Superman #42 discussion thread (spoilers)

[manofsteel1979]

Thanks to all of those who responded. I may download it later and read it after all.

Oh it's understandable she is upset. In almost every version of the "unveiling" she is angry to some degree. The only exceptions are MOS (she knows from day one), "Smallville" (cause Erica Durance Lois is awesome) and the one in the early 90's comics that lead to the marriage,but even there she was taken aback.

I still wish they stuck with the dynamic Perez was going with. I.E. she knowing and protecting his secret, and he not knowing she knew. That not only would have been something new, but would have from the start given Lois an important defined role different than girlfriend/lover while turning the whole "secret" thing on it's head. SHE would have been the one hiding information from Clark. May have made the last 4 years a smoother experience all around for Lois fans.

[adkal]

I still wish they stuck with the dynamic Perez was going with. I.E. she knowing and protecting his secret, and he not knowing she knew.

Me, too.

So much potential...


(But then there would have been the 'how dumb is Superman for not knowing that Lois knows' folk...)

[MeloDet]

To be honest, even though Lois has never really clicked for me and I'm far from her biggest fan, I'm having a hard time understanding the hate for how she was portrayed here. She may have been angry at first, but she clearly still cares for Clark from her reaction at the end of the issue. It seems to me like she's just struggling to come to terms with everything, and even though I normally don't care much for her, I found her quite likeable here.

Edit: Just wanted to add that it seems like this storyline is going to be bringing the Lois haters out in full force. Not through any fault of the story itself, but through the opportunity it presents. No matter how justified she is in exposing his secret there are going to be people using it as another reason to hate her. So all of you that are big Lois fans might wanna prepare yourselves, because there's probably going to be a lot of Lois hate going around regardless of what actually happens.

[dexx707]

I'm just gonna move my original post from the spoiler thread.

This issue was pretty decent to me. I liked the fact that they called Lexcorp old news, and that data is the new wave. It's especially funny considering that Jesse Eisenberg is playing Lex in the new film and makes Lex look like a data billionaire than a science one. Glad that toyman is still making his appearances throughout the superman storyline, also Lol at the "I think I'm in love" bit. The reveal of the villain was.... underwhelming. Yet another punk kid that thinks that they can take on a super hero just because they got a meta-power and some money. I do find the guy... alien? robot? being-thing that touched superman interesting. I'm just wondering why superman isn't actively looking for this guy/thing in his other Truth stories.

Sigh.....now on to Lois....I seriously don't like her (the feeling is closer to hate but I typically feel that you can't truly hate something without feeling love for it or loving it's polar opposite ex: I hate hilter's philosophy and actions, but I love Martian Luther King Jr's). She's the type of woman, journalist, and human that just give all of them a bad name. I can't go into as much detail as some other posters on Lois's comic history because I just simply could give less of a crap about the actions of the personified image of damsel in distress. To me the only time she seemed even slightly appealing was I her smallville incarnation and that was because she was waaay less obnoxious than everything else I saw of her. Also her Flashpoint incarnation I like that she became more than a nosy reporter (In fact I kinda wanted more of a back story on the spy who infiltrated the amazon army learned their skills, culture, gained their trust, got some powers, but stayed true to her original mission).

This though..... how she reacted, how she snubbed his explanation, how she seems to utterly lack empathy for a person who's suppose to be her friend. It just frustrates me, he literally just saved your life 30secs beforehand. This entire truth storyline intrigues the hell outta me. But fact that it was Lois who exposed Clark for whatever reason short of saving another person's life is just stupid. Even the excuse that "If she hadn't the bad guy would have." and? So what!? That's what bad guy's do. Lois as his friend should have idk maybe got the first interview with him after he's expose. That probably would have been just as big of a scoop, and would have allowed Clark to maybe explain his reasons (Though I really don't think he needs too. i don't care who he his or what he does anyone who does what he does deserves to chill out every now and again).
Even in this issue she tells Clark that she has a program that can track superman's whereabouts..... who the hell does she think she is!? The f*#$ing NSA!? Who's to say that that program that she developed did'nt some how end up in the HORDR didn't get a hold of that then use it to track superman? Even if they didnt why would she create such a thing? whatever..... but it gets worse. This program tracked how weak superman was getting.... so your "friend" is losing his powers, essentially becoming human? So you take his secret ID and expose him for a story...... now every villain, nutjob, and wannabe tough-guy is basically now knows it's open-season on superman and everyone he loves. nice Lois. real nice.

