Superman's abilities and relationships have changed over time. Editors and writers used the process of retroactive continuity , or retcon , to adjust to changes in popular culture, eliminate restrictive segments of the mythos, and permit contemporary storylines. These changes, while significant, permit the retention of the core elements that make Superman an iconic character.
The story of Superman's origin parallels that of other cultural heroes and religious figures [1] who were spirited away as infants from places where they were in danger.
In the original Golden Age comics (as shown in Action Comics #1 (1938), Superman (volume 1) #1 (1939), and Superman (volume 1) #61 (1949), as well as in later post-Golden Age stories such as Secret Origins (volume 2) #1 (1986)), it was revealed that, discovering that the planet Krypton was about to explode, noted scientist Jor-L was unable to convince his fellow Kryptonians to save themselves, but did manage to construct a spaceship to save his and his wife Lora's infant son, Kal-L. The ship was launched just as the planet finally exploded, with Kal-L landing on Earth around the end of World War I ; his landing was watched by passing motorists John and Mary Kent. The couple took the infant to an orphanage , and soon returned to adopt the child, naming him "Clark." (The names of Jor-L, Kal-L, Lora, John and Mary were eventually changed to the more modern " Jor-El ", "Kal-El", "Lara", "Jonathan" and "Martha" by the the late 1940s/early 1950s).
Clark grew up in an ordinary childhood on the Kent family farm, slowly discovering that he possessed various superpowers, but unaware of his Kryptonian origins. After the deaths of his parents in 1938, Clark decided to use his powers for the benefit of humanity, constructing a stylized costume and moving to the nearby city of Metropolis. Obtaining employment at the newspaper the Daily Star , Clark soon made his debut as the world's first superhero, Superman. Eventually, Superman's powers increased over the 1940s from his earliest appearances, including vast increases in his superstrength and gaining the ability to fly (his earliest comics featured Superman able to only leap about an eighth of a mile at a time). In Superman (volume 1) #61 (1949), Superman finally learned of the existence of Krypton.
During the 1940s, Superman also became a member of the Justice Society of America , though was shown only participating in two cases in the original Golden Age stories ( All-Star Comics #8 and #36).
After the establishment of DC Comics' Multiverse in the 1960s, it was established retroactively that the Golden Age version of Superman lived on the parallel world of Earth-Two , while his Silver Age counterpart lived on Earth-One . A series of stories in the 1970s established that the Earth-Two Superman, after losing his memory thanks to the Wizard, had married his version of Lois Lane in the 1950s ( Action Comics #484, (1978)), followed by having him become the editor-in-chief of the Daily Star . In the late 1970s, Superman discovered a rocket of Kryptonian origin landing on Earth, which contained his cousin, Kara Zor-L; after acclimating to Earth, Kara became the superheroine Power Girl . Superman also continued in serving with the revived Justice Society as a member; he was revealed to have been a founding member of the group in the team's origin story in DC Special #29. In the early 1980s, Superman was also shown to have been a member of the All-Star Squadron during World War II.
During the 1985 miniseries Crisis on Infinite Earths , the various parallel Earths were collapsed into one, retroactively eliminating Earth-Two and all that it contained. The Earth-Two Superman, along with his wife Lois, were spared from annihilation, however, and entered a "paradise" dimension at the end of the series with the Superboy of Earth-Prime and the Alexander Luthor of Earth-Three . Superman wasn't seen again until the miniseries The Kingdom in 1999, where it was revealed that he had found a means of exiting his dimension, but chose not to at that time. In Infinite Crisis #1 (2005), Superman was shown as having been observing events in the post-Crisis DC Universe from his dimension, and finally decided to re-enter the mainstream DC Universe. He has since revealed himself to be the current Power Girl's cousin (she having been one of the few to survive Crisis without a clear history), and has revealed his plan to restore Earth-2 as the "true" Earth - thereby retconning the current DC Universe out of existence, destroying it.
[ edit ]During the 1940s and 1950s, various familiar elements of the Superman mythos were gradually added, and became firmly established by the late 1950s. This included a greater emphasis on the science fiction elements of Superman's world, including his Kryptonian origins, as well as an updated version of his origin story.
