Superman 13

Superman 13: They Will Join You in the Sun

Original Solicit

Published Cover

Taking its title from a Grant Morrison line that appears in the upcoming Man of Steel film (via All-Star Superman), the second issue of Lobdell and Rocafort's Superman places the action back on earth.  The cover asks: "Who is the fallen angel of Krypton?"

The book's revelation spotlights the character H'el, originally the New 52's Bizarro, floating above an arguing Kara Zor-El and Kal El, who are unaware of his presence.  It's certainly a neat trick to hide in plain sight from these two.

The issue reads as two separate stories.  The first half of the issue is placed mostly on Metropolis, perhaps to humanize the book after the Kryptonian adventures in issue 0, and the second half is a Kal vs Kryptonian Dragon story.

Kenneth Rocafort again outpaces much of his peers and is one of the rare breed of gifted illustrators who are able to seamlessly integrate stellar cartooning into their illustrative work.  After the polygonal all out action in the 0 issue, Rocafort focuses almost all of the panels where sci-fi/fantasy/superpowers aren't involved into conventional rectangular layouts.

Much was made about Clark quitting The Daily Planet but it doesn't ring out as a gimmick in the story. Lobdell talks about this in interview:

"Rather than Clark be this clownish suit that Superman puts on, we're going to really see Clark come into his own in the next few years as far as being a guy who takes to the Internet and to the airwaves and starts speaking an unvarnished truth." - Scott Lobdell

Rocafort's outstanding cartooning ...
Cat Grant is utterly moved after Clark lays into his boss Morgan Edge, while the rest of the crew wants to keep their job

The Clark Kent/Cat Grant duo may seem odd at first glance, as Lois is the obvious choice, but Scott Lobdell's made a career out of odd pairings; his latter-day X-Men run focused on Marrow and Cecilia Reyes (among others), and his Age of Apocalypse work centered around Blink, Morph, Sabretooth and Wild Child, Sunfire and Rogue.

Lobdell does spice up Clark's personality a bit as Clark uses his powers to see what Lois is texting about, shows Clark having a funny moment with Cat after they're both no longer employed by the Planet, and makes Kal overjoyed when Kal's found out he's able to sweat; these are all interesting character moments, and there's some genuine (if one-sided) humor during the Clark/Cat scene.

"If we don't mean something, then we're meaningless."
New 52 Thinker Cat Grant

In the sense that Lobdell wants to give us both character moments and action in the same book, I'm all for a second half of action, especially after a great first half of character scenes.

The dragon part of the story is ten of the twenty allotted pages for the book and, unfortunately, is where the issue falls apart story-wise.  A Kryptonian dragon is in Metropolis and smacks Kal El to Ireland, proceeds to follow him to Ireland almost instantly but, luckily, the dragon has "decaying" DNA, so it's ok for Kal El to kill it with, luckily, an underground oil lake, even though not moments earlier it survived a huge punch from Kal (to say nothing of its ability to cross-continent travel just seconds before) and Kara Zor El, follows them to the area where this all happens.  Lobdell hangs his hat on a lot of luck and, only two issues into the run, it's pretty disappointing turn after a brilliant first issue and a good first half.  I'm not sure what the point of fighting the dragon was, outside of Kara coming to the conclusion that Krypton didn't die.

When people complain about Scott Lobdell comics, the second half of this issue is the sort of haphazard storytelling that they seem frustrated about.  I'm all for hyper-compressed stories, dizzying action, but it's constructed as a vehicle to set Kara apart from Kal, and ten pages to make that point, along with the way it's made, is simply a chore.

After a spectacular issue 0, filled with intrigue, adventure, and an interesting first half, the issue is derailed once the dragon shows up.  Hopefully the H'el on Earth story offers more than mindless punching, killing, and plotting.  However, the Clark Kent portions are outstanding.

Concepts:

• Kryptonian Dragon with decaying DNA
• H'el can hide in plain sight from Kal and Kara
• Kara Zor-El and Kal El are not the last Kryptonians
• Kara believes Krypton is still alive
• Truly testing Kal's strength would require a pan-dimensional wormhole, which the Graviton Matrix is capable of in its "second gear"
• Clark's super-hearing works as sonar to form images in his head
• Clark Kent and Cat Grant no longer at the Daily Planet
• Clark Kent isn't above snooping on people he cares about
• Kal El never experienced sweat, is excited that he can sweat like a normal person
• Jimmy Olsen: Worst Roommate on earth
• Lois/Clark: Best Friends with no benefits
• Dr. Veritas is a new character, a sort of Emil Hamilton figure it seems, and she's tasked with assessing Kal El's physiology/powers

Yea:

