All-Star Superman Companion

Newsarama Presents:
All-Star Memories:
The All-Star Superman Companion
The Grant Morrison interview by Zack Smith
All-Star Memories: The All-Star Superman Companion

All-Star Superman written by Grant Morrison Artwork by Frank Quitely & Jaime Grant Interviewer: Zack Smith Layout & Design: Angelo Soliongco Superman and related images, names, characters, and logo copyright & trademark by DC Comics. Superman Created by Jerry Siegel & Joe Sushter Disclaimer: This is an unofficial compiliation based on a 10-part interview series published by Newsarama. com [http://www.newsarama.com/comics/100821-All-Star-Morrison-01.html]. This was done for fun and not profit. In no way does this product claim to own, or create any part of Superman, or All-Star Superman. Copyright Newsarama.com 2009
Newsarama Presents:
All-Star Memories:
An In-depth Interview by Zack Smith with series creator Grant Morrison
With artwork by Frank Quitely & Jaime Grant
Part One
Three years, 12 issues, Eisners and countless accolades later, All Star Superman is finally finished. The out-of-continuity look at Supermans struggle with his inevitable death was widely embraced by fans and pros as one of the best stories to feature the Man of Steel, and was a showcase for the talents of the creative team of Grant Morrison, Frank Quitely and Jamie Grant. Now, Newsarama is proud to present an exclusive look back with Morrison at the series that took Superman to, pun intended, new heights. We had a lot of questions about the series...and Morrison delivered with an in-depth look into the themes, characters and ideas throughout the 12 issues. In fact, there was so much that were running this as an unprecedented 10-part series over the next two weeks sort of an unofficial All Star Superman companion. Its everything about All Star Superman you ever wanted to know, but were afraid to ask. And of course theres plenty of SPOILERS, so back away if you havent read the entire series. Newsarama: Grant, tell us a little about the origin of the project. Grant Morrison: Some of it has its roots in the DC One Million project from 1999. So much so, that some readers have come to consider this a prequel to DC One Million, which is fine if it shifts a few more copies! Ive tried to give my own DC books an overarching continuity intended to make them all read as a more coherent body of work when Im done. Luthors enlightenment when he peaks on supersenses and sees the world as it appears through Supermans eyes was an element Id included in the Superman Now pitch I prepared along with Mark Millar, Tom Peyer and Mark Waid back in 1999. There were one or two of ideas of mine that I wanted to preserve from Superman Now and Luthors heartstopping moment of understanding was a favorite part of the original ending for that story, so I decided to use it again here. My specific take on Supermans physicality was inspired by the shamanic meeting my JLA editor Dan Raspler and I had in the wee hours of the morning outside the San Diego comic book convention in whenever it was, 98 or 99. Ive told this story in more detail elsewhere but basically, we were trying to figure out how to reboot Superman without splitting up his marriage to Lois, which seemed like a copout. It was the beginning of the conversations which ultimately
The All-Star Superman Companion 7
led to Superman Now, with Dan and I restlessly pacing around trying to figure out a new way into the character of Superman and coming up short... Until we looked up to see a guy dressed as Superman crossing the train tracks. Not just any skinny convention guy in an illfitting suit, this guy actually looked like Superman. It was too good a moment to let pass, so I ran over to him, told him what wed been trying to do and asked if he wouldnt mind indulging us by answering some questions about Superman, which he did...in the persona and voice of Superman! We talked for an hour and a half and he walked off into the night with his friend (no, it wasnt Jimmy Olsen, sadly). I sat up the rest of the night, scribbling page after page of Superman notes as the sun came up over the naval yards. My entire approach to Superman had come from the way that guy had been sitting; so easy, so confident, as if, invulnerable to all physical harm, he could relax completely and be spontaneous and warm. That pose, sitting hunched on the bollard, with one knee up, the cape just hanging there, talking to us seemed to me to be the opposite of the clenched, muscle-bound look the character sometimes sports and that was the key to Superman for me. I met the same Superman a couple of times afterwards but he wasnt Superman, just a nice guy dressed as Superman, whose name I didnt save but who has entered into my own personal mythology (a picture has from that time has survived showing me and Mark Waid posing alongside this guy and a couple of young readers dressed as Superboy and Supergirl its in the Gallery section at my website for anybody who can be bothered looking. This is the guy who lit the fuse that led to All Star Superman).
After the 1999 pitch was rejected, I didnt expect to be doing any further work on Superman but sometime in 2002, while I was going into my last year on New XMen, Dan DiDio called and asked if I wanted to come back to DC to work on a Superman book with Jim Lee. Jim was flexing his artistic muscles again to great effect, and he wanted to do 12 issues on Superman to complement the work he was doing with Jeph Loeb on Batman: Hush. At the time, I wasnt able to make my own commitments dovetail with Jims availability, but by then Id become obsessed with the idea of doing a big Superman story and Id already started working out the details. Jim, of course, went on to do his 12 Superman issues as For Tomorrow with Brian Azzarello, so I found myself looking for an artist for what was rapidly turning into my own Man of Steel magnum opus, and I already knew the book had to be drawn by my friend and collaborator, Frank Quitely. We were already talking about We3 and Superman seemed like a good meaty project to get our teeth into when that was done. I completely scaled up my expectations of what might be possible once Frank was on board and decided to make this thing as ambitious as possible. Usually, I prefer to write poppy, throwaway live performance type superhero books, but this time, I felt compelled to make something for the ages a big definitive statement about superheroes and life and all that, not only drawn by my favorite artist but starring the first and greatest superhero of them all. The fact that it could be a noncontinuity recreation made the idea even more attractive and more achievable. I also felt ready for it, in a way I dont think I would have been in 1999; I finally felt grownup enough to do Superman justice. I plotted the whole story in 2002 and drew tiny colored sketches for all 12 covers.
8 All-Star Memories
The entire book was very tightly constructed before we started except that Id left the ending open for the inevitable better and more focused ideas I knew would arise as the project grew into its own shape...and I left an empty space for issue 10. That one was intended from the start to be the single issue of the 12 issue run that would condense and amplify the themes of all the others. #10 was set aside to be the oneoff story that would sum up anything anyone needed to know about Superman in 22 pages. Not quite as concise an origin as Supermans, but thats how we got started. NRAMA: When you were devising the series, what challenges did you have in building up this version of the Superman universe? GM: I couldnt say there were any particular challenges. It was fun. Nobody was telling me what I could or couldnt do with the characters. I didnt have to worry about upsetting continuity or annoying people who care about stuff like that. I dont have a lot of old comics, so my knowledge of Superman was based on memory, some tattered 70s books from the remains of my teenage collection, a bunch of DC Best Of... reprint editions and two brilliant little handbooks Superman in Action Comics Volumes 1 and 2 which reprint every single Action Comics cover from 1938 to 1988. I read various accounts of Supermans creation and development as a brand. I read every Superman story and watched every Superman movie I could lay my hands on, from the Golden Age to the present day. From the Socialist scrapper Superman of the Depression years, through the SuperCop of the 40s, the mythic HyperDad of the 50s and 60s, the questioning, liberal Superman of the early 70s, the bland superhero of the late 70s, the confident yuppie of the 80s, the over compensating Chippendale Superman of the 90s etc. I read takes on Superman by Mark Waid, Mark Millar, Geoff Johns, Denny ONeil, Jeph Loeb, Alan Moore, Paul Dini and Alex Ross, Joe Casey, Steve Seagle, Garth Ennis, Jim Steranko and many others. I looked at the Fleischer cartoons, the Chris Reeve movies and the animated series, and read Alvin Schwartzs (he wrote the first ever Bizarro story among many others) fascinating book An Unlikely Prophet where he talks about his notion of Superman as a tulpa, (a Tibetan word for a living thought form which has an independent existence beyond its creator) and claims he actually met the Man of Steel in the back of a taxi. I immersed myself in Superman and I tried to find in all of these very diverse approaches the essential Supermanness that powered the engine. I then extracted, purified and refined that essence and drained it into All Stars tank, recreating characters as my own dream versions, without the baggage of strict continuity. In the end, I saw Superman not as a superhero or even a science fiction character, but as a story of Everyman. Were all Superman in our own adventures. We have our own Fortresses of Solitude we retreat to, with our own special collections of valued stuff, our own superpets, our own Bottle Cities that we feel guilty for neglecting. We have our own peers and rivals and bizarre emotional or moral tangles to deal with. I felt Id really grasped the concept when I saw him as Everyman, or rather as the dreamself of Everyman. That S is the radiant emblem of divinity we reveal when we rip off our stuffy shirts, our social masks, our neuroses, our constructed selves, and become who we truly are. Batman is obviously much cooler, but thats because hes a very energetic and adolescent fantasy character: a handsome billionaire playboy in black leather with a butler at this beck and call, better cars and gadgetry than James Bond, a horde of fetish femme fatales baying around his heels and no boss. That guys Superman day and night. Superman grew up baling hay on a farm. He goes to work, for a boss, in an office. He pines after a hardworking gal. Only when he tears off his shirt does that heroic, ideal inner self come to life. Thats actually a much more adult fantasy than the one Batmans peddling but it also makes Superman a little harder to sell. Hes much more of a working class superhero, which is why we ended the whole book with the image of a laboring Superman. Hes Everyman operating on a scifi Paul Bunyan scale. His worries and emotional problems are the same as ours... except that when he falls out with his girlfriend, the world trembles.
