This is James Robinson’s first arc on Superman, and it’s a promising start. This accomplishes two goals: it brings back Krypto as a force to be reckoned with, and it introduces long term subplots.

Atlas appeared on All-Star Superman, which was the first time I read about him. Here he seems to have his first appearance in the current continuity, which keeps Johns’ tradition of Silver Age inspired stories.

I loved the interactions between Clark and Lois about Krypto, they have their differences but they love each other so much. It was nice to see them so happy as a young couple, not just a boring married couple.

I wasn’t too interested in Atlas’ story, it just felt generic. I was more intersted in the mystery military men. Also I’m not sure I buy that they could defeat Superman and Supergirl that easily. But I did like that Krypto had a big role in here, proving himself to be worthy of being Superman’s dog.

I wasn’t happy about Lana being fired from Lexcorp, it just felt like a new writer trying to clean the slate for his own stories. Or maybe it just wasn’t a good idea from the beginning, because I don’t think they did much with Lana as CEO.

Unfortunately the real culprits behind Atlas’s attack were not revealed in this issue, but answers were promised in the one shot Jimmy Olsen.

This one-shot is a long detective story, with Jimmy as the investigator. It goes into past stories that I wasn’t familiar with, but it was compelling enough that I kept reading. At times I was confused, there’s a lot of history uncovered and lots of minor DC characters.

Still I was eager to learn the truth… unfortunately I never got it. Not yet at least. I will have to keep reading the new Superman event New Krypton. That’s the nature of ongoing series, I realize that, I just hoped I would get more answers in this one-shot.

The art by Renato Guedes is good but not spectacular like previous issues. Here he’s not coloring anymore, he’s only penciling. I still like it, but it’s not as special. My favorite artist on the one-shot is Jesus Merino. He’d done a fill-in issue before, but it looked like Carlos Pacheco-light. Here I think he’s becoming his own artist, finding his own style separate from Pacheco. I hope he’ll continue to pencil.

Johns continues to redefine Superman for a new generation of readers. He seems to be tackling some of the classic Superman characters and bring them to basics, so that we don’t need to know their past history to understand them.

SPOILERS!!!

This time it’s Brainiac. Johns basically retcons all previous Brainiac appearances and presents us the real Brainiac and his first encounter with Superman. It’s an interesting concept that ties very well with Supergirl, giving her a nice breakthrough.

But this story also ties up with recent Johns stories, including Zod and co. and Krypton’s history. Johns seems to have planned this for a long time, putting Krypton at the center of his story. So much so that by the end of this arc the city of Kandor is now on Earth with lots of Kryptonians.

But we’ll see the consequences of this in the next big arc involving the other two Superman titles (Superman and Supergirl). However there is another big event at the end of the story, and that is Pa Kent’s death. I feel like I’ve seen it so many times already, but I was still touched by it.

Most recently this happened in All-Star Superman, as well as Smallville the TV show, not to mention the original Superman movie. This death coupled with the return of Steve Lombard (also in All-Star Superman) and Cat Grant, it’s clear that the Silver Age is back.

Gary Frank’s art continues to shine. His Reeve as Clark/Superman is just too good. But his action scenes and expressions are all great. I’ve always liked his style, but he’s now better than ever and I am glad that he’s getting the attention he deserves.

I’ve enjoyed John’s recent arcs, but he’s going to work closer with the other Superman writers. The future stories will cross over all three books, but I am conflicted about that. On one hand Johns is doing great by himself, he doesn’t need help. On the other he really seems to integrate all 3 series’ storylines in a cohesive and organic way, so I am curious to see how that works out.

This recently concluded series has a lot going for it. It’s been lauded as the best Superman story in years with many levels of subtext, and people are waiting for the inevitable Absolute edition.

I liked it, but I didn’t think it was the best story in years. I probably missed all the metaphors (I enjoy them, I just never get them by myself). However as a superhero story it’s very good.

This being out of continuity it’s the perfect story that summerizes Superman’s character. It also has a silver age feel to it, where Superman has many different powers and is also a scientist.

There are many important events in the history of Superman, some of them are re-interpreted here. Clark telling Lois about his real identity, then giving her superpowers for 24 hours. Pa Kent dying. Jimmy Olsen (never liked him though). Bizzarro world ( also never likes this, but it was a nice parallel to Superman’s role in the world.

