Your Top Superman Stories

[Dispenser Of Truth]

Another old thread I'm reviving, for the same reasons as Who Is Superman, To You?. Just list 'em and explain why. Any medium you want, from movies to comics to TV episodes to fanfic, though I'm personally sticking to print. Mine is going to be long as hell, and be spread over a couple posts. The one rule is that it has to really be a story about Superman himself: "Lex Luthor: Man of Steel", for instance, is GREAT, but not really a Superman story. However, if you can justify a story largely focusing on another (such as "The Duel Between Luthor and Superman!") as a good enough Superman story too to belong on the list, that's fine. Pastiches/homages are allowed too. As few or as many as you want, as much or as little elaboration as you please.

[Dispenser Of Truth]

A couple caveats. First, honorable mentions to Sentry by Paul Jenkins and Jae Lee, the story of a Superman analogue placed in the fabric of Marvel's history seeking to discover why he's been forgotten, and the seminal Miracleman by Alan Moore, Garry Leach, Alan Davis, John Ridgeway, Chuck Beckum/Austen, Rich Veich, John Totleben, Neil Gaiman and Mark Buckingham. The first is entirely a thought experiment, having little to say about the actual nature of the character, and the latter only addresses the larger archetype that Superman represents instead of the character himself, though it still paints a fascinating picture of the mind of a truly alien superman. Also, a shout-out to For Tomorrow. Frankly lacking in terms of basic storytelling, it still presented some interesting ideas and has the best work of Jim Lee's career; worth a look-see. And 'runner-up' positions to The Super-Key to Fort Superman by Jerry Coleman and Wayne Boring (a fun mystery introducing the Fortress), Superman For All Seasons by Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale (a lot of solid work weighed down by the bizarre 'Toxin' subplot and mopey Clark), Superman's Day of Doom by Jerry Siegel and Curt Swan (a mostly by-the-numbers story with a surprising and humanity-affirming ending) and It's Superman! by Tom DeHaven (it never quite reconciles it's nature as both a period piece mystery and Superman story, but good stuff nonetheless, and that the day is saved by a small act of kindness on Clark Kent's part is perfect). And, of course, there's plenty of stuff I haven't read that could well find a place on here, including Jim Starlin's DC Presents Tales, most of the work of Elliot S! Maggin and Cary Bates, Mark Millar's run on Superman Adventures, most Golden Age Superman stories, Age of The Sentry by Jeff Parker, Paul Tobin, Nick Dragotta, Ramon Rosanas, Michael Cho, Colleen Coover and Bill Galvan, and Mr. Majestic by Joe Casey, Brian Holgun, Ed McGuinness and Eric Canete.

So after all that, let's get on with it. I'll list my choices here, and my explanations in two follow-up posts.

35. The Amazing Story of Superman-Red and Superman-Blue! by Leo Dorfman and Curt Swan
34. The Last Days of Superman! by Edmond Hamilton and Curt Swan
33. The Old Man of Metropolis! by Otto Binder and Curt Swan
32. For the Man Who Has Everything by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons
31. What's So Funny About Truth, Justice and the American Way? by Joe Kelly, Lee Bermejo and Doug Mahnke
30. Ending Battle by Geoff Johns, Pascal Ferry, Joe Casey, Derec Aucoin, Mark Schultz, Brandon Badeaux, Joe Kelley and Duncan Rouleau
29. Superior by Mark Millar and Lenil Francis Yu
28. Superman Beyond by Grant Morrison and Doug Manhke
27. Faster Than A Bullet by Matt Kindt and Stephen Segovia
26. Taking Time by Samuel Hawkins
25. Must There Be A Superman? by Elliot S! Maggin and Curt Swan, with recognition to Jeph Loeb
24. Tomorrow's Story by Samuel Hawkins
23. The Big Chill by Alan Moore and Carlos D'Anda
22. "Of Thee I Sing" by Garth Ennis and John McCrea
21. Up, Up and Away! by Kurt Busiek, Geoff Johns, Pete Woods and Renato Guedes
20. In Dreams by Kurt Busiek and Brent Anderson
19. Red Son by Mark Millar, Dave Johnson and Killian Plunkett
18. Bittersweet by Joe Casey and Derek Aucoin
17. Jungle Line by Alan Moore and Rick Veich
16. Change or Die by Warren Ellis and Tom Raney
15. Peace on Earth by Paul Dini and Alex Ross
14. The Death of Superman by Jerry Siegel and Curt Swan
13. Luthor's Gift by Elliot S! Maggin
12. The Living Legends of Superman by Elliot S! Maggin, Joe Orlando, Al Williamson, Frank Miller, Marshall Rogers, Wendy Pini, Mike Kaluta, Klaus Janson and Jim Steranko
11. Supreme by Alan Moore, Joe Bennett, Jerry Ordway, Keith Giffen, Rick Veich, Chris Sprouse and Rob Liefeld
10. Kingdom Come by Mark Waid and Alex Ross
9. Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow? by Alan Moore and Curt Swan
8. Strange Visitor by Joe Keatinge, Ming Doyle, Brent Schoonover, David Williams, Al Gordon, Tula Lotay and Jason Shawn Alexander
7. Secret Identity by Kurt Busiek and Stuart Immonen
6. Birthright by Mark Waid and Lenil Francis Yu
5. Irredeemable by Mark Waid, Peter Krause, Diego Baretto and Eduardo Baretto
4. Superman and the Fiend From Dimension 5! by Grant Morrison, Rags Morales, Gene Ha, Sholly Fisch, Brad Anderson, Andy Kubert, CAFU, Ben Oliver, Travel Foreman and Chris Sprouse
3. Last Son of Krypton/Miracle Monday by Elliot S! Maggin
2. Martha's Story by Samuel Hawkins
1. All-Star Superman by Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely

