art from marvel comics’s black panther. words by hudlin, art by sal larocca, scot eaton, and cafu.Whether chocolate or vanilla, or you’re somewhere in between
A cappuccino mocha or a caramel queen
Rejected by the black, not accepted by the white world
And this is dedicated to them dark skinned white girls
–Murs, “DSWG”

This is kind of a hard post to phrase, ’cause, man, it’s rooted in old school prejudices. It’s the kind of thing that’s hard to shake, you know? So, let’s just get right into it.

When Halle Berry was announced as Storm for the first X-Men movie, there was really just one response from most black people I knew who read comics, including my uncle who put me onto them in the first place: “Well, if that ain’t just the worst and most apt casting ever.”

Halle Berry has made a career out of being the “safe” black actress. She’s part (half?) polish and she’s fairly light-skinned. She’s just white enough to be nonthreatening, if that makes sense. I’m not dissing her for that, of course. She can’t help how she was born or why she sometimes gets roles. It’s just that, well, she’s got a reputation.

So, in a way, she was the perfect Storm and the worst possible Storm they could have picked. Storm is a regal, powerful, arrogant African Queen. Storm possesses some of the most powerful abilities on the X-Men and in the Marvel U. She’s a powerhouse. Storm also has long, apparently super-permed white hair, blue eyes, and distinctly non-african features for the majority of her lifespan.

That’s the crux of Storm right there. For a long time, she was only black in skin tone, and barely even then. Claremont built her up into this amazing goddess in Africa (and that is something else entirely), a master tactician (making for three on the X-Men), and generally just this amazing character. Thing is, she looked black. She doesn’t read black, she doesn’t feel black, and to a lot of people, that means that she’s barely black at all.

I mean, look at how long it took her to hook up with a black dude. Heyooooooo I’m here all night folks, try the veal. You guys are a great audience, really.

The thing is, Storm was all we had for so long that she’s kind of the pre-eminent black female of the comics world by default. I might find Misty Knight more interesting, but I like crime comics and blaxploitation. Misty pushes my buttons, but she can’t really go cosmic. Who else is left? Vixen can’t carry that burden. Natasha Irons is still way too green. Who’s left? Bumblebee from Teen Titans? I hadn’t even read her in Teen Titans before Tiny Titans came out, but I hate shrinky people, so that’s a big fat en oh.

This is the problem with only having a few black characters in comics way back when. You have to latch onto someone, and sometimes that someone isn’t really what you’re looking for. You settle for second best, basically. You can’t get the Smurfs, so you settle for the Snorks. You can’t get Beast Wars, so you settle for Extreme Ghostbusters. That sort of thing.

In a way, Storm is one of the best black females in comics. In another, she’s one of the absolute worst.

I love Storm, but I hate her, and what she represents, so much sometimes.

from milestone comics’s static. words by mcduffie/washington, art by john paul leonDear Sean–
What’s goin’ on? Not much to say
Just checkin’ in wit’cha trying to see what’s wrong today
I know there’s gotta be something kickin’ your bruises
How’s the love? How’s the music? How’s the self-abusiveness?
Got a lot to lose, it’s breakin’ your shoulders
So you let your paranoia place your bets for you
–Atmosphere, “Little Man”

I really enjoy Static. Honest to goodness, he’s one of the best “new” characters to hit in the ’90s. I think that McDuffie & Co. did a wonderful job creating and realizing him. They took the Spider-Man prototype and took it to the next logical level. I spoke about this a few days ago, but I wanted to get back at it. I’v got some breathing room during Wondercon, so you guys get to reap the whirlwind!

Static is probably the most accurate depiction of a young black male to ever hit comics. I haven’t read every comic ever, but Static just rings true on basically every level. He’s also a great example to show just how black masculinity goes sometimes.

You could a decent case for Virgil having gotten his powers because of a girl. One day at school, he met a girl named Frieda. A bully embarrasses him in front of her, but waits until she leaves to beat him down. Virgil crumples and can’t do much but cry. His friend rescues him from the bully, probably saving him a trip to the hospital, and helps him up. He lets Virgil know that he’s got a gun for him if he wants it. Virgil goes home.

When he gets home, his mom chides him for getting beaten up. He’s supposed tos tay out of trouble at this school, not fall into more. He’s got to learn to take care of himself. Virgil goes up to his room just in time to catch the phone ringing. On the other line is Frieda Goren, the girl from before. She compliments him on not being about “that macho stuff” and says that that’s why the bully chose him to attack.