In the version that had become extant by the early 1960s (and memorably summarized at the start of each episode of the 1950s Adventures of Superman television series), Superman was born on Krypton as Kal-El, the son of Jor-El , a scientist and leader, and Lara , a former astronaut. When Kal-El was two or three years old, Jor-El learned that Krypton was doomed to explode, and he brought this to the attention of Krypton's ruling leaders, the Science Council. Disbelieving Jor-El's prediction, they refused to warn their fellow Kryptonians, and forbade Jor-El to do so. Jor-El and Lara promised that they wouldn't leave Krypton (Lara vowed to stay by her husband's side rather than accompany Kal-El to Earth, so that his ship would have a better chance of surviving the trip), and decided to use the little time remaining to save their son. Moments before Krypton exploded, Jor-El launched Kal-El in a rocket ship towards Earth, knowing that Earth's lower gravity and yellow sun would give the boy extraordinary powers.
Kal-El's ship landed in a field near the town of Smallville , and was discovered by Jonathan and Martha Kent (in the earliest comics, the Kents were named "John" and "Mary"; in a 1942 text novel and the 1950s television series The Adventures of Superman, the Kents were named "Sarah" and "Eben."). They named him Clark , after Martha's maiden name. After formally adopting him, the Kents raised him on their farm through his preschool years. By the time Clark started school, the Kents had sold their farm and moved into Smallville, where they purchased a general store. During this time, both Clark and the Kents had discovered Clark's amazing powers, and, with the Kents realizing the good he could do with his powers, began training their adopted son to use his powers wisely. At the age of eight, Clark adopted the superhero identity Superboy , and began to fight crime, both in the present and in a far future time as a member of the Legion of Super-Heroes . After he graduated from high school and the Kents died, Clark moved to Metropolis to attend Metropolis University. During his junior year, Clark changed his superhero name to Superman. After graduating with a degree in journalism, Clark was hired by the Daily Planet .
In 1971, the Galaxy Broadcasting System and its president, Morgan Edge , purchased the Daily Planet , with Edge subsequently naming Clark Kent as the lead anchorman for its Metropolis television station, WGBS-TV. Later in the 1970s, Clark would be joined in his newscasts by childhood friend Lana Lang as a co-anchor.
This version of Superman was retired in 1986 after the continuity-altering miniseries Crisis on Infinite Earths , given a sendoff in the noncanonical story Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow? .
In 1986, after the Crisis on Infinite Earths miniseries (usually referred to as simply "Crisis"), DC Comics hired writer/artist John Byrne to recreate the Superman character and retell the Superman mythos, reshaping the previous forty-eight years of stories by putting several new twists on the established mythos. In this "post-Crisis" version, as seen in Byrne's miniseries The Man of Steel , Superman—like all "post-Crisis" Kryptonians— was created through in-vitro fertilization on Krypton . While a fetus, he escaped Krypton's destruction in a spacecraft (his "birthing matrix" with a rocket engine attached), and landed some fifty years later on Earth, just outside of Smallville, Kansas. Effectively this Superman was "born" on Earth, and was a "son" of Earth as much as Krypton. As in the original version, he was found and adopted by the Kents, and raised like a normal human. In the retelling, Clark's powers developed gradually, beginning with his invulnerability, and he didn't fly until he was a teenager. After leaving Smallville, he traveled the world before settling in Metropolis, completing his education, and going to work at the Daily Planet. The remodeled Clark did not become a superhero until just before starting work at the Daily Planet, when he prevented an experimental spacecraft from crashing in Metropolis. The Kents were kept alive during Clark's transition to Superman.
In the post-Crisis comics, Clark Kent is presented more as the "real" person, with Superman the secret identity that he presents to the world to prevent his enemies from harming his family or friends. Also post-Crisis, people do not suspect that Superman is hiding his real identity because he wears no mask. The concept that Clark is the real man, and the greater emphasis on his earthly upbringing, is a deliberate reversal of the earlier, pre-Crisis version. As in the original continuity, Lois Lane is Clark Kent/Superman's love interest. In the early 1990s, Lois and Clark fell in love. Clark soon told her he was Superman, which caused a brief strain in their relationship, but they eventually married, in the mid-1990s special Superman: The Wedding Album .
A 2004 miniseries, Birthright , introduced further changes to Superman's origin story, bringing back some of the pre-Crisis elements eliminated by John Byrne, including an emphasis on alien heritage over human upbringing, and introducing elements of the Smallville television series.
