Action Comics #687

From the box of random unread comics.

Title: Action Comics
Issue: #687
Date: June, 1993
Publisher: DC Comics
Writer: Roger Stern
Art: Jackson Guice, Denis Rodier
Colorist: Glenn Whitmore
Letterer: Bill Oakley
Editor: Mike Carlin, Jennifer Frank

Reign of the Supermen! This is one of the four issues introducing the new "Supermen" following Superman's death at the hands of Doomsday. These issues (complete with gimmicky cutout covers) each featured a "pretender" to the role of Superman, based on phrases associated with the character: "Man of Steel", "Man of Tomorrow", "Metropolis Kid", and in the case of this issue, "Last Son of Krypton".

The actual character in this case is the Eradicator (no, not Rhea Ripley). The story is written so that it is possible to believe that Eradicator is actually some sort of reincarnation of Superman, who has gone full-on Kryptonian at the loss of his humanity.

In the background, we see lots of details of the ripple effect of Superman's death. This is one of those stories that felt like a gimmick at the time. After all, no one believed for a minute that Superman was actually dead. He was simply spending some time "dead in the DC Universe", as one does. But looking at this story years later, the fact that the Superman's death turned out to be as temporary as everyone knew it would be seems less important, and the story itself is quite good.

Writer Roger Stern juggles a ton of little details and character interactions and does a nice job of introducing Eradicator-Superman while adding to the overall mystery. While I wasn't buying that Eradicator really was Superman, and I knew that we were getting the real Superman back eventually, I was left intrigued to find out how we get there and what other plot twists lie ahead.

Nice piece of an epic story that still holds up pretty well.

Rating: 7/10

The Adventures of Superman #510

Some stores and vendors sweeten the Free Comic Book Day pot by adding a few free picks from their stock of "quarter books". It's a good way to add some more choices to the freebies available and it gets rid of some of the low end books that every dealer seems to have boxes and boxes of. This was one such book that I picked up at this year's FCBD.

Title: The Adventures of Superman
Issue: #510
Date: March 1994
Publisher: DC Comics
Writer: Karl Kesel
Penciler: Barry Kitson
Inker: Ray McCarthy
Letterer: Albert DeGuzman
Colorist: Glenn Whitmore
Editor: Frank Pittarese, Chris Duffy, Mike Carlin

This is part of a reboot of the Bizarro character. Bizarro has abducted Lois Lane and constructed a model of Metropolis out of scrap lumber in a warehouse. Bizarro intends to keep Lois on hand in his Bizarro-world, where he can be her Superman, constantly saving her from peril that he creates himself.

Lois keeps her cool and eventually manages to distract Bizarro (not too difficult) and give herself a chance to escape (a bit more easily said than done).

There's some other stuff going on, including even a brief appearance by Superman, but most of the rest is all setup for ongoing plot points in the continuity. The one other really significant plot point is Cat Grant finally standing up to sexually harassing boss Morgan Edge, which is a pretty well handled scene.

Lois starts out as the hapless-if-feisty victim, having her early attempts to escape pretty handily foiled, but she gets better as this goes on, and I thought most of the handling of her character was quite good. Bizarro is also pretty well handled. He is, well, bizarre, but in a way that plays to his motivation to truly be Superman.

Rating: 7/10