Whoops.

Let me tell you, speaking as a former black teenager– there is nothing in the world worse than looking like a chump in front of a cute girl. Honestly. Getting beaten up would be one thing, but having that girl basically say “You aren’t a real man and that’s why you got beaten up,” regardless of the reason, is like being kicked in the junk by like four different people at once. It’s that Hitchcock zoom– the world zooms out, your face zooms in, and you can’t do anything but grimace in pain.

The second issue of Static uses this as part of Static’s origin story, and it’s a good hook. Regardless of how ridiculous or nonsensical standards of manhood are– they exist. You can be a “real man,” for varying definitions of “real man” depending on your location, upbringing, and state of mind. There are certain thing that you should do and are expected to do and if you don’t do them? Well, dude, sorry, but you aren’t gonna fit in. You’re a sucker, a mark, a punk, a whatever your local regional slang calls a dude who can’t stand on his own two feet.

Virgil was already feeling low because of the beatdown, but this was strikes two, three, four, and five all at once. The secret ingredient to being a boy is that being around girls makes you do stupid things. They don’t even have to say or do anything to you– girls are kryptonite. Kryptonite makes Superman weak. Frieda’s comments, no matter their trustworthiness, made Virgil weak. He calls his friend and asks for a gun. He’s going to put one between the bully’s eyes.

That’s the other half of being a man. Regaining lost manhood. It’s just as bad as kryptonite. Thing is, regaining your lost manhood isn’t a matter of “how far will you go.” It’s a matter of “You’ve already gone too far. How far over the line will you go?” Putting a .38 slug into a dude because he beat you up and made you feel like a chump? That’s way over the line.

There’s something I picked up years ago from music. Knowledge is all about knowing the ledge. That means knowing your limits, knowing the edge, knowing how far is too far, and just knowing period. If you’re “not knowing?” You’re not right. You’re doing wrong. Virgil was not knowing.

This is that fine line that you have to learn to walk. You put on that mean face and treat everyone like a threat. If you’re smiling and walking around like it’s all good, you’re a target. You have to learn what being a man means to you, not to other people. If you don’t mind a bit of punnery, you’ve got to be a self-made man. What means “a man” to you? You have to decide early, otherwise you’re stuck following someone else’s definition.

It’s almost like a competition, only there aren’t any winners in this race. You’re just trying to keep up with the Joneses and look better than the next man, but you don’t realize that those people you’re trying to keep up with? They’re trying to keep up with you at the same time. It’s a zero-sum game.

art from dc comics’s hitman. words by garth ennis, art by john mccreaI call my brother “son” ’cause he shine like one.
–Method Man

Just a quick one today. I’ve got a ridiculous weekend on tap, so I’m gonna have to let the images do the talking for me this time. Sorry! I wanted to go more in-depth on Natt, as I think he’s kind of an awesome character, but time is working against me.

Basically, Natt the Hat is an old friend of Tommy Monaghan’s. They were in Desert Storm together and formed a bond there that lasted for years. When they reconnected, they went into business together. Tommy would get a call for an assassination, he’d call Natt up, and then they’d go kill somebody.

The thing about Natt is that he’s a no-BS kind of guy. He’s very much straight and to the point. If it needs to be done or needs to be said, Natt says it. He’s big on doing what you’re supposed to do, but also in being honest with yourself.

Natt quit cursing when a loved one asked him not to on her deathbed. He went twenty-odd issues without saying a curse word, or at least Ennis’s censored curses. When the SAS came after him and Tommy, he quit quitting. The quitting was an affectation, something he did because it was nice and he was supposed to. But, he recognizes that when you get down to brass tacks, affectations have to go out of the window. You have to be able to do what you need to do to survive.

The scene above shows Natt’s personality perfectly. He calls Tommy on the idea that there’s an honorable hitman. Whether or not you kill cops doesn’t matter– you still pull triggers for a living. Pretending to be anything else is just window dressing. You have to be honest with yourself, and then work your way up from there.

Natt and Tommy are close enough to be brothers. They know each other very well, which is what prompts this scene. It’s a good one, and a good example of the character work Ennis did during Hitman. Yeah, Natt is from the ghettos of Detroit. Yeah, he’s a black dude who uses slang. Yeah, he uses guns for a living.