Among the changes made, the "birthing matrix" explanation was replaced by the more well-known rocket ship explanation, with Kal-El sent from Krypton as an infant, not a fetus. Also in the current portrayal, there are two portrayal styles of Clark Kents--"Smallville Clark" and "Metropolis Clark." "Smallville Clark" is the real person (who is also Kal-El and Superman) while "Metropolis Clark" is the mild-mannered persona he uses to blend in with other people.
Unlike the Man of Steel revision, this origin doesn't eliminate most of the previous post-Crisis Superman stories told, though what impact it will have on future stories (and some previous post-Crisis stories' status) remains to be seen.
Clark Joseph Kent is the civilian secret identity of Superman. (Note that some sources claim that his middle-name is in fact "Jerome," in honor of creator Jerry Siegel. The name Jerome was used in the "Seasons Greedings" episode of the television series Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman . It was also featured in several episodes of the series " Smallville ".) Though never receiving the same popular attention as the superheroic alter ego, the personality, idea, and name of Clark Kent have entered into popular culture in their own right, becoming synonymous with secret identities and fronts for ulterior motives and activities.
As first written in the earliest Superman comics, Clark Kent's primary purpose was to fulfill the basic dramatic concept that a costumed hero cannot operate as a costumed hero twenty-four hours a day, or throughout the entirety of a comic book series. As such, Kent acted as little more than a front for Superman's activities. Although his name and history were taken from his early life with his adoptive Earth parents, everything about Kent was staged for the benefit of his alternate identity — he acquired a job as a reporter for the Daily Planet for the convenience of receiving late-breaking news before the general public, providing an excuse for being present at crime scenes and having an occupation where his whereabouts do not have to be strictly accounted for as long as he makes his story deadlines. However, in order to draw attention away from the correlation between Kent and Superman, Clark Kent adopted a largely passive and introverted personality, applying conservative mannerisms, a higher-pitched voice, and a slight slouch. This personality is typically described as "mild-mannered," perhaps most famously by the opening narration of Max Fleischer 's Superman animated theatrical shorts . These traits extended into Kent's wardrobe, typically consisting of a blue business suit, a red necktie, black-rimmed glasses, and combed-back hair.
Kent wears his Superman costume underneath his street clothes, which lends itself to easy transferrence between the two personalities. However, the purpose of this convention outside of fiction is largely dramatic, allowing Kent to rip open his shirt and reveal the familiar "S" insignia when called into action. When in action, Superman usually stores his Clark Kent clothing inside a secret pouch hidden inside of his cape, though some stories have shown him leaving his clothes in some covert location for later retrieval.
In the wake of John Byrne's The Man of Steel reboot of Superman continuity, many traditional aspects of Clark Kent were dropped in favor of giving him a more aggressive and extroverted personality, including such aspects as making Kent a top football player in high school, along with being a successful author. Recently, some aspects of this change have been dropped, in favor of bringing back elements of the earlier "mild-mannered" version of Kent.
In Metropolis, Superman (as Clark Kent) works as a reporter at the Planet, "a great metropolitan newspaper" which allows him to keep track of ongoing events where he might be of help. Largely working on his own, his identity is easily kept secret. Fellow reporter Lois Lane became the object of Clark's/Superman's romantic affection. Lois's affection for Superman and her rejection of Clark's clumsy advances have been a recurring theme in Superman comics, television, and movies.
Various reasons over the decades have been offered for why people haven't suspected Superman and Clark Kent of being one and the same. In the 1970s, one such suggestion was that the lenses of Clark Kent's glasses (made of Kryptonian materials) constantly amplified a low-level super- hypnosis power, thereby creating the illusion of others viewing Clark Kent as a weak and frailer being; however, this reason was abandoned almost as quickly as it was introduced, since it had various flaws (such as stories where Batman would disguise himself as Clark Kent, among others).
Another reason given in the late 1980s was that Superman would vibrate his face slightly so that photographs would only show his features as a blur, thus preventing the danger of photographs of both identities being reliably compared. However, more recent stories showing Superman being photographed have tended to ignore this factor.