10 All-Star Memories
Part Two
Our 10-part look back at All Star Superman with writer Grant Morrison continues. This time out: Morrisons favorite moments. The 12 Labors of Superman are finally enumerated. And we even get into the series unfortunate abbreviation. Newsarama: Grant, what are some of your favorite moments from the 12 issues? Grant Morrison: The first shot of Superman flying over the sun. The Cosmic Anvil. Samson and Atlas. The kiss on the moon. The first three pages of the Olsen story which, I think, add up to the best character intro Ive ever written. Everything Lex Luthor says in issue #5. Everything Clark does. The whole says/ does Luthor/Superman dynamic as played out through Frank Quitelys absolute mastery and understanding of how space, movement and expression combine to tell a story. Superboy and his dog on the moon that perfect teenage moment of infinite possibility, introspection and hope for the future. Hes every young man on the verge of adulthood, Krypto is every dog with his boy (it seemed a shame to us that Kryptos most memorable moment prior to this was his death scene in Whatever Happened To The Man of Tomorrow. Quitelys scampering, leaping, eager and alive little creature is how Id prefer to imagine Krypto the Superdog and conjures finer and more subtle emotions). BizarroHome, with all of Earths continental and ocean shapes but reversed. The page with the first appearance of Zibarro that Frank has designed so the eye is pulled down in a swirling motion into the drain at the heart of the image, to make us feel that were being flushed in a cloacal spiral down into a nihilistic, existential sink. Frank gave me that page as a gift, and it became weirdly emblematic of a strange, dark time in both our lives. The story with BarEl and Lilo has a genuine chill off ammonia and antiseptic off it, which makes it my least favorite issue of the series, although I know a lot of people who love it. Its about dying relatives, obligations, the overlit overheated corridors between terminal wards, the thin metallic odors of chemicals, bad food and fear. Preparation for the Phantom Zone. Superman hugging the poor, hopeless girl on the roof and telling us all were stronger than we think we are.
Joe Shuster drawing us all into the story forever and neverending. Nasthalthia Luthor. Frank and Jamies final tour of the Fortress, referencing every previous issue on the way, in two pages. All of issue #10 (theres a single typo in there where the time on the last page was screwed up but when we fix that detail for the trade Ill be able to regard this as the most perfectly composed superhero story Ive ever written). I dont think Ive ever had a smoother, more seamless collaborative process. NRAMA: The story is very complete unto itself, but are there any new or classic characters youd like to explore further? If so, which ones and why? GM: Id happily write more Atlas and Samson. I really like Krull, the DinoCzars wayward son, and his Stalinist underground empire of Subterranosauri. I could write a Superman Squad comic forever. Id love to write the Son of Superman sequel about Lois and Clarks super test tube baby. But...I think All Star is already complete, without sequels. You read that last issue and it works because you know youre never going to see All Star Superman again. Youll be able to pick up Superman books, but they wont be about this guy and they wont feel the same. He really is going away. Our Superman is actually dying in that sense, and that adds the whole series a deeper poignancy. NRAMA: Aside from the Bizarro League, you never really introduce other DC superheroes into the story. Why did you make this choice? GM: I wanted the story to be about the mythic Superman at the end of his time. Its clear from the references that he has or more likely has had a few super powered allies, but that theyre no longer around or relevant any more. For the context of this story I wanted the superfriends to be peripheral, like they were in the old comics. The Flash? Green Lantern? They represent Supermans old army buddies, or your dads school friends. Guys youve sort of heard of, who used to be more important in the old mans life than they are now. NRAMA: Some readers were confused as to how the Twelve Labors broke down, though others have pointed out that Supermans actions are more reflective of the Stations of the Cross (I note theres a Station Caf in the background of issue #12). Could you break down the Twelve Labors, or, if the cross theory is true, how the storyline reflects the Stations? GM: The 12 Labors of Superman were never intended as an isomorphic mapping onto the 12 Labors of Hercules, or for that matter, the specific Stations of the Cross, of which there are 14, I believe. I didnt even want to do one Labor per issue, so it deliberately breaks down quite erratically through the series for reasons Ill go into (later). Yes, there are correspondences, but thats mostly because we tried to create for our Superman the contemporary superhero version of an archetypal solar hero journey, which naturally echoes numerous myths, legends and religious parables. At the same time, we didnt want to do an update or a direct copy of any myth youd seen before, so it wont work if you try to find one specific mythological or religious plan to hang the series on; James Joyces honorable and heroic refutation of the rule aside, theres nothing more dead and dull than an attempt to retell the Odyssey or the Norse sagas scene by scene, but in a modern and/or superhero setting. For future historians and mythologizers, however, the 12 Labors of Superman may be enumerated as follows: 1. Superman saves the first manned mission to the sun. 2. Superman brews the SuperElixir. 3. Superman answers the Unanswerable Question. 4. Superman chains the Chronovore. 5. Superman saves Earth from BizarroHome. 6. Superman returns from the Underverse. 7. Superman creates Life. 8. Superman liberates Kandor/cures cancer. 9. Superman defeats Solaris. 10. Superman conquers Death. 11. Superman builds an artificial Heart for the Sun. 12.Superman leaves the recipe/formula to make Superman 2. And one final feat, which typically noone really notices, is that Lex Luthor delivers his own version of the unified field haiku explaining the underlying principles of the universe in fourteen syllables which the P.R.O.J.E.C.T. GType philosopher from issue 4 had dedicated his entire life to composing!
You may notice also that the Labors take place over a year with the solar heros descent into the darkness and cold of the Underverse occurring at midwinter/ Christmas time (thats also the only point in the story where we ever see Metropolis at night). It can also be seen as the suns journey over the course of a day we open in blazing sunshine but halfway through the book, at the end of issue #5, in fact, the solar hero dips below the horizon and begins the nightjourney through the hours of darkness and death, before his triumphant resurrection at dawn. Thats why issue 5 ends with the boat to the Underworld and 6 begins with the moon. Clark Kent is crossing the threshold into the subconscious world of memory, shadows, death and deep emotions. Although they can often have bizarre resonances, specific elements, like the Station Caf, are usually put there by Frank Quitely, and are not necessarily secret Dan Brownstyle keys to unlocking the mysteries. I think there might be a Station Caf opposite the studio where Frank Quitely works and the SAPIEN sign on another storefront is a reference to Franks studio mate, Dave Sapien. At least hes not filling the background with dirty words like he used to, given any opportunity NRAMA: For that matter, do the Twelve Labors matter at all? They seem so purposely illdefined. They seem more like misdirection or a MacGuffin than anything that needs to be clearly delineated. GM: They matter, of course, but the 12 Labors idea is there to show that, as with all myth, the systematic ordering of current events into stories, tales, or legends occurs after the fact. Im trying to suggest that only in the future will these particular 12 feats, out of all the others ever, be mythologized as 12 Labors. I suppose I was trying to say something about how people impose meaning upon events in retrospect, and thats how myth is born. Its hindsight that provides narrative, structure, meaning and significance to the simple unfolding of events. Its the backward glance that adds all the capital letters to the list above. Even Superman isnt sure how many Labors hes performed when we see him mulling it over in issue 10. When you watched it happening, it seemed to be Superman just doing his thing. In the future its become THE 12 LABORS OF SUPERMAN! NRAMA: And on a completely ridiculous note: AllStar Superman is perhaps the most difficulttoabbreviate comic title since Preacher: Tall in the Saddle. Did you realize this going in? GM: Going into what? Going into ASS itself? In the sense of how did I feel as I slowly entered ASS for the first time? It never crossed my mind...
