Superman vs. Lobo Announced

[Robanker]

Be at ease, this series has been poorly received critically and commercially from what I’ve seen, it’s going to be instantly forgotten after the last issue comes out. Shame that Seeley misfired so badly because I was very excited at the prospect of him doing Superman in a solo capacity off of the strength of his previous work.


Hopefully Waid gives us a hit, but yeah the BL Superman stuff has not been kind for him. But Tom King, Gene Yang, Morrison, and Vendetti have all done solid to great Superman minis lately.

I've been too busy to post for a while so I'll have to take your word on the book's reception and hope this gets forgotten quickly.

[Prime]

I still can't get over the fact Lobo actually f*cked Clark's mom.

[Robanker]

I still can't get over the fact Lobo actually f*cked Clark's mom.

I'm having trouble getting past it too. It's not in continuity. Take refuge in that.

[Vordan]

Lex did it first back in the Silver Age, so you guys should just relax lol.

[Robanker]

Lex did it first back in the Silver Age, so you guys should just relax lol.

I dunno, man. Jor-El being her husband while it happens is so much worse. I wouldn't care if it was Lara before she met Jor-El or something, but it's while they're married.

[exile001]

I dunno, man. Jor-El being her husband while it happens is so much worse. I wouldn't care if it was Lara before she met Jor-El or something, but it's while they're married.

I think you're taking this too seriously. Have you read Lobo before? It's all about ott, convention defying, fan-base offending nonsense.

If this puts off fans from buying it, well, that's just another reason for DC to not publish more experimental Superman stuff (and this really isn't very experimental). They can't even take a joke about Lobo, a comedy character, banging Kal-El's in a non-canon comedy book. Why try?

Meanwhile, Batman gets Reptillian which is pretty terrible/insane but we're all looking at it with Ennis goggles on and enjoying the ride.

[Yoda]

I honestly forgot about that plot point over the intervening 5 or so months since this came out. It's gross, but I feel like the whole book took a huge nosedive in quality after the first issue. But this is just going to end up on the pile of forgotten Superman books that goes out with a whimper.

I don't think we're in any danger of this becoming a plot point in future origin adaptations. So while its unnecessary and juvenile humor that annoys me and really doesn't belong (Lara barely gets included in stories and now this is what we're stuck with here) I can't get quite as annoyed at it as I got with Year One. That book's flaws had the potential to poison the well for years to come given how so many people still think Miller is some kind of visionary. Thankfully, Year One seems to have been largely forgotten as well. This likely will be too.

[Frontier]

I think you're taking this too seriously. Have you read Lobo before? It's all about ott, convention defying, fan-base offending nonsense.

If this puts off fans from buying it, well, that's just another reason for DC to not publish more experimental Superman stuff (and this really isn't very experimental). They can't even take a joke about Lobo, a comedy character, banging Kal-El's in a non-canon comedy book. Why try?

Meanwhile, Batman gets Reptillian which is pretty terrible/insane but we're all looking at it with Ennis goggles on and enjoying the ride.

I think being open to experimental books shouldn't mean accepting poor quality of storytelling that doesn't really do the characters justice (I mean, Superman gets top billing in this comic).

[Vordan]

People still love Miller’s early work, but none of his post 9/11 work is highly rated at all (except for ASBAR which is so bad it’s amazing). Remembering that + the fact we’ve got so many Superman origins already meant that YO was destined to be forgotten and it has. Still pissed they wasted Year One on Miller though, I get he came up with the concept but they absolutely should’ve called Wolfman’s origin that. It’s the only Superman origin that actually follows the structure of Miller’s Batman origin: Starts in Metropolis with Clark Kent already an adult, we follow him around as he does the “proto-hero” bit, at first people are skeptical of him and don’t like him, by the end he wins the city over and the course is set for a clash with his arch nemesis. And it was actually a great origin to boot!

Seeley isn’t even close to being on the same level as Miller in terms of rep and Superman as a character isn’t enjoying a lot of attention or focus right now. This will be forgotten just like the vast majority of Superman stories are, good and bad.

[Robanker]

I think you're taking this too seriously. Have you read Lobo before? It's all about ott, convention defying, fan-base offending nonsense.

If this puts off fans from buying it, well, that's just another reason for DC to not publish more experimental Superman stuff (and this really isn't very experimental). They can't even take a joke about Lobo, a comedy character, banging Kal-El's in a non-canon comedy book. Why try?

Meanwhile, Batman gets Reptillian which is pretty terrible/insane but we're all looking at it with Ennis goggles on and enjoying the ride.

I'm fine with that happening when she's younger, but not during her marriage that we're supposed to think is unaffected by it.

It's just poor storytelling and, frankly, a shitty joke. Sure, that's Lobo's schtick, but this isn't strictly a Lobo book and passing it off as such is lazy and intellectually dishonest, as if the book must be dragged to Lobo's level instead of a median between it's two lead characters.

The execution here is the problem. If this was a younger Lara, the joke still works. Lara after she's made the ultimate sacrifice with her husband? Different story.

But by all means, argue it's about thin skin. Just because it's a comedy book didn't excuse them from actually writing a good story or remembering that pushing too far in either direction kills the project. This was several bridges too far.

More importantly, I've seen lots of pushback against Batman books recent and old, so your characterization that the Batman community doesn't get up in arms over poor work is fraudulent.

[Vordan]

Yeah the Batman community on Reddit constantly hated on Reptilian. Everyone hated Tom King’s Batman run, and there was plenty of whining about Tynion’s run as well. The Batman community is nowhere near as tolerant of variant takes as they pretend they are, people may have forgotten how Batman fans screamed bloody murder when Brave & the Bold was announced but I haven’t.

All that said, this is a comedy book. Complaining about Lara sleeping with Lobo here is like getting mad that Fractiom made fun of Batman in Jimmy Olsen. It doesn’t work for me because it’s just not funny, but I don’t see it as sacrilege or whatever.

[Bored at 3:00AM]

For me, the most egregious part about all this was the utterly ridiculous notion that Lobo is well-endowed. If anyone in the DCU is over-compensating, it's the guy who rides around on a comically over-sized crotch-rocket.

[Hoodj]

Lobo makes Superman look like a pussy and a bore just like Batman does. There are some characters Superman should not team up with unless his dignity and popularity suffers along they way.

[Powerboy]

I'm having trouble getting past it too. It's not in continuity. Take refuge in that.

Does anybody really take anything involving Lobo as being in main universe continuity?

[DABellWrites]

For me, the most egregious part about all this was the utterly ridiculous notion that Lobo is well-endowed. If anyone in the DCU is over-compensating, it's the guy who rides around on a comically over-sized crotch-rocket.

You know what? I like this idea. XD