But, you know what? He’s fully realized. He isn’t a cardboard cutout. He’s got all 360 degrees that good characters have. He’s just as important to the book as the main character, and that’s a wonderful thing.

art from marvel comics’s panther’s quest. words by don mcgregor, art by gene colan.I still remember the first comic featuring Black Panther I ever read. It was Marvel Comics Presents 15. It might have been 16. I had both. Amazon tells me that the line-up was “Ann Nocenti (Author), Don McGregor (Author), Bobbie Chase (Author), Fabian Nicieza (Author), Rick Leonardi (Illustrator), Gene Colan (Illustrator), Dwayne Turner (Illustrator), Javier Saltares (Illustrator).”

Not bad for a first look at a book, huh? Nocenti and Nicieza remain favorite writers for me. The rest of the team is just as awesome.

Anyway, the storyline was called “Panther’s Quest.” It was by Don McGregor and Gene Colan. It was probably my first book by those two, as well. Double my pleasure, then. As a kid, I just remember the story being about tube-socked Black Panther being in the desert, dying slowly, and sometimes running into barbed wire and getting cut or meeting up with a big game hunter in the woods and getting shot. It was bloody, disturbing, and I didn’t understand all of it because it was 25 parts long. Back then, I got comics by trading them. Buying new ones was rare. So, I read maybe three or four issues of this storyline, only two of them sequential, and forgot about it until recently.

I looked the story up and re-read it, this time in its entirety and in one sitting. Wow, what a great story that was. It dealt with apartheid, reality, family life, how far a man will go, and how corrupt a man can get. McGregor’s script was awesomely well-written, not to mention exciting. I wish I’d read the complete story as a kid. It’s exactly what I would have needed to actually like the Panther, ’cause the Avengers books never did it for me.

A huge part of my love for this book is Gene Colan’s art. It’s gritty and realistic and really very violent, but in a way that fits the story, rather than titillates. It made a huge impression on me as a kid. I hadn’t seen art like that before. Gritty? Yeah. Violent? Yeah. But it was always done by Image guys, so it was just a cartoon. When Colan draws the Panther writhing in pain, struggling with an enemy, or collapsing, you feel it. It looks like it should, so it looks like it hurts.

This is another of those books that really needs a reprint volume. The new Marvel Classics Premiere Hardcovers would be perfect for it. It’s about 200 pages, I believe, so the page count is bang on target. I think it’s one of Marvel’s forgotten classics, if that makes sense. You can reprint Infinity War until the cows come home, but Panther’s Quest is just languishing. It shouldn’t.

I threw up a pretty hardcore preview of 16 pages at the top of this post. That’s the first two parts of the story. Hopefully it doesn’t run into fair use troubles! I just wanted to show you guys a bit of the storytelling, setup, and art.

C’mon, Marvel! Get us a hardcover of this story.

art from marvel comics’s black panther. art by mike deodato.The problem with Reggie Hudlin is that Christopher Priest ruined Black Panther.

I don’t mean “ruined” in a negative way. Priest had a ridiculously fun run and I’ve enjoyed Hudlin’s run. But, following up Priest on that book is kind of like following up Grant Morrison on Doom Patrol. When you make a book so thoroughly yours, you make it hard on anyone else who steps up to bat.

I think that Reggie Hudlin knew this, so he delivered a Panther that’s different from Priest’s. Where Priest worked the intrigue angle hard, Hudlin is working on a straightforward superheroic action movie. They’re two books that couldn’t be more different, and I kind of like that.

Reggie Hudlin isn’t afraid to try new things, either. Panther marrying Storm, a Luke Cage/Black Panther buddy movie, Skrull Civil Rights leaders, and all kinds of fun things have riddled his run. There are a few subplots going on (remember those?), but the A plots tend to be fun rides where the Panther gets to show off (or be in the wrong!) and things blow up.

I like that a lot. Don’t get me wrong, I love Priest’s Panther, but I think that Hudlin’s Panther is also very fun to read. If Priest hadn’t taken Panther on a different (not better, not worse, different) path, Hudlin’s Panther wouldn’t catch half the flak it does. There’s an expectation for a book starring the Panther now, and it’s one that Hudlin has only flirted with so far.

So, I come not to bury Reggie Hudlin, but to praise him. He’s writing a book that is aimed almost directly at the black comics reader, and I don’t think that that helps the reviews any. It took me a minute, but once Hudlin wrote the issue that began with Luke Cage thinking about what the Panther means to him, I realized exactly what he was doing.

