From: khale@camilla.Eng.Sun.COM (Abhijit Khale)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.comics
Subject: Re: Superman dead?!!!!!!
Date: 5 Sep 1992 18:10:57 GMT
Organization: Sun Microsystems, Mt. View, Ca.
NNTP-Posting-Host: camilla-50

Yes, I can just see it now. DC is about to kill off their most legendary
character, the star of movies, TV, comics and newspaper strips. They are
just going to say bye-bye to millions of dollars of merchandising, and get
rid of a character whose potential value Time estimated at $ 1 billion.
They are going to cancel 4 Superman titles, and loose the central character
in most crossovers. Yeh, right. 

Essentially DC realized a while back with the Robin death that DC has one
advantage over Marvel : some of its characters (superman, batman and robin
in particular) are well known to the general public and events dealing with
them are likely to be widely publicized. The death of Robin received lots of
media coverage. So did the engagement announcement. So will this. Its just
a stunt to get people to read Superman books again. 

The question is not whether, but how Superman will be brought back.

Some ideas tossed around (with various degrees of seriousness) were : 

1) He isnt really dead, but in suspended animation. 

2) It wasnt him that died, but his friend Eltro El from the planet Daxam,
who was playing Superman for a day.

3) It wasnt him that died, but an android created by manga khan while
Superman was off on an intergalactic promotion tour.

4) Clones. A clone of Superman was made by the Dominators during Invasion.
One of them (it doesnt really matter if its original or clone) was held
prisoner by the Dominators till now. If we assume that memory implants
were not made later, then this is a perfect chance to roll back the Lois Lane
engagement as well.

5) Ambush bug persuades the writers to write his old chum Superman back. 

6) Superman is reborn as a hair louse and works his way up the evolutionary
ladder to human to Kryptonian.

7) Darkseid brings Superman or a clone back to life, using cells stolen
from Superman's trip there a while back.

8) The Justice League and LEGION scour the galaxy for something that will
bring Superman back to life. In the end, they find a cure, but it means the
death of one of them. The Durlan pet of Dox bravely sacrifices him/her/itself
to bring Superman back to life ..

9) The Spectre/Phantom Stranger plead with the Voice/God and manage to
persuade the Voice to  spare Superman. 

10) Superman manages to trick the Archangels to fight each other over his
soul. Rather than  enagage in a divisive, mutual conflict which would tear
Heaven apart and hand the final victory to the trinity that rules Hell (Duma,
Remiel and Etrigan), the Angels resurrect Superman.  

11) Superman is dead, but Lois is pregnant with his baby. This baby is born,
and is promptly aged to 29 years by the Titans of myth to take up the mantle
of the new Superman. 

12) Superman is dead, but the original Superman of Earth-1 is brought back
from Limbo by Alexei Luthor as his replacement. 

If the story of the Death of Superman is even a quarter as good as Siegels
original death of Superman story [ THE best Superman story ever written, far
better than Alan Moore's overrated Last Superman story], it will be worth
reading, but I doubt it. 

Abhijit

Newsgroups: rec.arts.comics