Superman is widely considered to have entered the Silver Age with Action Comics #241 (June 1958) and Superman #122 (July 1958). Unlike the Flash and Green Lantern (for example), Superman was published continuously from the Golden Age into the Silver Age. Whereas it's easy to differentiate the Golden Age Flash and Green Lantern from their Silver Age counterparts, what is it that sets Action comics #241 apart from #240 and Superman #122 from #121? What happened in 1958 which led to such a change? You probably know already, but I'm going to tell you anyway: the cancellation of the Adventures of Superman television show.
According to Mark Waid: "[Mort] Weisinger inherited the editorial mantle of the Superman books in the 1950s. At first, his goal was simply to ensure that the Man of steel's comic-book adventures were tonally consistent with the successful Adventures of Superman TV series. Once production on Adventures came to an end, however, Weisinger was given a little more latitude to make Superman's tales more fantastic and to play up the kind of science-fiction story elements and mythology that the budgetarily challenged TV series could never have pulled off. During the coming decade, Weisinger and his writers would examine and exploit Superman's world and his Kryptonian heritage in a hundred different exciting ways. They'd surround him with dozens of new props and toys, each rife with story possibilities. But, like all of us, before he started accumulating possessions, Superman would first need a place to... well... put his stuff."
All of which leads to "The Super-Key to Fort Superman" in...
ACTION COMICS #241:
The first thing you'll probably notice is that the key itself doesn't look anything at all like the one in the story, which was used for decades thereafter. Waid explains that, "while the interior stories were drawn by a variety of artists, the covers for all Weisinger's books were then and for many years drawn by a legend in the making named Curt Swan. Weisinger knew that Swan, who would eventually become the most prolific and familiar comic-book artist of all time, could always be counted on to see the well-deserving wonder and spectacle of Superman's world to any child eager to invest ten cents in exploration."
"THE SUPER-KEY TO FORT SUPERMAN"
I encountered this story for the first time in 1987 within the pages of The Greatest Superman Stories Ever Told hardcover collection. the concept of a "Fortress of Solitude" was originally borrowed from Doc Savage, although I think it's safe to say that most people today associate it with Superman. It's the kind of story that can surprise you only the first time you read it, but it certainly introduces a classic element of Superman lore.
I don't have a particular goal in mind for this discussion (such as trying to justify the expense of an omnibus edition by reading it) and I don't know how much I'll have to say about these stories. Nor am I in any particular hurry to get through them, but I plan to maintain a modest pace of one comic each day, perhaps more if the mood strikes.
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In a world where Superman can heft an apartment building off its foundations to look into a lead-lined building or inhale a gas cloud the size of Metropolis, ignoring gravity isn't that remarkable.
SUPERMAN #137:
"The Two Faces of Superman" - another "Three-Part Novel."
Part 1 is "Super-Brat"; Part 2 is "Super-Bully"; Part 3 is "Super-Menace".
On its way to Earth from Krypton, Kal-El's rocket "glances against the nose-cone of a giant space-ship from another universe, a ship which is equipped with a multitude of weird scientific devices! As on the the devices is jarred into activity by the chance blow, a ray engulf's Kal-El's rocket, creating a duplicate of the rocket and everything inside it, including the tiny infant!!!" And we're off! The two rockets carom in opposite direction, yet they both arrive on Earth, the original landing outside Smallville and the duplicate near Brentstock, specifically "outside the isolated mountain retreat of ex-public enemy 'Wolf' Derek and his wife, Bonnie."
"Wolf! Save me! It's a baby monster!" screams Bonnie as Super-Brat emerges from the ship. "Don't talk stupid!" replies Wolf. "We'll adopt this super-baby, and pretend to love himQ We'll teach him to hate the law like we do! And when he grows up into manhood and becomes a super-outlaw..." Wolf begins, "...he will obey you, loike an obedient son! With him for a stooge, you'll become the Crime King of the Earth!" The rest of the chapter details various escapades Super-Brat performs. (The Dereks apparently don't even give him an actual name.) In parallel, Ma Kent is show teaching young Clark to cross the street. Oddly, his is dressed, out in public, in his superbaby costume, no leggings or "S" shield, but it does have a cape. It's a wonder, after Superboy appeared, no one in Smallville rememberd that young Clark Kent had such a distinctive playsuit.
