fans of the superhero are unlikely to forget. Despite its ambitious scope, Kingdom Come intimately explores the motivations behind Superman, as well as feeling like the final word on the DC Universe by its closing pages. SR. 6. Whatever Happened To The Man Of Tomorrow? Writer: Alan Moore Artist: Curt Swan Run: Superman #423, #583 (1986) Buy: Pick up DC Universe: The Stories Of Alan Moore for £6.99 from Amazon.co.uk. The final two episodes of Superman before the first Crisis reboot, presented as if they were the last two Superman stories ever – every dangling Silver Age plot thread is resolved, and our hero finally dies. (Yeah, right.) As the fellow said: “This is an imaginary story: aren’t they all?” AR. 5. Superman: Red Son Writer: Mark Millar Artist: Dave Johnson Run: Superman: Red Son #1-3 (2003) Buy: Pick up Superman: Red Son for £13.50 from Amazon.co.uk. An story that sees Clark Kent growing up on a Ukrainian farm in the Soviet Union rather than , Red Son shows us what happens when Superman’s influence is transposed to another part of the world, as well as the implications this has for mankind. Red Son is a sweeping epic, exploring Superman’s political implications in these circumstances and the conflict his existence creates, while also shedding light on the evolution of the bitterly obsessed American Lex Luthor by contrast. A well-conceived, definitive vision of Superman by Mark Millar, with an extremely concentrated narrative – and you’ll never predict the ending. SR. 4. Legends From The Dark Side Writer: Artist: John Byrne Run: Superman (Vol 2) #3-4 (1987) Buy: Pick up Legends: The Collection for £19.99 from Amazon.co.uk. John Byrne’s Superman reboot is still controversial today (Clerk Kent as an 80s yuppie; a Superman who summarily executes ). But he sure could pick villains and orchestrate battles: here, Superman confronts ultimate evil deity Darksied on his home turf, and actually dethrones him. Epic heroic stuff worthy of the man of steel, for a change. AR. 4. Superman: Birthright Writer: Mark Waid Artist: Run: Superman: Birthright #1-#12 (2003) Buy: Pick up Superman: Birthright for £9.59 from Amazon.co.uk. A deft, streamlined reimagining of Superman’s classic origins, Mark Waid – the bard of superhero mythology – and the effortlessly dynamic Leinil Francis Yu’s Birthright reconciled all the competing elements of the character’s beginnings into one tight package. Waid brought the Kryptonian aspect of Superman to the fore, reinventing Jor-El as a noble scientist who made the ultimate sacrifice, and Lex Luthor as a wounded, driven maniac whose desire to be recognised pushes him further and further over the edge. Waid’s Superman is a man who makes mistakes and can be beaten, Waid’s Clark is someone who allows himself to be belittled and ostracised to preserve his identity, Pa Kent is a man frustrated and worried about his son’s search for meaning and his alien identity, and Luthor’s ruthless intellect is every bit the for Superman’s godlike powers. A very real and emotionally complex retelling, though Birthright was written out of canon by Infinite Crisis and , it remains an inspiration for Man Of Steel which is more than the reality punching Superboy managed, eh? JH. 2. The Man Of Steel Writer: John Byrne Artist: John Byrne Run: Superman: The Man Of Steel #1-6 (1986) Buy: Pick up Superman: The Man Of Steel for £9.49 from Amazon.co.uk. Establishing the rules for a post-Crisis On Infinite Superman, the fundamentals of the character’s contemporary lore basically stem from John Byrne’s influential series (though ’ Origin gave us an updated version), abandoning the more complicated elements and streamlining the ’s back story. It was an entertaining and effective story that reignited interest in Superman at a crucial time, and for many readers acted as their entry point into comic books involving the boy scout. SR. 1. All Star Superman Writer: Grant Morrison Artist: Run: All Star Superman #1-12 (2005) Buy: Pick up Absolute All Star Superman for £48 from Amazon.co.uk. Cities in bottles, worlds, a virtually omnipotent hero: Grant Morrison lovingly reinstates all the bonkers Silver Age super-paraphenalia that multiple reboots and “crises” had abolished… “Doomed Planet…Desperate Scientist…Last Hope…Kindly