Superman: son of Kal-El

[Last Son of Krypton]

It's not that it is impossible to give a hero a son/daughter. But the point is - you must be extremely attentive and careful when you are going to change the status quo in such a radical way. Basically, you need a very good plan. For reasons Last Son of Krypton has explained here https://community.cbr.com/showthread...=1#post5694686 the pitch when they introduced Jon into "real" continuity was a flawed one.
If I had to take a guess, I'd say that Jon and SuperDad replacing Superbro was more or less a contingency plan after the DCYou fiasco, but when it became THE status quo things hadn't been planned well enough to overcome all the difficulties it presented.

Nah, it was still a result of the original planned "flawed" pitch, going from Jurgens interviews, after DiDio approved Jon surviving Convergence, he asked to age the baby and Jurgens came up with Superdad and family hiding for years in the new universe and Jon being 9 in present day.
The decisions were made while they were working on Convergence before the event was over and DC-You even started. Jurgens was already working on the L&C book that was announced right after the awful event ended.

To add to that, at that time, Tom King was preparing a Kon-El series with Rocafort, and the arc on Teen Titans that was supposed to lead to it was altered to get rid of Kon (and make him looking bad while at it) to not pose a treat to Jon's popularity when Jurgens' book would start. While the Superman team barely started writing the first arc of Truth (the storyline was supposed to lead to a relaunch too) and they had to change it to accommodate Jurgens' direction (this was also said by Tomasi in an old interview we discussed on this forum, stating that Final Days was planned when they were in the middle of writing the first Truth arc). Originally, the whole storyline was different according to Kuder: https://twitter.com/AaronKuder/statu...1585470386177/

Again, a deeply flawed pitch that got approved without thinking much long term.

[Vathlonian]

I thought maybe they were doing that. But if they’re actually making Jon queer (assuming it isn’t all bull crap or he won’t be bi and still date women 99% of the time)? Then there’s zero chance he replaces Clark in a long term role. I frankly don’t see the sales being there for him, being queer makes him harder to adapt because there’s vast swaths of the global market that will outright ban media he’s in, and all the other media is featuring Clark as Superman with the CW Jon being straight and powerless. Kinda curious as a Jon detractor, what do you think will happen if he flops? Because I can’t see them making a big deal of Jon as Superman and then deaging him (totally agree that Rebirth is the past) or even killing him off.

China and Russia are the only real obstacles sales wise to Jon Superman


One of those markets are largely impenetrable for DC films anyway outside of Aquaman(China) and the other isn’t anything to write home about in terms of box office(Russia)

Every other country wouldn’t care


Joker shows that DC films don’t need Asia

[Vathlonian]

Nah, it was still a result of the original planned "flawed" pitch, going from Jurgens interviews, after DiDio approved Jon surviving Convergence, he asked to age the baby and Jurgens came up with Superdad and family hiding for years in the new universe and Jon being 9 in present day.
The decisions were made while they were working on Convergence before the event was over and DC-You even started. Jurgens was already working on the L&C book that was announced right after the awful event ended.

To add to that, at that time, Tom King was preparing a Kon-El series with Rocafort, and the arc on Teen Titans that was supposed to lead to it was altered to get rid of Kon (and make him looking bad while at it) to not pose a treat to Jon's popularity when Jurgens' book would start. While the Superman team barely started writing the first arc of Truth (the storyline was supposed to lead to a relaunch too) and they had to change it to accommodate Jurgens' direction (this was also said by Tomasi in an old interview we discussed on this forum, stating that Final Days was planned when they were in the middle of writing the first Truth arc). Originally, the whole storyline was different according to Kuder: https://twitter.com/AaronKuder/statu...1585470386177/

Again, a deeply flawed pitch that got approved without thinking much long term.

