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Perhaps inspired by the success of the SUPERMAN; EARTH ONE GN with its younger, more teen-friendly Superman, the DCnÜ Superman will similarly be a jeans-wearing, broodier alien who is NOT married to Lois Lane.

In fact, Lois is dating another guy! Is he named Jacob Black or Eric Northman? Only time will tell.

The new cover by Rags Morales is one of the best of the current relaunch, a nice iconic shot of the Man of Steel in his jeans, T-shirt and running shoes outfit. According to the PR, he’s soon to don his battle armor that pays tribute to his Kryptonian past. It was either that or a friendship bracelet.

What do you think? Is the new Superman a zero or a hero?

He has been called the Man of Steel, the Last Son of Krypton and a strange visitor from a distant planet.

He is Superman, the Man of Tomorrow. As part of DC COMICS – THE NEW 52, this September will usher in a new Superman for the new century.
In the pages of ACTION COMICS, writer Grant Morrison and artist Rags Morales will present humanity’s first encounters with Superman, before he became one of the World’s Greatest Super Heroes. Set a few years in the past, it’s a bold new take on a classic hero.

* This Superman is very much an alien, one struggling to adjust to his adopted home. In the series, he must come to terms with both the loss of his home world, as well as the loss of both of his adopted parents. He is more Kal-El from the planet Krypton than Clark Kent from Kansas. He’s a loner trying to find his place in the world.

* The series’ first storyline will explore the origins of Superman’s costume, as it evolves from a look that includes jeans and work boots to a new look: a suit of battle armor that pays tribute to his Kryptonian past.

* His great powers have limits. When the series begins, Superman can leap tall buildings, but his ability to fly is in its infancy.
And in the SUPERMAN ongoing comic book series, by writer George Perez and artist Jesus Merino, will be set in present day continuity and will unleash a series of new challenges for Superman and his alter ego Clark Kent.

* Clark Kent is single and living on his own. He has never been married.

* Lois Lane is dating a colleague at the DAILY PLANET (and his name isn’t Clark Kent) and she has a new position with the paper.

Timeless and modern, classic and contemporary, but younger, brasher and more brooding, this is Superman. The New Man of Tomorrow.

1 COMMENT

  1. “In fact, Lois is dating another guy! Is he named Jacob Black or Eric Northman? Only time will tell.”

    It’s probably Richard White.

  2. Hmmmmm.

    I guess this is how some people felt in 1986 when Man of Steel rolled in.

    Not interested in Supes being “more brooding” in the least.

    Also? I’ll miss Ma and Pa Kent.

  3. I also am not interested in Superman being “brooding” and I’m not into the “very much an alien” angle. But I admit to having my own very specific ideal of Superman — to me, Clark Kent is his REAL identity and Superman is the disguise. His human, rural upbringing define who he is, and the struggle should be with having to reconcile that with the fact that he’s from another planet.

  4. I don’t understand why Geoff would kill Ma Kent off. That doesn’t match the Superman movie from 1978, which seems to be Johns’ Bible.

  5. Jennifer: I’ve always seen him that way, too, you summed it icely. There’s something about Superman and his desire to do and be good and protect and remain loyal that I guess is nowadays too corny or something for some folks. I prefer it.

  6. So Superman is “brash!” yet somehow “timeless!” That sounds like an ad for jeans or some body spray. That would somehow get you shot at by cops. Because that’s what America wants to see — Superman shot at by cops. “Timeless!”

    Totally agree with Jennifer’s great comment — letting Clark fade into the background was the whole reason (I think) behind Superman being ‘broken.’ Clark is why readers could identify with the character in 1938, not the fantasy alien.

  7. “Lois Lane …. has a new position with the paper.”

    Not sure what to make of that…

    I always liked the way in which Clark Kent was the novice reporter and Lois Lane was the seasoned professional.

    This reboot may either mean that Lois Lane isn’t yet the career-woman that she is – which would be a step back for the feminists, OR that she’s a senior editor / Perry White’s lieutenant / Perry White (which would be a step forwards for the feminists, but seems too much to expect from DC).

    Any thoughts on what LL’s position will be? Coffee lady? ‘Society’ reporter? Or Rebekah Brooks type (without the scandal)?

  8. DCE just keeps on proving that they don’t know their own characters anymore. None of the Super people should ever seem ‘alien’ to readers of their adventures, which is a critical part of why their books are all failing now. And as for the silly ‘Lois has a different boyfriend now’, with this ‘creative’ group I’d predictably imagine that his initials are LL, for more contrived drama.