Couple” says the first page… Which says it all, really. AR. Superman: Phantom Zone. For fans and comics creators alike continuity can be a harsh mistress. These days, when maintaining a faux-historical cloak of rational integrity for the made-up worlds we inhabit is paramount, the greatest casualty of the semi-regular sweeping changes, rationalisations and reboots is the terrific tales which suddenly “never happened”. The most painful example of this – for me at least – was the wholesale binning of the entire charm-drenched mythology that had evolved around Superman’s birthworld in the wonder years between 1948 and 1986. Thankfully DC is not as slavishly wedded to continuity as its readership and understands that a good story is worth cherishing. This slim, trim spectral selection gathers the superb 4-issue The Phantom Zone from January-April 1982 and the very last pre- Crisis on Infinite Earths Zone yarn from DC Comics Presents #97 (September 1986), whilst simultaneously celebrating the stylish and enthralling scripting of unique comics voice Steve Gerber. The riotous recapitulation of all that lost Man of Tomorrow mythology begins in ‘The Haunting of Charlie Kweskill!’ when the eponymous Daily Planet paste-up artist collapses at work. The solitary little dweeb has been sleeping badly, plagued by nightmares of a life on the long-gone world of Krypton. His dreams reveal how brilliant scientist Jor-El devised a -lethal way to deal with Krypton’s most incorrigible criminals: human monsters such as Jax-Ur , Professor Va-Kox , Dr. Xadu , sadistic psycho-killer Hu-Ul , potential dictator General Dru-Zod and even Jor’s own crazy cousin Kru-El … Many lesser menaces such as psionic aberrants Az-Rel and Nadira were also banished to the twilight realm, as well as outcasts like callous biological experimenter Nam-Ek , but the one who most catches Charlie’s attention is convicted fraudster Quex-Ul ; a Kryptonian who was Charlie’s doppelganger… The dreams are all true, telepathic broadcasts beamed at Charlie by the Zone inmates from within the plane of timeless intangibility. Quex-Ul had been one of them, surviving long after Krypton died, but was innocent of his crimes. He had been framed and mind-controlled by a mastermind who had deservedly perished when the Red Sun world detonated. After Superman corrected the injustice and released the poor dupe, Qwex-Ul had saved the Man of Steel from a Gold trap, losing all his inherent Kryptonian abilities and memory in the process. The grateful, heartsick Action Ace had found the amnesiac a job at the Planet and almost forgot his alien origins in the years since. Charlie’s former fellows had not… Their telepathic has turned Kweskill into a somnambulistic slave, unknowingly spending his nights breaking into labs and stealing high- tech components. Superman, slowly putting the puzzle pieces together, is just too late to thwart the stealthy scheme and as he bursts into Charlie’s apartment a hastily cobbled together Phantom Zone device hurls him and the hapless mind-slave into the ghostly region, whilst simultaneously freeing a of the cruellest criminals in existence… The saga continues with ‘Earth Under Siege!’ as Superman and Charlie helplessly watch Zod, Jax-Ur, Va-Kox, Faora and Kru-El immediately take off to undertake the next stage of their plan, leaving passively nihilistic Az-Rel and Nadira to negligently torture monstrous Nam-Ek with their psychic talents and mock the ranting liturgies of religious zealot Jer-Em , whose manic bigotry and fundamentalist isolationism caused the death of every person in Argo City … Superman’s cousin Kara Zor-El had been born on the city-sized fragment of Krypton, hurled intact into space when the planet detonated. Eventually Argo turned to Green Kryptonite like most of the detonated world’s debris, and her dying parents, observing Earth through their scopes, sent their daughter to safety as they perished. On Earth, the teenager met the Man of Steel who created for her the identities of Linda Lee and Supergirl , concealing her from the world whilst she learned about her new home and how to use her astounding new abilities in secrecy and safety. As the emotionally disconnected, disaffected and doubly alienated youths laconically saunter through