Part Three
In All Star Superman, Morrison not only highlighted new angles of the Superman Universe, he also brought many new faces to the mythology. For anyone whos ever wanted to know Grant Morrisons process for creating new characters, heres your chance and a look into many, many ideas that didnt find their way onto the printed pages. First off, we take a look at P.R.O.J.E.C.Ts colorful director Leo Quintum, and the Bizarro-Bizarro Zibarro (say that five times fast). Newsarama: Id like to know a little more about Leo Quintum and his role in the story. He seems like a bit of an outgrowth of the likes of Project Cadmus and Emil Hamilton, but in a more fantastical, Willy Wonka sense. Grant Morrison: Yeah, he was exactly as you say, my attempt to create an updated take on the character of Supermans scientist friend in the vein of Emil Hamilton from the animated show and the 90s stories. Science so often goes wrong in Superman stories, and I thought it was important to show the potential for science to go right or to be elevated by contact with Supermans shining positive spirit. I was thinking of Quintum as a kind of Man Who Fell To Earth character with a mysterious unearthly background. For a while I toyed with the notion that he was some kind of avatar of Lightray of the New Gods, but as All Star developed, that didnt fit the tone, and he was allowed to simply be himself. Eventually it just came down to simplicity. Leo Quintum represents the good scientific spirit the rational, enlightened, progressive, utopian kind of scientist I figured Superman might inspire to greatness. It was interesting to me how so many people expected Quintum to turn out bad at the end. It shows how conditioned we are in our miserable, selfloathing, suspicious society to expect the worst of everyone, rather than hope for the best. Or maybe its just what we expect from stories. Having said that, there is indeed a necessary whiff of Lucifer about Quintum. His name, Leo Quintum, conjures images of solar force, lions and lightbringers and he has elements of the classic Trickster figure about him. He even refers to himself as The Devil Himself in issue #10. What hes doing at the end of the story should, for all its geewhiz futurity, feel slightly ambiguous, slightly fake, slightly Hollywood. Yes, hes fulfilling Supermans wishes by cloning an heir to Superman and Lois and inaugurating a
Superman dynasty that will last until the end of time but hes also commodifying Superman, figuring out how its done, turning him into a brand, a franchise, a biggerandbetter revamp, the ultimate coming attraction, fresher than fresh, newer than new but familiar too. Quintum has figured out the formula for Superman and improved upon it. And then you can go back to the start of All Star Superman issue #1 and read the formula for yourself, condensed into eight words on the first page and then expanded upon throughout the story! The solar journey is an endless circle naturally. A perfect puzzle that is its own solution. In one way, Quintum could be seen to represent the creative team, simultaneously reempowering a pure myth with the honest fire of Art...while at the same time shooting a jolt of juice through a concept that sells more S logo underpants and towels than it does comic books. All tastes catered! I have to say that the Willy Wonka thing never crossed my mind until I saw people online make the comparison, which seems quite obvious now. Quintum dresses how I would dress if I was the worlds coolest superscientist. Whats up with that? NRAMA: Was Zibarro inspired by the Bizarro World story where the Bizarro Neanderthal becomes this unappreciated Casanovatype? GM: Dont know that one, but it sounds like a scenario I could definitely endorse! Zibarro started out as a daft name sickedup by my subconscious mind, which flowered within moments into the mustwrite idea of an Imperfect Bizarro. What would an imperfect version of an already imperfect being be like? Zibarro. NRAMA: Id like to know more about Zibarro whats the significance of his chronicling Bizarro World through poetry? GM: Its up to you. I see Zibarro partly as the sensitive teenager inside us all. Hes moody, horribly selfaware and uncomfortable, yet filled with thoughts of omnipotence and agency. Hes the absolute center of his tiny, disorganized universe. Hes playing the role of sensitive, empathic poet but at the same time, hes completely selfabsorbed. When he says to Superman Can you even imagine what its like to be so different. So unique. So unlike everyone else? he doesnt even wait for Supermans reply. He doesnt care about anyones feelings but his own, ultimately. NRAMA: The character is very close to Superman, so what does it say that a nonpowered version on a savage world would focus his energy through that medium? Also, does Zibarros existence show how Superman is able to elevate even the backwards Bizarros through his very nature?
GM: All of the above. And maybe he writes his totally subjective poetry as a reflection of Clark Kents objective reporter role. The suppressed, lyrical, wounded side of Superman perhaps? The SuperMorrissey? Bizarro With The Thorn In His Side? But hes also BizarroHomes mistake (or so it seems to him, even though hes as natural an expression of the place as any of the other Bizarro creatures who grow like mould across the surface of their living planet). He feels excluded, a despised outsider, and yet that position is what defines his cherished selfimage. He expresses himself through poetry because to him the regular Bizarro language is barbaric, barely articulate and guttural. And they all think hes talking crap anyway. It seemed to make sense that an interesting opposite of Bizarro speech might be flowery woe is me school Poetry Society odes to the sunset in a misunderstood heart. Hes still a Bizarro though, which makes him ineffectual. His tragedy is that he knows hes fated to be useless and pointless but craves so much more. NRAMA: Zibarro also represents a recurrent theme in the story, of Superman constantly facing alternate versions of himself BarEl, Samson and Atlas, the Superman Squad, even Luthor by the end. Notably, Hercules is absent, though Supermans doing his Twelve Labors. With the mythological adventurers in particular, was this designed to equate Superman with their legend, to show how his character is greater than theirs, or both? GM: In a way, I suppose. He did armwrestle them both, proving once and for all Supermans stronger than anybody! And remember, these characters, along with Hercules, used to appear regularly in Superman books as his rivals. I thought they made better rivals than, say, Majestic or Ultraman because people who dont read comics have heard of Hercules, Samson and Atlas and understand what they represent. For that particular story, I wanted to see Superman doing tough guy shit again, like he did in the early days and then again in the 70s, when he was written as a supremely cocky macho bastard for a while. I thought a little bit of that would be an antidote to the slightly soppy, SuperChrist portrayal that was starting to gain ground. Hence Samsons broken arm, twisted in two directions beyond all repair. And Atlas in the hospital. And then Supermans got his hot girlfriend dressed like a girl from Krypton and theyre making out on the moon (the original panel description was of something more like the famous shot of Burt Lancaster and Deborah Kerr kissing in the surf from From Here To Eternity. Franks final choice of composition is much more classically pulpromantic and iconic than my down and dirty rumble in the moondirt would have been, Im glad to say).
Part Four
In the fourth part of our 10-part look back at All-Star Superman, we talk with writer Grant Morrison about the new foes for the Man of Steel that he conceived for this series. Even though some only appeared for a few panels, Morrison reveals that by design, they had a life that extends far beyond the page..and maybe you can help a few of them show up in the mainstream DC Universe. We also learn how he revamped an obscure Supergirl antagonist for fan-favorite nasty, and find out how Samson and Atlas were influenced by a British comic youll have to see to believe. Newsarama: Tell us about some of the thinking behind the new antagonists you created for this series (at least the ones you want to talk about...): First up: Krull and the Subterranosaurs... Grant Morrison: We wanted to create some throwaway new characters which would be designed to look as if they were convincing longterm elements of the Superman legend. We were trying to create a few foes who had a classic feel and a solid backstory that could be explored again or in depth. Even if we never went back to these characters, we wanted them to seem rich enough to carry their own stories. With Krull, we figured a superhuman character like Superman can always use a powerful subhuman opponent: a beast, a monster, a savage with the power to destroy civilization. For years Ive had the idea that the familiar gray aliens might actually be evolved biped dinosaur descendants, the offspring of smartthinking lizards which made their way to the warm regions at the Earths core. I imagined these brutes developing their own technology, their own civilization, and then finally coming to the surface to declare bloody war on the mammalian usurpers! It seemed like we could develop this idea into the Krull backstory and suggest a whole epic conflict in a few panels. Dom Regan, the Glasgow artist and DC colorist, saw the original green skin Jamie Grant had done for Krull, and suggested we make him red instead. Jamie reset his color filters and that was the moment Krull suddenly looked like a real Superman foe.