• Kenneth Rocafort adds his entry into the "Superman punching through a wall" gallery
• Clark Kent/Cat Grant as a team
• Kenneth Rocafort cartooning/illustration
• Superman mentions that half the planet thinks he's an advance scout for an alien race; or, the Justice League cartoon's Hawkgirl
• Jimmy Olsen: Worst Roommate on Earth
• Clark spying on Lois' text
• "The head is out cold, but its paws are trying to kill me!"
• Clark wearing red underpants, a nod to the missing ones in the New 52

Nay:

• The pointless Dragon fight, drags the entire issue down
• I like the effort to have another bizarre creature like the Herald in issue 0, but the Dragon held little purpose other than convincing Kara Krypton isn't dead.
• Pace crawls once Krypton Dragon shows up
• The solicited cover is colored differently than the published cover.  Not a Nay by itself, but it's certainly odd considering that the solicited cover was provided to major media outlets and the issue on stands looks different.  I'm not sure if this is just a simple matter, or maybe indicative of last minute changes.
• Unless the Dragon is the Fallen Angel of Krypton, we don't get an answer

First Half: 88/100

Second Half: 40/100

66/100

Superman 0

Superman 0: Every End Has a Beginning:

"... the thing about Superman is that he's setting himself up as - he is the most powerful person on the planet - but he's also trying to behave in a way that he thinks is right for people, so you gotta have to have a pretty healthy attitude if you're gonna be putting yourself as the kind of authority figure on a huge, huge planet that isn't even your own planet.  So I figure, where does that come from?  And I think it's from his mother ... (had) this adventurous streak and this sense of right and wrong that Jor El didn't really have to worry about because, to him, science .. doesn't really fall within the realms of right and wrong."  Scott Lobdell's thoughts on Superman #0

Scott Lobdell begins the first issue of his and Kenneth Rocafort's Superman run with his familiarly cadenced exposition.  Lobdell's introductions are much more digestable than the almost decoder-ring nonsense recent Marvel Comics have been wasting a page on, and Lobdell's such a master of exposition by now, it's always interesting to read his setup.  Rocafort's opening salvo is a stunning work of sci-fi gadgetry.

Besides his unique exposition, Lobdell's scriptwork often has, like most serialized comics, a hook at the end (academically known as the revelation/catastrophe).  For Superman 0, that revelation is that Kal-El is on Krypton, spying on his father!  Quite a revelation!

What's he doing here?

Flying in the face of this era's decompression, Superman 0 is a Kirby-esque exercise in boiling pot compression - something I'm totally in favor of - and introduces a whirlwind of concepts:

• The New 52 Eradicator may be the leader of a "Doomsday" cult - this seems like a hint that Doomsday was something bred to destroy Krypton
• Lara-El is not a docile wife, but received her education and training from the Kryptonian Military Academy
• Some goo found underground attempts to eat Jor-El alive
• The Cosmicide, used to "set(ting) the universe right"
• Personal Phantom Zone Projector
• Kal El is perched on a building as if he flew there, and can see through walls, meaning he has his powers, somehow, on Krypton
• Kal El was on krypton before it died
• The Oracle, an entity older than the omniverse, and who will see it die
• The Herald, who "heralds" the Oracle by blowing on the Sacred Horn of Confluence, and then dies
• The "Grand End" Eradicator's armed henchmen mention
• Jor-El's sci-fi techno babble roots Kryptonian heat metrics based on RAO, which is either the Rao of Kryptonian mythology, or simply the ambient heat of Krypton's famously unstable sun:

"I am currently 3Z-tectrons beneath the planet's surface.  The enviro-pod I created this morning is maintaining 98% cellular integrity despite temperatures far in excess of RAO 008." 

Rocafort - who, even at this early point in his career, should be considered nothing less than a North American comics all-star - uses his polygonal layouts to great affect, accentuating the alien nature of Krypton, and greater Kryptonopolis looks like something right out of a David Schnell landscape:

David Schnell: Thermal

Kenneth Rocafort: Superman 0

Fine art in a Scott Lobdell comic?  Kenneth Rocafort as member of the New Leipzig movement? All in the eye of the beholder.

Lobdell, who's worked with Travis Charest, Jim Lee et.al, on Rocafort (from Lobdell's Superman #0 video):

"I've been working in the business for a long time and it's rare that you come across a guy that can make everything so fascinating and gorgeous to look at, while also telling a story."  

Throughout the issue, Lobdell's prose is concise, adventurous, and playful.  It reads much better than his concurrent work in Teen Titans, which, at times, is grossly hackneyed (to be fair, the target markets for Superman and Teen Titans are obviously different; in Teen Titans, Lobdell is playing to a young teen audience).