Jon is here to stay


Make lemon out of lemonade and deal with it

[Yoda]

Not if you let it be. Much like how Damian grew past his characterization in Morrison's Batman and Son, Jon was poised for charting new territory at the end of Super Sons of Tomorrow and I don't mean going to space with Jor-El. If Bendis never left Marvel, we would not be in this situation. In some people's eyes, Jon was treading water, but in my eyes, he was swimming a marathon that would've taken decades to complete, which is why I and some many others feel in love with him. It's not too late and it never will be.

If Bendis had never left Marvel, Tomasi and Gleason and Jurgens were still on the way out. The books were floundering and sales were still sliding. The plan was to shake up the books, with Lois leaving for much longer and likely Jon being aged up anyways. Tomasi and Gleason were never getting their next 50 issues.

And I'm trying to wrap my head around Superman being DC's top book in the top ten on the day all the Marvel releases come out is some sort of evidence the book isn't selling well. How's that work exactly?

[Vathlonian]

The internet is not real life


The continued success of this series will likely convince none of you of that though

[Yoda]

Nah, it was still a result of the original planned "flawed" pitch, going from Jurgens interviews, after DiDio approved Jon surviving Convergence, he asked to age the baby and Jurgens came up with Superdad and family hiding for years in the new universe and Jon being 9 in present day.
The decisions were made while they were working on Convergence before the event was over and DC-You even started. Jurgens was already working on the L&C book that was announced right after the awful event ended.

To add to that, at that time, Tom King was preparing a Kon-El series with Rocafort, and the arc on Teen Titans that was supposed to lead to it was altered to get rid of Kon (and make him looking bad while at it) to not pose a treat to Jon's popularity when Jurgens' book would start. While the Superman team barely started writing the first arc of Truth (the storyline was supposed to lead to a relaunch too) and they had to change it to accommodate Jurgens' direction (this was also said by Tomasi in an old interview we discussed on this forum, stating that Final Days was planned when they were in the middle of writing the first Truth arc). Originally, the whole storyline was different according to Kuder: https://twitter.com/AaronKuder/statu...1585470386177/

Again, a deeply flawed pitch that got approved without thinking much long term.

It's a "deeply flawed pitch" that is now apparently looked at by WB's as a solid hook on Superman's evolution. PKJ has said as much and S&L and MAwS really show. This idea that it was "deeply flawed" compared to a cratering New 52 status quo that apparently was bottoming out in merchandising and engagement even outside of comics remains laughable.

[Blue22]

First issues are statistical outliers and should never be counted when determining a general trend. Rebirth and Bendis both started at 100k, but the actual average sale for each run was around 30-40k and 30k respectively. Rebirth had a much more gradual decline while Bendis had a much sharper decline. SSoK did not have a strong start and as evident but its predecessors, it's all downhill from here.

I just check Comixology's top ten and SSoK is at number 7 and right below it Robin at number 8. That's a decrease from number 3 where it was last month whereas Robin is at the same spot it was last month. Over the course of 5 issues, Robin has been consistent, but SSoK has already seen a drop, but it's a drop that I've been saying will happen from before the first issue even released. Now we have to wait and see each month if it maintains its place in the bottom half of Comixology's top ten.



It's common knowledge that the reason Super Sons was cancelled was so it could make way for Bendis' flipping of the status quo. It was never cancelled because of sales. Its trades sales were very strong while its single issues weren't the best, which is to be expected because it was a new book with a new name. Not all books can sell like Batman.



Hal Jordan was Parallax for quite a while. Didn't stop DC from turning back that clock. Please don't fall victim to the sunk cost fallacy. Anything can be undone.



I literally referenced Franklin Richards a few pages back. In the grand scheme of Franklin's history, that was only a flash in the pan, but at the time I'm sure the adult Franklin stuck around longer than baby Franklin until it was undone.



Bart is the other example of a successful de-aging, but I can't speak to anything relating to the Flash, but I do know that aging up Bart was a purely editorial thing.



