You’ve written extensively about your regard for the character - just what is it about her you like? What are her strengths?
Oh, geez, Sue! What don’t I like about Lois? I mean… look, if you view Superman as aspirational, as the stories and adventures of a man who wants us to be ourselves at our best, then Lois is quintessentially that. She is absolutely the focus of that aspiration - brilliant, beautiful, courageous, kind, an advocate for truth and for justice, but amidst all that, always entirely human, possessed of all our foibles and insecurities and flaws. I love her fearlessness and her smarts, her morality and her ethics. I love that she’s a professional, who is legitimately good at her job, if not one of the best (even if we so-often don’t get to see that in the comics). I love that she does not surrender, and she does not back down. There’s so much there. She’s gone beyond quantification for me.
Greg, what role does Lois play in the Superman mythos and what’s her importance?
As I said above, if we view Superman as aspirational, than she is, in her own way, our ideal. Not an ideal woman, but an ideal human - one whose character is such that her actions demonstrate what we can be at our best, despite all of our worst.
From a dramatic point, she gives us eyes not just on Superman from the ground, but she provides a crucial outside view. So many heroes stick only in their own POV, and we lose their magnificence when that’s the only lens. Aside from her role as a dramatic engine, as a character who creates and propels story, she allows us to see Superman in much the same way that, I think, Superman sees her.
What role does Lois play in comics/pop culture as a whole?
Much harder for me to answer, honestly. I think a Superman comic without Lois Lane is a Superman comic that is missing a leg and is doomed to topple. In the larger culture, I’m honestly not certain. It’s not something I’ve given tremendous thought to, and I fear that, more and more, she’s being side-lined. Yet Lois is so clearly a character with which people identify, they can imagine themselves in her shoes, in her place. And in many ways, Lois Lane, I think, is seen as “super” but without the powers.
That said, I think, in the main, the pop culture view of her is terribly confused, filled with mixed messages about who this woman is, to such an extent that there are many who believe her presence in a Superman story is optional.