• If Superboy Was Real

    From Quadibloc@21:1/5 to All on Sat Sep 25 20:43:28 2021
    I grew up reading DC comics during the Silver Age.
    Among others. I came late to reading Marvel comics, but along with DC, some Gold Key comics were among my favorites - Space Family Robinson, and particularly Magnus: Robot Fighter, 4000 A.D..

    Anyways, as I grew a bit older, still being young enough to read comics, I realized that certain things had to be... glossed over, so that the world of the comic books could resemble our world.
    Before World War II started, some Siegel and Shuster Superman comics had Superman ending the Spanish Civil War, or defeating the Japanese single-handedly. But the Superman comics of the 1960s, even though Superboy was around in the 1930s, weren't set in
    a world where World War II never happened.

    What if... as a one-shot graphic novel or some such project... we saw a glimpse of what Superman's world might look like if this limitation weren't observed?

    Superboy starts his career at, say, age 14 in 1931 or thereabouts.

    He begins by dealing with crooks. Then he also handles some bigger stuff that is relatively unproblematic. He chases Mussolini out of Ethiopia and the Japanese out of China. And he overthrows Stalin as well.

    And then he takes on segregation in the South - not openly. but things happen to protect innocent victims of violence. Pa Kent eventually notices some unusual newspaper stories about strange events in the South, and has a heart-to-heart talk with Clark.

    He can't fight a one-man war against the human race, or turn Earth into a new Krypton. But he can't just turn away either. There has to be another way.

    When you can move Heaven and Earth... you _can_ find one.

    So, in, say, the year 1934 or thereabouts... the planet Venus is relocated to the L5 point of the Earth-Sun system. And at least _partly_ terraformed.

    And it becomes a home for oppressed minorities from Earth. As Earth people, particularly members of oppressed minority groups, don't quite have the same advantages as the Kandorians that settled Rokyn, there would probably be an issue of a bit of a
    kickstart being needed to allow the people there to build looms and mills and factories, but that could be done without him having to do _everything_ for them.

    So one ends up with a re-shaped Solar System, and an Earth where World War II and the Cold War afterwards never happened.

    John Savard

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Robert Carnegie@21:1/5 to Quadibloc on Sun Sep 26 14:35:22 2021
    On Sunday, 26 September 2021 at 04:43:29 UTC+1, Quadibloc wrote:
    I grew up reading DC comics during the Silver Age.
    Among others. I came late to reading Marvel comics, but along with DC, some Gold Key comics were among my favorites - Space Family Robinson, and particularly Magnus: Robot Fighter, 4000 A.D..

    Anyways, as I grew a bit older, still being young enough to read comics, I realized that certain things had to be... glossed over, so that the world of the comic books could resemble our world.
    Before World War II started, some Siegel and Shuster Superman comics had Superman ending the Spanish Civil War, or defeating the Japanese single-handedly. But the Superman comics of the 1960s, even though Superboy was around in the 1930s, weren't set
    in a world where World War II never happened.

    What if... as a one-shot graphic novel or some such project... we saw a glimpse of what Superman's world might look like if this limitation weren't observed?

    Superboy starts his career at, say, age 14 in 1931 or thereabouts.

    He begins by dealing with crooks. Then he also handles some bigger stuff that is relatively unproblematic. He chases Mussolini out of Ethiopia and the Japanese out of China. And he overthrows Stalin as well.

    And then he takes on segregation in the South - not openly. but things happen to protect innocent victims of violence. Pa Kent eventually notices some unusual newspaper stories about strange events in the South, and has a heart-to-heart talk with Clark.


    He can't fight a one-man war against the human race, or turn Earth into a new Krypton. But he can't just turn away either. There has to be another way.

    When you can move Heaven and Earth... you _can_ find one.

    So, in, say, the year 1934 or thereabouts... the planet Venus is relocated to the L5 point of the Earth-Sun system. And at least _partly_ terraformed.

    And it becomes a home for oppressed minorities from Earth. As Earth people, particularly members of oppressed minority groups, don't quite have the same advantages as the Kandorians that settled Rokyn, there would probably be an issue of a bit of a
    kickstart being needed to allow the people there to build looms and mills and factories, but that could be done without him having to do _everything_ for them.

    So one ends up with a re-shaped Solar System, and an Earth where World War II and the Cold War afterwards never happened.

    John Savard

    What about Jews?

    And, try Elseworlds _Red Son_, where Superman /works/
    for Stalin. But decides that being the "Man of Tomorrow"
    is show-offy in this universe (Earth-30).

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Quadibloc@21:1/5 to Robert Carnegie on Sun Sep 26 17:53:58 2021
    On Sunday, September 26, 2021 at 3:35:23 PM UTC-6, Robert Carnegie wrote:

    What about Jews?

    Oh, black people from the South would only be the start.

    While Nazi Germany wouldn't arise in such a world, Jews from places in the Islamic world, along with Egypt's Coptic Christians, might be represented there as well over time.

    John Savard

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)