The main focus of the series is Superman’s place in the world and Lex Luthor’s plan to destroy him. Superman is actually dying of cancer (his version of it) and this being a standalone series actually made the threat real.

The final confrontation with Lex is both action oriented and philosophical. I really liked that Lex finally saw things from Superman’s perspective, that really changed him on a fundamental level. Which is why I like the theory that Quintum is actually a reformed Lex from the future.

But Superman’s final fate was really the high point of the series for me. He basically is gone, but he’s powering the sun from its heart. What better final fate than that of keeping the whole world alive.

Quitely was at the top of his game. The subtle expressions, the angles, the action scenes. All were greatly executed. It took a while for him to finish this series, but it was well worth it.

There’s so much more to this story, the future Gold Superman, the cast at the Planet etc… I’ll still enjoy it on multiple reading.

After his run with Richard Donner, Geoff Johns is finally free to really start his own run in Action Comics 585-863. This first arc starts off very nicely. I’ve never read any Legion comics, and knowing that there were so many reboots I was never interested in the series. This story may have changed that.

I didn’t feel confused at all reading this arc, even though all the characters were new to me. It certainly helped that in each issue every single character was introduced with name/powers/origins.

The story is simple but of huge importance. In the future Earth believes that Superman was not an alien, and all aliens are banned from Earth. The Legion are trying to rectify this problem, and they pull Superman from the present.

Even though there are so many characters, I could understand the motivation of most of them, particularly the bad guy. At the end of this arc things are not totally solved, because the Legion is pretty much disbanded and the federation has lost its faith in them. I surprisingly enjoyed this story very much.

The art by Gary Frank is very detailed and clear. His Superman is obviously modeled after Christopher Reeves, which is fine by me. Frank puts a lot of emphasis in the characters expressions, sometimes going overboard. But in general it works.

864 is an epilogue to this story, bringing Batman into the series to present a different view of the Legion. This issue also helps setup the follow up in Legion of 3 Worlds, the miniseries drawn by George Perez that teams up all the different versions of the Legion. That will be very interesting.

I have previously reviewed Busiek’s arc Camelot Falls on Superman, here is the rest of his run.

Between 659-666 there were 5 standalone stories, each drawn by a different artist. 659 is about Barbara Johnson who believes Superman is an angel sent by God. This was an interesting story about how Superman is explained by religious people. I liked the open ending.

660 is about the Prankster, whom I was not familiar about (I vaguely remember him in the Flash tv series? Was that him?). Nothing too exciting about it, but a good written story. 661 is about Wonder Woman and Khyrana, I liked the interaction between Superman/WW and Lois, it was refreshing not seeing a love triangle, but just a friendship triangle.

665 is about the origins of Jimmy Olsen. I am not that familiar about his story, not before nor after Crisis. But this story seemed to change things considerably. I don’t know what to think of those changes. 666 was a double sized issue about Rakkar from Hell, literally. I liked seeing Superman without any inhibitions, even if it was not real. I liked the clever way Phantom Stranger helped Superman disguise himself.

All these issues were fine, but they didn’t really delve into Superman’s character. Which is why I liked the next arc, The Third Kryptonian (668-670). The identity of the third kryptonian is finally revealed in this arc, and it delves into the past history of Krypton. It really brings some important backstory about Superman’s native planet, how it was ruled by military before changing into a scientific society. We go deep into Karsta and Alamak’s history.

Another part of this story is Chris Kent. Here we see Clark hanging out with Chris and building a relationship with him. Chris even meets Batman and especially Robin. I think Busiek did a better job at writing Chris than Geoff Johns.

It was also fun to see all Kryptonians unite, though I am very confused about Krypto’s origins. The art by Rick Leonardi was good, but I don’t think he’s improved much since his glory days (for me at least) on Spider-Man 2099.

The next arc (671-673)was less interesting to me. It was a more traditional villain story about the Insect Queen, wanting to conquer Earth and the whole universe! BWHAHA!! The only interesting bit was Lana Lang. The art by Peter Vale was fine, but didn’t excite me either.