get the right design for the beast because its meant to be a 5D being that we only ever see in 4D sections. It had to work as a convincing representation of something much bigger that were seeing only where it interpenetrates our 4D space-time continuum. Imagine youre walking along with a song in your teenage heart, then suddenly the Chronovore appears, takes bite out of your life, and you arrive at your girlfriends house aged 76, clutching a cell phone and a wilted bouquet. NRAMA: One more obscure run that I was happy to see referenced in this was the use of Nasty from the old Mike Sekowsky Supergirl stories. What made you want to use this character? GM: I remembered her from the old comics, and felt her fashiony look could be updated very easily into the kind of fetish club thing Ive always been partial to. She seemed a cool and sexy addition to the Luthor plot. The setup, where Lex has a fairly normal sister who hates how her wayward brother is such a bad influence on her brilliant daughter, is explosive with character potential. They need to bring Nasty back to mainstream continuity. Geoff! They all want it and you know you never let them down! The red skin marked him out as unique, different and dangerous, even among his own species. It had echoes of Jack Kirbys Devil Dinosaur that played right into the heart of the concept. A good design became a great design and the whole story of who Krull was his twisted relationship with his father the DinoCzar, his monstrous ambitions came together in that first picture. The society was fleshed out in the script even though we see only one panel of it a gloomy, heavy, Soviet underworld of walled iron cities, cold blood and deadly intrigue. WarBarges that could sail on the oceans of heated steam at the center of the Earth. A Stalinist authoritarian lizard world where missing person cases were being taken to work and die as slaves in hellish underworld conditions. NRAMA: MechanoMan? GM: An attempt to preimagine a classic, archetypal Superman foe, which started with another simple premise how about a giant robot villain? But not just any giant robot this is a rampaging machine with a raging little man inside. Giving him a bitter, angry, scrawny loser as a pilot turned MechanoMan into a much more extreme and pathological expression of the Man of Steel/Mild Mannered Reporter dynamic, and added a few interesting layers onto an 8panel appearance. NRAMA: The Chronovore a very disturbing creation, that one. GM: The Chronovore was mentioned in passing in DC 1,000,000 and would have been the monster in my aborted Hypercrisis series idea. It took a long time to NRAMA: Speaking of Mike Sekowsky, Im curious about his influence on your work. I have an odd fascination with all the ideas and stories he was tossing around in the late 1960s and early 1970s Jasons Quest, Manhunter 2070, the IChing tales and many of the characters he worked on, from the BWana Beast to the Inferior Five to Yankee Doodle (in Doom Patrol), have shown up in your work. The Bizarro Zoo in issue #10 is even slightly reminiscent of the Beasts merged animals. GM: Those were all comics that were around when I was a normal kid, prior to the obsessive collecting fan phase of my isolated teenage years. They clearly inspired me in some way, as you say, but certainly not consciously. Id never
anymore about this bastard hes often described as the British Superman, but oh...my arse! I hated meathead, personalitysingularity Garth...but we all grew up with his meandering, inexplicable yet incrediblydrawn adventures and some of it was quite good when you were a little lad because he was always shagging ON PANEL with the likes of a barebreasted cave girl or gauzedraped Helen of Troy. (Unlike Superman, you see, the top British strongman liked to get naked. Lots naked. Naked in every time period he could get naked in, which was all of them thanks to the miracle of his bullshit powers. (Imagine Doctor Who buff, dumb and naked all the time Russell, Ive had an idea!!!! and thats Garth in a nutshell. (Sorry, I know Im going on and the average attention span of anyone reading stuff on the Internet amounts to no more than a few paragraphs, but basically, Garth was always getting naked. In public, in family newspapers. Bollock naked. Lets face it, patriotic Americans, have you ever seen Supermans arse? Newsarama Note: Well, there was Baby Kal-El in the 1978 film... (Brits, hands up who still remember the man, and have you ever not seen Garths arse? Do you not, in fact, have a very clear image of it in your head, as drawn by Martin Asbury perhaps? In mine, Garths pulling aside a flimsy curtain to gaze at the pyramids with Cleopatra buck naked in foreground ogling his rock hard glutes...). Anyway, Samson, I decided, was the Hebrew version of Garth and he would have his own mad comic that was like an American version of Garth. I saw the Bible hero plucked from the desert sands by timetravelling buffoons in search of a savior. Introduced to all the worst aspects of future culture and, using his stolen, erratic ChronoMobile, Samson became a time(and space) travelling Soldier of Fortune, writing wrongs, humping princesses, accumulating and losing treasure etc. Like a science fiction Conan. Meets Garth. Fortunately, youll never see any of these men ever again.
have considered myself a particular fan of Mike Sekowskys work, but as you say, Ive incorporated a lot of his ideas into the DC Universe work Ive done. Hmm. Interesting. While Im at it, I should also say something about Samson and Atlas, halfway between old characters and new. Samson, Atlas and Hercules were classical mainstays of old Superman covers, tangling with Superman in all those Silver Age stories that happened before he learned from his friends at Marvel that it was possible to fight other superheroes for fun and profit, so I decided to completely revamp the characters in the manner of superhero franchises. Marvel has the definitive Hercules for me, so I left him out of the mix and concentrated on Atlas and Samson. Atlas was reimagined as a mighty but restless and reckless young prince of the New Mythos a society of megabeings playing out their archetypal dramas between New Elysium and Hadia, with ordinary people caught in the middle and Superman. Essentially goodhearted, Atlas would have been the newbie in a team with Skyfather Xaoz!, Heroina, Marzak and the others. He has a bullish, adolescent approach to life. He drinks and plunges himself into illadvised adventures to ease his naturally gloomy weighed down by the world temperament. You can see it all now. The backstory suggested an unseen, Empyrean New Gods type series from a parallel universe. What if, when Jack Kirby came to DC from Marvel in 1971, hed followed up his scifi Viking Gods saga at Marvel, with a dimensionspanning epic rooted in Greek mythology? New Gods meets Eternals drawn by Curt Swan/Murphy Anderson? That was Atlas. Samson, I decided would be a callback to the British newspaper strip Garth. Although you may already be imagining a daily strip about the exploits of time tossed The Boys writer, Garth Ennis, it was actually about a blonde Adonis type who bounced around the ages having mildly horny, racy adventures. (Go look him up then return the wiser before reading on, so I dont have to explain
Part Five
We continue our epic (and growing) conversation with Grant Morrison about his and Frank Quitelys recently concluded run on All-Star Superman. Its ten parts in all collect all of them, and get the stick of gum! Newsarama: How have your perceptions of Superman and his supporting characters evolved since the Superman 2000 pitch you did with Mark Waid, Mark Millar and Tom Peyer? The Superman notions seem almost identical, but Luthor is very different here than in that pitch, and so is Clark Kent. Did you use some aspects of your original pitch, or have you just changed his mind on how to portray these characters since? Grant Morrison: A little of both. I wanted to approach All Star Superman as something new, but there were a couple of specific aspects from the Superman 2000 pitch (as I mentioned earlier, it was actually called Superman Now, at least in my notebooks, which is where the bulk of the material came from) that I felt were definitely worth keeping and exploring. I cant remember much about Luthor from Superman Now, except for the ending. By the time I got to All Star Superman, Id developed a few new insights into Luthors character that seemed to flesh him out more. Luthors really human and charismatic and hateful all the same time. Hes the brilliant, deluded egotist in all of us. The key for me was the idea that he draws his eyebrows on. The weird vanity of that told me everything I needed to know about Luthor. I thought the real key to him was the fact that, brilliant as he is, Luthor is nowhere near as brilliant as he wants to be or thinks he is. For Luthor, no praise, no success, no achievement is ever enough, because theres a big hungry hole in soul. His need for acknowledgement and validation is superhuman in scale. Superman needs no thanks, he does what he does because hes made that way. Luthor constantly rails against his own sense of failure and inadequacy...and Supermans to blame, of course. Ive recently been rethinking Luthor again for a different project, and theres always a new aspect of the character to unearth and develop. NRAMA: This story makes Superman and Lois relationship seem much more
