#elliot s maggin

[ufonaut]

You know I've always hated you, Superman, but that guy's a real pain!

Superman (1939) Annual #9, with a cover date of 1983. Written by Elliot S! Maggin with art by legendary cartoonist Alex Toth.

[cantsayidont]

January to April 2004. Fans of MY ADVENTURES WITH SUPERMAN would likely enjoy this poignant 2004 miniseries by Kurt Busiek and Stuart Immonen, about a young man named Clark Kent in a world very much like ours, where Superman is a familiar — and fictional — pop culture icon. Clark grows up the butt of many jokes, but when he's in high school, he discovers that he really does have powers like Superman's, something that has no precedent in his world outside of comic books.

If this premise sounds familiar, it's because it's a lot like the origin of the Earth-Prime Superboy, before he became a way for Geoff Johns to mock comics fans (and for DC to play out its institutional hostility toward Siegel and Shuster). In the pre-Crisis era, Earth-Prime, one of editor Julius Schwartz's little jokes, was supposed to be our world, where comics artists, writers, and editors transcribed the adventures of the real heroes of the other Earths. In the afterword to the trade paperback compilation of SECRET IDENTITY, Busiek admits that the similarities were wholly intentional, and that while he didn't mention it in his proposal (and DC didn't advertise it as such), this was essentially his extrapolation of that 1985 concept by Elliot S! Maggin, Curt Swan, and Al Williamson.

After moving to New York City in his '20s, this Clark becomes a reporter — though not for the Daily Planet — and meets a young woman named Lois Chaudhari. To my knowledge, this was the first time a counterpart of Lois Lane was presented as an Asian woman (although of course she's not precisely Lois Lane).

Throughout most of the story, Clark uses his powers only in secret, but he does make himself a Superman costume. Eventually, he feels compelled to come clean with Lois:

Like Busiek's ASTRO CITY, SECRET IDENTITY is a very introspective story, less interested in action (of which there's relatively little) than in emotion and small observations of life with superhuman abilities. If you're expecting bigger dramatic stakes, you may find the series underwhelming — there are no supervillains or alien invasions, just Clark's reflections on his life and family, from childhood to old age — and the fact that the story never reveals why Clark has powers may frustrate. However, its autumnal wistfulness is appealing if you're in the right frame of mind for it. Immonen's art is gorgeous, and I can't think of a better artist for this story, which straddles the line between a real-world environment and the "heroic realism" of the modern superhero genre.

Fourteen years later, Busiek tried to do a similar story with Batman, BATMAN: CREATURE OF THE NIGHT, with John Paul Leon, which doesn't work nearly as well, wallowing in some uncomfortable attitudes about mental illness and an inappropriate though deliberately ambiguous supernatural element. Leon's art is interesting, but the story leaves a sour taste, and it does not succeed (at all) in doing for Batman what SECRET IDENTITY does for Superman, which is disappointing.

[dcbinges]

The Joker #9 (1976) by Ernie Chan, Irv Novick & Elliot Maggin

[comicarthistory]

Pages from Superman Annual #9. 1983. Art by Alex Toth and Terry Austin.

[luthwhore]

petition for this to be the lex they use in my adventures with superman

[ewzzy]

There's a tiny Fire and Ice story in Showcase '93 that's great but ends on a weirdly horny page even for these two.

[onlylonelylatino]

Green Arrow and Superman by Curt Swan

[nerds-yearbook]

Action Comics 642# (cover date, March 1989) marked the end of the title running as a weekly comic as issue 643# would start publishing monthly with standard size and page count. ("Where There Is A Will...! CHAPTERS I through IV", Action Comics 642#, Comic, Event)

[scottwbeattie]

Review: Superman in the Seventies

Superman is not just my favorite superhero, he’s my favorite fictional character. Yet, comparatively speaking, I haven’t read that many of his comics, and, prior to this collection, I hadn’t read a single Superman comic from the 1970’s. I blame this entirely on DC, who, apparently, have no interest in publishing anything prior to Crisis on Infinite Earths. Even Superman in the Seventies is out of print, however, I managed to find a used copy on Amazon for a decent price and picked it up. Since I’m completely ignorant of Superman in this decade, I can’t say if the comics that they chose for this anthology are a good representation of the character at this time, but since it’s all that I have, it’ll have to do.

There are quite a few charming stories in this volume. I found that the ones I usually liked most were written by Elliot S! Maggin, but there were strong and weak stories from just about every contributor. The writers include a grab-pack of names that most DC readers of this era will be familiar with: Maggin, Cary Bates, Len Wein, and Robert Kanigher, but the biggest name undoubtedly will belong to Jack Kirby, as an issue of his Jimmy Olsen run is included.

The inclusion of that particular issue is a bit of a head-scratcher in that it ends on a cliffhanger, but the following issue is not collected. This actually happens a few times in the anthology, and so it can make for a frustrating reading experience. Again, I’m not familiar enough with this era to name a better stand-alone Jimmy Olsen issue, and it’s entirely possible that there isn’t one. I understand that you can’t not include a Kirby comic in a 70’s Superman collection, which is all the more reason to just create something like the equivalent of the Marvel Epic line (but that’s an argument for another day).