When Super-Brat grows into Super-Bully, he patterns his costume after Superboy's and adds a domino mask. (As Superman would klater do with supergirl, Wolf Derek demands that Super-Bully keep his existance secret.) Because Super-Brat is a "force manifestation" (described as "an unearthly force manifested in human form" and therefore "not a real human being"), Super-Brat is immune to Kryptonite radiation. He secretly startles the real Clark Kent (by clapping his hands together, simulating thunder) into crushing an uncut diamond in science class but, at sped speed, Clark empties all the lead from his mechanical pencil and, super-squeezes it in his fist, and "transforms the graphite's carbon... into a diamond!" (Yeah, that's a new one on me, too.) Later, he masquerades as Clark in order to steal Lana. She exposes him to Kryptonite, however (which doesn't affect him), and he dumps her on the spot. He can't fool Kryto, though, and barely gets away.
When he is the adult Super-Menace, Wolf finally gives him permission to reveal himself and attack Superman, which he does with glee. He overhears his "father" admit that he only pretended to love him, though, which messes with his head. He does defeat Superman, with Kryptonite, but then reconsiders, removing it. while Superman is regaining his strength, Super-Menace confronts his parents. Confronted with the truth, they call him a freak, and Super-Menace returns to a state of pure force... and takes them with him. Of the eight or nine story types we've encountered so far, this one should have been an "imaginary story" but is actually closest to a "Mopee."
I think it's got to be a Mopee... because how would you keep Super-Bully from robbing every bank in Florida? Which, I figure, would draw Superboy's attention, and there goes your story.
But I thought it would be cool to pit Super-Bully against the Legion of Super-Heroes. An evil Superboy without a weakness to Kryptonite! That would be a hall of a fight for Mon-El and Ultra Boy... maybe with Sun Boy and Star Boy greatly contributing. It would have been a hell of a fight!
I think ["The Two Faces of Superman"] has got to be a Mopee . . .
. -- Eric L. Sofer
We have to be careful here, old friend, not to let semantic broadening creep in here. A Mopee story isn't just a story in which some facets of it don't make sense or defy willing suspension of disbelief. Especially in the case of the latter, that's a sliding scale which differs from reader to reader. A Mopee story is more specific:
Mopee story: A comic-book story which purports to alter a significant fact of a main character’s established history and this change turns out to be so universally rejected by both the readership and the company that it is ignored, never to be mentioned in the canon, again.
Think of the classic Mopee tales. Barry Allen didn't receive his super-speed by accident; it was a deliberate action. Krypton did not explode as a result of a natural disaster; a space pirate caused the planet to annihilate. Jor-El and Lara did not perish in Krypton's destruction. Carter and Shiera Hall are publicly exposed as aliens living on Earth. In each case, the story intended to make a fundamental change in the hero's history or status quo.
You'll also note that there was nothing that didn't make sense or pushed too far the willing suspension of disbelief in the above classic Mopee stories. It wasn't that their details were too unbelievable. It was that the readers refused to accept what the story was trying to put over. That's what made them Mopees.
While "The Two Faces of Superman" might fit the back half of a Mopee story's definition, in that it was subsequently ignored (although it's more of a visceral reaction than a deliberate determination), it doesn't meet the first requirement.
Jeff of Earth-J said:
I believe that when this story was reprinted, it was retroactively declared an "Imaginary Story."
I remember reading this and thinking that I can swallow almost anything ... but the idea of an evil Superman living an entirely secret existence all the way into adulthood was too much.
I believe that when this story was reprinted, it was retroactively declared an "Imaginary Story."
-- Jeff of Earth-J
You're correct, my friend. The story was reprinted in 80 Page Giant Annual # 1 (Aug., 1964), which carried a selection of tales under the heading of "Superman's Most Fabulous Imaginary Adventures" While no indicia clarifying its imaginary status was added to the story proper within the 80-pager, clearly it was meant to be reclassified as an Imaginary Story.
It could not be a Mopee story, even retroactively, as it doesn't fit the definition of a Mopee. So "Imaginary Story" is the only way to go.
Mopee story: A comic-book story which purports to alter a significant fact of a main character’s established history and this change turns out to be so universally rejected by both the readership and the company that it is ignored, never to be mentioned in the canon, again.
While "The Two Faces of Superman" might fit the back half of a Mopee story's definition, in that it was subsequently ignored... it doesn't meet the first requirement.
I would argue that it does. If a story is not a Mopee (or an "Imaginary Story" which it wasn't at the time of initial publication) then it must be canon, yes? And if it is canonical it must be treated as such. In this case, the ray created "a duplicate of the rocket and everything inside it" (epmphasis DC's). That would include (in at least one version of the story, anyway) Beppo the monkey. DC is very consistent with certain aspects of their lore (time travel, for example), others not so much. If "The Two Faces of Superman" were canonical, then at some point DC needed to account for why Beppo was not duplicated (or, alternatively, admit that there's another super-monkey flying around Earth-1 somewhere.