romantic and epic than usual, but this one also makes Superman more of the pursuer. Lois seems like more of an equal, but also more wary of his affections, particularly in the blackandwhite sequence in issue #2. She becomes this great beacon of support for him over the course of the series, but there is a sense that shes a bit jaded from years of trickery and uncomfortable with letting him in now that hes being honest. How, overall, do you see the relationship between Superman and Lois? GM: The black-and-white panels shows Lois paranoid and under the influence of an alien chemical, but yes, shes articulating many of her very real concerns in that scene. I wanted her to finally respond to all those years of being tricked and duped and led to believe Superman and Clark Kent were two different people. I wanted her to get her revenge by finally refusing to accept the truth. It also exposed that brilliant central paradox in the Superman/Lois relationship. The perfect man who never tells a lie has to lie to the woman he loves to keep her safe. And he lives with that every day. Its that little human kink that really drives their relationship. NRAMA: Jimmy Olsen is extremely cool in this series its the old Mr. Action idea taken to a new level. Its often easy to write Jimmy as a victim or sycophant, but in this series, he comes off as someone worthy of being Supermans Pal he implicitly trusts Superman, and will take any risk to get his story. Do you see this version of Jimmy as sort of a natural evolution of the version often seen in the comics? GM: It was a total rethink based on the aspects of Olsen I liked, and playing down the whole wetbehindtheears cub reporter thing. I borrowed a little from the Mr Action idea of a more daredevil, proactive Jimmy, added a little bit of Nathan Barley, some Abercrombie & Fitch style, a bit of Tintin, and a cool Quitely haircut. Jimmy was renowned for his disguises and bizarre transformations (my favorite is the transvestite Olsen epic Miss Jimmy Olsen from Jimmy Olsen #95, which gets a nod on the first page of our Jimmy story we did), so I wanted to take that aspect of his appeal and make it part of his job. I dont like victim Jimmy or dumb Jimmy, because those takes on the character dont make any sense in their context. It seemed more interesting see what a young man would be like who could convincingly be Supermans pal. Someone whose company a Superman might actually enjoy. That meant making Jimmy a much bigger character: swaggering but disingenuous. Innocent yet worldly. Enthusiastic but not stupid. My favorite Jimmy moment is in issue #7 when he comes up with the way to defeat the Bizarro invasion by using the seas of the Bizarro planet itself as giant mirrors
to reflect toxic to Bizarros sunlight onto the night side of the Earth. He knows Superman can actually take crazy lateral thinking like this and put it into practice. NRAMA: Perry White has a few smallbutkey scenes, particularly his address to his staff in issue #1 and standing up to Luthor in issue #12. Id like to hear more about your thoughts on this character. GM: As with the others, my feelings are there on the page. Perry is Clarks boss and need only be that and not much more to play his role perfectly well within the stories. Hes a good reminder that Superman has a job and a boss, unlike that goodfornothing work-shy bastard Batman. Perrys another of the series older male role models of integrity and steadfastness, like Pa Kent. NRAMA: Theres a sense in the Daily Planet scenes and with Loiss spotlight issues that everyone knows Clark is Superman, but they play along to humor him. The Clark disguise comes off as very obvious in this story. Do you feel that the Planet staff knows the truth, or are just in a very deep case of denial, like Lex? GM: If I had to say for sure, I think Jimmy Olsen worked it out a long time ago, and simply presumes that if Superman has a good reason for what hes doing, thats good enough for Jimmy. Lois has guessed, but refuses to acknowledge it because it exposes her darkest flaw she could never love Clark Kent the way she loves Superman. NRAMA: Also, the Planet staff seems awfully nonchalant at Luthors threats. Are they simply used to being attacked by now? GM: Yes. Theyre a tough group. They also know that Superman makes a point of looking out for them, so they naturally try to keep Luthor talking. They know
GM: The Marks Waid and Millar were big fans of the Maggin books, and may have persuaded me to read at least the first one but Im ashamed to say cant remember anything about it, other than the vague recollection of a very humane, humanist take on Superman that seemed in general accord with the pacifist, hedonistic, betweenthewars spirit of the 90s when I read it. It was the 90s; I had other things on my mind and in my mind. I like Maggins Must There Be A Superman? from Superman #247, which ultimately poses questions traditional superhero comic books are not equipped to answer and is one of the first paving stones in the Yellow Brick Road that leads to Watchmen and beyond, to The Authority, The Ultimates etc. Everyone still awake, still reading this, should make themselves familiar with Must There Be A Superman? its a milestone in the development of the superhero concept. However, the story that most defines Luthor for me turns out to be, as usual, a Len Wein piece with Curt Swan/Murphy Anderson Superman #248. This blew me away when I was a kid. Lex Luthor cares about humanity? Hes sorry we all got blown up? The villain loves us too? Its only Superman he really hates? Genius. Big, cool adult stuff. The divine Len makes Lex almost too human, but it was amazing to see this kind of depth in a character Id taken for granted as a music hall villain. I also love the brutish Satanic, Crowleyesque, Golden Age Luthor in the brilliant Powerstone Action Comics #47 (the opening of All Star #11 is a shameless lift from Powerstone, as I soon realised when I went back to look. Blame my...er.... photographic memory....cough).
he loves to talk about himself and about Superman. In that scene, hes almost forgotten he even has powers, hes so busy arguing and making points. He keeps doing ordinary things instead of extraordinary things. NRAMA: The running gag of Clark subtly using his powers to protect unknowing people is well done, but I have to admit I was confused by the sequence near the end of issue #1. Was that an eltrain, and if so, why was it so close to the ground? GM: Its a MagLev hovertrain. Look again, and youll see its not supported by anything. Hovertrains help ease congestion in busy city streets! Metropolis is the City of Tomorrow, after all. NRAMA: And theres the death of Pa Kent. Why do you feel its particularly important to have Pa and not both of the Kents pass away? GM: I imagined they had both passed away fairly early in Supermans career, but Ma went a few years after Pa. Also, because the book was about men or man, it seemed important to stress the father/son relationships. That circle of life, the king is dead, long live the king thing that Superman is ultimately too big and too timeless to succumb to. NRAMA: There is a real touch of Elliott S! Maggins novels in your depiction of Luthor someone who is just so obsessivecompulsive about showing up Superman that he accomplishes nothing in his own life. He comes across as a showman, from his rehearsed speech in issue #1 to his garish costume in the last two issues, and it becomes painfully apparent that he wants to ursurp Superman because he just cant be happy with himself. What defeats him is actually a beautiful gift, getting to see the world as Superman does, and finally understanding his enemy. Thats all a leadin to: What previous stories that defined Luthor for you, and how did you define his character? What appeals to you about writing him?
And I like the Silver Age Luthor who only hates Superman because he thinks its Superboys fault he went bald. That was the most genuinely human motivation for Luthors career of villainy of all; it was Supermans fault he went bald! I can get behind that. In the Silver Age, baldness, like obesity, old age and poverty, was seen quite rightly as a crippling disease and a challenge which Superman and his supporting cast would be compelled to overcome at every opportunity! Suburban 50s America versus Communist degeneracy? You tell me. I like elements of the Marv Wolfman/John Byrne ultracruel and rapacious businessman, although he somewhat lacks the human dimension (ultimately theres something brilliant about Luthor being a failed inventor, a product of Smallville/ Dullsville the genius who went unnoticed in his lifetime, and resorted to death robots in chilly basements and cellars. Luthor as geek versus world). I thought Alan Moores ruthlessly selfassured consultant Luthor in Swamp Thing was an inspired take on the character as was Mark Waids ragedriven prodigy from Birthright. I tried to fold them all into one portrayal. I see him as a very human character Superman is us at our best, Luthor is us when were being mean, vindictive, petty, deluded and angry. Among other things. Its like a bipolar manic/depressive personality with optimistic, loving Superman smiling at one end of the scale and paranoid, petty Luthor cringing on the other. I think any writer of Superman has to love these two enemies equally. We have to recognize them both as potentials within ourselves. I think its important to find yourself agreeing with Luthor a bit about Supermans smug superiority we all of us, except for Superman, know what its like to have meanspirited thoughts like that about someone elses happiness. Its essential to find yourself rooting for Lex, at least a little bit, when he goes up against a mangod armed only with his bloodyminded arrogance and cleverness. Even if you just wish you could just give him a hug and help him channel his energies in the right direction, Luthor speaks for something in all of us, I like to think. However, hes played, Luthor is the male power fantasy gone wrong and turned sour. Youve got everything you want but its not enough because someone has more, someone is better, someone is cleverer or more handsome. Welcome to the second half of our 10-part look back at All Star Superman with Grant Morrison. In this part, well find out more about the themes of the series, and how Morrison views the power of stories. Newsarama: Grant, a recurring theme throughout the book is the effect of small kindness how even the likes of Steve Lombard are capable of decency. And Superman gets the key to saving himself by doing something that any human being could do, offering sympathy to a person about to end it all.