Metropolis; casually slaughtering cops and citizens, Zod’s far more motivated cronies have reached Superman’s and destroyed the only means of returning them to their extra-dimensional dungeon. The next move is to attack the Justice League satellite, hurling it and occupants , , Red , , , and on a non-stop trajectory out of the Solar System. When the rampant destroy all Earth’s communications satellites and trigger a mass launch of nuclear missiles, and Supergirl narrowly avert atomic whilst the frantic Man of Tomorrow can only watch in horror… Not every Zone inhabitant is a criminal. For instance the Daxamite Mon-El was exposed to common lead in ‘Superboy’s Big Brother’ (by Robert Bernstein & Papp from Superboy #89, 1961) and his lingering, inexorable death was only forestalled by depositing the dying alien in the Zone until a cure could be found… Now, as Green Lantern confronts the Zod Squad on Earth only to be soundly beaten and have his Power Battery stolen, Mon-El informs Charlie and Superman of a possible back way out of the realm of hellish nullity… On Earth, as Wonder Woman subdues Nam-Ek, Supergirl checks in with Batman , desperately trying to ascertain where her cousin Superman has gone. As the Dark Knight heads to Metropolis to investigate, Kara returns to the Fortress only to be ambushed by the Kryptonian escapees and beaten near to death… With no other choice, Charlie and Superman reluctantly pass through a dimensional portal even the obsessed villains were too scared to risk and encounter surreal madness in ‘The Terror Beyond Twilight!’ … Back in the physical world of touch and time, Supergirl saves herself from ghastly atomic disintegration as Charlie and Superman pass through stormy turbulence and a tedious waiting-room-realm before arriving on a peculiar plane where they are confronted by luscious sirens with impossible riddles and exploding heads. Their narrow escape from the Priestesses of the Crimson Sun only leads them to Kryptonian Thul-Kar who magicked himself into the Zone in ages past and now slavishly serves an erratic and malevolent sentient universe named Aethyr . It wants to consume Charlie and Superman but only by passing through it can they reach the physical world again… On Earth, chaos reigns. Batman is utterly unable to pacify the extremist Jer-Em, who deems the planet impure, unclean and unholy. He would rather die than soil his Kryptonian purity here. …And high above the planet, the other freed villains have their own plan to fix the situation: a gigantic Phantom Zone Cannon which will inexorably and eternally banish Earth into the twilight dimension in the course of one full rotation… The drama comes to a tragic conclusion in ‘The Phantom Planet!’ as Az-Rel and Nadira, having found kindred spirits amongst Metropolis’ disenfranchised Punk Rock counter culture – and killed them – encounter Jer-Em in martyr mode. The now suicidal cleric is quite keen on taking the rest of the apostate Kryptonians with him… As the world turns into intangibility, in France Faora has briefly resumed her passion for murdering males – before they’re all gone – whilst in Aethyr’s universe an appalling sacrifice enables Superman to return to physicality in time to lead a last desperate charge, saving the day and putting the villains back where they belong… those still alive, that is… The remainder of the fantastic chronicle recounts the tying up of all those intriguing concepts and loose ends in a spectacular sidebar to the end of DC’s original universe. In 1986 the company celebrated its fiftieth year with the groundbreaking Crisis on Infinite Earths : radically overhauling its convoluted multiversal continuity and starting afresh . All the Superman titles were cancelled or suspended pending this back-to-basics reboot courtesy of John Byrne, allowing the opportunity for a number of very special farewells to the old mythology. One of the most intriguing and challenging came in the last issue of DC Comics Presents (#97) wherein ‘Phantom Zone: the Final Chapter’ by Gerber, & Bob Smith offered a creepy adieu to a number of Superman’s greatest foes… Tracing Jor-El’s discovery of the Phantom Zone through to the imminent end of the , this dark yarn built on Gerber’s landmark miniseries and revealed that