  9. “a suit of battle armor that pays tribute to his Kryptonian past.”

    Looks like the suits finally got their wish, to somehow put Supes in ‘battle armor’. That’s as useful to Superman as a bicycle is to a fish!

  10. I will give Morrison’s series a shot, but visually I already miss the classic outfit. The only thing more ridiculous that the image above (the short cape is especially awkward looking) is the idea of “battle armor”.

  11. OK, jeans, running shoes, a Superman t-shirt and a cape. I think I saw this running through Port Authority. As for it being more “Twi-lighty” – like that fad hasn’t crashed.

  12. That’s as useful to Superman as a bicycle is to a fish!

    Not to the original Superman, in a very technical sense. Morrison’s Superman is much more like the S&S original, apparently, with relatively limited powers — when having bullets bounce off was something novel and exciting.

    I don’t see the point in doing a prequel-type Superman, though, especially when there is a current-day Superman series as well. Unless they work hard to make them complementary, the two series will compete for readers. And, given how dating in comics works, will Superman’s youth be set in the ’90s?

    If this was intended to be a project which would redefine Superman for the rest of the 21st century, with Morrison being selected as the best person for the job, I’d have a more favorable reaction. The way the Superman revamp is being handled, it comes across more as a vanity project for Morrison.

    SRS

  13. Oh man. More brooding from Superman? That’s the Superman I’ve always identified with, the brooding alien. Less Clark Kent and more Kal-El? Brilliant. Can we change the name from Superman to something else so we can completely guarantee that this is nothing like the old?
    Thanks DC. At least I have my old trades. By the way, DC hasn’t announced that they will be coming into homes and stomping your old trades and back issues into oblivion yet have they?

  14. Jennifer and MJ:

    Right on. He was raised since he was a baby as a small-town American boy, and though he has a heritage, his identity was formed by his very middle-American parents in the midwest.

    Which is very interesting to me, in light of all the immigration controversy going on (interesting how that controversy died down when it wasn’t election season; here it comes again). Wish Superman could address some of that material, actually.

  15. Why is “Twi-lighty” in quotes when that phrase or the word Twilight is not in any of the PR snippets that you’ve pulled?

    It’s kind of annoying in that it sounds like DC is using Twilight as a direct reference in the release, when it actually seems to be your own fear spin for more hits. I wouldn’t care if it was in the headlines without quotes, or if you actually used a quote where Twilight is referenced. Maybe I’m just off on my journalistic style, back to Write More Good!

    Brooding Superman is silly to me. I like my Man of Steel to be a happy dude who does good because he enjoys it and his attitude is so contagious it makes others want to do good as well. Maybe he’ll get to that point over the course of this run.

  16. Just when I couldn’t imagine how DC could possibly make comics any douchier, the gifted minds of DC have gone beyond any retarded “improvements” the’ve made before. This is even sillier than Superman’s mullet of the 90’s.

    I’m in constant amazement how seemingly competent and well-meaning people can do such damage to such an iconic and perfect character. He can bend steel in his bare hands, spin the Earth backwards, light a cigar with his eyeballs, and hide his identity just by wearing glasses, but he’s powerless against the constant indignities slathered on him by DC’s brain trust. Excuse me, I just threw up in my mouth — I can’t take it.

  17. “This is even sillier than Superman’s mullet of the 90’s.”

    Especially when it was already out of date even then! :-O

  18. I agree with Citizen Cliff. This is the stupidest thing I’ve ever seen. Superman in jeans and workboots??? C’mon, really? How about the Lone Ranger in bermuda shorts? Or Tarzan in a jogging suit? Well, good luck with it, boys, ’cause it all looks like cee arr aay pee.

  19. Any thoughts on what LL’s position will be?

    A reader can take it as a given that LL will be Superman’s love interest (eventually), but does that always have to be the case? The main reason Superman-LL worked so well in the past was that she got into situations that Supes would have to rescue her from. If you reject that thinking as being outdated and sexist, what basis is there for picking a love interest?

    If you go with his civilian occupation, the women he’ll meet as a result of that, the other interests they might have in common, and so on, you’re making his civilian identity at least as important as his Superman identity. If you choose a love interest based on what he does as Superman, you’re restricted to superheroines.

