Product Description: Alan Moore follows his Eisner-Award-winning Supreme: The Story of the Year script with Supreme: The Return, presented here in its entirety for the first time. Alan Moore's sense of irony and sense of humor combine to make a super hero comic like none you've ever seen. Collects Moore's final ten issues.
Superman has never been better Supreme was created in the early 90s as a thinly-veiled Superman knock-off. He was a superhero with all the power of Superman but arrogant, self-righteous and destructive. An interesting take but it did not last.
In the late 90s respected writer Alan Moore took over and started over. He created a Supreme closer to the classic Superman of the 50s and 60s but lost in the modern world. Scenes of 90s style extreme exaggerated action are juxtaposed with faithful recreations of silver age stories.
Supreme ends up with more personality than Superman has had in years.
Supreme is a history of comics, a love story and personal journey all in one.
This reprinting is not the greatest, apparently the original art was lost but is quite readable an in no way distracts from the quality of the stories.
The superb second half of Alan Moore's run on Supreme (or, "H-he just shot Monica, execution style..."). Supreme: "Did I hear you say Optilux was here?" Suprema: "He was...I sent him to the Prism world...but not before he'd sent a few hundred Bon Jovi fans there as well." Supreme: "Oh well. Can't be helped."
As originally thought up by Rob Liefeld, Supreme was an uninteresting superhero, a humorless and uninspired character. One of the best things Liefeld ever did was convincing Alan Moore to take a crack at writing this series. Alan Moore went on to successfully revamp Supreme, this helping to win him the Harvey Award for Best Writer in 1999.
Moore took over in issue #42 and immediately began his overhaul of Supreme. Known for breathtakingly deconstructing superheroes (MARVELMAN, Watchmen) Moore instead chose to re-invent this series as a fond tongue-in-cheek homage to the Silver Age of comics and, even more specifically, to the Superman mythos. He accomplished this mainly thru the incorporation of flashback segments (drawn old school style) which served to introduce Supreme's vast, rewritten backstory. The trade paperback Supreme: The Story of the Year collected Moore's excellent first-half run (issues #42-52). SUPREME: THE RETURN is an equally superb collection and presents the final issues (#53-56) of Supreme's original series, as well as the entire run of his next and very short-lived series, SUPREME: THE RETURN, which lasted for only 6 issues before it was cancelled.
A wink of the eye, a nudge in the ribs. But respectfully done by Alan Moore, and he does throw in his own twists. So Sally (or Suprema) may take after Supergirl, but she's got a prudish way about her. Radar differs from Krypto in that he's as intelligent as anybody, only with a canine point of view. And, thanks to a strapped-on voicebox, Radar speaks. In "And Every Dog Has Its Day!" Moore doesn't hesitate to show the Hound Supreme's earthy side. Another twist of Moore's is that his time-travelling version of the Legion of Super-Heroes tends to recruit historical and mythical figures (Wild Bill Hickok, Achilles, Aladdin).
In the Silver Age tradition, Moore narrates multi-part single issues and makes use of retro text with its typically flagrant alliteration and hyperbole (ie, comic book writer Diana Dane is described as "the Woman of Whiteout" or the "Tigress of Typewriter"). For those unused to this style, just remember that it's intended as a tribute. Besides, I do think "the Woman of Whiteout" is kinda amusing. However, some of the pop culture references have gotten a bit stale ("This is unbelievable! This is completely O.J."). Still, this is Alan Moore, an imaginative, natural-born storyteller and the guy who wrote one of the best Superman stories ever. His instincts are good. So, in his hands, even the purposely hackneyed characters and trite situations are given added dimensions and interesting spins.
SPOILERS now.
Moore capably juggles his nostalgic salutes with the contemporary superheroics. I enjoyed his take on Mxyzptlk, whose annoyance factor is addressed here. In "The Ballad of Judy Jordan" we learn of what befalls Supreme's longtime girlfriend. "Silence At Gettysburg" provides a fun time-travelling romp with the League of Infinity as Supreme wakes up one day to find himself in a reality where the South had won the Civil War and, in the present, he's a superhero called the Supremacist. Then, in the collection's most action-packed story arc, the frightening prisoners trapped in Supreme's mirror dimension escape, which gives us a chance to see Supreme matching up with the Shadow Supreme (his equal in might), the Televillain dropping in on an episode of Friends, and space-tyrant Korgo challenging President Bill Clinton to a fist fight.
In the STORY OF THE YEAR trade we learned what happens to superheroes when they get written out of the story. In "A World Of His Own!" Supreme's genius archnemesis, Darius Dax, who's died twice, suffers his own brand of revisionism. The next issue ("The Three Worlds of Diana Dane") focuses on Supreme's courtship (kind of) of Diana Dane, followed by a funny story showcasing Radar, the Hound Supreme. "And Every Dog Has Its Day!" is followed by a short League of Infinity back-up tale. The penultimate story is probably my least favorite. It centers on Supreme's old foe, the Supremium Man, whom I find boring. Finally, "New Jack City" is an all-out nod to Jack Kirby and his creations. Rob Liefeld actually does a decent job of mimicking Jack Kirby's bombastic style in this issue. Jim Baikie (I think it's Baikie) also covers Kirby's style in one segment of "The Three Worlds of Diana Dane."
SPOILERS end.
Penciller Chris Sprouse and inker Al Gordon provide a consistent look to the first half of this volume, with Rick Veitch nicely handling the flashback sequences. In the wake of Sprouse's departure, a slew of artists came onboard and, while their talents were certainly good enough, the lack of a regular artist was a bit jarring. On the other hand, it's hard to diss folks like Gil Kane, Jim Starlin, Matt Smith, and Jim Baikie. But Sprouse was missed.
Alan Moore's work on Supreme paved the way for what he'd do later with his Tom Strong series. And while Moore's Supreme wouldn't resonate as strongly or be as archetypal as Tom Strong, the stories here are inventive and charming enough (and, sometimes, snarkily humorous enough) that they're still very much worth reading. I mean, it IS Alan Moore. So, I say, pull up a sofa, get your milk and cookies, and catch up with Ethan Crane, mild-mannered illustrator for Dazzle Comics who becomes, in time of need, the "Alabaster Avenger." SUPREME: THE RETURN - it's a read supreme.
Graphic SF Reader More of some decent Supreme work. Alan Moore and company produce this homage to Superman, and offer some meta-commentary on the Superman character, and the Superman family, with some nifty flashback work.
You could burn all the non-Moore Supreme work and I don't think anyone anywhere would miss it.
How? When you think of all the ways that spandex heroes have been examined and recontextualized in the last 20 years, and then realize that at least half of the best of that was Alan Moore... The only real surprise is that he keeps coming up with bold, subtle, loving takes on a genre and form that most people still think of as shallow and vapid. How does he do it?
Beautiful writing Another Rob Liefeld production, luckily this story has none of his art even though the characters were created by him. Or rather regurgitated and made grander than they were by Alan Moores expert writing and artists like Steve Skroce and Chris Sprouse drawing part of the story. But then you also have real sloppy artwork that while is not as bad anything Rob would draw, its still pretty rushed and not that great. If you want to read old Superman with cheese, this ones for you. This one actually took me by surprise as Alan Moore elevated what were once cheap rip-offs created by Rob of the big Marvel and DC characters. Yeah, I really liked the story in this one and occasionally, the art as well. Trouble is Rob Liefeld could really do something cool with these once lame characters he has created if only he had no hand in drawing or writing them. The bottom line is, he needs to stay away from his creations creatively and from comics in general. The man has mediocrity and Uwe Boll written all over his work.
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