The main means of Superman protecting his secret identity has usually been the physical distinctions between Superman and Clark Kent: Clark Kent is usually shown as wearing conservative clothing, slightly slouching, and speaking in a higher-pitched voice, along with adopting more introverted mannerisms than his heroic alter-ego. Traditionally, Lois Lane and others would often suspect Superman of truly being Clark Kent (and vice-versa), though more recent comics often feature the general public assuming that Superman (because he doesn't wear a mask, suggesting he has nothing to hide) doesn't have a secret identity; in Superman (2nd series) #2 (1987), for example, Lex Luthor was once told the truth, but he dismissed the idea because he could not believe that someone so powerful would want another identity. Also in the modern stories, Lois Lane never suspected the dual identity, beyond one time when she visited the Kent farm, where she was told that Superman was "brought up" alongside Clark like a brother.
Some fans have noted that the disguise is effective presuming Clark is as skilled an actor as Christopher Reeve . The actor's portrayal of Clark in the feature film series was praised for making the disguise's effectiveness credible to audiences.
When crises arise, Clark quickly changes into Superman. In the Fleischer animated series of theatrical cartoons, he often ducked into a telephone booth to make the transformation. In the comic books he rarely does so, favoring the Daily Planet's storeroom. As a dramatic plot device, Clark often has to quickly improvise in order to find a way to change unnoticed. For example in the first Christopher Reeve Superman movie, Kent is comically unable to use a newer, open-kiosk pay phone, so he enters a revolving door and changes clothes while spinning within it at superspeed. Thus made invisible, he appeared to enter the building as Kent and exit seconds later as Superman.
In the current Superman continuity, it was revealed that the Kent family in the 19th century were noted abolitionists who assisted the personnel of the Underground Railroad , like Harriet Tubman . The family moved to the territory of Kansas during the infamous Bleeding Kansas period to promote the cause of creating a free state by running a newspaper for the region.
Unfortunately, the family patriarch was murdered by Border Ruffians who wanted to silence him. Furthermore, the sons, Nathaniel and Jeb, argued and had a parting of the ways so deep about slavery that they found themselves on opposing sides of the American Civil War with Jeb fighting with the notorious Confederate guerrilla unit lead by William Quantrill . Nathaniel fought for the North and married a half-Native American woman who gave him a special traditional spiritual symbol that was apparently a forerunner and inspiration for Superman's chest symbol.
After the war, Nathaniel became a sheriff in Smallville, while Jeb became the leader of a group of bandits. Eventually, Jeb discovered he had a son out of wedlock years ago, and allowed him to join his gang. Unfortunately, his son turned out to be a murderous sociopath and Jeb approached his estranged brother to arrange a trap to stop him.
Regrettably, in springing the trap, the son mortally wounded his father before being killed himself and Jeb fully reconciled with Nate before dying. Nate remained in Smallville and there the Kents have stayed for generations, including Jonathan and Martha Kent, Superman's adoptive parents.
Originally, Superman's personality could be rough and destructive. Although nowhere near as cold-blooded as the early Batman , the early Superman did not have a "no-kill" policy and evildoers would occasionally meet fatal ends when dealing with the hero. In one very early story in which the government would not help maintain low income areas unless a disaster occurred, Superman went on a rampage and created one. Superman is also nearly always portrayed as having had some hand in World War II , when the comics' timeline permits.
In the Silver Age, as superhero stories became more oriented toward young readers, the writers moved toward his better known " boy scout " persona. While the Golden Age Superman created a disaster to force the government to rebuild derelict housing, this Superman would both demolish and rebuild housing in areas that needed it. In fact, so far did the writers move from the grim and gritty original version, that he tended to be naive, even about his deadliest enemies. Also, while the original version was of apparent average intelligence, Superman now was genius level, and the intellectual equivalent of Lex Luthor. Even so, Superman's capacity for a violent anger is a key element to many of the most dramatic moments in his appearances, since it is this sort of telling snapshot into his psyche that allows readers and watchers to see that Superman's goodness is not inherent to his being, but learned, like it is with us.
This is why, despite the emphasis on Superman having powers "far beyond those of mortal men," his name referred also to his goodness. While Jor-El sent Kal-El to Earth because he felt the human race had the capacity to be great and good if they wished to be, it can be argued that Kal-El chose to become Superman and a force for good. The upbringing by Ma and Pa Kent he received is a highly potent symbol for "old fashioned values," and this helps ground the character. It might also be argued that Superman seems out of place and out of touch with his world because he is, in fact, the product of "better times" more than the real world.