I am as much against the creep of semantic broadening as you are, but I place more importance on the second half of your Mopee definition than the first. In other words, I don't require a Mopee to "purport to alter a significant fact of a main character’s established history"; the main criterion for me is that it be ignored. I agree with Kelvin that "the idea of an evil Superman living an entirely secret existence all the way into adulthood was too much." If this story was was retroactively declared to be "Imaginary" I'm glad to hear it.
Blast! Sorry, Jeff, I just posted a lengthy counterpoint to your comment here---and then, somehow, inadvertently deleted it. I'm not going to write it again from my phone. I'll give it another go when I get home.
But, the one point I wanted to add to my comment (which somehow caused me to delete it) was that events of "The Two Faces of Superman" were referenced, again. And not as Imaginary. In a feature page from Superboy # 100 (Oct., 1962).
(O.K., let's try this, again . . .)
From time to time, across fora, I've seen others come to the same conclusion about other stories that you, Jeff, and Eric have about "The Two Faces of Superman"---that some plot development is so absurd or unlikely that it snaps any willing suspension of disbelief. Such as "the idea of an evil Superman living an entirely secret existence all the way into adulthood was too much." (I agree with.you gentlemen about this, by the way.) And the poster proclaims, "It's a Mopee story!"
What's missed is that outlandish or impossible-to-believe plot occurances have nothing to do with Mopee stories. Take a look at the classic Mopee tales---the trope-namer Flash-Mopee story, the Black-Zero-destroys-Krypton story, the Jor-El-and-Lara-are-alive! story, the the-Halls-are-aliens story. None of them have any outlandish or absurd events of the degree that you complain about in "The Two Faces of Superman". In fact, all of those classic Mopee tales are solidly written within usual comic-book conventions.
They weren't rejected by the readers because of some too-absurd-to-believe element. They were rejected because the readers did not accept whatever fundamental change in the hero's mythos the story attempted to sell. That, along with DC's realisation that the story went too far, is what made them Mopee stories. (Note: they weren't proclaimed Mopee stories; they just were.)
Before I move on, let's also touch on "the story was never referenced, again" half of the definition. Lots of a hero's adventures are never referenced, again. Because nothing about them was all that memorable or they didn't provide fodder for future tales. They were just mediocre stories that didn't leave much of a mark.
But a Mopee story attempted to change the hero's history in a way that was intended to be referenced again, as the new normal, and, yet, it wasn't. Instead, the story was ignored, never to be mentioned, again.
There's a difference between a story that's too routine to be referenced again and one that's not referenced again because it's been ignored.
The danger in using absurd, too-impossible-to-be-believed plot developments to label a story as a Mopee is that each reader has a different limit to what violates his sense of disbelief. Take the story "A Matter of Menace", from JLA # 69 (Feb., 1969). Writer Denny O'Neil bases his plot on absolutely impossible legal and police procedure. Not "unlikely" or "misused", but impossible. For one thing, he shows a murder warrant being issued against the Green Arrow even though there is no evidence of foul play. And that's not the worst legal impossibility in the tale.
By the criterion you want to apply, that makes this story a Mopee. Yet, many readers who don't have my background in police procedure and the law accepted Mr. O'Neil's "television law" on its face and enjoyed the story. Who's standard applies---theirs or mine? "A Matter of Menace" was never referenced again, so is it a Mopee or not? You tell me.
By the criteria of absurd plot developments and lack of reference, most of stories discussed on the Silver-Age Supergirl thread are Mopees. So would be 75% of the stories in Jimmy Olsen and Lois Lane. Are you labelling all of them as Mopee stories?
The thing is, there is no debate over a true Mopee story. Everybody recognises it right off. It just is. It's a story shooting for Everything You Know Is Wrong (or Changed), but turns out to be What Were They Thinking? It's got nothing to do with impossible-to-believe plot points. It's just that the purported change is stupid. And everyone, publisher and reader, implicitly agrees to forget it ever happened.
I will throw in as another Mopee the idea Clark's glasses are unwittingly hypnotizing everyone to see him as physically puny. Plausible by comics standards but just wrong.
I think your analysis of Mopees is solid. So are everyone's complaints about Super-Menace hiding so long, even though I enjoy the story (it was in my mind when watching Brightburn and laughing at the idea Evil Superman was some radical, daring idea).
I agree about the personal variation in what's implausible: I roll my eyes at a lot of journalism portrayals in fiction but I know not everyone's going to spot the flaws.
Fraser
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