My favorite story might just be the Krypto story by Maggin, although I’ll be the first to admit that I’m a sucker for Krypto. As dated as it was, I also kind of liked the “I am Curious (Black)” where Lois Lane becomes black for a day. If you read it as a 2023 reader, then, yes, it’s very cringe, but if you’re willing to look at in its context, then it’s an interesting and well-intentioned piece of social commentary (although I suspect that, even in 1970, it came across as forced). “Must There be a Superman?” is a classic story that I’m really glad to have finally read and it lives up to its billing. There’s a few weak stories as well; the issue with Terra Man was just dull as he wasn’t a very compelling villain. The preface mentioned that he was an important foe during this decade, but he never came across as menacing. Instead, it felt like someone in the Superman office was a big fan of Clint Eastwood westerns and wanted him in a Superman comic.

The majority of the comics in this collection are drawn by Curt Swan, the definitive Superman artist, so the book looks great. My biggest complaint is that the quality of the paper and the scans don’t do justice to Swan’s art. Not to belabor the comparison, but the Marvel Epics treat the art from this same era with so much more reverence. To be fair, DC had a line of paperbacks and omnibuses (Wonder Woman: the Golden Age vol. 2, Green Lantern: the Silver Age vol. 4, The Brave and the Bold: the Bronze Age vol. 1, etc.) that was comparable in quality to the Epic line, but they never got around to printing any Bronze Age Superman stories, and, for the most part, it seems that the line has been discontinued.

Overall, I have mixed feelings about Superman in the Seventies. The stories themselves were almost always charming and fun even when they ended on an unresolved cliffhanger, but the format is just not the way that I would go about collecting stories from this era. For Superman fans like myself, however, it’s worth owning until a better collection comes along.

[comfortfoodcontent]

Superman Annual #9 - Villain! Villain! Who's Got the Villain?

By Elliot S. Maggin, Alex Toth, Terry Austin, Tom Ziuko & Gaspar Saladino

PART 2 OF 3

[newwarriorstalk]

Released 30 years ago this week:

Batman #488 by Doug Moench & Jim Aparo, cover by Travis Charest

Batman: The Blue, the Grey & the Bat #1 by Elliot S. Maggin & Alan Weiss

Spider-Man #30 by Ann Nocenti & Chris Marrinan

Punisher #74 by Dan Abnett, Andy Lanning & Doug Braithwaite

[geekcavepodcast]

Perry White Gets One-Shot Comic

It’s about time.

Yes, that is right. Perry White, Editor-in-Chief of the Daily Planet, is getting his own 48-page one-shot comic.

Superman’s Pal Jimmy Olsen’s Boss Perry White #1 will feature a new 7-page story from Matt Fraction, Steve Lieber, Nathan Fairbairn, and Clayton Cowles (the team behind Superman’s Pal Jimmy Olsen: Who Killed Jimmy Olsen?). The comic will then reprint three classic stories from Elliot S. Maggin and Curt Swan, Neil Kleid and Dean Haspiel, and Brian Michael Bendis and Ivan Reis, highlighting Perry White’s career.

Superman’s Pal Jimmy Olsen’s Boss Perry White #1, featuring a cover by Lieber and Fairbairn, goes on sale on June 21, 2022.

(Image - Cover of Superman’s Pal Jimmy Olsen’s Boss Perry White #1)

[cantsayidont]

"So each year, hoping he will return, we set an extra place at dinner...for Superman!"

In 1984, the 400th issue of SUPERMAN presented an oversize issue with a series of vignettes about Superman's future, illustrated by a selection of different artists (including Frank Miller and Jim Steranko, among others) and interspersed with pinups and little essays by artists ranging from Will Eisner to Moebius.

The story itself, mostly written by Elliot S! Maggin, is unusual, since unlike most "Imaginary Stories," it's not interested with Superman's future (whom he marries, whether he has children, etc.), but rather with his eventual transformation into a mythic figure.

The most interesting of the vignettes is this one, drawn and colored by Klaus Janson. The narrative captions aren't always very legible, so I'll transcribe them after each page.

"So did the legend wax and wane and wax some more across the ages until, inevitably, the career of Kal-El, the waif from a lost world, passed from the realm of legend into myth… And in the dawning days of the Sixtieth Century--the memory of Superman has passed from reverence to ritual…"

"Meet Riley Benedix-- Even to 20th-Century eyes Riley's mode of dress would appear eccentric… Worry not--there is an explanation. The hat, of course, is the stovepipe of Abraham Lincoln, who lived soon enough before the great age of heroes to be included among them… The eyes wear the distinctive spectacles of Woodrow Wilson, who made the world safe for democracy… The shirt is that of Superman, greatest of all heroes, who fought for truth, justice, and the American way… Over Riley's back is an Eisenhower jacket, reminiscent of the hero of D-Day… On his feet are the highwater boots of Kuhan Pei-Jing, who slogged through the ricefields of Asian negotiating to head off a Third World War in the 1990's."