[Dispenser Of Truth]

Here are explanations, referring back to my previous post (just reposting the numbers, not the titles). Note that I ordered them by degree of how good they are as Superman stories, rather than totally objective measures of quality. Otherwise, stuff like Change or Die would be much higher, and Must There Be A Superman much lower. And I'm not going to bother summarizing the famous ones.

35. Pure wish fulfillment, its vision of a superhuman utopia and vaguely unsettling paternalistic undertones inspired and would be explored in many later works, preeminently the final volume of Alan Moore's Miracleman, "Olympus" with John Totleben.
34. Showing what Superman would do with 30 days of life left, this loses some points for me both due to largely focusing on others accomplishing deeds in his stead (this could have worked if it had been hammered home how he inspired them, but this opportunity wasn't taken) and a painfully anticlimactic ending. But a haunting 'last' trip to Smallville and goodbye to an unaware Batman and Robin, coupled with perhaps the single greatest Superman panel of all time, puts it on this list.
33. A dream wherein Superman is thrown into a future where he has lost his power and aged due to prolonged Kryptonite exposure, with Supergirl (now Superwoman) replacing him and his old friends having long since moved on, this one got its hooks into me. The world is shown as a better place for Superman's efforts...but without purpose in life or friends to cherish, his life is meaningless. It's genuinely chilling, one scene in particular with him and a similarly aged Bizarro trying to break out of a run-down prison cell (it's a long story)--a feat any two young men could accomplish, much less the gods they once were--and failing, gets to me every time.
32. I've got some issues with the implications regarding Superman's relationship to Earth in here, but it's still an interesting look at his feelings of alienation. And while the Watchmen storytelling style doesn't work so well for Superman, the fight with Mongul where it switches to Miracleman Alan Moore? That's aaaaaalllllllllll right.
31. It's far from perfect. It's straightforward, reductive, ham-fisted, and the last speech has a grammatical error I can't unsee. But y'know what? Said last speech might be Superman's best ever.
30. The lesser-known followup shows Manchester Black abandoning all pretense of morality, pitting an army of Superman's greatest enemies against him and his friends in an effort to not simply destroy Superman, but break his soul beyond repair. And Superman's rebuttal to Black in here, while not as much of a crowd-pleaser, is to me even more powerful.
29. Showing a little boy with MS becoming his movie idol, Superior--though with a catch, naturally--it's the best thing Millar's done in years, a fun, simple story of wish fulfillment that includes themes of sacrifice, the power of inspiration and what it means to love and be loved in return. Mostly it's wish fulfillment though. But that's okay.
28. A substory of Final Crisis, this was Morrison at his trippiest, setting a tale of the power of Superman's story (and it's ability to overcome 'lesser' stories of failure, degredation and doom) against a backdrop of multiversal collapse, ultimately concluded in a stirring set of scenes in the last issue of Final Crisis proper.
27. Maybe the best "A Day in the Life" story of all time, not only giving a glimpse of the truly godlike scope of Superman's responsibilities like nothing else in comics, but subtly providing maybe the best evidence ever of why Superman needs Clark Kent so badly.
26. This is the first of a few stories I've listed by Samuel Hawkins, and most of you might be scratching your heads. Having written a series of Superboy stories (linked off of this page), what he does is essentially fanfiction. But it's fanfiction that I recall getting approval from Elliot S! Maggin, so I'm more than happy to include it. This first entry has young Clark struggling with his first crush on Lana Lang at the same time he's unveiling himself to the world as Superboy (a concept I've never been a fan of, but I'm more than willing to accept it for the sake of this story).
25. More here for concept than execution, though the execution was typically solid, it's influence in years to come cannot be understated.
24. Another Hawkins story, this time his first great adventure with the Legion of Superheroes, and is one of the best stories of either franchise.
23. A Mr. Majestic one-shot showing him at the end of time with the last remaining super beings, preparing for the end. A short but moving tale of love and wonder in the face of oblivion and the defiance of it by the act of creation that would work just as well as a 'last' Superman story.
22. I don't have the all-consuming love for it that many do, but it's still a stirring testament to what Superman means to people, even when he can't do it all. The follow-up, JLA/Hitman, has both one of the most interesting perspectives ever on Superman's no-kill code (minor spoilers), and quite possibly my favorite individual Superman sequence ever (much less minor spoilers in the last two pages of the sequence, but the first 3 work just fine--maybe even better--on their own). Ennis may hate superheroes with a burning passion, but damn if he doesn't get the big guy.
21. Superman Returns if it was good. 20. The first Astro City story, featuring a Superman analogue, and nevermind, this is the best "Day in the Life".
19. I think part of the end was a significant miscalculation, but it's still an interesting look at what Superman would be with his morals intact but his basic humility stripped away.
18. The end to Joe Casey's horribly underrated Adventures of Superman run, this one-off is equal parts celebration of Superman's world, questioning of his place in the ours, and examination of his relationship with Lois.
17. One of the few truly effective Superman horror stories, this picture of our hero delirious at death's door is as frightening and disturbing as watching one lose their grip on reality should be, and is a rare effective exploration of Superman's feelings of survivor's guilt.