An epilogue is provided, with the lazily named Herald (perhaps a pattern with Lobdell -  does anybody remember when Onslaught's Post was first called Harbinger - am I misremebering?) blowing on the amazingly named Sacred Horn of Confluence.  It's certainly the most alien creature in a comic set on an alien world, and a shockingly new creation in this rather creatively timid and oddly named creator-driven marketplace.  That he dies reads oddly in the context of the issue (he just showed up!) but I'm hopeful future chapters reveal something more.

Herald blowing into the Sacred Horn of Confluence

In the video, Lobdell sets the table going forward:

I was gonna end on a Krypto scene where Jor El was ... going through an animal shelter and he sees Krypto and he goes "That's the one."... The final scene would be Kara, Jor El and Krypto protecting little Kal El by the fire... that what was was gonna go forward... at one point, I was like, what if Kal was there, what if he's doing the narration?  You'll see in about six months why he's there, and we're gonna be seeing the story build from the 0 issue until around 17 or 18 and then whammo!  ... I kinda know what's gonna happen but, if I figure it out before I get to 17, I'll do something different to surprise myself, and surprise you.

Yea

• Kenneth Rocafort is supremely talented, and certainly doesn't shy away from his talents.  It's a shame that he wasn't on this book for issue #1, as that would have given him the widest possible audience, but the #0 issues are reported to have sold better than normal.
• Lobdell's Jor-El is personable, daring, funny, and the interplay with Lara during the home invasion was quite charming.  Just as Byrne was given mini-series' to show off his Krypton, I'd be equally as excited for more Jor-El and Lara written by Lobdell. 
• The Sacred Horn of Confluence, something I think we'd all like to own.  
• Lobdell's Eradicator and the Doomsday cult
• Personal Phantom Zone Projector
• Lara as a bad-ass, 
• the Herald for the Oracle

Nay 

• Lara beating up a whole bunch of armed men rings a bit false.  I know, I know, it's a comic and I'm a misogynist, but she's really quite a small woman.  I'm guilty of what Grant Morrison describes as a lack of imagination (I accept that Kal El can time travel, fly, etc.. but not that a small, trained woman can beat up 3 men).  
• The Herald dying as quickly as he showed up.

Background

Kenneth Rocafort, Scott Lobdell's Red Hood and the Outlaws collaborator, leaves that title to begin an effort to "stabilize" the Superman title with Lobdell.  Lobdell will drop his Superboy work (though he does return to it from time to time) and, instead, focus those attentions on the main Superman title.  This comes after a bevy of creators have worked on the previous twelve issues, some to their regret.  I'm interested to see if any of those re-writings George Perez has complained about will affect Lobdell also, as DC talent has made waves recently, leaving DC seemingly en masse, while Lobdell has more or less kept to himself.

One month earlier, Rocafort supplied the cover for Superman Annual #1, an issue pencilled by Pascal Alixe (he of Legion Lost fame) and Tom Raney (Stormwatch), plotted by Lobdell, and scripted by Lobdell's sometimes collaborator Fabian Nicieza. The Annual, with the lightened workload of both Rocafort and Lobdell, is apparently used to wrap up prior plot threads (Helspont makes an appearance), as well as to whet the appetite for, or at least introduce the new creative team to, those readers interested in a stable new lineup.

90/100

About

This blog is intended to be a place where Scott Lobdell's comic book works are going to be reviewed, much like NOT BLOG X combs over the X-Men work produced by Marvel Comics in the 1990s (hallowed ground, y'all), and the comics reviewer Chad Nevett analyzes the comics work of Joe Casey and Jim Starlin.

When applicable, we'll endeavor to contextualize the works by referencing appropriate interviews Mr. Lobdell's performed in, as well as providing comments by Mr. Lobdell's peers.

Scott Lobdell is a comics script-writer who has worked with the most outstanding illustrators in modern comics.  Travis Charest, Jim Lee, Kenneth Rocafort, Joe Madureira, John Romita Jr, Chris Bachalo, Leinil Francis Yu, Gene Ha and Andy Kubert, among a host of others, have all pencilled scripts written or co-authored by Scott Lobdell.  Mr. Lobdell has also worked extensively in the Hollywood film industry but, for the purposes of this blog, we'll concentrate on his work in the american comics scene.

Mr. Lobdell has worked for Marvel Comics, DC Comics, Wildstorm, IDW, Dark Horse Comics, Top Cow, Aspen Comics writing titles as varied as Superman, KISS, Galaxy Quest, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Uncanny X-Men, AXE Anarchy, The Darkness, Angel, Tales from the Crypt, and Gotham City Sirens.  He was an "architect" (before that word became anathema to comics fans) for the X-Men universe throughout a good chunk of the 1990s, authoring the beloved Age of Apocalypse saga.

A much more in-depth curriculum vitae may be found at comicbookdb's entry for Mr. Lobdell.