Adventures of Superman #500 - 504

After “Funeral for a Friend” wrapped up, all the Superman titles suspended publication. After all, Superman was dead so there seemed little point in continuing his titles, right?  It was actually a nice stunt on DC’s part, as it did lend to the illusion that Superman truly was dead. Plus, it gave DC added publicity when it announced, three months after the titles stopped, that Adventures of Superman #500 would be released, and that Superman might not be dead after all.

Adventures of Superman #497 - 499

It occurs to me that this November will mark the 20^th anniversary of the Death of Superman. It’s becoming somewhat disconcerting to reach the 20^th anniversary of my personal cultural touchstones. Last year it was a musical potpourri of anniversaries, as Nirvana’s Nevermind, Pearl Jam’s Ten, and U2’s Achtung! Baby hit the 20-year mark. (As did Rush’s Roll the Bones, but most of you are probably scratching your heads and going “Who?” rather than be overcome by visions of dancing skeletons pseudo-rapping , so let us stick with things more culturally shared. But if you want to know what you’re missing....)

Something tells me the death of Superman won’t be as popularly commemorated as much as Nevermind or Ten was, although I’m sure DC will be trotting out commemorative editions and special issues a’plenty when the time comes. But what may be forgotten is that when Superman died, the media frenzy was astounding. News programs led with the stoy, magazines featured it on their cover. Superman’s death was treated as a cultural milestone equivalent to the death of a king or president. While in current times you can kill off Captain America and every article ends with placing bets on his eventual return, when DC announced Superman would die, the media pretty much believed the hype that one of the biggest icons in America had gone to that great big Fortress of Solitude in the sky. It was like the death of a celebrity long passed their prime--nobody realized just how important Superman was until he was gone.

Adventures of Superman #444, 480, 488, 489

I have a “junk pile” of comics. These are, mostly, made up of comics that I owned before I began “collecting” comics; a motley assortment of random drug-store purchases and hand-me-downs from who-knows-where. They used to sit in the bottom drawer of the desk in my old room in my parents house. When I began collecting, these comics were kept separate, from what I was buying and bagging in protective sleeves. If you asked me about these comics when I was a teenager, I’d probably say they were comics in either very poor condition (a few are missing their covers outright) or that they were so corny that I would be embarrassed to include them in my “real” collection. (This junk pile included, among other things: a half dozen random Marvel Tales, Marvel’s three-issue A-Team mini-series, and about twenty semi-random issues of Marvel’s Star Wars comic.) And yet these comics stuck around, because my collecting-mentality couldn’t bear to discard even the comics I had essentially already discarded. When my wife and I bought our house three years ago, my mother unceremoniously handed over four or five boxes of my old crap that she had been wanting to get rid of, and among those boxes was my “junk pile”. I weeded through those comics and ended up pulling out a few dozen issues that, as an adult, I had a nostalgic attachment to. I now have a “not-really-junk pile” and a “junkier pile”; the whereabouts of the latter is unknown, either donated to some Goodwill store, or buried in a basement closet, while the “not really junk pile” sits, unbagged, on a shelf; part of my comic collection but, still, not really part of my comic collection.

I mention all this for two reasons: to explain why I own issue 34 of DC Comics Presents and the why it is not counted as one of the comics in the 5,600+ that are part of this project. This comic is from 1981, featuring a team-up between Superman, Captain Marvel, and the rest of the Marvel family, as they battle Mr. Mxyzptlk , Mr. Mind, and King Kull. Among other things, it also included Supes and Marvel being transported to an alternate dimension populated by talking bunnies, one of whom was, of course, Bunny Marvel. (A serendipitous bonus: the “next issue” blurb promised a Superman/Man-Bat team up! Man, now I need to track that sucker down!)  It’s all played straight—even Marvel Bunny—and clearly meant for a young audience. But I got to tell you: I enjoyed reading this issue more than I did these four Adventures of Superman comics.