    One other approach would be to have him meet someone as a teenager, have her learn his secret, have them marry when they become adults, and have them married for the rest of their lives, but that only works as a single set of stories.

    SRS

  20. Wow, I don’t think there’s a single word in this description of the new Action Comics that doesn’t strike me as completely, utterly, pathetically tone-deaf to the appeal of Superman as a character. I agree with everything Jennifer DeGuzman said, and I’ll add that I didn’t even start reading the character until my mid-teens, and even as an emo-before-there-was-a-word-for-it kid, I never once thought he needed to be more “brooding.”

    I mean, COME ON, DC. He’s Superman. He’s the archetype. Everything you’ve done here is make him more bland and less The Ultimate Superhero he’s supposed to be.

    I mean yeesh, I like Morrison and love Morales’ artwork, but the core concept of this just doesn’t appeal to me at all. I’ll give it a shot, but if it’s anything like I’m picturing from the above, I can’t imagine sticking around for more than an issue or two.

  21. Is there a better reason NOT to buy a comic book (or anything for that matter) than it being “more Twi-lighty”?? Well, maybe one. That would be Superman wearing a t-shirt and a cape.

  22. Steve Sherman:
    “Superman in jeans and workboots??? C’mon, really? How about the Lone Ranger in bermuda shorts? Or Tarzan in a jogging suit?”

    Stop it, Steve. I’m warning you — someone will read that and actually think it’s a good idea. Then we’ll ALL have to live with it.

  23. How convenient. DC has created a perfect jumping off point so that I don’t have to buy their comics any more because why would I want to start everything all over again?

  24. Where are these quotes from? A DC panel at SDCC? It would be really nice if the article said that. Just, you know, for those people who aren’t aware that SDCC is going on or what it is.

  25. Whoa, whoa, whoa! Can everybody just … take … a … breath?

    As a guy with nigh on a half-century invested in reading DC comics, I have my own questions about the Relaunch and a fair amount of skepticism regarding some of the characters decisions being made. And I empathize with longtime fans who feel like they’re being ignored in this retooling of the line and plan on using the occasion to jump off. But is it really deserving of all these outraged dismissals without a single page of story being read?

    Yes, the PR tips us off to some big changes to the post-Crisis continuity of the past 25 years, most notably having the Kents be dead and Clark and Lois unmarried. But those also shift back to the status quo for Superman’s first 48 years, and they worked pretty well as story elements in that time. As for the T-shirt and work boots outfit and the “brooding” and “alien” descriptors, I’m inclined to think they won’t be as radical a change to the character as they might sound at first blush. Morrison has too much affection for the character to dumb him down into some robot or angsty teen. My take on the relaunched Action series is that it’s just Superman: Year One, with Morrison using the early Siegel-Shuster stories as his bible and inspiration in the same way he did Weisinger’s Silver Age books for All Star Superman. A lot of the trappings that the new Superman starts with in issue one will likely be gone in a year as the character grows and evolves. The beauty of starting this early in the character’s career is that Morrison can do just what John Byrne did in 1986: make changes, really create some drama. And if Morrison shows the same care and heart with this storyline that he did with that earlier series, this could be a wonderful new take on a familiar story.

    And if it isn’t, I’ll just haul out All Star Superman or Busiek and Immonen’s Secret Identity or Loeb and Sale’s A Superman for All Seasons or Moore and Swan’s “Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow” or some old Siegel-Swan comics from the Sixties where I can easily find, in the words of MJ, Superman’s “desire to do and be good and protect and remain loyal” — those qualities that drew me to the character as a kid and have kept me a lifelong fan.

    I confess to rolling my eyes over the so-called Kryptonian armor and Superman’s trunksless pants, but I’m at least willing to give the stories a chance before I jump off the new Supes train. I’m hoping that underneath that new threads beats the same old Heart of Steel.

  26. So, it’s the Golden Age power set, via 90210. Awesome.

    And is it just me, or does Supes look like Captain Marvel? Maybe that’s the work around for the Siegel lawsuit (sarcasm).

  27. “But is it really deserving of all these outraged dismissals without a single page of story being read?”

    Absolutely.

    That’s why they’re called PREVIEWS, and by default, that makes them FAIR GAME for evaluation and criticism. That’s what the whole purchase process is about, FYI. Now if the end result of this upteenth latest comic revisionism is surprisingly good, then I’m certain some armchair critics will possibly change their minds and become converts anyway. But it always ticks me off when sycophantic people are so eager to roll over and play dead for the corporation, that they need to have everybody else shut up for themselves as well. Besides, it’s pretty obvious that at this point of desperation, DCE could care less what their readers think anyway, or they would have performed better market research. So, full speed ahead on the Titanic!