"Every year Riley and thousands of other history buffs fly hopelessly outdated spacecraft to Arcturus…to the convention of the 'League of Supermen'--for costume parades, sales of ancient memorabilia, parties, and a bit of unabashed fun… Riley's father never understood fun…"

"We join the Benedix family on a night of the year that is different from all other nights…"

"That is a good question, Superman…which you will answer to your own satisfaction soon enough…but for now you are only relatively sure of where you have been. You learned, again, that when the powers you wield are awesome, then the forces that array themselves against you are likewise--when the pulsing blob of chaotic energy nearly entered a star-system close to Earth's…and threatened, but its presence, to skew the orbits of inhabited worlds… Suddenly, not only was the blob of energy gone--but so was the last son of Krypton!"

"Alone, in pain, he found himself swimming through space like a drowning man looking for a life raft…directing himself more through will and instinct than through consciousness--to the blue-green world that has come to be his home. As, not a hundred yards from where the Man of Steel fell…"

"Soon, the stranger opens his eyes, looks around, and wonders…"

"So young Riley Benedix does continue the story of this festive day for his family…and he is the only one who knows that one of the story's main characters is here at the table with them all! It is a story of the days when America was young…and a child who could change the course of mighty rivers came to Earth--to exemplify all that American had and would come to stand for! Some of the story is accurate…some is clouded by the folds of myth and time--but like art and greatness, it is all true!"

"The young man walks the man from four thousand years ago into the sea-breeze of the night, and… For every Miracle Monday after that one, Riley's family set an extra place as everyone else did…but every year through Riley's old age, the food on Superman's dish mysteriously disappeared during dinner! Of course, everyone thought it was a trick--that Riley always teleported it away…but only Riley knew that sometimes legends live!"

Miracle Monday is a recurring holiday in Maggin's Superman stories, celebrated the third Monday of each May. It's explained in Maggin's 1981 prose novel of the same name, in which Superman beats the Devil (in the form of one C.W. Saturn) with some assistance from a time-traveling 29th century historian named Kristen Wells and an unexpected last-minute save from Lex Luthor (who was a very different character in that era and whom Maggin generally presented in a relatively sympathetic light).

(The cover of the novel tends to imply that it's a novelization of the Christopher Reeve SUPERMAN 2, which it's not, despite the glossy center section with photos from that movie.)

Maggin, who was a regular writer of the Superman comics in the '70s and '80s, later returned Kristen Wells in DC COMICS PRESENTS Annual #2 (1983) and #4 (1985), which make reference to the events of the novel.

In any event, the Benedix family's Miracle Monday celebration is very plainly modeled on a Passover seder, with an empty plate for Superman taking the place of the extra glass of wine poured for the prophet Elijah. It doesn't appear they've left the door open for Superman, but his appearance at the open door is obviously intended to evoke that tradition.

There is a lot of Jewish-coded content in the Superman stories of the Silver Age and Bronze Age (from 1958 to 1986) — a lot more than in the Golden Age, unless you really strain, and MUCH more than in the period following the John Byrne revamp begun in 1986–1987, which pointedly did away with most of that stuff — and this is a particularly clear example. In that respect, it's notable that the Miracle Monday seder is expressly an Earth custom; much of what you can most readily identify as Jewish-coded in these stories is associated with the Kryptonian diaspora.

Regarding the story's narrative coda, it may be worth pointing out that while this story has Superman initially thrown through time by a mysterious space phenomenon, the "pre-Crisis" Silver Age/Bronze Age Superman could fly at superluminal speeds, and was capable of both interstellar travel and time travel under his own power. There were some complicated (and irregularly applied) rules about traveling to time periods in which he already existed, but Superman was capable of simply traveling forward in time and then returning to his own time more or less whenever he felt like it, which is how he was able to perform this little parlor trick for Riley. That was one of the abilities that John Byrne removed in the wake of MAN OF STEEL, in the effort to reduce Superman's powers and try to tie them to a specific set of pseudo-scientific rules.

[dcbinges]

The Joker #9 (1976) by Irv Novick & Elliot Maggin

[comicarthistory]

Johnny Thunder page from Secret Origins #50. 1990. Art by Alan Weiss.

[luthwhore]

reading elliot s! maggin’s short story “luthor’s gift” and i really see what people mean when they say that early smallville lex feels heavily inspired by maggin because despite being written a decade prior, some of the dialogue feels like it could have been lifted directly from smallville.

also, was maggin the first person to suggest that lex is 100% hairless? because other than him, the only other instances in canon i can think of this being mentioned are smallville (which feels way too close to maggin’s lex for it to be a coincidence) and all-star superman (which was written by morrison, who loves to drop pre-crisis references and also wanted the visual gag of lex having to draw his eyebrows back on).