The last arc is more fun, and probably my favorite. Here we go back to another character and story established by Johns/Donner in Action Comics, Mon-El aka Lar Gand. Superman is constantly trying to find a cure for him, and we learn more about Lar Gand’s planet and culture Daxam. Then just when Paragon shows up, Daxam’s elders arrive on Earth looking for Lar Gand. I must say I was annoyed by the closemindness of the Daxams, and I blamed it on bad writing. However seeing how they reacted to Superman’s helping hand to the very end, I can see it was just ingrained in their culture.

The art is by my favorite Superman artist, Renato Guedes. I’ve also talked about him before, so I’ll just say that he does again a very good job here, although there were a few panels here and there that looked rushed to me.

This was a fun run for Busiek, but I don’t think he managed to really dig deep into Superman. Luckily we’ll see more of that in Trinity. The next writer to come onboard will be James Robinson, so I am excited about that. He’s going to work closely with Geoff Johns to create a little corner of the DCU for Superman, together with the Supergirl title. But who will be the writer on Supergirl? Can we dream of David Goyer?

It’s time to catch up on the Superman titles. The reason I hadn’t started on Action Comics was that the conclusion to the first storyline by Johns/Donner/Kubert was delayed for a long time, so that 19 months passed between the first issue and the fifth and last part. That’s pretty ridiculous. But how is the story by itself?

Last Son is actually an interesting storyline about a new Kryptonian boy, Christopher Kent. It raised some interesting questions between Clark and Lois and their heredity. But I really liked the origins of Christopher, it felt interesting and not tied into some obscure continuity.

This story does seem to tie to the Superman movies. Superman’s son appears in Superman Returns, although it’s not what this arc is about. But more importantly, the 3 villains in the first 2 Superman movies make their appearance in this story. It’s not surprising given that the co-writer of this arc is Richard Donner, writer/director of Superman The Movie.

The art by Adam Kubert is gorgeous as usual. I really like his Superman, but his strength is the panel layout. He always creates inventive layouts, that make the scene fun to read. I really like his Superman interpretation, unlike his brother Andy’s Batman. I don’t know what he’s up to next, but I hope they schedule it in advance.

I am glad that I wasn’t reading this monthly, but the end product was at least satisfying.

Donner also co-wrote the Annual 10, which actually contains a lot of the background story referred to in the Last Son arc. There are 5 stories in this annual, but the main ones are “Who is Clark Kent’s big brother?” (about Mon-El), and “The criminals of Krypton” about Jor-El, Zod, Ursa and Non on Krypton. The only problem with these stories is that they were already summerized in the Last Son, so I already knew what happened in them. At the same time, reading them before Last Son would have ruined some of the surprises. Still, I enjoyed reading this annual.

Donner also wrote another story arc with Johns, Bizzarro World with art by Eric Powell. This felt like a silver age story, with some crazy powers that create an entire Bizzarro World. There is a plausible explanation, but the story just feels like it was done with a smile. Powell’s art was perfect for Bizzarro, but I am glad he’s not staying as the Superman artist.

Between these 2 arcs there were many single issue fill-ins: some were Countdown tie-ins written by Kurt Busiek, some were written by Fabian Nicieza and Dwayne McDuffy. I didn’t read these, but I did read issue 850. This is a tribute issue to Superman, co-written by Busiek/Nicieza/Johns with beautiful art by Renato Guedes.

This is a nice story that features a time travel story with Supergirl and the Legion, going through Superman’s past. A good anniversary issue, but what I loved about it is the art. I think Guedes should be the permanent Superman artist. His style is pretty to look at, his faces are totally different from each other, so it’s easy to distinguish between gender, age etc… He also does colors, which gives it a very distinct look. I hope he can at least draw one complete story arc a year.

Next is the Legion arc with Geoff Johns as the sole writer and Gary Frank as the artist. I think this is where Johns run really starts. He has long term plans for this title, and he will work with James Robinson on Superman to create a fun and exciting time for Superman. I can’t wait.

I finally got to read Kurt Busiek’s Camelot Falls storyline with Carlos Pacheco, which has recently concluded after some delay.

Since I am not familiar with Superman’s titles, I don’t really know which character is new and which is old. The main concept of the story is that the natural course for humanity is to rise and fall in an infinite cycle, but that’s been stopped unnaturally by Superman and other aliens. So Arion the immortal is trying to “save” humanity by eliminating the aliens.