Superman has been willing to lay down his life or sacrifice his powers for good. He rescues cats from trees and participates in community fund-raisers. He often acts behind the scenes and lets others receive the credit. His modesty and humility catches his foes and critics off-guard, as they do not understand why he spends his life helping others and doing good.
Recent writers have attempted to deepen Superman's persona and provide a rationale for his goodness. They reveal his self-doubts, and his fear that he might abuse his powers and become a monster, subject to no one. He therefore makes it a point of submitting to authority, helping him to feel a restraint on his actions. In an extraordinary show of mutual respect, Superman has given Batman a ring of green kryptonite , so that if he ever lost his reason, posing a danger to himself or to humans, Batman could use the ring to defeat him.
This line of thinking, that Superman is a hero as deeply conflicted with his gifts as Batman is with his past, is key to the modern interpretation of Superman not as a better man, but what is best in man. It is also important that Superman often struggles with vast social issues, as when he attempted to tackle world hunger in Alex Ross and Paul Dini 's 1999 graphic novel Peace on Earth . Through these conflicts, discussions of good and evil are formed, as Superman struggles with restraint in the face of bigotry, avarice, and cruelty. In this manner, Superman's excessive arsenal of powers is rendered secondary to his ability to convince others to act.
This was a further motivation for Superman becoming a reporter, for it is then possible that his physical abilities give him no unfair advantage in a field where the critical skills are intellectual (although his editor, Perry White, praised him in Superman: The Movie as "the fastest typist I have ever seen"). In current continuity, Clark Kent writes fiction in his spare time, and has had two books published, "The Janus Contract" and "Under a Yellow Sun".
Far from a perfect individual, Superman is often pictured with a sense of childish innocence mixed with patriarchal restraint. He is also a man with an incredible depth of feeling, since he lives within his own mind as much as he does in the reality of society, often struggling with the differences between the right answer and the practical one. In many ways, Superman is truly one of the most "human" heroes conceived, since he responds to emotional grief in stark contrast to the way he shrugs off bullets, bombs, and death-rays. Superman's daily martyrdom is reflected tellingly in print during his reappearance in the 1996 miniseries Kingdom Come , where he is pictured as a bearded carpenter with a long beam of wood across his back, mirroring a Christ -like image of a man who gave himself for a world that, in that storyline, did not love him.
Superman's "lily white" persona has been mocked, ridiculed, and spoofed, especially in recent comic book history, when "grim and gritty" comics dominated the market. Superman may seem old-fashioned and even quaint compared to the "dark avengers" who currently command the lion's share of the market, and this is intentional. Superman fights fair long after both sides have begun swinging below the belt, knowing that his vast powers require him to act with equal restraint. On several recent occasions, Batman has faced Superman, and Batman has served as a foil to Superman's goodness; Batman, in his more recent incarnations, won't hesitate to use guile or underhanded tactics to gain an advantage, while Superman will be overly hesitant to use his natural gifts as an unfair edge. Indeed, Batman has undergone an increasingly dark makeover. However, Superman continues to be a driving force in the medium after more than sixty years, continuing to serve as an " old school " hero in a time of increasingly darker, anti-heroic superhero characters.
In the Infinite Crisis storyline launched in 2005, Superman is forced to deal with how his ideals and code of conduct are applicable in the modern (and, some may argue, post- 9/11 ) world. Most recently he has come to terms with the fact that his friend Wonder Woman made the decision to kill Maxwell Lord in order to save Superman's life, and did so without apparent remorse. His immediate reaction to this was to terminate his friendship with Wonder Woman Woman , though the long-term ramifications of the killing on both Superman and Wonder Woman has yet to be played out; Lois Lane has told him she supports Wonder Woman's action.
Superman possesses extraordinary powers which render him, as stated in the lead-in to the 1950s television series, "faster than a speeding bullet , more powerful than a locomotive , and able to leap tall buildings in a single bound". His powers were relatively limited in the early stories, but grew to become near-godlike by the 1980s. After Byrne's 1986 rewrite, Superman's powers were diminished, though have grown again since then. However, the levels of Superman's powers have sometimes varied depending on the media depiction or comic writer in question.