It’s a Marvel Comic book with a black american slant. Call it a black male power fantasy if you like. It’s Hudlin drawing a line in the ground and going “Here we are. We have always been here. We are just as awesome, just as capable, and just as fun as those other guys.”

I think that Hudlin’s Panther is a fun book to have out there. It serves a good purpose, even if that purpose is just “Watch Panther fight people for 22 pages.” I’d like to think that this is a book that has appeal outside of the usual spandex demographic. I’m still buying it, which is kind of a big deal for me since I don’t like floppies much. The latest arc, with the Kirby frogs and the Skrull gangsters and Malcolm X and all was fun. Just loud, bright comics about an awesome dude doing awesome things.

There are two Black Panthers. I love both of them.

art from marvel comics’s black panther and the crew. art by a kubert and jh williams iii, respectively.I don’t do black music, I don’t do white music
–Eminem, “Who Knew”

Who is Christopher Priest?

Some would say that Priest is your favorite writer’s favorite writer.

Others would say that Priest was the first black editor at both Marvel and DC, in that order. He edited Spider-Man, hired Peter David, had an interesting run on Power Man & Iron Fist (which is practically the patron comic of this site, huh?), and was the source of no end of racial tension at ’80s era Marvel through no fault of his own. At DC, he wrote The Ray and served as liason for Milestone Comics. He had stints filling in on JLA, and wrote his own JLA series. He wrote Quantum & Woody at Acclaim and had a few ill-received series at Marvel after that. Excepting Black Panther, of course.

Black Panther is probably the book that most people love Priest for. He managed to successfully weave action with political intrigue, Kirby-esque plots, superheroic cameos, and romance into one cohesive whole. It wasn’t a perfect run, far from it, but Priest was never afraid to try new things over the course of his five year run. Whether it was reconciling the Kirby-era Panther with the new modern one or revealing that Panther originally joined the Avengers to spy on them, Priest was throwing out ideas at a rapid pace and hitting on almost every single one.

He’s been kind of pigeonholed as a “black writer,” but Priest is the kind of writer who could write a killer Batman or Amanda Waller book. He knows plots and he knows how to work continuity. It’s a shame that people wanted him to fit into a little box, because he can do so much.

After the last of his Marvel work dried up, Priest took a break from comics. I say “took a break” because I want him to come back.

art from milestone comics’s static #1Sorry this is late! It’s been a busy day (what’s that? I have two conferences in town this week?) and I’ve been running ragged.

Today? Today we’ve got Dwayne McDuffie.

You might have heard the name before. I mean, he was only instrumental on one of the best comic-book based cartoons ever. You might know it as Justice League Unlimited? Before that, he worked in comics. He did a few series for Marvel. Damage Control, Deathlok, you know. Books like that.

When he moved to DC, though. Wow. He started up Milestone Comics with a group of like-minded individuals and tried to set the comics world on fire. They gave us a fleet of diverse heroes without beating anyone over the head with Issues. Static was a brand new hero in the Peter Parker mold, but with the added benefit of modern day maturity.

Where Lee and Ditko had to kind of hedge their bets with regards to bringing real life issues into their book, McDuffie, Robert Washington, and John Paul Leon didn’t have to worry about that at all. In the first few issues, Static has girl trouble, gets beaten up, gets humiliated, leaves his house with murder on his mind (he chickens out), gains powers, and loses the girl. He has those teenaged problems that we can all relate to, and he reacts about how a teenager would. He isn’t always right, he doesn’t always win, and sometimes he is hilariously in the wrong.

Did Milestone set the comics world on fire? Well, they went out of business after a while, so that’s arguable. However, they did the next best thing. They set more than a few minds on fire. They showed a generation of kids that it could be done.

From Wikipedia:

Milestone provided the opportunity for many emerging talents who had been passed over by larger established companies, beginning the careers of many comic industry professionals. Among them are John Paul Leon, Christopher Sotomayor, Christopher Williams (aka ChrisCross), Shawn Martinborough, Tommy Lee Edwards, Jason Scott Jones (aka J.Scott.J), Prentis Rollins, J.H. Williams III, Humberto Ramos, John Rozum, Eric Battle, Joseph Illidge, Madeleine Blaustein, Jamal Igle, Chris Batista and Harvey Richards.

You know what? That’s a rock solid legacy. You ever meet someone who doesn’t love Milestone Comics?