This was a dilemma for Superman, though nobody doubted what his answer would be in the end. I liked the story in the first half about what would happen in the future, we get to see familiar characters in a post-nuclear world, dramatically changed in both appearance and personality.

In the second half of the story Superman is basically mullying over the dilemma, with guests Young Gods, Squad K and JLA. I liked the fact that everybody is on edge and ready to deal with Superman in case he is possessed. Clark understands that but he doesn’t like it.

The final battle with Arion is ok, a good excuse to let Pacheco draw some big monsters but nothing much. Unfortunately I was disappointed that we didn’t really get any closure. Arion is back in his time, still trying to change things. The new villains Subjekt-17 and Khyber are still alive, and will come back in the future. Basically there is no resolution to the big dilemma.

I liked that Lana is now back in Clark’s life with a new role. I don’t know if Callie was introduced here, but I think Busiek has more plans for her. Pacheco’s art is very uneven in this arc. It’s definitely a different style compared to previous works (including Superman/Batman). It actually reminds me more of Jim Lee/J Scott Campbell. His Lois in particular is very sexy with that new haircut. I like it, but each issue seems different. It may be that he was catching up with deadlines, so his pencils were looser, while his inker helped more.

This is not a bad story, but it just doesn’t have much closure. Which is to be expected, since this is an ongoing series. But with such a long arc by the same artists I was expecting something with a resolution.

It seems both DC and Marvel are trying to give a full arc to one creative team (Action, Wonder Woman, Might Avengers etc…) at the cost of delaying the issues. I am conflicted about this. On one hand I don’t read these titles monthly but only once the arc is concluded, so I guess I am happy that we get one creative team. However these delays are exactly part of the reason why I don’t read monthly.

Jeph Loeb had big success with this series and I always wanted to check it out. Now that I have I will share my thoghts.

1-6: World’s Finest, Ed McGuiness
This first arc surprised me a lot. It introduced the characters and their relationship, and it also showed them fighting many super villains as well as cameo appearances by many fellow heroes. What really surprised me was the main villain being Luthor, who ends his presidency in this arc. That’s a huge event in the Superman/DC universe. This to me said that this series is totally in continuity and tells important stories, as well as self contained ones. I was a bit disappointed that the meteor/Darkseid connection was not fully explained in later issues. The art by McGuiness is nice, but it’s not a favorite of mine. It is a little bit too cartoony for me, it takes me away from the seriousness of the story.

7: Protege, Pat Lee
This story is about Robin and Superboy, who recruit Toyman, a character seen in the first arc. This was interesting in that it very briefly explored the relationship between the sidekicks and S&B. Other than that this was basically an excuse to have Pat Lee draw robots.

8-13: The Supergirl from Krypton, Mike Turner
Following the arrival of the meteor, we also get a new Supergirl (I am totally confused on the other Supergirls). I liked the way this new character is introduced, I especially liked the conflict between Superman and Batman on how to treat her. It makes sense that Wonder Woman is involved as well, which makes it even more interesting. There is also a death in this arc, and though it’s not a huge character, it still makes this series “count”. I was fooled by the surprise death towards the end, I really thought that was it. But I didn’t like how Superman dealt with Darkseid so easily. He could have done it before. I was also disappointed at the end: after Darkseid is gone, we find Kara hiding, afraid to let people know about her. Then she just reveal herself to everbody?!? The art by Mike Turner is very nice, and obviously well chosen for Supergirl and all the other Amazons running around half naked. I do like his style, but his characters look too much like models.

14-18: Absolute Power, Carlos Pacheco
This story started as an elseworld, presenting us with the main concept: 3 villains from the future go back in time and kill all superheroes during their origins, except for Batman and Superman, who are adopted by them. So now we have “bad” Superman and Batman who rule the world. As I said, a good premise. We also get other versions of DC characters, however I am not too familiar with DC, so I didn’t get them all. At the end the time travel becomes very confusing, and although I understand the concept I just don’t “believe” it. In particular I have problems with the fact that Superman and Batman remember everything that happens to them, even though they come from alternate time lines, as well as different times. This is more like a Silver Age explanation, which to me is not acceptable. The art by Pacheco is very clear, I like his style though it does not excite me too much.

19: Supergirl, Ian Churchill
This is just a set up for Supergirl’s ongoing series, where we setup her status as well as Luthor’s interest in her. I was midly curious about Lex’s involvement, but I don’t think I’m going to read her series.