the dread region of nothingness was in fact the sentient echo of a dead universe which had always regarded the creatures deposited within it as irritants and agonising intruders. Now as cosmic reigned Aethyr, still served by Kryptonian mage Thul-Kar, caused the destruction of the and the deification and corruption of Fifth Dimensional pest Mr. Mxyzptlk as well as the subsequent crashing of Argo City on Metropolis. As a result Zod and his fellow immaterial inmates were freed to wreak havoc upon Earth – but only until the now-crystalline pocket dimension merged with and absorbed the felons before implausibly abandoning Superman to his uncertain future as the very Last Son of Krypton… Superman has proven to be all things to all fans over his decades of existence and these timeless tales of charm, joy and wholesome wit are more necessary than ever: not just as a reminder of great tales of the past but as an all-ages primer of the wonders still to come… © 1982, 1986, 2013 DC Comics. All Rights Reserved. Confessions Of A Superman Fan. Steve Gerber’s “Phantom Zone” Miniseries. If I had to list who the greatest writer of all time is, it’d be a coin-toss between Steve Gerber and . Gerber died a couple years ago, and every time I think about his undeservedly excruciating and painful death it makes me angry, not just because of the injustice of a great man dying young, but also because we’re forever denied another Gerber story involving the , or Man-Thing, or , or the Metal Men…or Superman . Jeanette Kahn once said there are two types of writers: Superman people and Batman people. And while the distinction is hardly clear-cut, especially in the incestuous world of comics, Englehart was more of a Batman guy and Gerber was a Superman guy. Everyone knows about Stainless Steve’s “definitive” Batman run, of course, but Englehart was brought over to DC to do JLA, not Batman, however. His JLA run in 1977 featured Superman as explicitly alien, detached from mankind, something of an authoritarian hardass, an archtraditionalist, a man of great integrity but also pride and swagger. It is extremely difficult to argue that Stainless Steve Englehart liked Superman. Gerber, on the other hand, was quite clearly a “Superman guy.” In Adventure into Fear #17, Gerber introduced Wundarr, a character that was a Superman-esque pastiche, an innocent that was rocketed from his home planet. Because Wundarr grew up entirely in a rocketship, he was a dangerous, childlike innocent. Gerber liked the character enough that he brought Wundarr over as a supporting cast member when he started writing Marvel Two-In-One . Not only was it a strange act of deconstruction in an era when that was just ahead of its time, it was also a sure sign that Gerber was chomping at the bit to write the Man of Steel. Gerber’s greatest contribution to Superman was his Phantom Zone miniseries in 1982, one of the most tense Superman stories ever, with an atmosphere of anxiety and fear. It was obviously a story written by a lifelong fan with impeccable continuity and references to Superman’s rich world and past. Gerber’s miniseries is filled with skillful characterization, high-stakes, and dramatic and fearsome villains that are threatening, powerful and unstoppable – it showed how scary it would actually be if criminals like the Zoners were let loose and wild on the Earth while Superman was trapped in the Zone himself. Many people have said this series is what Superman II ought to have been. What’s more, Gerber transformed the Zone from some smoke background to an actual surreal and frightening world that makes someone doubt their sanity. It is, in short, my favorite Superman story of all time, the one that made me a fan in the first place after years of being skeptical about the character and his world, and it unquestionably one of the greatest Superman stories of all time. The Beginning. The story begins with one of Gerber’s favorite plot devices: a regular person with uncontrolled and bizarre visions of a strange other world or society, something he originally used as the hook of the Unknown. This time, it’s Charlie Kweiskill, who as all long-time Superman fans know, was an unjustly imprisoned Phantom Zoner, removed of his memory, who lost his powers due to Gold-K – a