Superman is fighting Doomsday. Lex Luthor is also fighting Doomsday. Luthor is helping the innocent bystanders. Clark Kent and Jimmy Olson are right there watching and giving commentary. Lois and Jon are watching it on TV and giving commentary. That is the plot of this issue, sure there’s a lot of questions, a mysterious cloaked figure making cryptic comments, but this is a fight issue through and through. At some point Doomsday uses strategy and it is very effective. Also in this issue Lois Lane is talking to her son and says “This is wrong, Jon. It all feels VERY wrong.” Rarely has a character summed up my thoughts on a comic so well. This entire issues feels wrong. Not because Clark Kent is watching Superman from another timeline/world fight Doomsday, that’s just comics, weird stuff happens, but because how Superman is acting.
Superman narrates at the beginning that he had to stop Luthor from claiming to be Superman. Thus far all Luthor has done is defeat bad guys and say “with Superman dead I will save the city.” The literal worst thing he has done is claim to be the new Superman. When Superman died back in the old universe, four guys claimed to be Superman, this timeline only has one. Superman has little to complain about.
During the fight, Luthor steps in to save Superman and comes up with a plan to get Doomsday away from the crowd of innocents. While Luthor goes about executing the plan, putting his life in danger, Superman just punches Doomsday and says he can handle this all on his own because he’s the REAL Superman. No communication otherwise, we have no proof that Luthor wasn’t holding his own nor that his plan was crap. Just sheer “I am Superman, leave it to me.” When SUPERMAN’s plan fails, and two innocents are about to meet their doom, Luthor saves them. When Superman saves a train full of people, he tells Luthor to take the train he is literally holding, because only SUPERMAN can save the day.
I…sigh, I just can’t get behind this Superman. I don’t know if Man of Steel has infected Superman, or if Superman has been a jerk all along. Reading this comic makes me believe Lex Luthor is a greater and better hero than Superman. He saves more lives, he tries to work with others more, and seems more willing to work for the greater good. Superman comes off as a petulant child, and that is not my Superman. I’m sure the point of this issue was to show Luthor isn’t cut out to be a hero and only old school Superman can save the day, but that isn’t how they wrote it. The fight scenes aren’t even that great; it is a lot of random destruction, but at least one of the two Supermen actually saves people, it just isn’t the Son of Krpyton, and that makes me sad.
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