Superman Images
| Super Name: | Superman |
| Real Name: | Kal-El |
| Aliases: |
Clark Joseph Kent Man of Steel Kryptonian Last Son of Krypton Kal-L Man of Tomorrow Jordan Elliot Superboy Supes Big Blue Night-Wing Nightwing Nova Man-God Mighty One Blue Boy Scout The Traveler Big S Sun-Spirit |
| Publisher: | DC |
| Gender: | Male |
| Character Type: | Alien |
| 1st Appearance: | Action Comics #1 |
| Appears in: | 4835 issues |
| Birthday: | |
| Died: |
Recent Appearances
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Hulk ( 4666 - 3222 ) |
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Wonder Woman ( 1397 - 457 ) |
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Supergirl ( 1209 - 350 ) |
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Iron Man ( 1129 - 533 ) |
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Silver Surfer ( 970 - 1055 ) |
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Thor ( 889 - 912 ) |
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Man-Thing ( 775 - 251 ) |
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Venom ( 772 - 322 ) |
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Batman ( 760 - 459 ) |
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Hyperion ( 733 - 212 ) |
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Storm ( 621 - 385 ) |
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Goku ( 590 - 641 ) |
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Beast ( 565 - 212 ) |
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Captain Marvel ( 558 - 286 ) |
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Jean Grey ( 550 - 561 ) |
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Goten ( 549 - 175 ) |
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Martian Manhunter ( 525 - 228 ) |
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Sentry ( 520 - 349 ) |
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Spider-Man ( 517 - 194 ) |
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Colossus ( 484 - 194 ) |
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Hulk ( 4666 - 3222 ) |
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Silver Surfer ( 970 - 1055 ) |
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Thor ( 889 - 912 ) |
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Goku ( 590 - 641 ) |
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Jean Grey ( 550 - 561 ) |
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Iron Man ( 1129 - 533 ) |
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Batman ( 760 - 459 ) |
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Wonder Woman ( 1397 - 457 ) |
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Superman Prime ( 275 - 417 ) |
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Flash ( 334 - 399 ) |
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Storm ( 621 - 385 ) |
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Supergirl ( 1209 - 350 ) |
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Sentry ( 520 - 349 ) |
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Venom ( 772 - 322 ) |
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Galactus ( 147 - 307 ) |
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Captain Marvel ( 558 - 286 ) |
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Wolverine ( 361 - 286 ) |
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Juggernaut ( 448 - 285 ) |
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Captain America ( 428 - 254 ) |
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Man-Thing ( 775 - 251 ) |
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Justice League Of America
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Justice League Unlimited
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Justice League of Aliens
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Justice Society Of America
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Legion Of Super-Heroes
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Superman, the Man of Steel, is one of DC Comic's flagship characters. By day, reporter Clark Kent works at the Daily Planet. As Superman, the last son of Krypton is nearly unstoppable. Edit
News
- Clark Kent gives up BEER
Sept. 17, 2008 - G~man - Could Mark Millar Write a 'Kick-Ass' Superman Movie?
Sept. 3, 2008 - G~man - Warner Bros. Decides on Quality Over Quantity for Movies
Aug. 22, 2008 - G~man
Publication History
The cover of Action Comics #1, in which Superman was nationally introduced.
The first Super-Hero?
There are many comic characters that could be considered super-heroes preceding Superman, for example Hugo Hercules created in 1902 who was the first super-powered comic character. However if your definition of super-hero requires the following- Super powers
- Secret Identity
- Costume
- Fights crime.
Then Superman could possibly be the first.
Contrary to popular belief the term Super-Hero was not coined for Superman in particular, but started to pop up in comic books many years after his creation, describing anyone who acted remotely heroic and not necessarily with super-powers. The exact origin of the word seems to be hard to pinpoint, and that is why Marvel and DC has a joint trademark over the term Super-Hero rather than DC having the sole trademark (Actually, they bought the trademark from Mego Toys, who had no legal ownership and simply claimed the term as their own long after it was already in wide public use), and also why other companies uses terms as mystery men, masked heroes or science heroes.
Origin
Golden Age / Kal-L
The Golden Age Superman during Infinite Crisis.
