Final Crisis

Final Crisis #1-3; Final Crisis: Superman Beyond #1-2; Final Crisis: Submit; Final Crisis #4-6

It’s often criticized as being tough to follow, but Final Crisis is one of my favorites, in large part because of how incredible Final Crisis: Superman Beyond is. It’s an unambitious story about the last battle between good and evil and how Superman fights vampiric stories across the entire multiverse.

There are three sections to the story. The first, consisting of the first 3 issues of Final Crisis proper, covers the downfall of the planet. The war between New Genesis and Apokalips is over, and the New Gods lost, killed by Darkseid, who with his minions, has infected Earth. Operating out of Bludhaven, Darkseid is gunning for Superman hard: his agent, Libra, kills the Martian Manhunter and in an effort to impress the Society of Super-Villains, manages to put Lois Lane on her death bed. The first part of Final Crisis ends with Wonder Woman infected by a mind control virus (delivered by the claws of a corrupt, perverted Mary Marvel) and Oracle realizing that the entire internet has been rigged to deliver the Anti-Life Equation across the world.

The second part is told through Final Crisis: Superman Beyond. Superman, at Lois’s death bed, is made an offer by Zillo Valla, a Monitor trying to save the multiverse. Superman joins her on her ship and travels between worlds through the Bleed (which we saw in The Multiversity #1), joining Captain Marvel (from Thunderworld), Captain Atom (this is where he went when he was “killed” in Pax Americana, and I don’t think that’s a hatchet order invention: I think that was Morrison’s intention), Ultraman (from JLA: Earth 2), and Overman (who we will meet again in Mastermen) to stop the ship, the Ultima Thule, from crashing into various Earths: the home of the Revengers; Doc Fate’s Earth 20; and Earth 17, home of the Atomic Knights.

The ship eventually crashes in Limbo, a concept from Morrison’s time writing Animal Man: the place where comic characters go when they’re not being used, and the various Supermen discover a book that has every story ever written in it. They learn the history of the multiverse, and in that history, Ultraman finds god: Mandrakk, the evil vampire Monitor feeding off of the stories produced by the multiverse. Eventually, Ultraman is unwantedly fused with Superman to ascend to Monitor-space and they fight off Mandrakk and his armies, and save the Orrery of Worlds, letting Superman return to “our” Earth with a sample of the Bleed (the substance that exists between universes, the ultimate healing liquid) that he gives to Lois and saves her.

If that sounds insane, it’s because it is. It was originally printed in 3D and came with those ridiculous red and blue glasses, to simulate Superman’s new power, “4D vision.” It’s densely packed with almost every ridiculous idea Morrison had about the character. Captain Atom actually comes out quite nicely here, going from the disconnected sociopath in Pax Americana to figuring out his role in the multiverse and being the catalyst behind the fight that eventually saves everything, and Morrison’s midpoint in his Superman saga ends with Superman revealing what to put on his tombstone: “To Be Continued.”

Bear with me for a second: I’m going to try and zip through the rest of this and focus on big points and what’s relevant to Superman.

We then jump back to the remains of Earth: Final Crisis: Submit is about how the Tattooed Man goes from bouncer at the Darkseid Club to a hero in the Justice League’s last Earthbound outpost, which we see fall to the Anti-Lifed up vast majority of the world in Final Crisis #4. In issue 5, the final battle in Bludhaven begins and we see the birth of Nix Uotan, SUPERJUDGE, as he had been banished to Earth by his colleagues, but he rediscovers his power when Metron’s ghost solves a Rubiks Cube in 17 moves (the fastest ever). In issue 6, the world ends: the heroes win in Bludhaven, but lose on the Watchtower as a black hole at the center of creation starts to collapse all of reality. Batman escapes captivity at Darkseid’s hand and uses a radion bullet to shoot Darkseid just before he’s struck by the Omega Sanction. Superman comes back from the future (he was hanging out with the various Legions of Super Heroes from a handful of timelines in the no-bullshit all-time classic Final Crisis: Legion of Three Worlds) finds Batman’s corpse, and gets super pissed.

If you are buying the collected version of these, don’t be surprised when you get two Batman stories (from Batman #682-683) dropped in after Final Crisis #5. They belong there, but aren’t relevant to the outcome of either our Morrison hatchet order or the conclusion to Final Crisis, they just add some really intense background to the story Batman goes through.

Collected in Final Crisis

Ultra Comics #1

The comic that was spreading the infection through the multiverse in Multiversity is one of the toughest to understand in this entire arc, but if you look at it as a Superman story, it works very well.

Ultra Comics is a new hero created on Earth 33. He’s powered by imagination, by the collective power of being read and reread simultaneously, and he’s let loose on a decimated world. He runs into a broad analogue of the Newsboy Legion transporting a giant Rubiks Cube through the streets of a broken, deserted Manhattan under attack from giant insects. He’s captured by a group of Ultras from various other stories and nearly killed by Intellectron of the Gentry, before he heals himself and beats back the Gentry attack by unleashing snarky Tumblr comments.

This fits between the last two issues of Final Crisis really well for a lot of reasons, but the aesthetic ones are really strong: after Final Crisis #6, it’s easy to imagine the busted up New York City existing simultaneously to the battle in Bludhaven, made even easier by the fact that Doug Mahnke draws Ultra Comics and both of the final issues of Final Crisis.

Thematically, I think it fits there incredibly well, too. Ultra is the Superman stand in here, and he represents Superman without an audience. He’s a living comic book, one who reflects the times (there’s a sequence where he goes through ‘60s, ‘70s, ‘80s, and ‘90s adventures in 4 panels) but at his core, he’s still just four colors of ink, pulp and a gem that represents imagination. But with no one there to read his stories, he fades to nothing – this is super meta, but his death comes when you close the comic.

