We Have Met The Enemy And He Is Us

Since this is -- please, let it be true -– my last Infinite Crisis post for a while, there are SPOILERS beyond the link.

I really wanted a happy ending for Superboy.

Yes, him too, but I’m talking about the hometown boy. Earth-Prime, lest we forget, was originally meant to be our Earth, where there were supposed to be no superheroes outside of fiction (and, of course, the Human Fly). Thus, the Superboy of Earth-Prime was a kid named Clark Kent who, as it happened, turned out to be Kal-El of Krypton.

The traditional Clark was picked on throughout his life, and therein resided his appeal: you can’t hurt me, you only hurt this human shell I have constructed. A Clark without Superman, therefore, is just like all us other Earth-Prime nerds, having to look for strength to an imaginary alter-ego. When Clark-Prime's powers appear, that alter-ego becomes incarnate, and the nature of that hidden strength changes. Kid Miracleman and Supreme Power's Hyperion have taught us that the ability to channel pent-up frustrations into one’s newfound omnipotence is almost never a good thing, so fortunately this Superboy is guided from the start by older versions of himself -- and, we have to assume, by the idea of Superman the fictional character.

That’s where things start to get weird. Remember, the Supermen of Earths 1 and 2 had to learn how to be "Superman." For them, "Superman" is the culmination of accumulated life experiences, and the expression of a morality developed over decades of adventuring (almost 50 years for Kal-L; at least 20 years for Kal-El). Superboy-Prime can learn from them, but he knows Superman more from cartoons, Christopher Reeve, and DC Comics. Imagine the Grant Morrison-like possibilities if Clark-Prime had been reading Crisis on Infinite Earths....

Instead, Superboy-Prime plays into the paradigm of Superman-without-Clark -- or, more accurately, Superman deprived of Clark. Geoff Johns tells us that Superboy went mad over losing his human existence (family, girlfriend, etc.), and indeed was tortured by the possibility of restoring it. “I’ll grow up to be Superman!” was Superboy-Prime’s mantra, which seemed at first to be a good complement to Kal-L’s “I know how to be Superman” perspective.

Ironically, remembering the Reeve movies might well have reinforced the idea that Superboy-Prime was truly destined for great things. The Superman of those films brought his love back from the dead and restored his own powers after giving them up for her. Paired with a version of Superman who was just as dedicated to curing his own wife, Superboy-Prime might be forgiven for thinking he was living out the legend, twisted as it may have been.

Still, it’s the notion that Superboy-Prime came from our Earth (by way of our Krypton, of course) that makes me a little sad to think of him imprisoned and insane. If Johns presented Kal-L as the old guard, seeking the return of his lost golden age, his Superboy-Prime might naturally have been that hypothetical new reader, eager to experience superheroics through young, fresh eyes. However, Superboy-Prime was shaped by the tragedies and cataclysms of big-event comics, and his frustrations were only encouraged by Alex Luthor. Without reading too much more into the symbolism, it’s safe to say Johns made him tragic too, and since Superboy-Prime comes from us, his tragedy is doubly so.

It occurs to me, happy to move on to the greener pastures of 52 and One Year Later, that in the end Superboy-Prime deserved more compassion. Of all the participants in both Crises, he was the only one not born into a world of fantastic powers and periodic universe-shatterings. His few memories of a normal life were turned against him in a world that was itself supposed to be paradise. Why not let him leave this universe of adventure and death behind for a world where he could finally find peace -- even if it existed only in his own mind, as fictional as the Superman he never thought he’d meet?

Zatanna, are you busy...?

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