Lois has always been unappealing to me I found her romance with superman an enigma. The most powerful guy on the planet (top-tier in the universe/multi-verse) is willing to settle down and down grade (yes down grade I don't care how much anyone tries to prop her up a virtual god going for a lowly reporter woman is a down grade) with this average woman is odd to me. If most want to go with the excuse that superman wanted to feel more human? Fine. You wanna go with the love angle? Fine. However don't tell me that she was his best option. Don't state that she was worthy of him (yes worthy like in the case with thor's hammer worthy. As in if you don't meet these standards you get s#!t. The same way relations between real people work). Am I a fan of SM/WW? Yes. Would it bother me if they break up? Only sightly. Would I mind if they dated other people but remained friends? No. But for the love of god keep him away from Lois!

[misslane]

I wasn't crazy about Lois in here (her anger was understandable and certainly in some aspects justifiable, but the whole "You're Superman! Why would you want to be normal?!" line was ridiculous), but it wasn't a fraction as bad as I had feared

I wasn't thrilled with the line either. One the of the ways I can understand it better or a way I can think of it in a better light, since Yang doesn't really let that beat of the conversation play out more, is something similar to what Lois says in Smallville after having Clark's powers for a day.

LOIS: You know, Clark, walking a mile in your shoes is so different than imagined it would be. When you're just a reporter with a story, the word hits the paper, the paper hits the stands, and ... and it's over. But for you, it's ... it's never over, is it? [...] I can't just sit and watch a movie and eat ice cream when at that very moment you could be saving five people. Clark, every moment of your life that I take for myself... I am stealing from people who need saving.

In the following episode, the Finale, Lois and Chloe talk about the issue:

LOIS: Clark can hear the world's cries for help, and he's duty-bound to answer the call. I am not gonna stand in his way.
CHLOE: He can't listen all the time, Lois. He's not God. He can't be aware of every bird or blade of grass, okay? He's a man. And sometimes he needs to not listen.

Basically, Lois is such a go-getter and impulsively heroic, and someone who didn't spend her whole life learning to find a balance between heroism/duty and a personal life, that she initially has trouble appreciating why someone who had the power to save people 24/7 would spend any time with a personal life or a day job. Eventually, Lois does come to understand and accept that Clark needs a normal life, and she agrees to go through with their wedding secure in the knowledge that she won't be standing in his way as a hero.

[The World]

I must say I'm a bit suprised by some of the fans' reactions. I mean, yeah, she gets pissed off because he didn't tell her and stuff, but that's about it. And frankly, if you put yourself in he shoes for 5 minutes, it's kind of understandable, y'know. They're supposed to be friends -both his personnas-and he has been lying to her face for years. Now, we know he had reasons because we've been following the show for the last 4 years, but she didn't.
Besides, it's far from the first time Lois reacted to the discovery with anger, for instance in Miracle Monday or All Star Superman. So, to me at least, it didn't feel that far off.
As for HORDR, nah, it's definitively not over. Basically, the leader escapes and he still knows who Clark is which, considering that Clark reacted to is attempt at blackmail by destroying his "evil campus", which basically screams "reckonning".
Overall, I thought it was interesting. I like the concept behind the bad guys.

This. I don't really get the negative response to Lois from this issue her reaction was pretty reasonable. People compare it to how Jimmy reacted but Jimmy was told where as Lois had to find out for herself so it's not really all that comparable. Besides she got over it in a matter of pages, started treating him with respect and tried to help him out with HORDR.

That having been said I hate the Solar Flare power, it sucks and is clearly just a plot device. We've seen him do better feats of destruction with his heat vision in previous stories. But overall I did like the story and I do like HORDR as far as enemies go; definitely one of the better ones for the N52

[fredrol]

I agree. The more he uses it, the more we see just how contrived and pointless it is. Whatever happened to super strength and speed. On the plus side, we do see the point in which Kal-el is Depowered.

[Auguste Dupin]

This. I don't really get the negative response to Lois from this issue her reaction was pretty reasonable. People compare it to how Jimmy reacted but Jimmy was told where as Lois had to find out for herself so it's not really all that comparable. Besides she got over it in a matter of pages, started treating him with respect and tried to help him out with HORDR.

That having been said I hate the Solar Flare power, it sucks and is clearly just a plot device. We've seen him do better feats of destruction with his heat vision in previous stories. But overall I did like the story and I do like HORDR as far as enemies go; definitely one of the better ones for the N52

Yeah, between this and issue 41, that was one time too many. Of course, since it was needed here to have him depowered later, that mean it's the one for issue 41 that should have been written out.
And since that basically mean won't see it again for at least another year (and I wouldn't be surprised if it disapeared altogether), I just sort of went "yeah, sure, whatever".

[Tayswift]

I'm just gonna move my original post from the spoiler thread.