McDuffie is one of the unsung heroes of comics, as far as I’m concerned. His miniseries from a couple years ago, Beyond, was a great little spotlight on a few forgotten Marvel characters. His run on Fantastic Four was not only years in the making– it showed a remarkable grasp of character work. Characters sounded exactly like they should, and the jokes were actually funny. His recent Damage Control miniseries is off to that same start.

When he came to DC, he was put on JLA. Perfect fit, right? He rocked on the cartoon series and he’s got some comics clout. He did good work at Marvel, maybe he can bring some of that magic to DC?

I’ve been less than enthused with his JLA, to be honest. The writing is solid, but the stories keep tripping into Countdown crossovers and being covered up with pretty shoddy work on the part of Ed Benes and Joe Benitiez. Why grab a great writer and then weigh him down with sandbags? Why not just let him work?

Despite all this, I’m glad that he’s still in comics. He’s a great voice and, I believe, a necessary one. I just want a company to be brave enough to throw him on a name book, give him a hot artist, and let him go wild. I’m willing to lay 2.99 a month on the fact that we’ll get something hot.

Static made #5 on my top black male characters in comics a while back. That’s for a really good reason.

(i snuck this article in under the wire, huh? whoops.)

Just a quickie for today, as I have a ton of work to do today! This one isn’t an ISSUES post so much as it is something awesome I saw on the Marvel Comics site that relates in a way. Go check it out. That cover is the bomb.

Cover Story: Black Panther Annual #1 – Marvel.com News

Better content tomorrow, I promise– I’m gonna talk writers. Guess who’s on first!

art from marvel comics’s new avengers: civil war. words by bendis!, art by leinil yuReturn of the gangsta, thanks ta’
them niggas who got them kids who got enough to buy an ounce
but not enough to bounce them kids to the zoo or to the park
so they grow up in the dark
never seein’ light
so they end up being like
yo’ sorry ass
robbin’ niggas in broad ass daylight?
Get down!
–Andre 3000, “Return of the Gangsta”

Man, a nigga don’t want no trouble
a player just want to kick back with my gators off
and watch my li’l girl blow bubbles
But, still ready to rhyme
standin’ my ground, never back down
Willin’ to rob, steal, and kill any thing that threatens mine
–Big Boi, “Return of the Gangsta”

Fatherhood is a tough one for me. What makes a father? What makes a man? It’s all mixed up and entwined with each other.

The one thing I do know is that you gotta be hard, you gotta be strong, and you gotta leave behind a worthwhile legacy. It’s a pride thing, with a side dish of honor. This way, you end up with dudes that are solid as a rock. Men who, when faced with overwhelming odds, hopelessness, and generally poor situations, will stand tall, look it in the eye, and say, “I will not move.” It’s a kind of noble stubbornness.

Bendis’s Luke Cage, and Cage in general, is a good example of this. This scene up above is probably one of my most favorite Cage scenes. His friends have allied themselves with the government and are working to support an unfair law. They’re delivering ultimatums on behalf of their masters and are assured of their righteousness.

Luke’s response is simple. He doesn’t want his daughter to grow up thinking that her daddy went through all the things he did and punked out at that point. He doesn’t want to compromise his principles just for the sake of an easier life. He is doing the right thing and he is going to keep doing the right thing, no matter the consequences.

It’s like that old saying… “you’ll either stand for something or fall for everything.” Cage is standing tall. He’s doing this for his daughter, because once you become a parent, the only thing that matters is the next generation and the future that you can give them.

“I’m going to raise my kid right.”

Apologies for the short post. I mean, really, those two quotes up top say what I’m trying to say here better than I ever could.

What if I say I’m not like the others?
What if I say I’m not just another one of your plays?
You’re the pretender
What if I say I will never surrender?
—Foo Fighters, “The Pretender”

Yeah, that’s right. I’m allowed to do these articles too. hermanos said I could. So there.

When I think about black history and comics, I have to talk about the history of one of my favorite black comic characters, Steel. My first memory of the character is seeing a poster for Reign of Supermen near my local arcade back in the early 90’s. It asked the question of which one of those four S-shield-wearing superguys was the real Superman. It seemed obvious to me that it was either the cyborg guy or the dude with the visor. The George Michael one looked too young and that guy with the hammer looked nothing like Superman.

