Superman's origin vs. Superman's origin

The first page of 2006's All-Star Superman #1, by Grant Morrison, Frank Quitely, Jamie Grant and Phil Balsman

The first page of 2018's Superman #1, by Brian Michael Bendis, Ivan Reis, Joe Prado, Alex Sinclair and Josh Reed.

The first page of Bendis' first issue of the newly relaunched Superman title--following his contributions to Action Comics #1,000, DC Nation #0 and his six-issue Man of Steel story, includes a recap of Superman's origin and the relevant events leading up to the current story, and I found it revealing just how different it was from Morrison and Quitely's famously succinct retelling of Superman's origin in their All-Star Superman (which one could probably argue was still eight words more than needed).

Only the first half of the first narration box on this first page covers the exact same ground that Morrison and Quitely did, but it takes about 25 words. And that's followed by four more narration boxes. I wanted to draw the comparison not to suggest that Morrison's strategy was superior to that of Bendis', but simply to compare the two, which couldn't be more different, despite telling the same story about the same character at the same point in their respective runs on a Superman book.

Certainly, both are very emblematic of the creators involved--Morrison doing something weird and leaving a lot up to the imagination of the reader, Bendis using a lot of words, so many that they threaten to overwhelm the artwork--but both are equally valid. What was compelling about Morrison's origin at the time was that it was basically unnecessary; he knew that everyone knew Superman's origin, and thus he didn't even really need to tell it at all. I said it was eight words too long because, if you removed Morrison's captions, I think that page reads just about the same, and a reader gets all the necessary information. But maybe even the art is superfluous, because surely anyone reading a comic book, anyone who has ever heard of Superman, knows those basic points of the character.

What I find interesting about Bendis' strategy is the idea that there is no assumption of a reader's familiarity with the character, even on the most basic level, or that a reader might have been aware of recent Superman history (that Jor-El is alive, that Superman has a son), or the story Bendis just got done telling the previous week in Man of Steel.

DC, and/or Bendis himself, seem to think that Bendis' presence on the book will be drawing all kinds of readers who are completely new to the character, perhaps new to comics, which seems to me to be vastly overestimating Bendis' pull. Bendis is, of course, a pretty big deal in comics, and I'm sure that all sorts of people will be reading this issue of Superman who weren't reading the previous few issues, but it's hard to imagine Bendis' arrival bringing in large numbers of people who weren't already reading mainstream, Big Two super-comics that they purchased on a Wednesdayly basis from their local comic shop.

In other words, the audience Bendis is likely to draw is one that is already in the direct market, they just might have been reading Iron Man, Spider-Man, X-Men and New Avengers instead of Superman and Action. In that regard, I think the arrival of Gene Luen Yang to the Superman franchise a few years ago was a much, much bigger deal, and one that was much more likely to attract new readers to Superman, to DC and to the direct market that Bendis moving from Big Company A to Big Company B, but Yang's arrival wasn't treated as so much of an occasion, likely because how notoriously difficult it is for DC (and Marvel) to see comics and their place in the medium and industry from the outside.

Regardless, here are two different ways to kick off Superman runs from two of the more popular and more divergent writing talents in the modern direct market.

A few thoughts on Batman and Owlman, in light of Batman Vol. 2: City of Owls and Forever Evil

In 1964, the Justice League of America creative team of writer Gardner Fox and artist Mike Sekowsky introduced The Crime Syndicate of America, villainous counterparts to the JLA from the parallel earth of Earth-3, where the events of history were reversed in more-or-less random ways (In Earth-3's version of the Revolutionary War, for example, British colonists declared their independence from America, and so on). Therefore rather than having a team of superheroes, like the League's Earth-1 had, Earth-3 had a supervillains, who were a lot like their Justice League counterparts, but not quite (Ultraman instead of Superman, Superwoman instead of Wonder Woman, and so on).

Batman's opposite number was Owlman, who wore a blue and gray costume somewhat similar to Batman's costume, but instead of a cowl he wore what looked like a toupee made out of an owl's head.

In 1999, writer Grant Morrison and artist Frank Quitely reintroduced a new version of the "Crime Syndicate of Amerika," this one hailing from a parallel earth within the Anti-Matter Universe in their original graphic novel JLA: Earth-2. The team roster was the same, but the characters were a little more thoughtfully designed, tweaked to more closely parallel their JLA counterparts, and some of them were given fuller back stories.

