At least if we're any kind of old stuff/DC fan , most of us here have read the very first , published , Superman story , the one which appeared in a somewhat edited version that began in the middle of the , ur , um , " action " , in ACTION COMICS #1 - and then , some months later , re-appeared in SUPERMAN #1 in a somewhat longer version that restored what Seigel and Shuster had originally intended , a two-page origin and 6-8 pages of story leading up to Supes leaping through the air with a female killer - but dropped the shorter version of the origin that had been substituted for the original two-pager in Action #1 .

  Haven't we ???????????

  DC has certainly bloody reprinted 'em enough times !!!!!!!!!!!

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  • Yes. I proudly cherish my Limited Collector's Edition tabloid-size reprints of those!
  • The woman was Bea Carrol who murdered her lover and framed another girl for it. Superman coerces her to confess to save the innocent girl, invading the governor's mansion, ripping down a steel door ("It was your idea!") and publically revealing himself. Thus she is the first criminal Superman officially caught!
  • I think I have...
  • ...Okay , I just HAVE :-) been able to re-read both of them , at Superman Through The Ages , as well as some other versions which are there...One difference between the two is the the first-drawn one , the two-pager , has the Kents finding Kal's rocket...But the one-pager has " a passing motorist " find the rocket , then turning it over to an orphanage/the authorities .
  • ...I just re-read the first two weeks of the Superman daily newspaper strip ( No Sundays . ) , which is the earliest-surviving version .

      This one places the most e,mphasis on the  " Krypton as a plantet of supermen " concept , something ehich was , however , in many versions of the originn , through the Forties !

  • ...Okay , with the discussion over the possibility of the Siegels ( and the Schusters , when they are allowed to come in . Joe Schuster had no children , so it was somewhat more complicated , getting his cousins?? in...........) taking " their " version of Superman to another opublisher inspired me to revive this thread of mine...
  • ...The story by Joe Casey , in ADVENTURES OF SUPERMAN #612 SHOWS to-day's Big Blue coming into contact - and conflict - with what at least might be an echo of the " original " Superman !!!!!!!!!!!

      I've at times imagined writing a series where a supporting character would be " Captain Cleveland " , the exiled " original " Superman .

      Now , that's a little too parody-ish a way of putting it for a " serious " strip...

      I've recently re-read the several origins that Superman Through The Ages has up , from the 30s and 40s...

  • ...I wasn't able to find the full story of the SUPERMAN #1 version , however , so I'm working on memory here .

      As far as how late some Superman stories might be said to be about the " original " Superman , how about sometime during the expanse of time covered by THE SUPERMAN CHRONICLES , VOLUME 8 ? That straddles ( Well , in preperation/pre-publication of the stories , anyway . ) Pearl Harbor , which makes for a good cut-off point...........

      The early Superman was an agressive social reformer , a " New Dealer with musclesz " , NOT the " Big Blue Boy Scout " , was capable of ignoring the established authorities , and , as has been pointed out , was capable of fighting back to the level of killing his opponent , and did not try very hard " to put a cushion underneath him to save him " , either !!! We may know about the continuation of the first story in ACTION #2 , in which Superman , in a Comicsland European country , grabs a " torturer " and throws him waaayyy to the end of the horizon - In one early story Clark , as a reporter , blackmails an honest government person into giving him an exclusive/lallowing him to break rules !!!

  • ...Those early origins ( Plus , the Superman #1 set-up before Superman meets that murderousminx :-) - actually , isn't that " You're Not Fighting A Woman Now ! " wall-bounce to that abusive husband the first super-thing he is shown doing ? ) do provide some interesting springboards for alternating things - I do think the Superman #1 version of how Clark applies for that job at the Planet leaves room to decide that , the moment when he walked inside the Star/Planet as " wimpy , glasses-wearing Clark Kent " was the first time he walked anywhere in that personality/appearance !

      The Superman #1 origin plainly states that he did not become Superman until after the deaths of the Kents - and , frankly , show a , maybe , somewhat more middle-class-ish-looking Kents than " small-town farmers/general store operators " !

      I think that this Superman could've spent some time knocking about the world - ( The resemblance to Roy Crane's Captain Easy helps with this . ) - and , though , perhaps , never truly evil/bad , might've spent some time developing his own moral code/guide for living ? I once thought of a fan concept , something among these lines...

      I like the Thirties period idea , as well , though I suppose that it might be seen as commercially dodgy/questionable:-( .

  • As noted over here ("The Siegel Family Gains Some Superman Rights"), Jerry Siegel's family has limited rights to the Superman character -- basically, they own the character as he was before any "work for hire" was done for the early DC Comics company -- and could, theoretically, publish their own Superman based on that.

     

    What the Siegels have is, basically, the Superman we saw in the first four to six issues of Action Comics; those were produced by Siegel and Joe Shuster and shopped around to several publishers before the early DC saw fit to publish them.

     

    With that, I think this retro Superman would work best in a 1930s setting, and I'm not sure it could work in any setting BUT that. That's because it would be competing with the Superman the world grew up with, which is more powerful, flashier, and has a lengthy and rich history. But the charm and strength of this retro Superman, I think, is that it was created in a 1930s world, and fits there.

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