guy whose first, last and only appearance was in 1962 and was presumably working at the Planet in the background all that time. Gerber shows his great gift for characterization with some impressive scenes with Perry White, who pretty much gets all the best lines in the series and is obviously Gerber’s favorite character. One problem with Superman is how, at times, his supporting cast becomes a near-afterthought; more or less every scene with is more or less the same, for instance: a practical joke that backfires, to the point where writers obviously are phoning it in. In this mini, the Superman supporting cast are an important part of the series and play a role in the resolution. Through Charlie Kweiskill (actually Quex-Ul) and his dreams, we are introduced to the Phantom Zoners. Sure, we’ve all heard what they’ve done to merit entering the Zone, but Gerber is the first to show us the emotional reality of it all. The forces of General Zod become nightmarish and dreadful. The destruction of Wegethor was shown for the first time from the point of view of its victims, a horrific war crime. Even the previously laughably named Kru-El, the worst of the El line, became a madman with lethal weapons. Make no bones about it, all the Zoners are there because they deserve it. The are all fearsome sociopaths without redemption. Gerber devotes more than half of his first issue showing the Zoners and their past crimes, which amps up the fear for the series. These are not the easily dispatched laughable clowns they often were in the Silver Age that took them for granted, but nightmares, a fearsome threat, and I am surprised at how seriously Gerber treated all of these characters. As Charlie Kweiskill is plagued by the images he sees, we see the Zoners observing the real world, hidden, using their combined mental power to manipulate him into collecting electronics for them. There have been many times we’ve seen the Zoners hidden and surrounding the world, but their invisible malevolent presence is, here, actually very suspenseful and dangerous. The Phantom Zone Unleashed. When Superman goes to investigate, the Zoners’ plan is unleashed: Charlie, under mind control, sends himself and Superman into the Phantom Zone, and the Zoners break out! The Zoners don’t just go on a , however. Their strikes are tactical and planned, the acts of people with vicious cunning and plenty of time on their hands to contemplate revenge. The Zoners throw the JLA sattelite into orbit, destroy and loot Superman’s Fortress of Solitude, and steal Green Lantern’s power battery. The Zoners even smash sattelites to trigger a nuclear attack of the world powers on each other – quite possibly worst case scenario. Supergirl shows up to stop ’em, but the combined power of four Zoners smack the tar out of her. She’s actually going to be thrown into the Kandorian incinerator, the one place where Kryptonian matter can be destroyed. And worst of all, Superman can only watch helplessly, unable to prevent this savagery and mayhem. This story has something very rare in a Superman tale: a real feeling of danger so great one wonders how even Superman can possibly get out of it all. Meanwhile, Perry White actually does some detective work together with Batman, investigating the disappearance of Charlie Kweiskill… Superman in the Phantom Zone. One very heroic choice the series took is to not emphasize on Superman, who the story doesn’t even really get around to focusing on until the third issue of the miniseries. It goes to show one of Denny O’Neil’s bit of advice for comics scripters: if you’re going to be a slacker, forget your hero and focus all your industriousness on your villains. When we finally return to Superman and Quex-Ul in the Phantom Zone, Superman finds that everything he does as a wraith could be an illusion, and we therefore begin the major part of this phase of the story: Superman doubting his sanity in a brainbending, horrific landscape where Superman has none of his powers. This is one of the best gifts that Gerber gave the Superman mythos that made it much stronger for those after him: the Phantom Zone isn’t just some weird nothing, but something far more fascinating. In one surreal moment, he’s confronted by women with masks. They reveal their