Reality Dies At Dawn!

Or: Why Grant Morrison's All-Star Superman is the Best Comic I've Ever Read

     Grant Morrison's All-Star Superman was originally pitched in 1998 by Morrison with Mark Millar and Mark Waid as "Superman Now." After originally being greenlit, DC eventually declined the publishing of this limited series. Morrison states that he originally got the idea outside of a San Diego Comic Con when he met a Superman cosplayer who struck him as most realistic. He had what he claims is a "shamanic" moment when he began to ask the cosplayer questions who actually answered as though he were Superman. Thus, Superman's new story began to form. This story has everything I could have wanted from a Superman comic, as I was never a fan of Superman growing up. Grant ended up blossoming in me a love for the man of steel. I will spend the following paragraphs explaining to you why I love this limited series more than any other comic that I own.

Warning: MASSIVE SPOILERS BELOW

Now, how about we start with issue #1's 

COVER: When we look at the cover of All-Star Superman #1, we see a peculiar pose from our big blue boyscout. He's not flying, not flexing, not tense, not stressed, not worried, he's as cool as acucumber. Morrison claims he got the idea from another Superman cosplayer: "... I suddenly realized this was how Superman would sit. He wouldn't puff out his chest or posture heroically, he would be totally chilled. If nothing can hurt you, you can afford to be cool." Grant is totally correct in my eyes, what does the indestructible man have to worry about in the world? What would he have to prove by puffing out his chest like he does on the cover of other comics? When he relaxes, he really is able to have no care in the world. I think this is the real Superman, a good guy who is really just a teddy bear (unless you have nefarious purposes).

Let's move further, shall we?

The Story So Far: Our writer begins with our man's stripped down origin. We see 4 simple panels: Superman's planet during it's apocalypse, a concerned Jor-El and Lara Jor-El, the rocket that brought him to earth, and his adoptive parents, the Kents. We are only given the simple, elegant and ephemeral words: Doomed planet. Desperate scientists. Last Hope. Kindly couple. His whole origin summed up in four sentences, it's all so simple, this is what birthed the man who became so complex, so beautiful, it's just all that was what made him who he became, in the comics and in our world. I want to also focus on the third panel. The words last hope evoke more to me than it would seem. He's the last hope for the future of Krypton, the last hope for the continuation for his family line. He is the last hope for the continuation of his whole species (forgetting the bottled city of Kandor.) He's not only all these things, but he is also the last hope of his new home, Earth. He continues to be the hero and protector of Earth and it's personification of hope and resolve. It's so elegant.

Lex's Evil Plot: We're all familiar with Lex Luthor and his vendetta against Superman. He doesn't trust and alien on Earth, he doesn't like him and he doesn't want him to continue to be what he thinks is a danger to Earth. Lex has realized that he's getting older, he's going to die and he's failed at every attempt at killing superman, this time, he needs the ultimate idea. He's built a robot supermen, he's contracted other villains to do his bidding, he's used kryptonite to weaken and kill him, he's even built his own mechanical suit to fight Superman himself. Why have all these plans ultimately failed? They weren't planned well, they weren't thought out and they were just too obvious for Superman not to find a flaw in, but what is something that even Superman himself not save himself from? Lex realized a way to turn his own powers and his own body against himself. Superman gets his powers from the yellow sun, which his cells turn into the powers that he uses now. Lex hypothesis a way to get Superman so close to the sun that apopstisis begins to occur in his body, cell death. Although Superman's powers are amplified, he learns that he has one year to live. Checkmate Lex.

Love Story: We've seen the story evolve between the bumbling reporter Clark Kent and beautiful Lois Lane. We haven't, however, seen it unfold like this. When Clark reveals to Lois that he is the man that he is Superman, her love, she is incredulous. She still follows him to his Fortress of Solitude for some r&r on her birthday. Superman's heart is not only shown to the world, he also saves enough for his girlfriend. Her whole experience is nothing short of interesting, she receives singing flowers from Alpha Centauri 4, he allows her into all of the rooms in the fortress, including the ones no one else is allowed in, save one. What is this room? Lois begins to not only be suspicious, but paranoid. Superman reveals that the room she was not allowed in was actually a room where he had his "superbots" creating a serum for her to have his powers for 24 hours. She would be able to have the experience that all of us have dreamed about, he did it all for her. He even made her a suit to go with her new powers. They end the most beautiful night of their lives with one final kiss on the moon. You just can't beat that romanticism.

