Action Comics #775

In 2001, The Authority was the comicbook du jour. We’ll explore that comic more fully in the not-too-distant future but, in a nutshell, the Authority took the idea of super-powered vigilantism to its extreme. As their name implied, they became the moral arbiter of the world; not ruling it, but not worried concerned with sovereign rules when a threat or injustice reared its head. This type of “superhero” is diametrically opposite a superhero like Superman. As the title of Action Comics #775 says, Superman stands for Truth, Justice, and the American Way, but the quaint relativism and jingoism of that sentiment was all too apparent (if not obviously stated) to comicbook audiences of 2001. A group like the Authority would laugh at such naiveté. But if that sentiment was naïve, and if such sentiments were at the very core of a character like Superman, then what did that say about Superman himself?