masks to show what both Superman and Quex-Ul are most afraid of. It’s like the Phantom Zone is one-part LSD trip, another part shamanistic journey, and another part Island from The Prisoner . It’s easy to see why being in there would make someone absolutely crackers. One of the reoccurring critiques of the series, usually put forward by people that have never read the miniseries but have heard about it, is that the miniseries made the Zone something of a weird spiritual concept. To that I’d respond by saying that the miniseries worked because Gerber didn’t contradict anything about the Zone, he only expanded and showed a side to it that we had never seen before. It’s all enormously powerful alien cosmic forces. The Zone is no more supernatural than . Eventually, Quex-Ul recovers his memory of his Kryptonian heritage, and we learn something even more shocking: the Zone has native inhabitants! One of them is a hideously disfigured Kryptonian sorcerer, who reveals some of the most interesting information passed on about the series. We actually get some more information about the Zone itself: the Phantom Zone is actually sentient , a manifestation of a cosmically powered entity called the Aethyr! Finally, the story ends with what may be the most frightening cliffhanger ever. Supergirl discovers the true extent of the Zoners’ plans: with Green Lantern’s power battery, they mean to suck the entire planet Earth into the Phantom Zone! Now that is just plain scary . I can only imagine how dramatic it must have been to people reading the comics at the time, who now have to wait a whole 30 days! The Zoners on a Rampage. The Zoners of course, live it up in terrifying ways. In one creepy scene, Faora a man that watches her bathe. At a rock concert, two Zoners with pyrokinetic abilities that were former jewel thieves set fire to a concert, as they both nihilistically contemplate death. The characterization of these is both chilling and compelling. In the meantime, Superman and Quex-Ul are prisoners of Aethyr, the mind at the heart of the zone, who confronts them with a terrible fate: the total loss of identity, which would dissolve and merge with the Aethyr forever. The Aethyr plays games with Superman and Quex-Ul, even restoring Quex-Ul’s powers. With them in hand, Quex-Ul realizes Superman can’t escape the identity and purpose-sucking void of the Aethyr, and instead, for one last time, uses the powers he always wanted back and sacrifices himself. Now this took me by surprise. The first time I read this comic I expected Quex-Ul to do something that would totally free Superman from the Zone the way underestimated, scrappy mortals are prone to do in stories of this type. Quex-Ul’s self-sacrifice, which in many ways was pretty meaningless, casts a pall on the entire story, the kind of uncomfortable and not-easy resolution that is Gerber’s trademark. Like Phillip K. Dick, every time I read a Gerber story I tell myself it’ll be the last one. It never is, of course. With a lunge of rage, Superman pounces out through the Zone. Together with Supergirl and Green Lantern, he wrecks the Phantom Zone projector designed to take in the whole earth. Superman attacks General Zod, enraged by the death of Quex-Ul, and beats Zod incredibly badly. With a character with as much self control as Superman, it’s something of a shock to see him lose his temper – though he’s certainly entitled to it. The ensuing battle is colossally nasty – Faora is even burned badly by Supergirl’s heat-vision, something I’m surprised made it through the Comics Code Authority. Whatever teeth that unnecessary body might have ever had, of course, was totally sucked out by the White Queen’s bondage outfit on the cover of Uncanny X-Men way back in 1978. Here’s a hilarious postscript from an interview with Gerber in the Superman Companion: Bwahahahahahaha! Beautiful. Chew on that, fascists! The Art of Gene “The Dean” Colan. I love Curt Swan, but if he had done this mini in his wholesome All-American style, it wouldn’t have been as effective or interesting as the , spooky and spectral art of Gene Colan, best known for work in like Tomb of . Gene Colan circa 1982 was viewed as an over-the-hill artist with his best work behind him, and in fact, in many interviews, says he