That's the thing, he didn't have to be. And that's what we were deprived of when he was aged up, the stories of him growing up. I swear I've typed "Character can grow past their initial introduction" a dozen times by now, but it bears repeating. Of course his logical conclusion was to become Superman, that's all that was ever written about him! Once Tomasi and Gleason were done with him, Jon would've been handed off to the next writer who would've written the next set of Jon stories, using Tomasi and Gleason's work as basis for theirs.

Instead, Jon was ripped from their hands and placed in Bendis' who preceded to break his new toy because he didn't want to play with him and then we have Bendis' successors siding with Bendis over Tomasi and Gleason.



A lot of work went into making Damian into his own thing. Morrison planted a seed they never planned to reap benefit from. Instead, Tomasi and Gleason grew that seed into a strong character but that would have never happened if they didn't have the time to write and draw over 50 issues across several different titles.



What was the point of undoing Hal as Parallax or Bart as the Flash? They completed their journeys, so why go back? Because those were shitty directions that no one liked (that's a misnomer because there's always going to be fans of unpopular thing, just looked at aged up Jon).



Because we wouldn't be going back to tell the same story again. We'd be going back to where we left off, with Jon and Damian going to school together. Aged up Jon could be revealed to be an Earth-3 version or a clone or a time displaced Jon. There are a myriad of solutions at DC's disposal. Just pick one. The distinction between the real Jon and the aged up one is so clear cut, it's amazing how easy it would be to delineated one from the one.



Not if you let it be. Much like how Damian grew past his characterization in Morrison's Batman and Son, Jon was poised for charting new territory at the end of Super Sons of Tomorrow and I don't mean going to space with Jor-El. If Bendis never left Marvel, we would not be in this situation. In some people's eyes, Jon was treading water, but in my eyes, he was swimming a marathon that would've taken decades to complete, which is why I and some many others feel in love with him. It's not too late and it never will be.

I honestly don't even have much else to add to this. This sums most of it up perfectly.

The one thing I will disagree on though is whether or not Bendis is the entire reason for the age up. Given where DC was at the time and how Didio likes breaking shit just as much as Bendis does, I wouldn't be surprised if he would have just gotten someone else to do it. Best case scenario is that it wouldn't have been done in such a shitty way. At the very least not in a way that made it feel like both of Jon's parents didn't give even the slightest of fucks about him.

[garazza]

Which… is still good? Like I’m not sure how you can spin that as a negative lol. They set low expectations and Taylor exceeded them, that’s a success however you look at it.

What if DC didn't preemptively lower their expectations? What if they expected Taylor to sell 100k of his first issue, like his predecessors, and he only sold a little half of that, which is what happened? They moved the goalposts specifically for him, which suggests to me they had significant reservations about the book. Their expectations were exceeded, but only because they lowered them in the first place.

Sure they could have but that never going to happen, nor was it ever a consideration. Kathy was Jon’s Lana, his first crush, Jon never had any romantic interest in boys, nor were Tomasi and Jurgens ever going to portray him otherwise. The intent with Rebirth was to play all the cliches straight and sincerely.

Just because they weren't going to write Jon as queer doesn't mean another writer wouldn't.

If Tomasi and Jurgens hadn’t been kicked off, you were never getting a queer Jon. Not happening no matter how much fanfic people wrote. Tomasi and Jurgens clearly saw and wrote Jon as straight, zero indication he was anything but.

Not sure what fanfiction has to with what professional writers do.

If Rebirth had been allowed to come to a “natural conclusion” (not really sure what you mean),
Jon would’ve grown up, dated women and became Superman alongside Damian as Batman.

I have never once said, and don't where you got it from, that the natural conclusion for Rebirth was Jon becoming Superman and Damian becoming Batman. The natural conclusion of Rebirth would've been that crop of writers wrapping up their runs and handing their books off to the next set after the editors determine it was time to wrap up and move on to the next thing. Jon and Damian would've still been the same age at the natural end of Rebirth.