  28. “But is it really deserving of all these outraged dismissals without a single page of story being read?”

    I don’t see much outrage, just lots of dismissals, derision, and shrugs. That’s what should be worrying the folks at DC. They’d be OK if there were outrage. This is largely provoking responses from “meh” to “that’s dumb” to “this too shall pass.”

  29. I didn’t anything here saying the Kents were dead. Just that they, and a middle-American Protestant work ethic, aren’t an intergal part of the character’s personality any longer.
    I agree that, like many of the readers who’ve commented above, I’ve got a fondness for that part of his personality. But I can see reasons (quite a few of them legal) for pulling away from the Norman Rockwell view of Supes as an American-bred hero. Moreover, I trust Grant Morrison to find the most interesting way to recast the character under that kind of light.
    Or is someone out there willing to make a case for a better writer to balance a fresh and yet iconic view of Superman? This isn’t SUPREME, after all, not a creative experiment in how to play with the genre; it’s the flagship of superhero comics, and no smart admiral will take the flagship into trecherous and uncertain waters. Of Moriison’s reverent attachment to the history and importance of the character we can all be certain. But I’m also willing to make commitment to talent and ability to bring us something new and not ready to be frightened off by short capes and shoelaces.
    And really, who says Ma and Pa Kent are dead? Anyone?

  30. “I don’t understand why Geoff would kill Ma Kent off. That doesn’t match the Superman movie from 1978, which seems to be Johns’ Bible.”

    But it does match the Golden Age mythos, which is really the last time the character was not a complete bore in print.

    “Whoa, whoa, whoa! Can everybody just … take … a … breath?”

    No kidding. The ironic thing is that all the hate will ultimately drive even more people to check the new titles out. Which makes the hate seem all the more ridiculous.

    “That’s why they’re called PREVIEWS, and by default, that makes them FAIR GAME for evaluation and criticism. That’s what the whole purchase process is about, FYI.”

    Because no one has ever bought a comic with a shitty solicit before, right? Insert eye roll here.

  31. Wasn’t aware that I was being sycophantic, rolling over and playing dead for the corporation, or asking anyone to shut up. I was merely responding to the level of heat in some of the comments, which struck me as a bit overblown for a couple of images and some PR copy. Of course I understand that previews are open for evaluation and criticism, and basing one’s decision to buy or not buy something on them is entirely reasonable. Getting indignant over one seems a little premature, but I guess that’s just me.

  32. Man, people really hear what they want to hear sometimes. As someone noted above, “Twilight” doesn’t appear in any of the actual descriptions. Was that just The Beat’s assessment? If so, it had to’ve been done to get a rise out of comic fans.

    And are folks here familiar with Grant Morrison? Guy generally doesn’t do broody in trite ways. In fact, you might remember him from the All-Star Superman series most were rightly praising just in the last few years.

    The DC relaunch could go wrong in any number of ways, but I have a strong feeling it won’t be because Grant Morrison ends up unduly influenced by Twilight. In fact I really wish DC would just let him do all the talking about what he’s gonna be doing. His pre-release interviews for All-Star Superman really conveyed his exciting intent.

  33. “I was merely responding to the level of heat in some of the comments, which struck me as a bit overblown for a couple of images and some PR copy.”

    Nice attempt at walking back your comments, but the revamp over Superman has been news for far longer than just today. The only thing ‘overblown’ is when people pretend that they’re being more adult in trying to shout down commentary they don’t particularly like.

  34. And now we see the horror that the sales of Superman Earth One hath wrought!

    I’m not vastly upset because I’m not a Superman reader, but this really does seem like an utterly inexplicable story direction. Superman! Immensely popular and iconic! None of which does this fit…

    Frankly, the Lois thing bothers me the least. She’s fine, she’s working for the Planet, no one made any deal with demons, she can always date Clark later. But the rest? Oh dear, sounds like Superman is in for another Dork Age.

    Ah well, with a superhero as big and iconic as Superman, this too shall pass.

    Anyone want to start a betting pool on how long it will take to put him back in something approximating his original costume? (Not that this is the most important change, just the easiest to define, in a way that gung-ho kitten-saving spirit is not.)

