"The MIDNIGHT MURDER SHOW!"

[VanZee]

I don't know how super-hearing and super-vision are defined in today's Superman comics, but back in the 1970s they were generally governed by the laws of physics.

Don't mean to be confrontational, but I don't believe there has ever been an era where Supe's powers were governed by the laws of physics.

His powers impossible in any event, I think it is the misapprehension or ignorance of basic science and physics by many writers that led some subsequent writers to attempt a "reboot" or "retcon" to repair some of this unreason.

Please note that I am in agreement with most on this forum that the results of that revisionism has been lamentable and destructive to the mythology of Superman.  I simply state that the continued and escalating violations of the "laws of reason"-- which led to such things as Superman blowing supergiant stars around the universe at trans-lightspeed w/ his superbreath-- creates a sort of Supermanic state of physical laws that are difficult to write into.  A writer couldn't just step into the Superman universe; he'd have to get his head around things that were permitted by precedent but that were not reasonable or logical or even internally self-consistent.

You know, the endless efforts to "explain" Superman's secret disguise--a pair of eyeglasses!--is the most blatant illustration of this.  The dumbest (actually, the most innocent, from a time of innocence) secret identity in all of comics, its very lack of reason screams to conform w/ a universe of reason.  Ergo, so much attention to what many in this forum have correctly identified as the most mundane, boring aspect of the whole Superman story.  But... if *that* doesn't make sense, what does make sense??

What a tragedy that, instead the various attempts to "challenge" Superman (whether through various hues of Krytonite, endless survivors of Krypton, Sandman, etc), DC editors didn't just make the writers take a classes in physics or somesuch to bring Superman's powers into a common realm...

Superhearing?  Superventriloqusim?  Sure, but subject to the speeds of sound.  Telescopic vision?  Yeah, but subject to the speed of light.  What's seen on other planets is ancient history.

Perhaps this attention to detail, this "common sense weakening," might have spared us all some horrible destruction of the Superman family and of a character special to us all.

My $0.02.

[TELLE]

a sort of Supermanic state of physical laws

A phrase to conjure with!  Thanks Van-Zee!

You know, the endless efforts to "explain" Superman's secret disguise--a pair of eyeglasses!--is the most blatant illustration of this.  The dumbest (actually, the most innocent, from a time of innocence) secret identity in all of comics, its very lack of reason screams to conform w/ a universe of reason.  Ergo, so much attention to what many in this forum have correctly identified as the most mundane, boring aspect of the whole Superman story.  But... if *that* doesn't make sense, what does make sense??

Similar problems lead the ancient Greek poet Homercles (what, you never heard of him?) to scrap most of those hoary old nonsensical Greek Myths in favour of a new batch of "more realistic" myths --now lost to history.

What a tragedy that, instead the various attempts to "challenge" Superman (whether through various hues of Krytonite, endless survivors of Krypton, Sandman, etc), DC editors didn't just make the writers take a classes in physics or somesuch to bring Superman's powers into a common realm...
.

Some good points.  One of the most charming aspects of this "weakness" I read recently was a Superboy story in which SB stashes his glasses in a tree to convince Lana that Clark was flung there by Chandu the gorilla.  Later Clark confronts LL without his specs but because he's wearing civilian clothes (I guess) she doesn't see that he's Superboy.

Of course, many of the writers were long-time science fiction fans and writers themselves, with at least a basic grounding in physics and chemistry.  Go figure.  I still chalk the Crisis, etc up to small-mindedness, idiocy, and short-sightedness, in general.