Look to be blunt, I believe that your fellow fans of Rebirth are not likely to be fans of a queer Jon. They would despise that as “wokeness” and even if he was deaged they would still stay away, same reason a lot of Kaldur’s fans left when they made him gay. So making Jon queer would still have sent the sales numbers into freefall because queer kids don’t fit in to the nice nuclear family living in the wholesome country with Lois baking pies and Clark working on the farm that Rebirth sold. We clearly disagree and that’s fine, it’s all a moot point now I suppose.

There is so much I disagree with here, I don't have time to unpack it all, so I'll agree with your last and simply agree to disagree.

[Last Son of Krypton]

It's a "deeply flawed pitch" that is now apparently looked at by WB's as a solid hook on Superman's evolution. PKJ has said as much and S&L and MAwS really show. This idea that it was "deeply flawed" compared to a cratering New 52 status quo that apparently was bottoming out in merchandising and engagement even outside of comics remains laughable.

Moving a kid from another timeline isn't deeply flawed to you? Compare it to Kelly Sue pitching Arthur and Mera having a baby.

[Quinlan58]

That's an odd conclusion to jump to given the large amount of fans who'd been shipping Jon with Damian since 2016, just as hard as folks have shipped Tim with Conner.

I was seeing people shipping Jon with Damian before Rebirth even properly started, back when some people were holding on to the hope that the name "SuperSons" meant Jon and Conner. I assume a large portion of the DamiJon fanbase is less "fans of Rebirth" and more "fans of the fanon Super/Bat relationship". Emphasis on "fanon" here. They may use Supersons and Rebirth material as reference, but they're not basing the ship on that.

[Superlad93]

China and Russia are the only real obstacles sales wise to Jon Superman


One of those markets are largely impenetrable for DC films anyway outside of Aquaman(China) and the other isn’t anything to write home about in terms of box office(Russia)

Every other country wouldn’t care


Joker shows that DC films don’t need Asia

Everyone's going to need China in a few years. It's the fastest growing market, and that's why you see so much consideration for them from the biggest studios that you'd assume wouldn't need to worry about them because they're so big (aka Disney).

Studios, especially ones that use superhero IPs, are stuck between a rock and a hard place these days. On the one hand the climate of the western world that they originate from and draw inspiration from is experiencing a very significant moment of change that's centered around representation, and the mass market of these films begs for more representation, but on the other hand China is such a major player and growing player in the block buster game that you just genuinely can't ignore them.

But this does honestly call into question Jon's film potential if it's true. No two ways about that. It all depends on what exactly they land on.

[Yoda]

Moving a kid from another timeline isn't deeply flawed to you? Compare it to Kelly Sue pitching Arthur and Mera having a baby.

In comics? No. Not at all. A little overcomplicated maybe, but necessary given the status quo at the time. It's par for course for shared universe superhero comics and was patched over within a few years regardless. And the general concepts they brought back are now being used all over the place. So I don't really see many deep flaws in it at all.

[garazza]

Is...is it safe to come out and finally have fun talking about this book and character, or is that just not happening today?

Sorry about that, Superlad. It's been an eventful day. I think I'm tapped out now.

[garazza]

If Bendis had never left Marvel, Tomasi and Gleason and Jurgens were still on the way out. The books were floundering and sales were still sliding. The plan was to shake up the books, with Lois leaving for much longer and likely Jon being aged up anyways. Tomasi and Gleason were never getting their next 50 issues.

And I'm trying to wrap my head around Superman being DC's top book in the top ten on the day all the Marvel releases come out is some sort of evidence the book isn't selling well. How's that work exactly?

I'm still operating under the idea that DC doesn't count digital sales and only cares about physical pre-order sales.

[Superlad93]

Sorry about that, Superlad. It's been an eventful day. I think I'm tapped out now.

No need to apologize! I'm sure everyone who gets into these discussions get some sort of fun from it.

I just feel dumb because I'm over here with my dinky little theory for the book while all this is going on lol