  35. This seems perfectly designed to attract new readers who know Superman from movies (including the upcoming one). It’s a marketing decision I think and giving a chance to Morisson to write what he wants (and he likes aliens that don’t fit in).
    I think the thinking at Time Warner is that they would prefer to have 500k new readers reading Superman on their iPads than 100k old readers buying it from their LCS. That could make sense businesswise. Time Warner is not in the business of pleasing old fans who have ‘invested’ 25 years of their life in reading DC like Robert.

  36. If Clark is going to be switching from his blue jeans, t-shirt and waist-length cape into his “suit of battle armor that pays tribute to his Kryptonian past,” then what excuse do all the other heroes have for wearing the exact same bodysuit designs? Does this first story end with Clark acquiring his new duds then emailing pdfs of his sewing templates to Batman or something?
    https://www.comicsbeat.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/JLA-toontumbler-625×501.jpg

  37. I used to be able to handle reboots/resets/crisis/whatever in the past, but not anymore. What I want now are stories with characters that grow and evolve, and alas Marvel and DC won’t let their characters neither grow or evolve.

    So, it’s only creator owned projects for me from now on, and the occasional Elseworlds story where we will see how Clark is married to Lois and have a family.

  38. Um, has anyone even looked at sales on the Superman books for the last five years? No one’s reading them. No one cares about them. Superman, as a character, is and has been dull for a long time. And people here seem to be whining that they want to keep him dull because, der, that’s how he’s been for the last 25 years.

    Grow up.

    Say what you want about the new book (which you haven’t even read yet), but it’s gotten people talking like crazy. This is the most interested people have been in the character since . . . he died?

  39. “Um, has anyone even looked at sales on the Superman books for the last five years? No one’s reading them. No one cares about them. Superman, as a character, is and has been dull for a long time. And people here seem to be whining that they want to keep him dull because, der, that’s how he’s been for the last 25 years.”

    Wrong.

    The reason he isn’t currently selling is because DC editorial have been consistently strangling the character to death with endlessly mediocre stories, art, and reboots that have taken away anything and everything relevant about the character for readers. The reason that Superman doesn’t sell today is because he hasn’t been Superman in a long, long time, and this latest attempt is getting it wrong even before it is released. So you grow up and smell the coffee, because it’s DONE.

  40. The reason that Superman doesn’t sell today is because he hasn’t been Superman in a long, long time, and this latest attempt is getting it wrong even before it is released.

    But can any new Superman stories that get him right be written? There isn’t any point, that I see, to a reboot if the resulting stories are going to recycle old material with only superficial changes.

    Take his secret identity (SID). I’d argue that the entire concept of a hero protecting his SID and his love interest, or other people trying to guess it, is outdated and, in retrospect, silly, entertaining only in material written mainly for kids. A story that has suspecting the hero’s SID as its main point would be a waste of everyone’s time. All the variations on that have been done already.

    Lois Lane as a love interest has been done. Even people with only passing familiarity with Superman know who his love interest is. If a reboot only has them falling in love again for the same reasons, the same motivations, etc., there’s no reason to do the stories.

    A rebooted Superman could be improved by eliminating silly powers, such as X-ray vision, super breath, and super hearing. His vulnerabilities could also be updated and modified.

    What would make the biggest differences in Superman stories would be writing him as an actual person, with opinions on multiple political and social issues, leisure time preferences, etc. Doing that could turn off readers in love with the archetypal Superman, but the archetype might have run its course.

    SRS

  41. KET’s right. The book was selling GREAT for a while there, particularly when Geoff Johns got back in the business of just writing good, traditional Superman stories. They went in the shitter when Superman was shipped off to New Krypton and quit being Clark Kent….or, in other words, when they started moving too far away from the core appeal of the concept. I have my doubts that moving just as far away in a different direction will yield any better dividends.

  42. Hmm, so the young Superman will be no flights, no tights? Sounds familiar.
    JM, this reads more like what older suits assume would draw young non-comics fans to Superman than anything that would actually work (“He has to be young! And broody! And tormented! Yeah, ’cause kids dig that stuff.”). And the assumption thousands of people who don’t read comics will pick it up because it’s a Relaunch and a Great Jumping On Point always struck me as dubious. I suspect (based on absolutely nothing but subjective opinion) there’s more people who aren’t interested in the medium than people who would love to read them but get intimidated by the continuity.
    As for growth and change (To answer another commentator) we already know what he’ll be like five years down the road. Kind of limits it.

