Bendis' Big Twist Revealed MAJOR SPOILERS for Action Comics 1000

[Ra-El]

I will say I’ve never bought into Kryptonians being solar powered (the amount of power storage just isn’t there in their body volume without exotic matter) but always saw it more as solar triggered.

And in my head, they lost a war and their genes were programmed to shutdown or suppress their powers under red sunlight.

That what I think too. Kryptonians don't have power only under a yellow sun, they only don't have powers under a red sun. Maybe the Quintessence confined kryptonians in one of the feel places they wouldn't have access to their powers.

[superduperman]

It's pretty much what we all suspected it was. It's been done before and probably better in other versions. What concerns me is that this might mean that they are just letting Bendis do whatever he wants. Like that might be one of the conditions of him coming to work for them. Something like this isn't too crazy or out there but who knows what he'll be allowed to do next. I'm always iffy about letting one person have complete control over the character.

[adkal]

My best guess is that this kind of Council oh the Universe was growing afraid of the Kryptonian's abilities, feeling that should they leave their home system (either again or ever). But Zaar probably went too far, I bet he was tasked with making sure that they would forever remain on Krypton, for instance by killing all their scientists and destroying their archives or something. Instead, he killed a world, hence why he seems to be judged in those panels.

That's exactly what I was thinking about.

They did worse with the Kryptonians than they did with the Martians? grr

Xenophobic gits

In reality Zaar could just be a racist, zealot, patsy who this council hand the smoking gun to. The perfect scapegoat when in reality guys like Sardath and Ganthet were the culprits if not facilitators.

Is Sardath an immortal? If so, is Alanna?

[Superlad93]

Is Sardath an immortal? If so, is Alanna?

*shrugs* Doubt it. But we don't know if this is the group of immortals known as The Quintessence, or if that is Sardath and Ganthet in the first place. We're just guessing.

[adkal]

*shrugs* Doubt it. But we don't know if this is the group of immortals known as The Quintessence, or if that is Sardath and Ganthet in the first place. We're just guessing.

Ha! I was thinking there was other information out that you lot knew

[Sacred Knight]

Just what I was thinking. That explains the solicits, but also the pages we've seen from DC Nation #0.

I'm wondering if Clark himself doesn't know where they are at because he and Lois agreed on a plan that protects them from,say, Brainiac or some other being able to read minds. This way if worst comes to worst if Superman is captured or defeated, the bad guy can't read his mind and find them in order to use them as some sort of further leverage, but also to protect his identity.

I mean, he once accidentally sent a significant portion of Earth's population including Lois,to the Phantom Zone before and it was based on a contingency plan he concocted and then made himself forget. He could have done the same or something similar here.

I'd like this. A plausible deniability scenario for extra protection. When was the story you're referencing from before? I can't recall that one.

Also, looking at those pencils and comparing it with the #1000 preview, Zaar is definitely scarred. I had forgotten actually but now I remember someone earlier likening the side of his face to the burns Mr. Oz had. I still think either Lara or Jor-El is responsible for those injuries. Of course, could be maybe Superman himself causes the injuries but I'm kinda doubting it, as I'm guessing in Superman gets thoroughly owned at first to set up his threat. So I'm thinking those pencils of him with who-might-be-the-Quintessence are set in the past.

[adkal]

I'd like this. A plausible deniability scenario for extra protection. When was the story you're referencing from before? I can't recall that one.

For Tomorrow

2004-05

[Sacred Knight]

Oh, of course, duh, the potential connection to it with the Phantom Zone thing was already discussed.

[Patrick Gerard]

It's pretty much what we all suspected it was. It's been done before and probably better in other versions. What concerns me is that this might mean that they are just letting Bendis do whatever he wants. Like that might be one of the conditions of him coming to work for them. Something like this isn't too crazy or out there but who knows what he'll be allowed to do next. I'm always iffy about letting one person have complete control over the character.

I think many of the better runs came from either letting a creator run wild or giving them the kind of twisted freedom they had in the “Death” era (Ie. WB would block a Lois/Clark Wedding but let them kill Superman off instead). If that leads to bad stuff, it’ll get retconned or ignored but it at least means there’s a narrative direction.

The Busiek/Johns team had freedom until World of Krypton locked those teams into a direction, which sucked.

The Loeb/Kelly had absurd freedom until OWAW when DC, down a summer crossover, came to them with a character hit list and a bunch of one shots and further placed restrictions on the “Luthor knows Clark’s identity” plot, which stagnated.

