Happy Birthday, Superman!
Action Comics No. 1 â€" in which Superman made his first appearance â€" was released on April 18, 1938, which makes the Man of Steel 75 years old on Thursday. In Cleveland, where Superman’s creators, Jerry Siegel (the writer) and Joe Shuster (the artist) grew up, plans to celebrate the hero’s birth include a lighting ceremony at City Hall and a mayoral proclamation of Superman Day. There will also be birthday cake at the airport near a Superman display. A new trailer is also out for “Man of Steel,†starring Henry Cavill, which opens on June 14. (In comics lore June 18 is the day the Kents found the spacecraft from Krypton that contained baby Kal-El, whom they would adopt and raise as Clark Kent.)
Superman’s life in comics has been filled with change. His abilities have gone up and down: at the start, he could leap one-eighth of a mile; at his most powerful, he could move planets. The original version of the hero eventually became known as the “Earth-2†Superman, who would age, marry Lois Lane and retire.
The more modern Superman would continue to torment Lois Lane until he was revamped by John Byrne in the 1986 mini-series “Man of Steel,†which reset Superman’s continuity. This hero would more seriously romance Lois Lane, reveal his secret identity to her and they would eventually marry. This is the version of the hero that “died†in 1992 at the hands of Doomsday. He got better, but only until 2011, when DC reset the clock on all its heroes.
This latest version seemed interested in Lois Lane, but she has other prospects. No worries, however, as Superman has hooked up with Wonder Woman, a pairing that came to light in August last year but that is having ramifications for the Justice League now. In issue No. 19, which is to be released Wednesday, Superman and Wonder Woman publicly intercede in a country plagued by terrorism and civil war. “Government sanctions may prevent others from coming in here, but not us,†Wonder Woman says. “Nothing can stop us.â€