One of these was, of course, Owlman, who was now revealed to be Thomas Wayne Jr., older brother to Bruce Wayne. On their world, Bruce and his mother Martha Wayne were killed in that alley, while Thomas and his father, Thomas Wayne Sr., the police commissioner, survived. Blaming his father for the death of his mother, Thomas grew up to become the criminal mastermind of Gotham City, Owlman, and went to war with his father.

Morrison, who always showed a zeal for in-story allusions and/or Easter eggs, was in fact referencing an old, Crisis On Infinite Earths-rendered apocryphal story from a 1974 issue of World's Finest by Bob Haney, Dick Dillin and Vince Colletta.

In "Wipe The Blood Off My Name!", Batman pursues "The Boomerang Killer," only to discover it is actually his older brother Thomas Wayne Jr, who was severely and permanently brain-damaged in a childhood car accident, and confined to an asylum (I guess it was a very specific type of brain damage, which causes those who suffer from it to eventually grow up to become killers?). Bruce's parents had every intention of telling him about his criminally insane older brother they put in an asylum when he was old enough to understand, of course, but then there was that whole murder in an alley thing.

Fast forward to 2011, when Scott Snyder and Greg Capullo take over the relaunched Batman. Their first year's worth of stories is dedicated to The Court of Owls, a sort of semi-legendary Illuminati pulling the strings behind everything going on in Gotham City, a secret organization so secret that even Batman didn't know they were real. In addition to naming themselves after owls, wearing ceremonial owl masks and using a lot of owl themes in their decor, they also command a small army of elite, undead assassins in owl costumes that they refer to as "Talons."

At the climax, it is revealed that among their more prominent members is mayoral candidate Lincoln March, who Capullo draws to look a lot like Bruce Wayne. And with good reason!

March claims to be Thomas Wayne Jr., Bruce Wayne's younger brother, who was still in Martha Wayne's womb when she was in a terrible car accident. Born early and severely brain-damaged, he was put in the "Willowood Home For Children" (In Haney's story, Thomas Wayne Jr. was in the "Willowood Asylum;" like Morrison then, Snyder was heavily referencing the now non-canonical early '70s story). Feeling abandoned by his parents and older brother, Wayne/March was raised by the Court of Owls to inherit the Wayne empire. That didn't quite work out, nor did his run for mayor, so he ultimately makes a play to seize control of the Court of Owls, even going so far as to give himself the Court's undead-making super-secret super-serum, the one reserved for the virtually un-killable Talons. Then he puts on a fancy new Talon suit; "Something tough and modern," he says of it, " Something to rival the Batman."

While he never goes by that name, Snyder and Capullo's March/Wayne dons a fancy owl costume and essentially becomes an owl man. (As to whether or not he actually is Thomas Wayne Jr., Bruce Wayne and Alfred Pennyworth are certain that he is not, that Bruce's brother actually died from the wounds sustained in that crash, but Bruce says he can't know with 100% certitude until he gets a DNA sample, and March/Wayne disappears during their climactic battle, in the fashion of many supervillains—presumably killed, but with no body discovered).

Then, in 2013, writer Geoff Johns re-introduced the new, New 52 version of The Crime Syndicate, who are once again from Earth-3, a parallel world where many aspects of the DC Universe is "reversed," including the fact that the heroes are villains and the villains are heroes. This Syndicate also has an Owlman, and as Johns reveals in issues of his Justice League of America, the new Owlman of Earth-3 is still Thomas Wayne Jr., now once again Bruce Wayne's older brother.

In Johns' origin story, the two Wayne children—Thomas and Bruce—conspired to kill their own parents, and, on the night when they were shot to death in the alley, Bruce had last-minute, second thoughts, so Thomas Jr., conspiring with Alfred Pennyworth, kills his mother, father and little brother. He then grows up to be Owlman.

So this is strange.

On the "real" Earth of the DC Universe, which I'll call Earth-New 52, there is a heroic Bruce Wayne defending Gotham City as the superhero Batman, and a villainous "Owlman" who is—or at least claims to be and presents a pretty good case for being—Thomas Wayne Jr.

And on Earth-3, the reversed world where good is evil and evil is good, Bruce Wayne was good (well, he was a spoiled brat who considered killing his parents, but he wasn't as evil as his brother), and a villanous Owlman who is really Thomas Wayne Jr.

In that respect, at least, the worlds aren't opposite at all. Thomas Wayne Jr./Owlman is a bad guy on both worlds, just as Bruce Wayne/Batman is a good guy (or at least not a bad guy) on both worlds.

