Wednesday, March 26, 2014

The Greatest Superman Story Ever Told

I hate to admit that I wasn't the biggest Jack Kirby fan as a kid. I thought the art was too blocky and too stiff. 

But having learned a little more about art, comics, myth and things in general he is fast becoming my favourite creator of all time. The man simply understood the medium of comic books in a way that very few ever have. 

A few weeks ago, stumbled across a collection which outlined much of his work at DC in the late sixties/early seventies. The man was a machine, writing and drawing six or so books a month, creating his entire Fourth World mythos of New Genesis vs Apokolips and most notably Darkseid during that time. The entire collection is a work of psychedelic genius, but the story that completely popped my noodle was Jimmy Olsen issue#142
I'm not even sure where to begin here ... Jimmy Olsen and Superman are on the trail of a vampire, which also leads to a werewolf. The two track the monsters back to a secret lab, but instead of Frankenstein castle, they discover a miniature planet floating in the basement! 
The planet also happens to be surrounded with movie-projectors which have been beaming Classic Hammer Horror films into the mini-planet's atmosphere. Now time is relative and what might be a ninety minute horror fest for us, influenced the entire planet's evolution resulting in the monsters that now live there. 
Once they learn that the people aren't really monsters, they don't want to destroy the planet, so Superman and Jimmy then decide to save the little planetoid ...  by switching the projected movies to Oklahoma! 

I have never laughed so hard at a comic in my life. 

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