Wal-Mart Superman Comic imagines torture and death of Lois Lane?

[OpaqueGiraffe17]

Generally a little shock value isn’t worth getting worked up over but 12 pages!?!? Who in their right minds thinks Superman and torture porn are a good combination?

[Kon93]

If the purpose of this story was to showcase Superman's anxiety, there was no need to be quite so gratuitous with all the Lois deaths, although the title was accurate in this regard so we shouldn't have expected anything less. It was just tacky and horrible. DC should have screened this before giving the okay considering the market they are trying to attract with these Wal-Mart books. And they should have vetoed the art, if nothing else. How many parents have bought this issue and without reading it first gave it to their little ones to read and have now traumatised their children? I get that Superman has some anxiety every time he's away from earth for long extended periods but using countless Lois' death is shortsighted and rather foolish.

You just gave king and didio another future reader of their depressing, graphic, shock **** they call writing.

Generally a little shock value isn’t worth getting worked up over but 12 pages!?!? Who in their right minds thinks Superman and torture porn are a good combination?

Same as above, they see $$$$ when they know it'll get us all fired up.

[rpmaluki]

You just gave king and didio another future reader of their depressing, graphic, shock **** they call writing.



Same as above, they see $$$$ when they know it'll get us all fired up.

I absolutely hate Lois being killed to further Superman's plot. Saying I get him having some anxiety isn't me saying I want to read them murder her over and over let alone once just so they can show Clark's man pain. I'm not even a target market for these books because I live outside the States so DC/King isn't getting my money regardless.

[Miles To Go]

Yep, this is escalating

https://www.supermanhomepage.com/wal...an-comic-book/

[Last Son of Krypton]

Who's the editor of the Walmart superman comic?

[king81992]

Why is it not healthy?

It feels like King projects his issues about trauma unto the characters he writes.

[superduperman]

I was more irritated that King didn’t write Supes thinking about anything else. Krypto starving because no one fed him, Perry firing him for being gone for so long, Darkseid invading, instead it’s just more of the “I CAN’T LIVE WITHOUT LOIS AHHHHHHH WHAT IF SHE DIES!?!?!?” crap. God I hate this characterization of Supes.

I was wondering this too. Will he still have a job when he gets back to Earth? Looks like a lot of things weren't thought out here.

[MajorHoy]

They are generally placed in the aisle with Pokemon cards, baseball cards, Shopkins, etc. So there is nothing that would indicate it's anything but a generic Superman comic. The trade dress is even like the old school comic covers with fun blurbs about the stories.

The one store where I finally found these (but they didn't have Superman; only saw Batman and Teen Titans there) had them in some aisles right at the very front, right by the registers, with some collectible cards and stuff (don't remember everything in that section) that I stumbled over on my way out.
The toys section and the general magazine/kids books section of the store is way in the back, nowhere near this area. (But then again, this Walmart had been doing some reworking of their aisles/sections, so I don't know if that may change in the future.)

I avoid Wal-Mart like the plague so hopefully I can just skip this.

Even if you went to a Walmart twice-a-day, every day of the week, you could easily skip this. Nobody came up to me and shoved them in my face or anything.

Generally a little shock value isn’t worth getting worked up over but 12 pages!?!? Who in their right minds thinks Superman and torture porn are a good combination?

Anybody remember when John Byrne had Superman and Big Barda making a porno movie?

[Flash Gordon]

Even if you went to a Walmart twice-a-day, every day of the week, you could easily skip this. Nobody came up to me and shoved them in my face or anything.

My reasons for hating Wal-Mart have nothing to do with this topic, ha.

[Flash Gordon]

King needs to get his own shrink and stop using his comics as his own personal journal of pain and sorrow

Eh well no, writing is exactly where an artist is supposed to "bleed onto the page". Your art belongs to you. I'm all for Tom King pouring his soul into his comics. The Sheriff of Babylon and Mister Miracle both were great. It's just, I'm not sure BATMAN and SUPERMAN are the appropriate venues for this kind of thing. I don't read Batman or Superman to be absolutely miserable. There needs to be big wins along with big losses. Triumphs that make Bruce seem heroic. That sort of jazz is missing from his mainstream work.

[manwhohaseverything]

Eh well no, writing is exactly where an artist is supposed to "bleed onto the page". Your art belongs to you. I'm all for Tom King pouring his soul into his comics. The Sheriff of Babylon and Mister Miracle both were great. It's just, I'm not sure BATMAN and SUPERMAN are the appropriate venues for this kind of thing. I don't read the World's Finest heroes to be absolutely miserable.

That seems like double standards. If he is allowed to bleed onto comics, he should be allowed to do that anywhere. Why should batman and superman be given special privilege?

[kjn]

That seems like double standards. If he is allowed to bleed onto comics, he should be allowed to do that anywhere. Why should batman and superman be given special privilege?

It's not a double standard at all.

Tom King is allowed to write whatever he wants. DC has the right to publish, not publish, or ask for changes in whatever thing Tom King writes for them.

Good publishers and writers—it is indeed a core trait of being any sort of good artist—know that they need to tailor their writings to the audience. What is suitable for publication in a Vertigo title is different from the mainstream DC comics, and again should be different to the Walmart comics, or DC Super Hero Girls. The readers are different, and reader expectations are different as well.

[thanatoskun]

I really hate Lois, so I will tell a friend to buy it for me, and send it to me. It will be the first Superman comic I bought in months.

[Flash Gordon]

That seems like double standards. If he is allowed to bleed onto comics, he should be allowed to do that anywhere. Why should batman and superman be given special privilege?

Because it's Batman and Superman, I feel like that's obvious. You need to know your audience. If writing my own stuff, I'm free to do what thou wilt. Writing Scooby Doo, there's limitations.

There's a way to tell meaningful stories with characters like Batman and Superman, but they don't belong to any one person and need to be handled that way. Lots and lots of Superman stories have metaphors for loss and anxiety, without going to the edgelord imagery that this goes to. Grant Morrison is different in The Invisibles than he is in Action Comics. The same writer, but he knows where he's standing.

[Clark_Kent]

Yep, this is escalating

https://www.supermanhomepage.com/wal...an-comic-book/

The article headline here is a bit misleading...it says "Walmart customers", as if these patrons were simply little Timmy & Tammy's parents on a shopping trip for cheap groceries and cheap clothes, who were blindsided by a Superman comic. But in the actual article, it makes it pretty clear that it is comics fans who are complaining, not your average Walmart customer. In other words, the people complaining the loudest A) know what most modern superhero comics are like on a violence scale, and B) know enough about Tom King to simply not buy something with his name on it if they already don't like Tom King. I guess the headline is technically right...if you hate Walmart with a passion, but go there only to pick up these new comics, then technically you are a "Walmart customer"...but the headline is still pretty cheap.

Anyway, I guess this whole "controversy" confuses me...the books are just sitting there on a shelf, not sealed, not bagged in any way. Do people not flip through books they buy anymore? I mean, at my LCS, all new floppies are bagged before they are put on the shelf, so I don't flip through them out of respect for the owner, but at Walmart or Barnes & Noble or you name it, I'm flipping through something quick to make sure there are no tears or damages to the pages. I think 12 pages of Lois dying would be easy to spot, and then not purchase, if people flipped through things first. Maybe I'm just weird (or not easily outraged over some ink and paper :P ).