When a scientist named Jor-L discovered that Krypton was going to explode, he tries to convince the other Kryptonians to flee the planet. The other people refuse to believe such allegations but Jor-L decides to just save his son. He builds a spaceship to place his infant son, Kal-L, into the ship. He launches him towards Earth while staying on Krypton with his wife Lora. Kal-L lands in Smallville around the same time as World War I. John and Mary Kent were passing by when they saw a spaceship crash land. They would take the infant Kal-L in and raise him as their own, eventually adopting him. During the 1940s, George Lowther’s Superman novel changed Jor-L, Kal-L, and Lora’s name to Jor-El, Kal-El, and Lara. John and Mary would name their new infant Clark Kent. Clark grew up on the Kent farm, and he slowly discovers his super-humanoid powers while still unaware of his Kryptonian origins. John and Mary would eventually pass away, and Clark decided to use his newly discovered powers to help the world. He moved to Metropolis to start his new career as a super-hero; he also became a reporter and worked at the local newspaper, the Daily Star. At the end of the Golden Age of Comic Books, most of DC Comics did not exist any longer, and it was nearing the launch of the Silver Age. The reason for this was to be able to bring back other DC characters and retcon them to be more modern. DC had decided that they wanted to abandon all the stories in the Golden Age and start from scratch. DC would soon introduce the Multiverse in order to start over while keeping stories from the Golden Age. It stated that Golden Age heroes would reside on Earth-Two, while the Silver Age heroes reside on Earth-One, and the two Earths are parallel. However, a problem resulted with the Superman continuity. As Superman’s stories were continued to be published without interruption since his debut in Action Comics #1 from the Golden Age through the Silver Age. This caused a big problem when they made Superman a member of the Justice Society of America while also being a Justice League of America member on Earth-One. DC would fix this by establishing that there were two Supermen, with Kal-L being the one to reside on Earth-Two and Kal-El would be the one on Earth-One during the Silver Age. They made a few minor details between the two Supermen to make them look obviously different. Earth-Two/Golden Age Superman would continue to be Kal-L with John and Mary Kent. His “S” would be slightly adjusted to look different from Earth-One, and he was given gray hair at the temples to make him look older, since Earth-One was where all the young heroes were. With the Multiverse, DC was able to continue writing stories for the Golden Age Superman while not interfering with the mainstream Superman. Kal-L eventually reveals his identity to Lois Lane from Earth-Two during the Bronze Age of Comic Books; it was supposedly during the 1950s in comic time but was revealed during the Bronze Age. The couple would get married soon after and stories would be written to describe their early life as a married couple. When Superman started out his career, he was only the protector of Metropolis. Eventually he began to become more confident and he was able to place the United States under his protection. Next, Superman would watch over the entire world. Later they would reveal that Superman was a founding member of the Justice Society of America, but he would actually be just an “honorary member” because he did not participate in many adventures with the JSA. He eventually built a secret citadel in the mountains near Metropolis, similar to the Earth-One Superman’s Fortress Of Solitude. Superman would meet more Kryptonians named U-Ban, Kizo, and Mala. They were three brothers and were part of the Science Council. They were exiled from Krypton and imprisoned in a suspended-animation vessel when they attempted to conquer the whole planet. Mala would create a counterfeit Earth where Bizarro would come from in the future. Eventually during the Silver Age, Superman’s cousin Kara (later known as Power Girl) was introduced onto Earth. Kara had arrived decades after Kal-L and her ship would educate her through a virtual reality, she arrives in her early twenties.
Superman in the Silver Age.
Silver Age
During the Silver Age, they had decided to create two Supermans instead of just updating the older version. Supergirl was first introduced as Superman’s cousin during the 1960s. Also there were many first appearances for villains such as Brainiac and Bizarro. Superman also helped found the Justice League of America. During the 1960s, his origin was finally explored. Superman was born on Krypton, was named Kal-El, and was the son of Jor-El by Lara Lor-Van. When Jor-El found out the planet was going to explode, he tried to warn the Science Council, but the other Councilors rejected Jor-El’s theory. Jor-El decided to try and build spaceships for his family to escape Krypton, but the disaster came much quicker even than he had expected. The only ship done by the time of Krypton’s destruction was only big enough to fit Kal-El and Lara. Lara elected to stay behind with her husband to give their son a better chance of escaping the explosion. Kal-El’s ship landed in Smallville where he would be discovered by Jonathan and Martha Kent. (An earlier version identified them as Ethan and Sara Kent.) They named Kal-El Clark, after Martha’s maiden name, and would proceed in adopting him as their own son. While growing up, Clark discovered his super-humanoid powers, convinced his foster mother to design a uniform for him, and began to work as a super-hero under the name Superboy. As Superboy, he had several adventures in Smallville and became a member of the Legion Of Super-Heroes. When Jonathan and Martha Kent both died of a disease for which even he did not know a cure, Clark moved to Metropolis and went to Metropolis University. He would continue his career as a super-hero under the name of Superman during college, from which he eventually graduated with a degree in journalism; he joined the Daily Planet soon afterwards.Bronze Age
Superman’s origin story was never altered that much throughout his entire history. The Bronze Age was during the 1970s where writers decided to just tone Superman up a little bit to be more modern. During this era, there were many spin-offs for Superman including “Superman’s Pal, Jimmy Olsen.” These were later incorporated into their own title, The Superman Family. Also, Superman movies and television series began to air. When the Daily Planet was bought out by Galaxy Communications, Morgan Edge reassigned Clark to television news as an anchorman and had him co-anchor it with Lana Lang. Since the Crisis on Infinite Earths had not taken place yet, the Golden Age Superman continued his stories through the Bronze Age, and it was during this time that he married Lois Lane and became the editor-in-chief of the Daily Star. Kal-L also discovered a Kryptonian spaceship with his cousin Kara Zor-L inside it.