Part Six
Grant Morrison: Completely...the person you help today could be the person who saves your life tomorrow. NRAMA: The character actions that make the biggest difference, from Zibarros sacrifice to Pas influence on Superman, are really things that any normal, nonpowered person could do if they embrace the best part of their humanity. The last page of issue #12 teases the idea that Supermans powers could be given to all mankind, but it seems as though the greatest gift he has given them is his humanity. How do you view Supermans fate in the context of where humanity could go as a species? GM: I see Superman in this series as an Enlightenment figure, a Renaissance idea of the ideal man, perfect in mind, body and intention. A key text in all of this is Picos Oration On The Dignity of Man (15c), generally regarded as the manifesto of Renaissance thought, in which Giovanni Pico Della Mirandola laid out the fundamentals of what we tend to refer to as Humanist thinking. (The Oratorio also turns up in my British superhero series Zenith from 1987, which may indicate how long Ive been working towards a Pico/Superman team-up!) At its most basic, the Oratorio is telling us that human beings have the unique ability, even the responsibility, to live up to their ideals. It would be unusual for a dog to aspire to be a horse, a bird to bark like a dog, or a horse to want to wear a diving suit and explore the Barrier Reef, but people have a particular gift for and inclination towards imitation, mimicry and self-transformation. We fly by watching birds and then making metal carriers that can outdo birds, we travel underwater by imitating fish, we constantly look to role models and behavioral templates for
guidance, even when those role models are fictional TV or, comic, novel or movie heroes, just like the soft, quick, shapeshifty little things we are. We can alter the clothes we wear, the temperature around us, and change even our own bodies, in order to colonize or occupy previously hostile environments. We are, in short, a distinctively malleable and adaptable bunch. So, Pico is saying, if we live by imitation, does it not make sense that we might choose to imitate the angels, the gods, the very highest form of being that we can imagine ? Instead of indulging the most brutish, vicious, greedy and ignorant aspects of the human experience, we can, with a little applied effort, elevate the better part of our natures and work to express those elements through our behavior. To do so would probably make us all feel a whole lot better too. Doing good deeds and making other people happy makes you feel totally brilliant, lets face it. So we can choose to the astronaut or the gangster. The superhero or the super villain. The angel or the devil. Its entirely up to us, particularly in the privileged West, how we choose to imagine ourselves and conduct our lives. We live in the stories we tell ourselves. Its really simple. We can continue to tell ourselves and our children that the species we belong to is a crawling, diseased, viral cancer smear, only fit for extinction, and lets see where that leads us. We can continue to project our self-loathing and narcissistic terror of personal mortality onto our culture, our civilization, our planet, until we wreck the promise of the world for future generations in a fit of sheer self-induced panic... ...or we can own up to the scientific fact that we are all physically connected as parts of a single giant organism, imagine better ways to live and grow...and then put them into practice. We can stop pissing about, start building starships, and get on with the business of being adults. The Oratorio is nothing less than the Shazam!, the Kimota! for Western Culture and we would do well to remember it in our currently trying times. The key theme of the Dark Age of comics was loss and recovery of wonder McGregors Killraven trawling through the apocalyptic wreckage of culture in his search for poetry, meaning and fellowship, Captain Mantra, amnesiac in Robert Mayers Superfolks, Alan Moores Mike Maxwell trudging through the black and white streets of Thatchers Britain, with the magic word of transformation burning on the tip of his tongue. My own work has been an ongoing attempt to repeat the magic word over and over until we all become the kind of superheroes wed all like to be. Ha hah ha.
Part Seven
In the seventh part of our 10-part look back at All-Star Superman with Grant Morrison, we find out what went into making the ultimate Superman story, some insights into the nature of Morrisons collaboration with artist Frank Quitely, and why writing this series wasnt like his gigs on Batman and Final Crisis. Newsarama: The structure of the 12 issues involves both Supermans 12 labors and his impending death. Do you feel the threat of his demise brings out the best in Supermans alreadyhigh character, or did you intend it more as a window for the audience to understand how he sees the world? Grant Morrison: In trying to do the big, ultimate Superman story, we wanted to hit on all the major beats that define the character the death of Superman story has been told again and again and had to be incorporated into any definitive take. Supermans death and rebirth fit the sun god myth we were establishing, and, as you say, it added a very terminal ticking clock to the story. NRAMA: When we talked earlier this year, we discussed the neurotic quality of the Silver Age stories. Looking at the series as a whole, you consistently invert this formula. Superman is faced with all these crises that could be seen as personifying his neuroses, but for the most part he handles them with a level head and comes across as being very at peace with himself. You talked about your discussion with an incharacter Superman fan at a convention years ago, but I am curious as to how you determined Supermans mindset. GM: I felt we had to live up to the big ideas behind Superman. I dont take my daft job lightly. Its all Ive got. As the project got going, I wasnt thinking about Silver Ages or Dark Ages or anything about the comics Id read, so much as the big shared idea of Superman and that S logo I see on Tshirts everywhere I go, on girls and boys. That communal Superman. I wanted us to get the precise energy of Platonic Superman down on the page. The S hieroglyph, the supersigil, stands for the very best kind of man we can imagine, so the subject dictated the methodical, perfectionist approach. As Ive mentioned before, I keep this aspect of my job fresh for myself by changing my writing style to suit the project, the character or the artist.
my heart broken, or mended. I couldnt have written it if I hadnt known what it felt like to be idolized, misunderstood, hated for no clear reason, loved for all my faults, forgotten, remembered... Writing All Star Superman was, in retrospect, also a way of keeping my mind in the clean sunshine while plumbing the murkiest depths of the imagination with that old pair of c****s Darkseid and Doctor Hurt. Good riddance.
With something like Batman R.I.P., Im aiming for a frenzied Goth Pulp-Noir; punkpsych, expressionist shadows and jagged nightmare scene shifts, inspired by Batmans roots and by the snapping, fluttering of his uncanny cape. Final Crisis was written, with the Norse Ragnarok and Biblical Revelations in mind, as a story about events more than characters. A doom-laden, Death Metal myth for the wonderful world of Fina(ncia)l Crisis/Eco-breakdown/Terror Trauma we all have to live in. The subject matter drives the execution. And then, of course, the artists add their own vision and nuance. With All Star Superman, Frank and I were able to spend a lot of time together talking it through, and we agreed it had to be about grids, structure, storybook panel layouts, an elegance of form, a clarity of delivery. Classical in every sense of the word. The medium, the message, the story, the character, all working together as one simple equation. Frank Quitely, a Glasgow Art School boy, completely understood without much explanation, the deep structural underpinnings of the series and how to embody them in his layouts. Theres a scene in issue # 8, set on the Bizarro world, where we see Le Roj handing Superman his rocket plans. Look at the arrangement of the figures of Zibarro, Le Roj, Superman and BizaroSuperman and youll see one attempt to make us of Renaissance compositions. The sense of sunlit Zen calm we tried to get into All Star is how I imagine it might feel to think the way Superman thinks all the time - a thought process that is direct, clean, precise, mathematical, ordered. A mind capable of fantastical imagination but grounded in the everyday of his farm upbringing with nice decent folks. Rich with humour and tears and deep human significance, yet tuned to a higher key. We tried to hum along for a little while, thats all. In honor of the characters primal position in the development of the superhero narrative, I hoped we could create an ultimate hero story, starring the ultimate superhero. Basically, I suppose I felt Superman deserved the utmost application of our craft and intelligence in order to truly do him justice. Otherwise, I couldnt have written this book if I hadnt watched my big, brilliant dad decline into incoherence and death. I couldnt have written it if Id never had
Part Eight
As we head into the home stretch of our look back at All Star Superman with Grant Morrison, we take a look at where Superman came from both on and off the page. In this section, Morrison discusses how the Superman stories of the past influenced his miniseries and how he interprets Supermans homeworld of Krypton. Newsarama: This is touched on in other questions, but how much of the Silver/ Bronze Age backstory matters here? What do you see as Supermans life prior to All-Star Superman? (What was going on with this Superman while the Byrne revamp took hold?) Grant Morrison: When I introduced the series in an interview online, I suggested that All Star Superman could be read as the adventures of the original Pre-Crisis on Infinite Earths Superman, returning after 20 plus years of adventures we never got to see because we were watching John Byrnes New Superman on the other channel. If Whatever Happened To The Man of Tomorrow? and the Byrne reboot had never happened, where would that guy be now? This was more to provide a sense, probably limited and ill-considered, of what the tone of the book might be like. I never intended All Star Superman as a direct continuation of the Weisinger or Julius Schwartz-era Superman stories. The idea was always to create another new version of Superman using all my favorite elements of past stories, not something Age specific. I didnt collect Superman comics until the 70s and Im not interested enough in pastiche or nostalgia to spend 6 years of my life playing post-modern games with Superman. All Star isnt written, drawn or colored to look or read like a Silver Age comic book. All Star Superman is not intended as arch commentary on continuity or how trends in storytelling have changed over the decades. Its not retro or meta or anything other than its own simple self; a piece of drawing and writing that is intended by its makers to capture the spirit of its subject to the best of their capabilities, wisdom and talent. Which is to say, we wanted our Superman story be about life, not about comics or superheroes, current events or politics. Its about how it feels, specifically to be a man...in our dreams! Hopefully that means our 12 issues are also capable of wide interpretation.
