Action Comics #1: Look At This Fucking Super Hipster

EDITOR’S NOTE: There might be spoilers here. I will try to keep them out, but I am writing this hung over, so I guarantee nothing.

Okay, I will never rule out the possibility that I am a complete moron, but I’ve read Action Comics #1 three times now, and to save my soul, I CANNOT figure out how Superman knew about the bomb on the platform. Oh wait… this book was written by Grant Morrison. That explains everything.

Morrison has a habit going back at least to his JLA run where he seems to like to jump right into a sequence without any explanation as to the events that let up to that sequence. Unlike any other writer I can think of, he seems willing to say, “Look: this is a comic book. Does it really matter how Superman found out about the bomb? Why spend time showing him investigating and wandering around asking questions or seeing clues or any other explanation? You just want to see him try to STOP the bomb, right? RIGHT… okay, maybe I just don’t feel like writing the explanation. Write it, don’t write it, the check cashes just as easy.”

I don’t like it when Morrison does stuff like this. Once in a while it works – in a big action sequence, I probably don’t need it explained why a hero would go looking for trouble in a PARTICULAR place any more than I need explained the sequence of events that brought a porno actress to that PARTICULAR mud puddle* – but it invariably drags me out of the story while I try to figure out if I missed something. That makes suspension of disbelief a real bitch.

But if we put that particular Morrison tic aside, I generally liked this book… as an ElseWorlds story. What we have here is Superman-as-Park-Slope-hipster; living on the cheap in a bohemian neighborhood, spouting the same social justice slogans as a G20 protestor if said protestor was bulletproof and had a metabolism that put marijuana out of the question.

It’s an interesting take on Superman for the Great Recession; if there’s a supervillain worse than an urban financeer / banker these days, neither I nor Matt Taibbi know what it is. And if DC truly wants to target teenaged readers with a relatable power fantasy, they could do worse than to make Superman a hipster. And make no mistake, that’s what he is: he lives in a shitty apartment with, as his landlady says, “Artists, musicians, models, whatever… it all translates to ‘professionally unemployed.'” Throw in the fact that there are two instances where the villain announces himself as such through acts of gentrification and urban renewal, and Superman is a PBR tall, handlebar moustache and a case of chlamydia away from an appearance on lookatthisfuckinghipster.com. He probably favors a Superman t-shirt over a full costume because it’s easier to check for bedbugs. But I digress.

The story kept me interested (Other than the “How did he know about the cockadoodie BOMB?” moment), and I’ll probably check out the remainder of Morrison’s run to see how it goes, but… this book shows the inherent flaws in the concept of a “complete” DC Universe reboot. Because Dan Didio and Jim Lee can say all day long that things are all new and all different, but part of why this book WORKS is because you KNOW who Superman is… and because you KNOW this isn’t that Superman. Even Morrison knows and acknowledges that he knows it and WE know it; the big word balloon on the splash page that shows us Superman in full figure for the first time says, “Because that ain’t Superman.”

No it isn’t, at least not the one we know. Which is the point… but it uses our knowledge of that to hook us in. The thing that worked the best for me in this story (Besides the Rags Morales art, which I’ve enjoyed since back on Identity Crisis. Say what you want about that book, but it’s DAMN pretty) was that Morrison used the best-known tropes of Superman to show us that this Superman was still growing. Yes, Morrison uses straight-ahead exposition to tell us that Superman can’t fly yet, and that his strength has been observed by other as still growing.

But Morrison also showed us this new Superman going up against a speeding bullet, a powerful locomotive, and trying to leap a tall building in a single bound… and he showed us that THIS Superman can only go one for three. Maybe.

THAT’S interesting writing, storius interruptus be damned. Check it out.

* She’s in the mud puddle because daddy didn’t love her enough. You’re welcome.