[Dispenser Of Truth]

(Concluded...)
16. The end to the first volume of Stormwatch, it's Ellis' love letter and tearful eulogy to Siegel and Shuster's original concept of a socialistic, utopian super-strongman that wishes only to save the country and world that took him in. The 'villain' of the piece is The High, at first painted as a metahuman revolutionary operating in secret since, naturally, 1938, who the government superhuman agents at the center of the story quickly realize only wants to share advanced technology and his and his allies evolved philosophical perspectives with humankind, in the hopes that they themselves would tear down their oppressive authority structures once they are rendered unnecessary. But the great plan is crushed before the hard facts of self-serving human nature, and man's inability to accept change unless on his own terms. It dares to suggest that Superman not changing the world is not due to our strength in being able to forge our own path, but our ultimate damning weakness in not yet being able to accept what he has to give. Whether you agree or not, it's absolutely worth your time, as is the rest of Ellis' Stormwatch.
15. An oversized story of Superman dealing with world hunger, it deals with many of the same themes as Change or Die, but holds out hope for the future and man's ability to overcome his own worst impulses.
14. Crushing. Lex Luthor's ultimate triumph, and one of the first and best stories to showcase how universally Superman is loved by the world, the strength of his morality and ability to inspire even once gone.
13. The story of Clark, Lex, Lois and Superman, the love of the last two, and the reconciliation of the first two. Linked from the same page that has the Samuel Hawkins stories.
12. With a murderer's row of top-flight artistic talent, a cover by Howard Chaykin, and pinups by Brian Bolland, Jack Kirby, John Byrne, Jack Davis, Leonard Starr, Walt Simonson, Bernie Wrightson, Will Eisner, Steve Ditko, Mike Grell, Moebius, Bill Sienkiewicz and Jerry Robinson, it's...well, it's a comic by Elliot Maggin and Jim Starlin about Superman's influence through the ages with art by all of those guys. How could it not be one of the best?
11. This is pretty much what most seem to think All-Star amounts to, which is just asking "Silver Age Superman is awesome, right?" Luckily, the answer is "SO AWESOME".
10. More a commentary on John Byrne's Superman than anything else, I think, but still a great story of Superman's moral code and the perils of living in the past.
9. All the deconstruction of the 80s Superman had avoided up to that point all thrown at him all at once, it strips away everything about him--his mythology, his friends, his power, his code--leaving the bare emotional core of the character for all too see. It could have been so cynical, but it's one of the most touching stories in the character's history. If his other two stories were calculating revisionist Moore taking a crack, this is the boy buried deep down who grew up on Superman getting to say goodbye.
8. A cross-time tale I really don't want to ruin any of the details of by discussing, this is probably the closest I've seen to the idea of Superman as a folk tale being realized. Think one part Morrison, two parts Kirby, and a whole lot of Siegel and Shuster, and you'd have something not unlike this. Comes out in print as the second-to last issue of Adventures of Superman in August, and absolutely worth your money.
7. A boy in the 'real world' named after the comic book character developing powers of his own for reasons unexplained, it's a wonderful character-driven story of what it takes to be decent and honest in an often unforgiving world, in a way paralleling the emotional journey of the character's namesake.
6. The best "realistic" Superman story, full-stop. Mark Waid finally manages the balancing act of making a fully human Clark Kent that still retains everything essential about the character, and does one of the best Lex stories ever and a subtle commentary of our real-world reluctance to accept Superman at the same time.
5. The polar opposite, this is a story of a Superman analogue, the Plutonian, falling apart under the pressure of protecting the entire world and going violently rogue. Brutal, uncompromising yet sympathetic in its vision, it highlights what makes Superman's unshakable morality so astounding by contrast, and is ultimately the story that made Superman my favorite character, in the long run.
4. Addition of truly new dimensions to Superman's early years, science fiction epic, industry commentary and paean to the power of Superman rolled into one. As someone once said, "it was almost worth tearing down the rest of the DCU to get this Superman".
3. Two separate works with a singular thematic throughline, one of the most interesting and through explorations of Superman's character, morality and world of all time.
2. I cried. I cried like a small child. Don't ask questions, just click the damn link above and read read read.
1. For a story with manned expeditions to the sun and Chronovores, 'subtlety' might not be the first adjective that comes to mind, but it's what it's all about here. Amidst all the wildness, the core of things isn't metacommentary or even celebration of the imaginative elements so freely embraced. It's about some of the most deceptively complex character work in the history of the medium, de- and re-constructing the personalities of Superman, Lois Lane, Lex Luthor, and even Jimmy Olsen and Steve freakin' Lobard from the ground up, amidst a symbolic tale of sacrifice, honesty, dignity, redemption, community, compassion, hope and the sacred power that lies within each and every one of us. It's far and away my favorite comic, even before Morrison and Quitely's other masterpiece Flex Mentallo, as all the life-and-imagination affirming messages of that epic are contained in one single page. It's durn good comics, is what I'm saying.