The Unanswerable Question: This one moment in the series is one of my favorites. Atlas and Samson appear to Lois and Superman during their adventure together, it turns out that they've stolen something from a menacing character called the Ultra Sphinx. The Ultra Sphinx holds Lois in a state of quantum uncertainty, and for Superman to save her, he most answer to unanswerable question. We all know it, "What happens when the unstoppable force meets the immovable object." To even wrap your head around it can rattle your brain, we've all been asked it, and we've all been stumped by it. Here's the real question, can the immovable object and the unstoppable force actually exist? Superman laughs at such a ridiculous question with the simple answer: "they yield."

The Death of Pa Kent: Superman meets a three-piece Superman squad in issue #6, the Superman of A.D. 85,250, The Superman of the 5th Dimension (which we learn in Batman R.I.P is the imaginary dimension) and the Unknown Superman of A.D. 4500. This is all when Pa Kent is still alive, mind you. The Superman squad arrives to chain what is called the Chronovore, which eats time out of living objects. During this fight, Superman notices an irregularity in Pa's heartbeat, he immediately leaves the fight, hoping to save Pa. "I CAN SAVE EVERYBODY" Superman cries, but Pa is already dead. Let's rewind, though, who was with Pa last? The bandage-clad Superman of 45,000 A.D., did he kill him? Nope, turns out this was our universe's Superman coming back to say goodbye for the last time, knowing that Pa's time was coming, saying "It all comes out right in the end." To me, this is one of the most touching moments in comics. We also meet the same Superman further in the future, but I wont give that away. 

Lex's Heart Stopping Moment: Turns out, Lex, who was sent to the electric chair, had one more move in his plan, making sure that Superman would die, makes his own "superman cocktail," giving himself powers for 24 hours. Making sure he will win this last showdown, he is aided by the Tyrant Sun. When confronted about the truths that sent him to jail, Lex imparts some questions upon Daily Planet editor Perry White: "Is that right, mister White? Funny, I don' see the truth anywhere around, do you? I mean, what color is it? Can I touch it? Nah, I don't think so." Even though we all have our ideas of truth, can we really define it? Can we impart an immortal and immutable truth upon anyone? I'm not so sure. While Lex is understanding what it is to be Superman, he enters the state of mind that comes with all of the powers, which isn't solely physical. Moments before he looses his power he has an epiphany, he finally understands how Superman sees the world. "I can actually see the machinery and wire connecting and separating everything since it all began..." Lex, with Superman's eyes, can actually see the mechanics in the universe, down to the smallest particle. There is a beauty to it, how humanity fits into the actual scheme of things, like we are all connected in property. It's all so easy to understand... if you can see it.

Ultimate Super-Moment: Superman is known for being a good man (or alien) he uses his strength to save the world, while making an example for the living. The funny thing is, Superman doesn't use his strength as often as you would think throughout this series, he uses his mind to solve the problems. I personally think that Morrison is trying to show us that any man can be a Superman. He doesn't need super-strength, laser eyes or even flight. He needs to be a man of good, a man of ideals. This leads into my favorite part of the series. On one page, we see a goth girl crying, dropping her phone off of the high ledge of a building that she is readying herself to jump from. As she gets ready to jump, we see a familiar "S" behind her. "It's never as bad as it seems." "You're much stronger than you think you are...trust me." Are the few words that Superman speaks to her. The man who spends most of his time saving the world, the most requested man on earth... still has time to reassure people that they are just as strong as him. Life isn't as bad as it seems, we've all had bouts of depression, but if we could have just heard those words spoken so softly, it would have made it so much better. Grant is further proving that it's not strength that makes a superman, it's being the best person you can be. This page makes me cry every time that I read it.

Okay, ready for things to start getting a bit complicated? Good.