I didn’t read the whole Death and Return story for well over a decade after it came out. For a while, the only experience I had with it was that SNES game, which I still declare as good. As fun as it was, the story aspect of the game was ridiculously lacking. No Green Lantern, no Supergirl, no Lex Luthor Jr. and strangely no Mongul. All I could figure from what the game showed me was that Cyborg Superman was evil for some reason and by merging Eradicator with Black Costume Superman with his arm cannon, he returned Superman back to his normal red and blue self.

I didn’t expect much when I read the actual comic, and yet I found it to be one of my favorite Superman stories. As long as it was, everything (except a lot of Funeral for a Friend) clicked. It was a good mystery with good character moments and good action sequences. What really sold it for me was that I really like all four of the false Supermen. Each one has his own appeal. I still think it’s absolutely criminal how little DC uses Eradicator, especially after how rad that one Dan Abnett Majestic story was.

I could go into detail on a lot of fantastic Steel moments, but the thing I remember him most for is taming the Eradicator and teaching him heroism through pounding the crap out of him. It takes place during Reign of Supermen in issues Action Comics #689 (Who is the Hero True?) and Superman: The Man of Steel #24 (Impact).

Steel is the one Superman who didn’t claim to be the real deal, both out of nobility and because, let’s face it, he’s just a huge, black human in a suit of armor. It would’ve been a hard sell anyway. What he didn’t have in appearance, he had in spirit. Almost literally, but I’ll get to that in a second. Steel was the only natural hero among the four pretenders to the point that he coached Superboy into being more than Booster Gold Version 2.0.

Eradicator was the opposite. Physically he looked the part and although his power set and weaknesses were different, he was easy to accept as being Superman after something odd and comic booky happened to him. I mean… that’s how we got Superman Blue, right? It’s just that emotionally, he was a cold bastard and had no qualms over murder or maiming. Guy Gardner loved him for it. At the time of this issue, his mission is to find anyone who pretends to be Superman and eradicate them.

Steel is in the middle of dealing with a gang of armed hoods, who find that his armor deflects every one of their bullets. One of them sneaks behind Steel and aims a shotgun. A second later, he’s vaporized by the Eradicator. He fries the others’ guns and decides to let them run off as he’d rather confront Steel.

Lois storms over and shows them what their little brawl has done to Metropolis. Steel immediately comes to realize he was in the wrong and owns up to it. Eradicator, more driven by his unease from being near Lois, also apologizes.

“You know, I never laid claim to the name of Superman. I wear this shield and this cape to honor a man who gave me back my life. Can you honestly look me in the eyes and say that you find anything wrong in that?”

“Put in those terms… No. I cannot. I am sorry…”

Right when the two have an understanding, a process server runs over and hands over some cease and desist papers for using the Superman trademarks, owned by Superboy’s employer. Eradicator fries the papers and prepares to fry the server for his insolence. This time, it’s Steel who runs into the fight by grabbing Eradicator and flying off in order to protect that poor weasel’s life.

The thing to remember here is that within the story, they went and made it pretty clear who was stronger than who. Cyborg Superman is stronger than Eradicator, who is stronger than Superboy, who is stronger than Steel. Steel is heading into battle against an enemy out of his league.

Without thinking about casualties, Eradicator drives Steel back towards the Earth and spikes him into the ground. They end up in Coast City and the fight begins anew.

He got through to a piece of intergalactic hardware through passion and a helping of metal fists. How great is that?

Even though we know the facts of the story in hindsight, at the time of this fight, there was another dimension to it. Earlier issues of Reign of Supermen suggested the concept that both Steel and Eradicator were the real deal in different ways. Eradicator was physically Superman, but Steel was a host for Superman’s ghost. Obviously, this wasn’t true in the end, but I’m sure at the time it made this incident a bit more interesting.

What did this fight lead to with our two super friends here? Eradicator got toasted by Cyborg Superman and came back a few issues later, finally discovering his true identity and successfully helping Superman win the final battle. But before that all happened, there was this.

Not only is his dialogue snappier, but… it almost looks like he’s smiling.

As for Steel? He ran into another guy claiming to be Superman, despite a different power set and a different appearance. At first, Steel remained cynical. As time went on, by seeing the true hero behind the black tights and 90’s mullet, Steel came to realize that unlike the immature teen, the callous killer and the metal megalomaniac, this Superman was indeed legit.

Last I checked, Eradicator is in a coma, under Steel’s care. You’d think they would have done something with that by now.