The Crisis On Infinite Earths marked the end of the Silver Age.
Crisis on Infinite Earths
The Paradise Door is opened for them to enter.
The Crisis On Infinite Earths story arc was written in order to erase the multiverse in 1985. It was agreed upon by DC that there had been too many Earths with too many mirror images of heroes. Therefore, it was decided to destroy the collection of several alternate realities at the hands of Anti-Monitor. There were five realities that were saved, but these were merged into one reality, becoming Earth-One. Kal-L was erased from history and only Kal-El existed as Superman now. All of Kal-L’s adventures would be replaced with another hero instead. Kal-L was one of the heroes that fought against the Anti-Monitor in hopes to save his reality. The battle took place at the dawn of time, and this was the reason that Kal-L was not fully erased from history. He remained in existence and retained all of his memories from Earth-Two/Golden Age. He became devastated when he realized that everything he knew and loved were erased from history, including Lois. However, this was not over when Kal-L discovers that Anti-Monitor was still a threat to the one reality still existent. Kal-L teamed up with Alexander Luthor Jr. from Earth-3 and Superboy-Prime from Earth-Prime to fight the Anti-Monitor. The three of them won, with Kal-L delivering the killing blow. Soon afterwards, Alexander Luthor Jr. reveals that he had saved Lois Lane from Earth-Two before she could be erased from history and had transported her to a safe place. Lois and Kal-L were able to reunite, and Lois described the safe place as “beautiful.” Alexander offered the couple and Superboy-Prime the chance to enter this “paradise” since it would not be a good idea to return to an Earth where they had been replaced. They agreed and entered the paradise to avoid causing any havoc on the new Earth-One. Prior to Crisis On Infinite Earths, it was revealed that Kal-L loved the paradise dimension and had no desire to leave until Lois became ill. Kal-L decided to build replicas of the Daily Star and eventually all of Metropolis. He believed that seeing their old home would help Lois heal, but instead her condition worsened. Alex convinced Kal-L that the paradise was eating away their souls. Eventually Kal-L would gain the desire to escape from the paradise because he began feeling like he was imprisoned. Kal-L would return in the Infinite Crisis mini-series.
Modern Age
As with most of the original super-heroes, especially DC Comics characters, Superman has had several origin tellings over the years. Mostly this was necessary due to the sloppy inconsistency in the first strips from the Golden Age, which never even granted Superman the power of flight for quite some time. These early comics also did not focus on the supernatural and science fiction elements that in time came to be considered part of the mythos. The early Superman fought mostly everyday humans like bank robbers and traffic offenders; most people would not believe this about him if it were not so well documented. It was not till the Silver Age that Superman had fleshed out his powers to what became widely known and began battling aliens, robots and other supernatural enemies. During the Crisis On Infinite Earths, every single DC hero was battling Anti-Monitor. They could not save most of the other dimensions, and this resulted in whatever dimension was left being merged with Earth-One. Following the Crisis On Infinite Earths, DC Comics decided to retire the Silver Age Superman and revamp him from scratch. There was a two-part story titled “Whatever Happened To The Man Of Tommorow?” This was basically a way of retiring the Silver Age Superman. In 1986, writer/artist John Byrne re-imagined the series and rewrote the history from scratch under the title The Man Of Steel.
The Man Of Steel, issue #1, published in 1986.
The Death And Life Of Superman
Superman #75: The Death Of Superman, published in 1993.