So as much as we may have used a few recognizable Silver Age elements like Van-Zee and Sylv(i)a and the Bottle City of Kandor, the ensemble Daily Planet cast embodies all the generations of Superman. Perry White is from 1940, Steve Lombard is from the Schwartz-era 70s, Ron Troupe - the only black man in Metropolis - appeared in 1991. Cat Grant is from 1987 And so on. P.R.O.J.E.C.T. refers back to Jack Kirbys DNA Project from his 70s Jimmy Olsen stories, as well as to The Cadmus Project from 90s Superboy and Superman stories. Doomsday is 90s. Kal Kent, Solaris and the Infant Universe of Qwewq all come from my own work on Superman in the same decade. Pa Kents heart attack is from Superman the Movie. We didnt use Brainiac because hed been the big bad in Earth 2 but if we had, wed have used Brainiacs Kryptonian origin from the animated series and so on. I also used quite a few elements of John Byrnes approach. Byrne made a lot of good decisions when he rebooted the whole franchise in 1986 and I wanted to incorporate as much as I could of those too.. Our Superman in All Star was never Superboy, for instance. All Star Superman landed on Earth as a normal, if slightly stronger and fitter infant, and only began to manifest powers in adolescence when hed finally soaked up enough yellow solar radiation to trigger his metamorphosis. The Byrne logic seemed to me a better way to explain how his powers had developed across the decades, from the skyscraper leaps of the early days to the speed-of-light space flight of the high Silver Age. And more importantly, it made the Superman myth more poignant - the story of a farm boy who turned into an alien as he reached adolescence. I felt that was something that really enriched Superman. He grew away from his home, his family, his adopted species as he became Superman. His teenage years are a record of his transformation from normal boy to super-being. As you say, there are more than just Silver Age influences in the book. Basically we tried to create a perfect synthesis of every Superman era. So much so, that it should just be taken as representative of an age all its own.
In the end, however, I do think that the Silver Age type stories, with their focus on human problems and foibles, have a much wider appeal than a lot of the work which followed. Theyre more like fables or folk tales than the later comic book superhero stories of Superman when he became just another colorful costume in the crowd...and perhaps thats why All Star seemed to resemble those books more than it does a typical modern Marvel or DC comic. It was our intention to present a more universal, mainstream Superman. NRAMA: In your depiction of Krypton and the Kryptonians, you show the complexity of Supermans relationship between humanity and Earth even further. Krypton has that scientific paradise quality to it, but the Kryptonians are also portrayed as slightly aloof and detached, even Jor-El. But from Bar-El to the people of Kandor, theyre touched by Supermans goodness. What do you see as the fundamental difference between Kryptonians and Earthlings, and how has Supermans character been shaped by each? GM: My version of Krypton was, again, synthesized from a number of different approaches over the decades. In mythic terms, if Superman is the story of a young king, found and raised by common people, then Krypton is the far distant kingdom he lost. Its the secret bloodline, the aristocratic heritage that makes him special, and a hero. At the same time, Krypton is something that must be left behind for Superman to become who he is - i.e. one of us. Krypton gives him his scientific clarity of mind, Earth makes his heart blaze. I liked the very early Jerry Siegel descriptions where Krypton is a planet of advanced supermen and women (I already played with that a little in Marvel Boy where Noh-Varr was written to be the Marvel Superboy basically). To that, I added the rich, science fiction detailing of the Silver Age Krypton stories and the slightly detached coolness that characterized John Byrnes Krypton, which I re-interpreted through the lens of Dzogchen Buddhist thought, probably the most pragmatic, chilly and rational philosophic system on the planet and the closest, I felt, to how Kryptonians might see things. We also took some time to redesign the crazy, multicolored Kryptonian flag (you can see our version in Kandor in issue #10). The flag, as originally imagined, seemed like the last thing Kryptonians would endorse, so we took the multicolored-rays-around-a-circle design and recreated it - the central circle is now
red, representing Kryptons star, Rao, while the rays, rather than arbitrary colors, become representations of the spectrum of visible light pouring from Rao into the inky black of space. In this way, the flag, that bizarre emblem of nationalism becomes a scientific hieroglyph. Showing Krypton and Kryptonians was also important as a way of stressing why Superman wears that costume and why it makes absolute sense that he looks the way he does. I dont see the red and blue suit as a flag or as rewoven baby blankets. Theres no need for Superman to dress the way he does but it made sense to think of his outfit as his national costume. The way I see it, the standard superhero outfit, the familiar Superman suit with the pants on the outside, is what everyone wore on Krypton, give or take a few fashion accessories like hoods and headbands, chest crests and variant colors. In fact, all other superheroes are just copying the fashions on Krypton, lost planet of the super-people. Superman wears his action-suit the way a patriotic Scotsman would wear a kilt. Its a sign of his pride in his alien heritage.
Part Nine
In the penultimate section of our look back at All Star Superman, we examine some of the religious underpinnings of the series. Many have compared Superman to Christ, but how does Grant Morrison really see him or religion in general? Read on to find out. Newsarama: Although AllStar Superman ties in with DC One Million, you style of writing has changed dramatically since then. How do you feel about One Million now? Grant Morrison: I just read it again and liked it a lot. Comics were definitely happier, breezier and more confident in their own strengths before Hollywood and the Internet turned the business of writing superhero stories into the production of low budget storyboards or, worse, into conformist, fruitless attempts to impress or entertain a small group of people who appear to hate comics and their creators. NRAMA: Obviously, this book is the most explicit SFChrist story since Behold the Man, only...happy. Superman/Christ parallels have existed for decades, but this story makes it absolutely explicit, from laying his hands on the sick and dying to...well, most of issue #12. Youve dealt with Christ themes before, particularly in The Mystery Play, but outside of the comics, how do you see Superman as a Christ figure for the real world? GM: The Superman as Christ thing is a little too reductive for me, and tends to overlook the fact that Superman is by no means a pacifist in the Christ sense. Superman would never turn the other cheek; Superman punches out the bully. Superman is a fighter. When did Christ ever batter the Devil through a mountain? The thing I disliked about the Superman Returns movie was the American Christ angle, which reduced Superman to a sniveling, masochistic wreck, crawling around on the floor, taking a kicking from everyone. This approach had an odd and slightly disturbing S&M flavor, which didnt play well to the characters strengths at all and seemed to derive entirely from a kind of Catholic vision of the suffering, martyred Jesus. Its not that hes based on Jesus, but simply that a lot of the mythical sun god elements which have been layered onto the Christ story also appear in the story of Superman.
I suppose I see Superman more as pagan scifi. Hes a secular messiah, a science redeemer with tough guy muscles and a very direct and clear morality. NRAMA: Continuing the religious themes, in issue #10, you have Superman literally giving birth to himself, both philosophically and as a character a nice little metamoment showing how Superman inspires a world where he is only fiction. How did that idea come about? GM: It came from the challenge wed set ourselves: as I said, issue #10 had been left as a blank space into which the single most coherent condensation of all our ideas about Superman were destined to fit. I wanted to do a day in the life story. So much of All Star had been about this threat to Superman himself, so we wanted to show him going about a typical day saving people and doing good. Then came the title Neverending, which comes from the opening announcement Faster than a speeding bullet!... of the Superman radio show from 1940, and seemed to me to be as good a title for a Superman story as any I could think of. It seemed to distil everything about Supermans battle and his legend into a single word. And the story structure itself was designed to loop endlessly, so it went well with that. On top of that went the idea of the Last Will and Testament of Superman. A dying god writing his will seemed like an interesting structure to use. Then came the idea to fit all of human history into that single 24 hours. And then to show the development of the Superman idea through human culture from the earliest Australian Aboriginal notions of superbeings descended from the sky, through the complex philosophical system of Hinduism, onto the Renaissance concept of the ideal man, via the refinements of Nietzche and finally, down to that smiling, hopeful Joe Shuster sketch; the final embodiment of humanitys glorious, uplifting notion of the superman become reduced to a drawing, a story for kids, a worthless comic book. And also what that could mean in a holographic fractal universe, where the smallest part contains and reflects the whole. Of course the next panel in that sequence is happening in the real world and would show you, the reader, sitting with the latest Superman issue in your hands, deep within the Infant Universe of Qwewq in the Fortress of Solitude, today, wherever you are. In Neverending, the reader becomes wrapped in a selfreferential loop of story and reality. If you actually, seriously think about what is happening at this point in the story, if you meditate upon the curious entanglement of the real and the fictional, you will become enlightened in this life apparently. According to some texts. NRAMA: On a personal level, youve explored all types of religions and philosophies in your work. What is your take on religion and how it influences humanity, and the Christian take on Jesus Christ in particular?
