DC Comics, via their Twitter account teased a coming announcement: the death of Superman…again. More comes out today, but as of this morning, we just have this tweet to go from. Well, this tweet and some hints dropped leading up to it.
According to Bleedingcool.com, “Superboy has been off in the 31st century with the Legion Of Super-Heroes. And so he has spoilers of his own to share. Superboy knows when his father will die. It’s a part of history. And it’s coming soon.” And this quote came from when Philip Kennedy Johnson was announced as the new Superman writer, he stated “the massive event that we’re building up to in Action Comics is a considerably bigger swing than I ever expected to get in comics. It’s no exaggeration to say it will change Superman’s status quo forever and have a lasting impact across the entire DC Universe,” again from Bleedingcool.com.
So, to say the Death of Superman will soon be upon us is no “will they?” or “won’t they?” The writing is on the wall. For me, it’s the really? of it all. I mean we’ve been here before, does it really matter?
The Death of Superman story line already rocked the world back in 1992. I’m telling on myself here but I was 13 and I remember it clearly. It was the first time I heard the evening news say remotely anything about comics. The mainstream press’ popular opinion of the event was akin to something from a christian revival. News anchors said it was blasphemous and sacrilegious. Newsweek, People, and Newsday wrote about it. Everyone was up in arms. All because DC just wanted to make a buck.
Alls fair in capitalism, right?
Spoiler alert, Superman wasn’t really dead. Through some crafty only-in-comics writing Superman is eventually resurrected by Eradicator, a Kryptonian humanoid (I dunno’ the details, it gets complicated). The point is, they find a way to bring him back and all that fuss and fervor was for naught.
Which brings us to today. So. DC teases us with the Death of Superman again but to what end? The running joke in comics is that no one ever really dies. I mean, Marvel just ran the Death of Dr. Strange storyline and one of the variant covers (by Skottie Young) just says the obvious out loud.
One of the biggest criticisms I hear about the Marvel films is that it’s hard for casual viewers to really get into them. Why? Because the stakes are never high. The heroes always win in the end…like always. After a handful of films the casual moviegoer is like, “Meh.” The same can be said for these epic comic events where they advertise the deaths of…whoever. I mean, we just witnessed the “death” of the Justice League. Now it’s the “death” of Superman.
Dead schmead. Stop killing icons and just tell good stories.