gave Gene work just for old times’ sake. But here, he was the right artist for the right project, and while his inks were at times scratchy and sketchy, it lent a surreal touch. Just look at what was on the stands in 1982: George Perez in Teen . Giffen in Legion of Superheroes . And then you had the rise of John Byrne as the decade’s superstar artist, what was to the 1970s. Superman comics, done by the same guy that did ’em in 1962, looked old-fashioned and tired. There was no noticeable decrease in quality in Curt Swan’s art as much as there had been, say, , but there was a real longing for something new. I’ve often said that part of the reason Garcia-Lopez’s art was so well received was not just that he was good, but that he wasn’t Curt Swan. And the Phantom Zone miniseries had a very different artist, which made it feel fresher than it ought. Aftermath. One can only read a story like this that is perfectly in keeping with the past, and then look back on what came before and say…”Oh! So that’s what those Silver Age guys meant to do!” It’s a serious, dramatic story, a “big” one with a huge scale that does honor and respect to the great and storied history of Superman. My overview barely captured some of the best moments: one of my favorites was Nam-Ek’s encounter with Wonder Woman, and how he was terrified of being in her presence with his rondor-horn ugliness. There was also a creepy Kryptonian , that eventually took a pair of nihilistic thieves with him via Kryptonite poisoning, an ending worthy of an EC Tales from the Crypt comic, where murders always got their comeuppance. There are even hints that Gerber could have played an even bigger role in the Superman story. In 1985, he and Frank Miller created a pitch for a Superman reboot. Gerber would have emphasized Superman’s role as a for social , for instance. At times it’s incredibly frustrating to read Superman comics before Julie Schwartz started editing them. With all due respect to , I can’t read 90% of the Silver Age. I just can’t stand it. The stakes are small, the villains aren’t real threats, and often they just consist of games Superman plays with his supporting cast. In that respect, Phantom Zone honors what came before by surpassing it. Phantom Zone (1982) comic books. "The Haunting of Charlie Kweskill!" Written by Steve Gerber, with art by Gene Colan and Tony DeZuniga. Cover by Gene Colan and . Enter the world of Krypton's twilight dimension! A humane method of criminal confinement. or a dimension without hope? Characters: Jor-El; ; Gra-Mo; Jax-Ur; Va-Kox; Dr. Xadu; Faora Hu-Ul; General Zod; Az-Rel; Nadira; Kru-El; Quex-Ul [Charlie Kweskill] (all in Charlie Kweskill's dream and in the Phantom Zone); Mon-El; ; Superman [Clark Kent]; Lana Lang; Perry White. 32 pages, FC. Cover price $0.60. Cover pencils by Gene Colan, inks by Dick Giordano. Does Supergirl die this day? Find out in "Earth under Siege!", by Steve Gerber, pencils by Gene Colan, inks by Tony DeZuniga; Does Supergirl die this day? Find out in "Earth Under Siege!"; Superman and Quex-Ul, as "Charlie Kweskill", watch helplessly from the Phantom Zone as General Zod, Jax-Ur, and their Kryptonian cronies attack the Earth; They throw the Justice League satellite out of orbit, with many of the Leaguers aboard. They smash communications satellites, which causes an exchange of atomic missiles, stopped only by Supergirl and Wonder Woman; Green Lantern's power battery is stolen, and he is rendered unconscious by the Zoners when he pursues them, with his charge running out shortly afterward. Supergirl tells Batman what has occurred, and then goes to the Fortress of Solitude, where the Zoners have already smashed open the door and destroyed the Phantom Zone projector and viewer; Supergirl engages General Zod, Jax-Ur and Kru-El in battle. "Marathon Madman" Hostess Cup Cakes ad with . Biographical info on Gene Colan and Tony DeZuniga. 