Superman - If You Had To Choose 7

[Vordan]

Doesn't Earth One effectively do the same thing, minus the risk of stumbling into a Morrison head screw while still providing a full story (you're really only going to recommend two floppy issues to a new reader?)?

I wouldn’t say the Earth One Supes is akin to the Morrison New 52 Supes at all. The Earth One Superman is much more akin to a “Spider-Man” take on Superman imo. Clark is selfish and self-centered at the start and over time learns to come out of his shell and protect others. But when Tyrell attacks at first Clark just sits back and watches. It’s only when Jimmy Olsen gets attacked that Clark finally joins the action. I never really got a “social crusader” vibe from him at all.

New 52 Superman is kind of the exact opposite. Where EO Supes is selfish at the start, New 52 Superman is an activist taking on corruption and corporate greed. New 52 Supes is arrogant and hotheaded while EO Supes is more quiet and observant. They both struggle with the question of what they want to do with their lives, but they come at it from different angles. EO Supes kind of gets dragged into it by an alien invasion while New 52 Supes is insanely eager to show off to the world all the feats he can do.

I get how the stuff with the 5-D Imps can be confusing but I didn’t think the first arc where Supes fights Glenmorgan, Metallo, Lex, the military, and finally Brainiac was that hard to follow at all. The one-shot stories like the Krypto issue were amazing (I also liked the EO version where he buries his cat on the moon).

Man and Superman by Wolfman hit on a lot of same story beats though and is great in its own right. If Morrison’s wasn’t to someone’s taste I’d give them that or Birthright.