This issue was pretty decent to me. I liked the fact that they called Lexcorp old news, and that data is the new wave. It's especially funny considering that Jesse Eisenberg is playing Lex in the new film and makes Lex look like a data billionaire than a science one. Glad that toyman is still making his appearances throughout the superman storyline, also Lol at the "I think I'm in love" bit. The reveal of the villain was.... underwhelming. Yet another punk kid that thinks that they can take on a super hero just because they got a meta-power and some money. I do find the guy... alien? robot? being-thing that touched superman interesting. I'm just wondering why superman isn't actively looking for this guy/thing in his other Truth stories.

Sigh.....now on to Lois....I seriously don't like her (the feeling is closer to hate but I typically feel that you can't truly hate something without feeling love for it or loving it's polar opposite ex: I hate hilter's philosophy and actions, but I love Martian Luther King Jr's). She's the type of woman, journalist, and human that just give all of them a bad name. I can't go into as much detail as some other posters on Lois's comic history because I just simply could give less of a crap about the actions of the personified image of damsel in distress. To me the only time she seemed even slightly appealing was I her smallville incarnation and that was because she was waaay less obnoxious than everything else I saw of her. Also her Flashpoint incarnation I like that she became more than a nosy reporter (In fact I kinda wanted more of a back story on the spy who infiltrated the amazon army learned their skills, culture, gained their trust, got some powers, but stayed true to her original mission).

This though..... how she reacted, how she snubbed his explanation, how she seems to utterly lack empathy for a person who's suppose to be her friend. It just frustrates me, he literally just saved your life 30secs beforehand. This entire truth storyline intrigues the hell outta me. But fact that it was Lois who exposed Clark for whatever reason short of saving another person's life is just stupid. Even the excuse that "If she hadn't the bad guy would have." and? So what!? That's what bad guy's do. Lois as his friend should have idk maybe got the first interview with him after he's expose. That probably would have been just as big of a scoop, and would have allowed Clark to maybe explain his reasons (Though I really don't think he needs too. i don't care who he his or what he does anyone who does what he does deserves to chill out every now and again).
Even in this issue she tells Clark that she has a program that can track superman's whereabouts..... who the hell does she think she is!? The f*#$ing NSA!? Who's to say that that program that she developed did'nt some how end up in the HORDR didn't get a hold of that then use it to track superman? Even if they didnt why would she create such a thing? whatever..... but it gets worse. This program tracked how weak superman was getting.... so your "friend" is losing his powers, essentially becoming human? So you take his secret ID and expose him for a story...... now every villain, nutjob, and wannabe tough-guy is basically now knows it's open-season on superman and everyone he loves. nice Lois. real nice.

Lois has always been unappealing to me I found her romance with superman an enigma. The most powerful guy on the planet (top-tier in the universe/multi-verse) is willing to settle down and down grade (yes down grade I don't care how much anyone tries to prop her up a virtual god going for a lowly reporter woman is a down grade) with this average woman is odd to me. If most want to go with the excuse that superman wanted to feel more human? Fine. You wanna go with the love angle? Fine. However don't tell me that she was his best option. Don't state that she was worthy of him (yes worthy like in the case with thor's hammer worthy. As in if you don't meet these standards you get s#!t. The same way relations between real people work). Am I a fan of SM/WW? Yes. Would it bother me if they break up? Only sightly. Would I mind if they dated other people but remained friends? No. But for the love of god keep him away from Lois!

sorry if superman isn't shallow, and he sees people for what they are not the powers they have.

To be honest, even though Lois has never really clicked for me and I'm far from her biggest fan, I'm having a hard time understanding the hate for how she was portrayed here. She may have been angry at first, but she clearly still cares for Clark from her reaction at the end of the issue. It seems to me like she's just struggling to come to terms with everything, and even though I normally don't care much for her, I found her quite likeable here.

Edit: Just wanted to add that it seems like this storyline is going to be bringing the Lois haters out in full force. Not through any fault of the story itself, but through the opportunity it presents. No matter how justified she is in exposing his secret there are going to be people using it as another reason to hate her. So all of you that are big Lois fans might wanna prepare yourselves, because there's probably going to be a lot of Lois hate going around regardless of what actually happens.

the story and the writers are the problem. they threw lois out for the wolfs

[Dispenser Of Truth]

Lois has always been unappealing to me I found her romance with superman an enigma. The most powerful guy on the planet (top-tier in the universe/multi-verse) is willing to settle down and down grade (yes down grade I don't care how much anyone tries to prop her up a virtual god going for a lowly reporter woman is a down grade) with this average woman is odd to me. If most want to go with the excuse that superman wanted to feel more human? Fine. You wanna go with the love angle? Fine. However don't tell me that she was his best option. Don't state that she was worthy of him (yes worthy like in the case with thor's hammer worthy. As in if you don't meet these standards you get s#!t. The same way relations between real people work). Am I a fan of SM/WW? Yes. Would it bother me if they break up? Only sightly. Would I mind if they dated other people but remained friends? No. But for the love of god keep him away from Lois!

