Sent to Earth as an infant from the dying planet Krypton, Kal-El was adopted by the loving Kent family and raised in America's heartland as Clark Kent. Using his immense solar-fueled powers, he became Superman to defend mankind against all manner of threats while championing truth, justice, and the American way!
I read this when I was a kid and I didn't really get it. Then I went back a couple years ago and was pretty surprised by the story. What was Byrne thinking? Maybe he was pissed at someone and did it as a cruel joke. Sounds like something he would do...
I don't know what he was thinking but I do know that it pissed off Kirby because Barda's character is based off of his wife. Maybe Kirby did something to him? I don't know.
Darkseid's agents didn't scour Metropolis looking for porn. Sleez was one of Darkseid's lesser minions, and he was far from being human. Darkseid bannished Sleez to Earth, Sleez attempted to "please" Darkseid through the humiliation of Big Barda (another former Darkseid minion) and Superman (one Darkseid's greatest enemies).
As far as where the tape is now, my guess would be Batman or Maxwell Lord having it.
Personally I always enjoyed the idea that you could find a "funny" video of Superman and Barda if you looked hard enough. But I am grateful that was erased with the Reboot
Pretty sure Zero Hour wiped this little two parter out of continuity. And boy was Kirby EVER pissed at Byrne for this, as he modeled Barda after his wife and all. I've heard tale that their relationship never recovered from this. Linkara did an awesome review of these issues on ATTFW.
This is one of the most ridiculous things I've ever seen. This is like daytime soap opera level. All-time low for comics. All time low for the people writing about this. All time low for people like me who are commenting on it. This is the comic book equivalent of someone making a viral video about a dead body they dug up to dance the waltz with...
but it's just so awesome.
It's also an All time high in my opinion. Darkseid comes to Scott Free's doorstep, is he tearing people's head off with his pinky finger? Enslaving armies with the anti life equation? Blasting people with his Omega beams? No, he's got a little VHS/Beta Max tape that Scoot Free needs to see. This should have been on the comicvine to 50 moments list. It even Tops Ult. Cap's "This A doesn't stand for France! Classic. This is journalism right here.
It will return in Multiversity or maybe Batman discovers it like he discovered the radion bullet.
"It is the ultimate archetypal pornography, all pornography. It was a magazine it was a videotape and now it is streamed."
Soon the JLA discover that because it was made with Fourth World beings this film survived Flashpoint. The heroes of Earth learn Sleez has mind controlled many superheroes over the years to make many pornos all must unite to wipe all of their films from existence before they are sold in flea markets.
Sure, I'm not quite awake yet, I'll take it seriously. So your thought to mind is how would this reason in the new DCnU continuity G-Man? The new edgy mature DCnU?
Modern days and I'm not even being slightly off-beat either, Superman, Big Barda, and any other super character that has any kind of celebrity status would probably hang out with most other celebrities and attend their parties and what not, including the likes of Ron Jeremy and the adult entertainment industry so when this " master plan " came to fruition Superman and Barda would pretty much shrug their shoulders, say " And...? ", and some nice lawyer friends would swoop in, in part on behalf of the United States government and take care of whatever loose ends, suing Sleez. In fact in real life in modern times you would just as easily be able to swap Kirby and his wife in Superman and Barda's position, and Byrne into Sleezes.
Its basically labelled among one of the worst superman stories ever written, right up there with the red and blue supermen, the electric blue and superman: at earths end.
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