20-25: With a Vengeance, Ed McGuiness
This last arc sees the return of McGuiness, this time dealing with an arc that might be more appropriate to him. Mxy and Bat-mite’s involvement means a more cartoony story, also thanks to Bizzarro. Unfortunately for me, I do not like any of those 3 characters. Not to mention that basically everything that happened does not count. This story reminded me a little of the first arc in JLA Classified, drawn by McGuiness and written by Morrison. I was totally confused by both.

26: Sam Loeb
This last story was plotted by Jeph’s son Sam, who died of cancer. So this is just a tribute to him by his father and a long list of artists. The story goes back to Robin, Superboy, Toyman, where they just have some fun. The backup story by Jeph Loeb and long time collaborator Tim Sale was very emotional.

Overall I wouldn’t call this a favorite series of mine, but it did have some great moments and great art. I did not like the internal dialogs from Superman and Batman, it felt like a gimmick to see their opposing point of view on everything that happened to them, which might have worked at first, but after a while they were distracting me from the main plot. I do not think they really told me anything new about these characters. None of the 4 arcs blew me away, I had some problems with all of them.

This is a short story arc following the return of Superman One Year Later. This arc felt like a stepping stone for future story lines in the main Superman books.

It’s actually a nice short adventure that establishes Superman’s return in the world’s view, so that nobody will doubt the identity of Superman. This is also a nice self-contained story featuring a lot of superheroes (which I liked, since this was a global crisis).

Lastly this is a setup for future story lines, in particular the Johns/Donner/Kubert run on Action Comics (which due to delays has not been completed yet), as well as the Busiek run on Superman (though that particular thread is being followed on only now).

The art by Pete Woods is very good, I think his Superman is the best modern interpretation of the last few years. Very clear lines and great storytelling.

I want to read more Superman stories, however none of the long arcs so far have been completed. The Son of Krypton storyline in Action Comics will be done in February, while the conclusion of the Superman arc about Camelot by Busiek/Pacheco has not been scheduled yet. In between there has been other stories, but most of them tie-in to Countdown, which I am really not interested in. So for the moment I am afraid I won’t be reading these two titles.

This is the One Year Later storyline, right after Infinite Crisis, and it is a great jumping on point for new readers, like me. I am not familiar with Superman in general, and I haven’t been reading any of the monthly titles. I prefer reading self-contained stories that do not cross over different titles and creative teams.

This story perfectly introduces (or re-introduces) Superman to the readers. Superman has been powerless for a year following the events in Infinite Crisis. During this time Clark has had time to devote his time to his career as a journalist and has become a dependable and brilliant writer. He’s also had time to spend with Lois, and their relationship is wonderfully depicted in this story. But we all know it, his powers are coming back.

Busiek and Johns manage to create a story that feels like an origin, even though it is not. It feels like Superman is flying and fighting for the first time. We are also very clearly shown what it means to be Superman, which is not just having super powers. And finally we get into Clark’s thoughts and feelings about being Superman.

The first half of these 8 issues we see Clark deal with Lex and the Intergang as an investigative journalist. I liked that aspect of Clark, and I was very intrigued by it. Even without powers Clark is still fighting for Metropolis.

However we all knew that his powers would be back, and the expectations were fully met. He re-gains his powers gradually, slowly getting used to them again. His mind is even supercharged, to which he also has to adapt. But more importantly, he re-discovers how it feels to be Superman, how it feels to be loved by Metropolis, and also how much Lois loves him. I really liked the Lois-Clark dynamic, and how it subtly changes at the end of the story.

Luthor’s characterization was spot on. He is simply obsessed with Superman, and he will never care for anybody else but himself. Even when Superman was away for a year, he didn’t put his resources for the good of humankind or Metropolis, but only for personal gain or vendetta.

The art by Pete Woods is surprisingly awesome. I knew his name, and although I never actually read any of his comics, I flipped through some of them in the past. But in this story he totally blew me away. His style is clean and feels fresh to me. I am sure the colors also were a great part of the appeal in this book, so I am very happy with the art.

Not being a great Superman fan I found this story surprisingly appealing, and I find myself wanting to read more Superman stories. For the first time, I am more interested in the Superman monthlies than Batman’s. Definitely recommended.