A few quick thoughts on JLA: Earth 2: The Deluxe Edition

DC Comics is re-releasing Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely's 2000 original graphic novel JLA: Earth 2 in a special "deluxe edition." Given the plot of the book—The DCU's heroic Justice League vs. the villainous Crime Syndicate, from an alternate Earth where everything is opposite—it's easy to see why DC might want to sell the book now. That's the same conflict driving their big, seven-month, line-wide crossover story Forever Evil, and while Geoff Johns and David Finch have re-re-created the CSA characters, theirs are closer to Morrison and Quitely's version than the Silver Age originals.

At the same time, if I were someone at DC closely involved in Forever Evil, I'd be reluctant to have too many readers read JLA: Earth 2, as it's so good it's likely to make the current comics look fairly awful in comparison. Visually, it's already clear the newer incarnations are greatly inferior. Even making allowances for variances in taste, I think it's fairly universally agreed upon that Quitely is a superior artist to Finch, and he and Morrison's designs for their evil JLA certainly eclipse those of Finch's.

Additionally, Morrison's story was a rather brilliant riff on an old standard comic book plot, one of those Morrisonian stories that seems very clever and, as soon as you've digested it, extremely obvious. It seems right, it seems true, and one wonders why another writer hadn't already written such a story (To spoil the 13-year-old story, the League tries to save the Syndicate's world, where evil always triumphs, and the Syndicate tries to conquer the League's world, where good always triumphs; both fail, because of the rules of those respective universes are as immutable as laws of physics).

Johns seems to be leaning in a different direction with his story, but as for his hopes of besting Morrison, it doesn't look good: Earth 2 was only about 90 pages long, while Forever Evil is already over 60 pages (and follows a 120-page prologue story), and hasn't hit upon anything particularly new or novel yet. (Earth 2 also had probably the most badass moment in Martian Manhunter's career, in which he destroys The Evil Superman in a matter of panels, and a nice example of how to make Aquaman seem powerful and badass without him having to whine and shout or have other characters express shock at how awesome he is; Morrison and Quitely just show Aquaman quietly and calmly defeating Evil Green Lantern in a couple of panels).

What's new in the Deluxe Edition? Well, there is apparently a new cover, but it's similar enough to the original, which I don't have in front of me, that I can't remember in what way exactly it's different; it still has that nice image of the characters casting reflections of their opposites, with Aquaman and Manhunter, who did not have CSA opposites, framed just so. There's one version, with the CSA on top, on the dustjacket (Note Wonder Woman's off-model blue boots; they were correctly colored red on the original collection covers), and a second version on the cover beneath it, with the JLA on top.

There's also an awful lot of backmatter, an additional 42 pages, most of it in the form of script pages or rough thumbnails and breakdowns. My favorite part is probably Morrison's own character designs, which demonstrate something people tend to forget or not realize about Morrison: The guy can actualluy draw pretty well, too.

He also puts a great deal of thought into the look of things like costumes and symbols (I believe this came out around the time he was mentioning sigil magic a lot in interviews, too), something that might not always be apparent, given the way DC has assigned him artists almost willy-nilly over the course of the last six or seven years now.

His designs for the CSA characters were apparently little changed, with a more Kyle Rayner version of Power Ring getting the most tinkering from sketch to final version.

Here's his Power Ring design:

I like the parenthetical "I don't know what it is either" regarding Power Ring's insignia,  the same one that his creator Mike Sekowsky and Gardner Fox gave him.

And here's his Owlman:

Aside from some minor tinkering with the cape and the helmet's "ears," Morrison's Owlman is pretty much finished. Brilliant summary of the character's design though: "Batman as an owl basically."

There are a few pages of cover sketches in here as well, and here are a few neat ones:

In the upper left, you can see apparently earlier versions of some of the CSA members (Superwoman's got a mask, Power Ring has a different mask), and apparently at one point Anti-Matter Universe versions of Martian Manhunter and Aquaman were to be included.

The Aquaman appears to have scaly skin, not unlike his ancestor Kordax, or the One Million version of the character that showed up in the DC One Million crossover spearheaded by Morrison.

In the upper right, you can see how Quitely defines the super-abstracted figures: Superman and Ultraman and The Flash by their symbols, Owlman and Batman by their ears, the aliens by their collars, and Superwoman and Wonder Woman by their huge boobs.