  43. They went in the shitter when Superman was shipped off to New Krypton and quit being Clark Kent….or, in other words, when they started moving too far away from the core appeal of the concept.

    But the question remains: How many stories can you do that hit on the core appeal of Superman before the possibilities are exhausted? The main reason for moving away from the core concept is that the writer can’t think of anything new (and entertaining) to do with it.

    SRS

  44. “The reason that Superman doesn’t sell today is because he hasn’t been Superman in a long, long time.”

    Er, I hate to break this to you, but your own personal concept of Superman does not define what Superman is or should be. You don’t get to decide what counts and what doesn’t count. Everything that was published counts. So does everything that’s going to be published.

    You don’t own these characters and DC doesn’t exist to cater to your personal preferences. So deal with the changes or move on.

    But for god’s sake, stop whining about it and posting the same thing over and over and over and over again.

  45. SRS: As long as there are nerdy kids — boys or girls — who are ignored by someone they like (and they know that person just can’t see them for who they feel they really are) then Lois Lane is absolutely essential. How long can the same concept work? Almost SEVENTY-FIVE years. In pop culture, that’s an eternity.

    Fraser: Totally agree. Dan Didio and Jim Lee and JMS, no offense, shouldn’t be telling us what it is or isn’t outdated. Same with Grant Morrison (Bruce Springsteen? Is this 1989?). I would much rather take a chance on a ‘younger’ voice like Daniel Way or Matt Fraction on the classic version. Don’t change the character if you can’t get a good story, change the writer.

  46. Aronson, been expecting to follow with that cliched ‘you don’t own these characters’ BS response, even though it’s really just your knee jerking itself around back into your mouth again. One could say the exact same thing about your constant crybaby carping on message boards whenever someone disagrees with you on ANYTHING. So for Allah, Krishna and Buddah’s sake, please stop trying to shut down conversations just because you’re too butt-hurt to move on to the next comment. Nobody’s stopping you from moving on already, as I was already done with this thread some time before you even showed up.

  47. KET, one of the worst ways to criticize writers is to complain that their stories are bad in some non-specific ways, and that the solution for making stories about _____ sell well again is to return to the core concept. If you’ll recall, Byrne specialized in going back to the basics with characters; one way he did that was to write an “Everything you know about ______ is wrong” storyline, which was as mind-numbingly inept a way of writing a character as to declare that everything which had happened since 19xx was a dream.

    If you have ideas for new stories about Superman which won’t repeat older ones, then describe them. It’s not as if they’re precious jewels. If a writer thought that ____ cooking up a new scheme and trying to kill Superman yet again was a new story, or that someone named ____ with a scheme that was practically identical to another scheme was a new story, he’d do it. Writers don’t do those stories because the similarities far outweigh the superficial differences.

    Writing an archetype against another archetype is trivially easy; there are books that lay out such stories as though they were recipes, with the characters as ingredients. Creative writers don’t do such stories because they mark the writers as lacking creativity.

    SRS

  48. Actually Synsidar your argument sounds more like one that focuses on current fans (or more likely ex-fans) than complete newbies. For someone who’s just picking up the book, there’s no reason the same old stories won’t work because they’ll be new to them—-and if they have any concept at all of Supes, it probably includes Clark Kent, Lois, the Daily Planet etc. “We’re handling Superman’s life totally different from everything we’ve done before” seems pitched more to those of us who’ve seen everything they’ve done before.

  49. Actually Synsidar your argument sounds more like one that focuses on current fans (or more likely ex-fans) than complete newbies.

    I’d think that most people who have any interest in Superman know that he’s been around for decades. If a direction for him is touted as “new,” that should mean it’s new to everybody, not just new readers.

    People who have watched TV for years know that series run into problems. Scripts become weak; actors get bored with their roles; a lead actor dies or he leaves, and the producers have to decide whether to write the departure into the series or recast the part. It’s taken for granted that a series eventually ends, for whatever reason; TV viewers accept that, while superhero comics fans — and publishers — don’t.

    SRS

  50. @ Fraser:
    “For someone who’s just picking up the book, there’s no reason the same old stories won’t work because they’ll be new to them …”

    Exactly. New readers won’t care about 75 years of continuity. Unless DC doesn’t think there are new readers — just the established audience, which seems to be dwindling away.