Earth-Q: Since Superman knows he is dying, he decides that he would create a mini earth called earth-q. The reason for this, is that he wants to see if a world without a Superman could survive. A world without heroes or powers, a world of man. "...When i'm not around anymore to protect them from the mad scientists, and monsters and themselves... can they survive their own self-destructive urges?" "There was only one way to study a world without Superman...I had to make one." Thusly, earth qwewq was born, and when it was born "it breathed in." We'll get to that part later. First, I want to talk about what we see in Earth Q. The first time we look in, we see tribes of ancient men (sorry, i'm bad with history) and the clock reads 11:59:59 pm. The next look we get looks like an Aztec or Mayan civilization, and the clock reads 11:59:59:914 pm, the next we see what looks like a civilization similar to Greece, with a philosopher speaking to a crowd and still, the clock only reads 11:59:59:980 pm. The last two peeks we get are the most interesting, at 11:59:59:996, we see what looks a whole lot like Nietzsche, writing about his "Ubermensch" or Superman, which is an idealized person, a goal for people to set for themselves, much like what Grant is trying to give us through Superman, not the actual superhero. Why is there a guy like Nietzsche in earth q? Most interestingly, and only at 11:59:59:998, we see the words "this is going to change everything" over the original action comics cover Superman, with the quote coming from the man himself, Joe Shuster.  He created OUR world, we live in his universe. But let's get back to that. What. the. Fuck.What the fuck is going on with the clock? Centuries seem to pass but the clock only moves in milliseconds. Why is this? Well, in order to help people fathom how old the earth is, anthropologists assert this idea: If the time on our clock were proportional to the time that passed from when the earth was created to now, then if earth was created at midnight on one day, we'll say that that is the time that Superman created qwewq (his time), then civilized man has only existed since 11:59:59 on that same day, which makes the earth very old, but also makes sense in this story. We see the growth of their earth pass in Superman's time, not theirs.

Superman Answers the Question: If God created the universe, then who created God? Grant Morrison gets to play around with this question a little bit with the use of Earth Q. Since Supes creates the world, then that would make him their God, most likely, but with Joe Shuster actually creating Superman in Earth Q, does that make him Superman's god? I don't think so, I think the answer is that Superman, by proxy, created himself. It's cyclical, earth q creates him, but he already created earth q before he was created there. Fucked up, right? I think it's pretty fun.

Willing your Creation to Life: When we see that Superman created earth q but Joe Shuster (from earth q) we may conjecture that Shuster and Seigel willed their creation to life. This is very familiar to Grant Morrison's other comic, Flex Mentallo. In Flex, Wally Sage, a loser in his time, sees a character when he is a child. Later in his adolescence, he creates that same character, named Flex Mentallo. This character lived out of time just like Supes in All Star. We also see something like this in another of Morrison's comics, at the end of his run on Animal Man, AM meets his writer, Grant Morrison and has an existential crisis when he learns that his whole life is a story and who ever writes it decides what happens or how it feels, Grant actually brings him out of the DC universe and into ours. Grant has expressed his idea that he wants to make the DC universe a living breathing thing, just like earth q in all star. This is his way of doing it, he brings all of these characters out of the shell that they live in to be with us. He has said that these heroes from the comics are just as real as any of us, just because they are written doesn't make them imaginary, they are alive, they do things, they feel things, they have exploits. For example: in All Star, we see panels of Superman switch from Quitley and Grants beautiful art to what look more like raw sketches, but when it is shown, it doesn't change a single thing about his existence. My favorite part about Flex was that the universe needed saving, but all of the heroes were gone. Flex was looking for them, since he was willed into creation by Wally, but the others were gone. It turns out that the superhero universe was about to be destroyed so they made themselves fictional in our (Wally's) universe. To come back, they go to Wally when he was a child (since they still didn't exist in the fictional universe) so that they could enter his brain and create and transmit certain ideas directly into his reality so that they could come to life. Superman is another example of this, he is putting these ideas of himself out there, so that he can continue to live, even though he is dying. In Flex, Grant writes "Comics are...crude attempts to remember the truth about reality." It's in plain writing, Superman and the DC universe are a way to him of recovering the truth of the truth about the DC Uni.

This comic is a great combination of love, idealism and heroics. It is a beautiful story with beautiful art, it's got a message and it has a little hint of reality in it's own fiction. I suggest you read this comic, it will change how you feel about Superman.