GM: I think religion per se, is a ghastly blight on the progress of the human species towards the stars. At the same time, it, or something like it, has been an undeniable source of comfort, meaning and hope for the majority of poor bastards who have ever lived on Earth, so Im not trying to write it off completely. I just wish that more people were educated to a standard where they could understand what religion is and how it works. Yes, it got us through the night for a while, but ultimately, its one of those ugly, stupid arseoverbackwards things we could probably do without now, here on the Planet of the Apes. Religion is to spirituality what porn is to sex. Its what the Hollywood 3act story template is to real creative writing. Religion creates a structure which places special, privileged people (priests) between ordinary people and the divine, as if there could even be any separation: as if every moment, every thought, every action was not already an expression of dynamic divinity at work. As Ive said before, the solid world is just the part of heaven were privileged to touch and play with. You dont need a priest or a holy man to talk to god on your behalf just close your eyes and say hello: god is no more, no less, than the sum total of all matter, all energy, all consciousness, as experienced or conceptualized from a timeless perspective where everything ever seems to present all at once. God is in everything, all the time and can be found there by looking carefully. The entire universe, including the scary, evil bits, is a thought God is thinking, right now. As far as I can figure it out from my own reading and my own experience of how the spiritual world works, Jesus was, as they say, way cool: a man who achieved a state of consciousness, which nowadays would get him a diagnosis of temporal lobe epilepsy (in the days of the Emperor Tiberius, he was crucified for his ideas, today hed be laughed at, mocked or medicated). This holistic mode of consciousness (which Luthor experiences briefly at the end of All Star Superman) announces itself as a heartbreaking connection, a oneness, with everything that exists...but you dont have to be Superman to know what that feeling is like. There are a ton of meditation techniques which can take you to this place. I dont see it as anything supernatural or religious, in fact, I think its nothing more than a developmental level of human consciousness, like the ability to see perspective which children of 4 cannot do but children of 6 can. Everyone whos familiar with this upgrade will tell you the same thing: it feels as if alien or angelic voices far more intelligent, coherent and kindly than the voices you normally hear in your head are explaining the structure of time and space and your place in it. This identification with a timeless supermind containing and resolving within itself all possible thoughts and contradictions, is what many people, unsurprisingly, mistake for an encounter with God. However, given that this totality must logically include and resolve all possible thoughts and concepts, it can also be interpreted as an actual encounter with God, so Im not here to give anyone a hard time over interpretation. Some people have the experience and believe the God of their particular culture has chosen them personally to have a chat with. These people may become born again Christians, fundamentalist Muslims, devotees of Shiva, or misunderstood lunatics. Some contactees interpret the voices they hear erroneously as communications from an otherworldly, alien intelligence, hence the proliferation of abduction accounts in recent decades, which share most of their basic details with similar accounts, from earlier centuries, of people being taken away by fairies or little people. Some, who like to describe themselves as magicians, will recognize the alien voice as the Holy Guardian Angel. In timeless, spaceless consciousness, the singular human mind blurs into a direct experience of the totality of all consciousness that has ever been or will ever be. It feels like talking with God but I see that as an aspect of science, not religion. As Peter Barnes wrote in The Ruling Class, I know I must be God because when I pray to Him, I find Im talking to myself.
Part Ten
Our look back at All Star Superman with writer Grant Morrison finally concludes. In our last installment, we look at the possibility of future stories with this version of the character, the hidden meaning of the title All Star Superman...and what Morrison hopes readers take away from his epic. Newsarama: When we spoke earlier this year, you talked about some of your ideas for future All Star stories. Are you moving forward on those, or have you started working on different ideas since then? Grant Morrison: I havent had time to think about them for a while. I did have the stories worked out, and Id like to do more, but right now it feels like Frank and Jamie and I have said all there is to be said. I dont know if Im ready to do All Star Superman with anyone else right now. I have other plans. NRAMA: You end the book with Superman having uplifted humanity having inspired them through his sacrifice and great deeds, and with the potential to pass his powers on to humanity still there. Do you plan to explore this concept further, or would you prefer to leave it openended? GM: I may go back to the Son of Superman in some way. At the same time, its best left openended. I like the idea that Superman gets to have his cake and eat it; he becomes golden and mythical and lives forever as a dream. Yet, he also is able to sire a child who will carry his legacy into the future. He kicks ass in both the spiritual and the temporal spheres! NRAMA: The notion of transcendence always a big part of your work. But the debate about All Star Superman is whether or not it transcends its genre. Superman becomes transcendent within the series itself, and inspires the beings on Qwewq, but does the work aspire to more than that? Is it simply the greatest version of a Superman story, and thats enough? GM: That would certainly be enough if it were true. Its a pretty highlevel attempt by some smart people to do the Superman concept some justice, is all I can say. Its intended to work as a set of scifi fables that can be read by children and adults alike. Id like to think you can go to it if youre feeling suicidal, if you miss your dad, if youve had to take care of a difficult, ailing relative, if youve ever lost control and needed a good friend to put you straight,
What was the inspiration for the image of Superman in the sun at the end? (I confess this question comes as the result of much unsuccessful Googling) I didnt have any specific reference in mind - just that one weve all sort of got in our heads. I drew the figure as a sketch, intended to be reminiscent of William Blakes cosmic figures, Russian Constructivist Soviet Socialist Worker type posters, and Leonardos Proportions of the Human Figure. The position of the legs hints at the Buddhist swastika, the clockwise sun symbol. It was to me, the essence of that working class superheroic ideal I mentioned, condensed into a final image of mythic Superman, - our eternal, internal, guiding, selfless, tireless, loving superstar. The daft All Star Superman title of the comic is literalised in this last picture. Its the fearful symmetry of the Enlightenment project - an image of genius, toil, and our need to make things, to fashion art and artefacts, as a form of superhuman, divine imitation. if you love your pets, if you wish your partner could see the real you...All Star is about how Superman deals with all of that. Its a big old Paul Bunyan style mythologizing of human - and in particular male - experience. In that sense Id like to think All Star Superman does transcend genre in that its intended to be read on its own terms and needs absolutely no understanding of genre conventions or history around it to grasp whats going on. In todays world, in todays media climate designed to foster the fear our leaders like us to feel because it makes us easier to push around. In a world where limp, wimpy men are forced to talk tough and act badass even though we all know theyre shitting it inside. In a world where the measure of our moral strength has come to lie in the extremity of the images were able to look at and stomach. In a world, Im reliably told, thats going to the dogs, the real mischief, the real punk rock rebellion, is a snarling, fuck you positivity and optimism. Violent optimism in the face of all evidence to the contrary is the Alpha form of outrage these days. It really freaks people out. I have a desire not to see my culture and my fellow human beings fall helplessly into step with a middle class media narrative that promises only planetary catastrophe, as engineered by an intrinsically evil and corrupt species which, in fact, deserves everything it gets. Is this relentless, downbeat insistence that the future has been cancelled really the best we can come up with? Are we so fucked up we get off on terrifying our children? Its not funny or ironic anymore and thats why we wrote All Star Superman the way we did. Everything hs changed. Dark entertainment now looks like hysterical, adolescent, Zibarro crap. Thats what my Final Crisis series is about too. NRAMA (aka Tim Callahan): Continuing with the theme of transcendence: The words ineffectual and surrender are repeated throughout the book. Discuss. GM: Discuss yourself, Callahan! I know you have the facilities and I should think its all rather obvious. It was Superman as this fusion of Renaissance/Enlightenment ideas about Man and Cosmos, an impossible union of Blake and Newton. A Pop Art Vitruvian Man. The inspiration for the first letter of the new future alphabet! As you can see, we spent a lot of time thinking about all this and purifying it down to our own version of the gold. Im glad its over. NRAMA: Finally: What, above all else, would you like people to take away from All Star Superman? GM: That we spent a lot of time thinking about this! No. What I hope is that people take from it the unlikelihood that a piece of paper, with little ink drawings of figures, with little written words, can make you cry, can make your heart soar, can make you scared, sad, or thrilled. How mental is that ? That piece of paper is inert material, the corpse of some tree, pulped and poured, then given new meaning and new life when the real hours and real emotions that the writer and the artist, the colourist, the letter the editor translated onto the physical page, meet with the real hours and emotions of a reader, of all readers at once, across time, generations and distance.
And think about how that experience, the simple experience of interacting with a paper comic book, along with hundreds of thousands of others across time and space, is an actual doorway onto the beating heart of the imminent, timeless world of Myth as defined above. Not just a drawing of it but an actual doorway into timelessness and the immortal world where we are all one together. My grief over the loss of my dad can be Supermans grief, can trigger your own grief, for your own dad, for all our dads. The timeless grief thats felt by Muslims and Christians and Agnostics alike. My personal moments of great and romantic love, untainted by the everyday, can become Supermans and may resonate with your own experience of these simple human feelings. In the one Mythic moment were all united, kissing our Lover for the First time, the Last time the Only time, honouring our dear Dad under a blood red sky, against a darkening backdrop, with Mum telling us itll all be okay in the end. If we were able to capture even a hint of that place and share it with our readers, that would be good enough for me.
In the end, I saw Superman not as a superhero or even a science fiction character, but as a story of Everyman. Were all Superman in our own adventures. - Grant Morrison

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All-Star Memories: The All-Star Superman Companion

With artwork by Frank Quitely & Jaime Grant

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