There are also these 'feeling' things involved in relationships. Occasionally, they even trump narcissistic judgments of whether or not someone is "worthy" of you even though they can't bench-press a continent or see molecules. It's a shame, because you actually had a pretty good point about Lois' immediate impulse upon learning her friend Superman was weakening for some reason was to find a way to spy on him and figure out who he really was (though I'd chalk that up to the general degree of surprising stupidity going on in this story, whether Clark taking the most roundabout way possible of helping Ada, or mentioning his enemies not having heartbeats in this story right in front of Lois, who he thinks doesn't know his identity yet). But you didn't cite the aspects of her you dislike (which I think is more the cause of bad writing than any inherent problem with her character), it's that she's just an ordinary meat-sack rather than the omnipotent alien mangod that is Superman, and I'd imagine that for your average emotionally healthy adult like Clark Kent, that's waaaay near the bottom of the list of priorities when it comes to who you're going to be interested in.

[Sacred Knight]

the story and the writers are the problem. they threw lois out for the wolfs

Yeah, how dare have a multi-faceted reaction. What would have been "proper" characterization to you? Her throwing herself into his arms crying for him of the burden he must have held all these years?

[dexx707]

sorry if superman isn't shallow, and he sees people for what they are not the powers they have.

Didn't say she needed powers just that it's an enigma to me why he'd settle for her. Who is pretty but has a terrible personality.

There are also these 'feeling' things involved in relationships. Occasionally, they even trump narcissistic judgments of whether or not someone is "worthy" of you even though they can't bench-press a continent or see molecules. It's a shame, because you actually had a pretty good point about Lois' immediate impulse upon learning her friend Superman was weakening for some reason was to find a way to spy on him and figure out who he really was (though I'd chalk that up to the general degree of surprising stupidity going on in this story, whether Clark taking the most roundabout way possible of helping Ada, or mentioning his enemies not having heartbeats in this story right in front of Lois, who he thinks doesn't know his identity yet). But you didn't cite the aspects of her you dislike (which I think is more the cause of bad writing than any inherent problem with her character), it's that she's just an ordinary meat-sack rather than the omnipotent alien mangod that is Superman, and I'd imagine that for your average emotionally healthy adult like Clark Kent, that's waaaay near the bottom of the list of priorities when it comes to who you're going to be interested in.

As I said before the "worthy" thing should be taken as standards a certain person should have when choosing who they want to be with and why their with them. Also it's not narcissistic, as I'm going by the fact that to most people have standards for who they'll be with for guys (women need to have a certain type of personality, and physical appearance) for women (physical appearance, status, personality, and money). Superman just has more to offer than most other people. People have those standards, I would assume that superman does too. Yes feeling are taken into account too but that typically happens after the initiation phase of a relationship.

Regardless of all that though how does that take away from my argument on Lois in this issue? As for what I don't like about her it basically come down to she unemphatic (unsympathetic?), arrogant, and obnoxious. For a reporter who have the full story of any situation before reacting to it she does it on impulse and a negative impulse on that. This isn't the first time either during DOOMED while in a coma she learns Clark secret again and says she'll expose him. She has now understanding of why he could possible want to not be the earth's (metropolis) guardian 24/7. She has literally seen this man deal with some of the worst stuff on earth and has no understanding of why he'd want to chill out as a normal guy every now and again.

[Naked Bat]

I don't get the hate for Lois. She's right, he did trust Jimmy and not her.

Also, The solar flare thing is really lame, and nothing more than a gimmick. Luckily, it was probably the last time we ever saw it. So far, the superman title is above batman/superman, but Action and superman/wonder-woman are better imo.

[Sacred Knight]

I would agree, yes. Also I thought last month's issue was better. I like the story its telling, but there's some odd pacing in this issue. Lois's definitive figuring out the secret also lacked emotion, but, I don't put that on Yang, that's just because they have such a minimally developed relationship period to this point. Nothing he could have done would really have given the moment any more pizazz, I'd imagine.

But yeah, Lois has done nothing to this point to really warrant hate. If a friend told another friend a huge secret and left me out of the loop I'd probably feel hurt too. Its not out of a desire to be a jerk, its just a natural reaction. Now, we all know what's coming so how that all comes to fruition could possibly lend to more warranted harsh criticism of her...but we'll cross that bridge when we come to it. As it stands right now she didn't do or say anything wrong.

[Naked Bat]

exactly. And the issue even ends with her caring for him. So even though she was upset, she's not being an antagonist so far.