[dupersuper]

The ones I read while listening to the Williams theme somehow always seem better...

[Penguin Truth]

1. "What's So Funny About Truth, Justice & the American Way?" (Action Comics Vol 1 775) (Joe Kelly/Doug Mahnke, Lee Bermejo) (March 2001)
2. "Metropolis Mailbag" (Superman Vol 2 64) (Dan Jurgens/Jackson Guice)
3. "Superman/Doomsday: Hunter/Prey" (Superman/Doomsday: Hunter/Prey Vol 1 1-3) (Dan Jurgens)
4. "Superman: Exile" (Various) (Various)
5. "Man of Steel" (Man of Steel Vol 1 1-6) (John Byrne)
6. "900 Miles to Metropolis" (Superman Vol 2 9) (John Byrne)
7. "For the Man Who Has Everything" (Superman Annual Vol 1 11) (Alan Moore/Dave Gibbons)
8. "Superman: Secret Origin" (Superman: Secret Origin Vol 1 1-6) (Geoff Johns/Gary Frank)
9. "Superman: War of the Worlds" (Superman: War of the Worlds) (Roy Thomas/Michael Lark)
10. "Fall of Metropolis" (Various) (Various)
11. "All-Star Superman" (All-Star Superman Vol 1 1-12) (Grant Morrison/Frank Quitely) (Yeah, me, liking a Grant Morrison comic. Weird, huh?)
12. "The Edge of Forever"/"Supertown"/"Anti-Life" (Superman Confidential Vol 1 8-10) (Dan Abnett, Andy Lanning/Chris Batista, Prentis Rollins, Mike Norton)
13. "Superman for All Seasons" (Superman for All Seasons) (Jeph Loeb/Tim Sale)
14. "Death of Superman" (Various) (Various)
15. "Luthor Unleashed!" (Action Comics Vol 1 544) (Cary Bates/Curt Swan)
16. "Panic in the Sky" (Various) (Various)
17. "Lex Luthor: The Unathorized Biography" (Lex Luthor: The Unathorized Biography Vol 1 1) (James Hudnall/Eduardo Barreto)
18. "Superman: The Wedding Album" (Superman: The Wedding Album) (Various)
19. "Superman vs SHAZAM!" (All New Collector's Edition Vol 1 C-58) (Gerry Conway/Rich Buckler)
20. "Superman Takes A Wife!" (Action Comics Vol 1 484) (Cary Bates/Curt Swan)