His powers include:
When Superman was revamped in 1986, he became more vulnerable and was no longer omnipotent . As in the original series, writers again gradually increased his powers. Since "coming back to life" during The Death of Superman story arc, Superman can once again survive nuclear blasts, though they leave him wounded and weakened, and he can no longer fly faster than the speed of light or travel through time under his own power. His strength too has increased, to the point of allowing him to move mountains again.
Superman's powers are derived from his Kryptonian biology and Earth's sun (a yellow star ), and are likely increased by Earth's lesser gravity (versus Krypton's higher gravity).
Various explanations have been offered over the years explaining how Superman's powers work. In the earliest comics, all Kryptonians were said to possess superpowers while on Krypton. By the late 1940s, this was changed to Kryptonians only gaining superpowers when under a lower gravity environment such as Earth's. In the early 1960s, after the introduction of Supergirl, this was amended to Kryptonians deriving their powers from mainly exposure to a yellow sun (vs. Krypton's red sun), as well as to a much lesser degree Earth's lower gravity; when under a red sun, a Kryptonian would be completely powerless, even if it was a low-gravity environment. John Byrne in his 1986 reboot suggested that Superman's powers were telekinetic or psionic in their functioning (as a result of the traditional yellow sun explanation), though recent comics such as Birthright have begun to retcon this explanation away. As of Birthright's continuity, Superman's powers again work on a combination of solar conversion and gravitational difference from Krypton.
In 1997, the Superman titles began a year-long storyline; beginning in February 1997, Superman began experiencing problems with his powers---a conventional plot element. Superman soon found that his conventional superpowers were replaced with electrical-based ones that required a special new costume to contain them. Superman (volume 2) #123 introduced both Superman's new powers and his new costume.
Superman appeared with his new costume and powers until the end of 1997, when the comic special Superman Red / Superman Blue saw him split into two beings: a red-colored Superman, or "Superman Red," and the then-current blue-colored Superman, or "Superman Blue". These elements, as well as the comic special title, were a reference to the classic Silver Age " imaginary story " of the same name. After a few months of stories, March and April 1998 saw the comic special Superman Forever, in which the two Supermen united into one whole, with Superman's classic powers and costume restored.
There are some things Superman cannot do. Since he is not human, it is generally thought that he cannot donate blood, tissue, or organs (a story in Superman Family #214 (January 1982) in which Clark Kent gives blood may no longer be canonical). Procedures like surgery are impossible without special equipment. He does not sweat under earthly conditions, as no temperatures are high enough to make him secrete liquid to cool himself down. The issue of whether Superman can father children is humorously explored in the movie Mallrats , as well as in the essay Man of Steel, Woman of Kleenex by sci-fi author Larry Niven (originally published in his 1971 collection All the Myriad Ways ). During the Armageddon 2001 storyline, a possible future was seen in which Lois Lane, with the aid of fertility drugs, was able to conceive. However, a kick from the fetus inflicted fatal internal injuries. On the final episode of the television series Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman , the pair adopted a child who, like Clark, came from mysterious origins, and the "Death of Superman" novel established that Kryptonian DNA is twelve-stranded, and thus incompatible with two-stranded human DNA. But historically, many stories have established that Superman can in some manner have progeny.
Superman is also vulnerable to magical and psionic effects. Although he is no more detrimentally affected by such effects than a normal human would be, this is a significantly exploitable weakness in comparison to his incredible physical resilience.
During the JLA/Avengers crossover, Superman battled Marvel Comics character Thor . Although the thunder god manages to get solid shots on the Last Son of Krypton with his mystical hammer " Mjolnir ", it is evident that Superman's invulnerability still worked to resist the damage from the blows, even going so far as blocking the weapon mid-strike, as well as the lightning from the god's warhammer. It's been established that if the effect of magic is used to simulate or enhance a naturally occuring force (such as the natural elements or concussive energy, for example), Superman's natural defenses reacts to them normally. Effects that specifically alter the established laws of science are another matter entirely such as the natural weapons of supernatural creatures ( vampires , werewolves , etc.), spells and arcane energies targeted at the Man of Steel are treated as cast on any mortal.
Although Superman can resist telepathic/mental manipulation or outright domination thanks to his Kryptonian knowledge of " Torquasm Vo " (a mental training technique), as well as his own indomitable will, his natural powers do not provide him with any special defenses against such attacks.