36 pgs., full color. Cover price $0.60. Cover pencils by Gene Colan, inks by Dick Giordano. "The Terror beyond Twilight!", script by Steve Gerber, pencils by Gene Colan, inks by Tony DeZuniga; General Zod and his allies toss Supergirl into the disintegration pit and leave, but Supergirl barely saves herself by reviving in time and digging her fingers into the side of the pit's wall; She drags herself out of the pit and collapses; Meanwhile, Superman and Charlie Kweskill penetrate various lower (or higher) levels of the Phantom Zone, encountering an alternating yellow-and-red sun which Superman had once seen while racing with The Flash, battling monsters, and encountering weird "Priestesses of the Crimson Sun"; Finally, they meet Thul-Kar, a Kryptonian wizard; Thul-Kar tells them he believed Jor-El's prophecy of Krypton's doom and entered the Phantom Zone by magic. "Pirates' Gold" Hostess Twinkies ad starring Aquaman. Biographical info on Dick Giordano and Steve Gerber. 36 pgs., full color. Cover price $0.60. Cover pencils by Gene Colan, inks by Dick Giordano. "The Phantom Planet," script by Steve Gerber, pencils by Gene Colan, inks by Tony DeZuniga; Superman and Charlie Kweskill are transmuted to liquid in Aethyr's universe, then restored with Charlie in Superman's costume and with his old Kryptonian powers, and Superman in Quex-Ul's Kryptonian outfit; To save Superman, Quex-Ul flies into Aethyr's face and is killed, Superman's costume drifting back empty; Superman puts on his uniform again and, filled with rage, flies through Aethyr, who is unable to raise despair in his spirit and thus cannot him; Superman finally breaks through the last barrier and returns to Earth; The Phantom Zone villains have constructed the giant Zone cannon and are using it on the Earth, but Superman and Supergirl arrive in time to smash the projector, knock out the villains, and restore Green Lantern's power battery to him; Az-Rel, irked by Faora Hu-Ul, badly burns her face and hair just before Supergirl lands and kayoes her. 36 pgs., full color. Cover price $0.60. Customer Testimonials Our customers have some nice things to say about us: Customer Testimonials Mailing List Join our Mailing List for news and sales. We’ve been selling comics since 1961 (our first sale: #1 at $0.25, see one of our first ads) and on the since 1996. Copyright © 1996 - 2021 Lone Star Comics Inc. Character images copyright © their respective owners. Superman: Phantom Zone by Steve Gerber. A character who appears to be Thul-Kar appears in the background of the Phantom Zone on page 17, however this must be some other character since Thul-Kar does not enter the Zone until Krypton's last day (see issue #3). Earth under Siege (Table of Contents: 3) Superman / cover reprint (on interior page) / 1 page (report information) from The Phantom Zone (DC, 1982 series) #2 [Direct] (February 1982) Earth under Siege! (Table of Contents: 4) Superman / comic story / 27 pages (report information) from The Phantom Zone (DC, 1982 series) #2 (February 1982) [no title indexed] (Table of Contents: 5) Superman / cover reprint (on interior page) / 1 page (report information) from The Phantom Zone (DC, 1982 series) #3 [Direct] (March 1982) The Terror beyond Twilight! (Table of Contents: 6) Superman / comic story / 27 pages (report information) from The Phantom Zone (DC, 1982 series) #3 (March 1982) [no title indexed] (Table of Contents: 7) Superman / cover reprint (on interior page) / 1 page (report information) from The Phantom Zone (DC, 1982 series) #4 [Direct] (April 1982) The Phantom Planet! (Table of Contents: 8) Superman / comic story / 26 pages (report information) from The Phantom Zone (DC, 1982 series) #4 (April 1982) The Final Chapter of the Phantom Zone Criminals (Table of Contents: 9) Superman; The Phantom Zone Criminals / cover reprint (on interior page) / 1 page (report information) from DC Comics Presents (DC, 1978 series) #97 [Direct] (September 1986) Indexer Notes. Cover pencils and inks credits confirmed from 's editorial records provided by DC Comics. Phantom Zone: The Final Chapter (Table of Contents: 10) Superman; The Phantom Zone Criminals / comic story / 38 pages (report information) from DC Comics Presents (DC, 1978 series) #97 (September 1986) Indexer Notes. Credits for script, pencils and inks confirmed from Julius Schwartz's editorial records, provided by DC Comics. An Untold Tale of the Pre-Crisis Universe. Incorrectly depicts Nam-Ek being projected into the Zone on Krypton for 15 sun-cycles. Nam-Ek is an immortal who was left drifting in space when Krypton exploded. He was projected into the Zone in Superman #315.