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Author Topic: A Sermon Supreme #1: I Don't Want Origins to Honor the Past.  (Read 18812 times)
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Kal's Pal
Superman Emergency Squad
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« Reply #8 on: December 21, 2005, 02:56:13 PM »

Quote from: "TELLE"
more pivotal events:

-finding Krypto
-the romance with Lori
-going to work at the Planet
-going to work for WGBS
-meeting Batman
-founding/joining JLA


Absoloutly! Smiley (Posted that last one in a hurry, didn't have time to list them all!) As well as...

- Childhood friendship with Lex Luthor, resulting in emnity that carries into the present day
- Building the Fortress of Solitude
- Various encounters with the criminals of the Phantom Zone
- Finally enlarging the bottle city of Kandor on another world
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"Fellow scientists! Krypton is DOOMED!"
NotSuper
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« Reply #9 on: December 21, 2005, 03:41:12 PM »

In regards to the Luthor/Kent friendship: I've always liked the idea of Lex leaving Smallville while he's still Clark's friend. Then, when they meet years later, they've both completely changed.
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Many people want others to accept their opinions as fact. If enough people accept them as fact then it gives the initial person or persons a feeling of power. This is why people will constantly talk about something they hate—they want others to feel the same way. It matters to them that others perceive things the same way that they do.
Gangbuster
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« Reply #10 on: December 21, 2005, 04:05:06 PM »

Part of me would like the Evelyn Curry story to always be a part of Superman's early adventures...at least until the U.S. becomes the last civilized country to get rid of the death penalty, making the story "irrelevant." (but that's for another rant altogether)

But I've thought it over, and the most pivotal thing might be this: Superman almost has a different personality in the Golden Age. He was a tough guy, someone who could beat the gangsters at their own game, who really had no qualms about tearing the governor's door down, or making a munitions dealer enlist, just to set things right. What made Superman go soft?

I'm only 23, not a parent, and do not have as much life experience as many people on the board. However, I suppose for a moment I were the last survivor of my planet and family, often forsaking human relationships in favor of carrying out the promise I made on my father's deathbed. Then I suppose that one day a rocket crashed, and out of it came my own beautiful, blond-haired, blue-eyed flesh and blood, for whom I was now responsible. She would have me wrapped around her finger!

I would become a softy. Lois Lane would suspect that I was vulnerable to marriage, and spend an entire comic series trying to convince me of it. I would begin to seek out a "Superman family." So I think the most pivotal part of the story, that differentiates between Golden and Silver Age versions of myself, could be the sudden arrival of Kara.
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-"Superman", 1960

JulianPerez
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« Reply #11 on: December 21, 2005, 04:14:22 PM »

Interesting perspective, and one that I agree with: a character's history is the single most important thing about them, both in creating future stories and showing how they're characterized. Some of these "historical" stories were just gut-wrenchingly powerful. I doubt any story that involves the introduction and description of life on Krypton would be as suckerpunch powerful as what Jerry Siegel did in "Return to Krypton."

It would be a very heroic decision for DC to make if they said, "you know what? All that stuff from 1986 on? It really happened. Let's get to telling more stories." Not just because Superman comics past this point were by far the richest kind of comics world ever created (everything from Supermanium to the Kryptoniad, the Epic Poem of Krypton) and because these stories have additional resonance as being "the way it really happened," but ALSO because history itself is worth preserving, is worth making useful.

It's very wasteful that they have all this history, all these ideas from 70+ years, all these stories they could tell sequels to...and they can't make use of it because of an arbitrary reboot point.

You are right that the Earth-1 and Earth-2 dynamic DOES feel very retroactive. However, I think they were able to get away with it, because Superman comics until the 1970s did not quote from or derive from the past; previous battles were not brought up or used to affect current characterization (the exception was with Gardner Fox, who took his superhero history VERY seriously; the JLA had statements like "Gosh Manhunter, we haven't teamed up together since the battle with Starro!").

Quote from: "Gangbuster Thorul"
I would become a softy. Lois Lane would suspect that I was vulnerable to marriage, and spend an entire comic series trying to convince me of it. I would begin to seek out a "Superman family." So I think the most pivotal part of the story, that differentiates between Golden and Silver Age versions of myself, could be the sudden arrival of Kara.


This is a pretty good idea. It explains the change in Superman's personality in a natural way. Though one problem is, Superman didn't have to take responsibility for Supergirl. Superman chucked her in an orphanage; it wasn't a THREE MEN AND A BABY deal only with a teen.
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Super Monkey
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« Reply #12 on: December 21, 2005, 07:19:24 PM »

Quote from: "Kal's Pal"
Quote from: "TELLE"
more pivotal events:

-finding Krypto
-the romance with Lori
-going to work at the Planet
-going to work for WGBS
-meeting Batman
-founding/joining JLA


Absoloutly! Smiley (Posted that last one in a hurry, didn't have time to list them all!) As well as...

- Childhood friendship with Lex Luthor, resulting in emnity that carries into the present day
- Building the Fortress of Solitude
- Various encounters with the criminals of the Phantom Zone
- Finally enlarging the bottle city of Kandor on another world


-Finding the facts of his alien origins
-joining the Legion
-finding Super Monkey
-...
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"I loved Super-Monkey; always wanted to do something with him but it never happened."
- Elliot S! Maggin
llozymandias
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« Reply #13 on: December 21, 2005, 08:41:02 PM »

Earths 1, & 2 are parallel earths.  Their universes were separate from the beginning.
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John Martin, citizen of the omniverse.
Kal's Pal
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« Reply #14 on: December 21, 2005, 11:14:21 PM »

Quote from: "llozymandias"
Earths 1, & 2 are parallel earths.  Their universes were separate from the beginning.


Yes, but what were trying to say is that was only elaborated on so as to seperate the contradicting continuities. (And even then, Kal-L's history does not perfectally gel with that of Superman seen in the 1930s/40s). ... instead, how could we reconcile all those events into one continuity? (And can I just I love Al Schroeder's web-site, 'Schroder's Speculations' that seeks to do just that with nearly 70 years of continuity... however, trying to put it into a 'real world' historical perspective! Wink http://www.novanotes.com/specul.htm ).
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"Fellow scientists! Krypton is DOOMED!"
MatterEaterLad
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« Reply #15 on: December 22, 2005, 01:40:08 AM »

It SEEMS fairly simple, Supes and Bats survived the super hero shakeout and are VERY long lived characters in real years...the Earth 2 idea was quite clever in keeping the past and the present comic books "fresh" at the time...the separation of Earth 2 Supes and Kal-L was a mistake to my mind...
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