In general, sales and readability, for my tastes, peak when the creative teams get broad mastery over the mythos and the books tank when they get too wrapped up in mandates and housekeeping.

I would take Bendis making bad choices (even if they temporarily bench/kill characters I like) than having a run where rules get in the way of going anywhere.

I thought New 52 Superman was interesting being single but the fact he couldn’t have a meaningful relationship with anyone else at first and then got locked into a WW relationship driven by other books made it boring. At least with the marriage (which I always preferred), Lois’ relationship with Clark could drive stories without having to account for other books.

[Steven Ely]

Superman "The Face and the Voice" yeah that is the same, but he's not the Superman you know?

That is a great episode.

Regardless, A Very intriguing path or, should I say, web being spun for the Universe..

Hmm, I do like the little Easter eggs to George Reeves' Superman and the Mole Men (1951)
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[krazijoe]

Looks like Terrax, so maybe Bendis brought Galactus with him.

[jimmy]

[QUOTE=Steven Ely;3607430]That is a great episode.
Hmm, I do like the little Easter eggs to George Reeves' Superman and the Mole Men (1951)
[ATTACH=CONFI]

You know I do.

I was eight years old when this came out always thought that the mole men's ray gun looked like a my mother's eletrolux vacuum cleaner..

[Jim Kelly]

I haven’t read the comic in question and it might be some time before I can get it in my hands, but as far as it goes with the doomed planet died of old age, I see that as just the simple shorthand form without getting into long explanations.

Planets break apart at different rates, because they are subject to many variables. But eventually everything falls apart, it’s entropy. So you can call that old age.

A world killer would have to have tremendous power to completely oblterate a massive planet like Krypton. It would just be a lot easier to take advantage of some existing flaw in the system to hasten the natural destruction of the planet. Sort of like splitting a diamond.

If it wasn’t purely an “act of god”—my preference is that the Kryptonians doomed themselves through their own hubris. Let’s say the scientists harvested energy for their experiments from the planet itself. This increased the natural stresses at the planet’s core until the strain was so great that the planet blew apart.

But the Siegel origin story is superior, because it’s better science fiction. A story where a bad guy kills a good guy has some shock value. But the story where the hero defeats himself and hastens his own death, raises more questions about the human condition.

If Krypton died because a bad guy killed it, oh well they were screwed end of story. But if Krypton died and none survived because they were arrogant and convinced of their own superiority, that’s a morally powerful tale.

[Lvenger]

So I've realised what my biggest problem with Rogol Zaar is as a Superman villain. There's nothing new, unique or compelling being brought to the table with this character. His design is basically The Persuader and Magog rolled into one Jim Lee mashup, his shocking connection to Superman has been done by Tyrell in Superman: Earth One and his motivation of hating all Kryptonians are the same as Amalak's from Kurt Busiek's The Third Kryptonian story. Bendis' first OC has been done several times before and by better writers.

[Ascended]

If Krypton died because a bad guy killed it, oh well they were screwed end of story. But if Krypton died and none survived because they were arrogant and convinced of their own superiority, that’s a morally powerful tale.

That's always been my preference as well.

I like Krypton best when its a cautionary tale for earth; a "beware the hubris of Krypton, or your world may suffer the same fate!" sorta thing.

What I'm figuring happened here (based entirely on nothing), is that this Quintessence-like group decided that Krypton was too dangerous to exist. Every Kryptonian who escapes their world potentially becomes a world breaker. That's actually a really scary concept and we've seen what that sort of situation looks like in the past with the Viltrumites in Image's Invincible as well as the Kherb in WildStorm (among others). So this Quintessence orders Rogal (or whatever his name is) to ensure that Kryptonians never leave their planet.

Maybe Rogal takes his orders too seriously and destroys the planet when he was only supposed to limit their scientific advancement. Maybe he does exactly what he was ordered to do and the real threat is this universal counsel who sentenced Krypton to destruction (which would actually be fairly new and explain in this continuity why the GLC didn't do anything to help evacuate Krypton). Maybe Jor-El discovered all this and tried to stop Rogal and/or the counsel but was only able to save his son. More likely (to my mind), given the Oz stuff and the radicalized element we saw in the MoS film, Jor agreed with the idea of keeping Kryptonians on Krypton and agreed to help keep them grounded....but probably didn't know about any extinction plans, and betrayed Rogal to save his son.

However this plays out though, I was right when I said (weeks ago) that this big reveal that "changes everything we knew" wouldn't actually live up to that hype. It could still turn into a good story, but most of us called it a while back. Now it's just a matter of seeing how the details fall out.