Superman is also noticably vulnerable to the absorption abilities of the villain known as the Parasite , whose powers are capable of weakening or even killing the Man of Steel.
Given his abilities, personal equipment plays less of a role for Superman than for other superheroes.
The Fortress of Solitude , located in the Arctic in the pre-Crisis version of the mythos and (until recently when it was moved to the Amazon Basin ) in Antarctica in the post-Crisis version, serves as Superman's secret base of operations. The Fortress acts as Superman's personal getaway, although it has communications equipment for urgent messages. While various 1940s comics made mention of Superman having a "mountain retreat," the Fortress in its familiar sense was first introduced in the comics in 1958.
In pre-Crisis continuity, the Fortress included laboratories, a private zoo of alien animals, a room for communication with the Phantom Zone with a projector to place or remove people from it, a Krypton memorial, a trophy room, and a gym with custom exercise equipment. It also had tribute rooms to personal friends like Lois Lane, Jimmy Olsen, Batman , and Clark Kent (to throw off suspicion about his secret identity by visitors unfamiliar with it), where Superman prepared special gifts for each in the event of his death. Most importantly, the Fortress was where Superman stored the bottle city of Kandor , which, in the pre-Crisis, was a Kryptonian city shrunken and stolen by Brainiac prior to the planet's destruction. For years, Superman worked to reverse the city's condition, while also enjoying the opportunity to visit a native community where he was an honored guest.
In post-Crisis continuity, the Fortress was originally created by the Kryptonian artifact, the Eradicator, when Superman tried to dispose of it in Antarctica. The device created the Fortress which contains much of Krypton's technology, including artificially intelligent robots. Superman and fellow superhero Steel encased the Fortress in a tesseract , permitting the Man of Steel to carry the Fortress wherever he travels. Superman also stores in the Fortress various equipment, weapons, and vehicles of Kryptonian design, including a large fighting mecha called a battlesuit and a means of accessing the Phantom Zone.
A trademark of the Fortress in all of its incarnations is a memorial statue of his Kryptonian parents, Jor-El and Lara, holding up a globe of the planet Krypton.
Superman, in the pre-Crisis comics, also had androids that could impersonate himself (as both Superman and as Clark Kent). He largely abandoned them when Earth's pollution began to interfere with their functions. Post-Crisis, Superman at one time had built various Superman robots; however, all but one were destroyed, with the sole remaining robot currently being kept on duty at the Fortress of Solitude. This one remaining robot was destroyed by superheroine Donna Troy , at the expense of her own life, though she was soon resurrected.
For situations involving kryptonite, Superman in the original comics had a collection of lead-lined suits for protection. If his powers were disabled or he needed stronger protection, Superman also had his "Supermobile," a small flying car-like vehicle which could fly anywhere and use its powerful waldo arms to handle outside objects.
Superman's costume was created by Ma Kent ; pre-Crisis, she created it out of the blankets from the rocket that brought him to Earth. Said blankets, like everything else from Krypton under a yellow sun environment such as Earth's, shared Clark's invulnerability. His armor-like costume could also protect others that wore it. While carrying passengers in flight, Superman would wrap them in his cape to protect them from air friction. In the post-Crisis comics, his costume is invulnerable because of the bioelectric field that his cells produce (see how it works ). Recently, the costume was retconned so that it did indeed come from blankets in Kal-El's ship. Although much fun has been made over the years of the unusuality of his costume, it was in fact very practical in Superman's earliest stories due to its gliding cape and unemcumbering body suit ( [5] ).
In the original comics, Clark's eyeglass lenses were made from two small rounded pieces of glass from his spaceship. Since they were of Kryptonian origin, Clark could fire his heat vision through them without melting them (in contrast, the post-Crisis Clark has to lift his glasses [made of ordinary materials] off his eyes when he uses his heat vision). Superman also sometimes carries spare change in his hollowed-out belt buckle, which also doubles as a Justice League communication device. In recent comics (as seen in Superman/Batman ), the belt buckle is made of lead and stored a fairly safe synthetic form of kryptonite for Clark to use. When he had Kandor in his possession in the pre-Crisis comics, all of these improvisations were supplemented by the products of the professional tailors and lenscrafters available in the bottle city.
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