Collected in The Multiversity

Final Crisis #7

Which brings us to the end of Final Crisis, framed in large part as a bedtime story about Superman told by Supergirl to the last remaining humans after the collapse of the multiverse. Renee Montoya, at this point the Question, is travelling the multiverse gathering Supermen for a final battle as Supergirl tells the collected people what happened as the world fell: Darkseid was ripped out of Dan Turpin’s body by the Black Racer and the best (Wally West) and third best (the recently returned Barry Allen) Flashes; the villains, led by Lex Luthor, held back Darkseid’s armies; and Wonder Woman was healed of the mind control virus and freed the world from Anti-Life with her lasso.

Then Superman shrinks and freezes the remaining humans, builds the Miracle Machine (a magical wish granting machine), but before he can activate it, he’s attacked by Mandrakk and his vampiric servant, Ultraman. But Nix shows up with Captain Carrot, the Forever People, the Supermen of the multiverse and the Green Lantern Corps, and they successfully destroy Mandrakk. Superman puts the multiverse right with the Miracle Machine by wishing for a happy ending for everyone.

Scattering Multiversity throughout the rest of the Superman stories sets up contrasts with points Morrison’s been making his whole career, but it rearranges the narrative of Final Crisis at the same time. Final Crisis is now Nix’s origin story, showing how he got to the point of being SUPERJUDGE from just being a junior Monitor, and it’s easier to keep your eye on the end of FC, that the story is as much about Mandrakk as it is about Darkseid, with the story of the Monitors weaving in and out of the whole narrative.

Collected in Final Crisis

The Multiversity Guidebook #1

The only issue of The Multiversity that isn’t a Superman story is a fun Batman one. The Multiversity Guidebook only describes part of what the comic does: it is an illustrated guide to the 52 universes of the known multiverse and a map of the cosmological composition of that multiverse (with the Hall of Heroes at the center, the Source Wall -on the edge, and the various realms of deities ringing the 52 Earths). But it also uses Kamandi and Omac (not the cool one from the Dan Didio/Keith Giffen New 52 story. A different one) to tell the history of the DC Universe, from the formation of the multiverse by the Monitors, through “The Flash of 2 Worlds” and the various Crises and Zero Hour and right up through Flashpoint.

But it also tells how the Transmatter Arrays work, and how the comics that are repeatedly showing up across the series are influencing other stories within the books, and it tells a pretty entertaining Batman story: the Lil’ League of Earth 42 is under attack by the Legion of Sivanas, and Atomic Knight Batman finds himself trapped in that world. Chibi Batman finds a copy of The Multiversity Guidebook on the ground and figures out that the Arrays are pathways to other worlds, and discovers that the other members of the Lil’ League are robots with perhaps a sinister purpose. He figures out how to turn the array on as Atomic Knight Batman is holding off the Sivanas, and Lil’ Batman ends up on Atomic Knight’s Earth (Earth 17) while Atomic Knight Batman shows up in the Hall of Heroes just before it falls under attack by the Gentry.

Collected in The Multiversity

And now, for the final act…

All-Star Superman and The End

All-Star Superman #1-5

Structurally, All-Star Superman isn’t the geometrical Tool album that much of Morrison’s other work is. It’s a combination of one-offs, mini-arcs, or two-parters that all link together to tell one broader story, about Superman finding out that he’s dying, then performing his twelve great feats before he passes. But there is a point after issue 5 that feels like the story starts rolling downhill towards a grand conclusion.

Arguably the pair’s greatest work that doesn’t involve cyborg pets that make me cry a lot and really hard and then I get a little embarrassed, All-Star Superman is Morrison and Frank Quitely’s masterpiece, widely regarded as one of the best Superman stories ever told. In it, Lex Luthor sets Superman up to die by sabotaging a mission to the Sun: when Superman saves the astronauts, the solar radiation from being in its corona supercharges his cells, causing them to start to die.

Accepting his own mortality, Superman then sets out to settle his affairs, and by that I mean “fix the whole world.” (Please note: this is the exact point in writing when I had a flash of panic on Twitter about the end of New 52 Superman. I started writing this to react to terrible, terrible movie Superman, but it kinda turned into a dirge for the Superman who started in Action Comics).

The first five issues have more or less definitive moments between Superman and Lois, Superman and Jimmy and Superman and Lex: it’s Clark coming to terms with the Earthbound side of his life. He tells Lois, then makes her a serum that gives her the same powers he has for 24 hours; he gets dosed with black kryptonite while saving Jimmy at P.R.O.J.E.C.T. (the final evolution of Cadmus, into good guys inspired by Superman’s legacy instead of trying to design a weapon to kill him), so Jimmy shoots himself full of Doomsday formula to stop the Superdickery; and Clark interviews Lex on death row, challenging him to be greater while appearing to bumble his way through a prison riot.

Collected in All-Star Superman

Mastermen #1

Morrison has been fascinated with the idea of Kal-el’s ship crashing in Nazi Germany for years, and here he gets to expand on the idea. Mastermen is fundamentally a tragedy: baby Kal-el is found by the Nazis in occupied Sudetenland in 1938 and raised in the reich to be their ultimate weapon. He wins the war for Germany, eventually leading the Nazis through Washington D.C. and creating a world where German is the baseline language.

Then he has to live with himself: we discover that he was unaware of the atrocities of the Nazis until after the war, and he’s wracked with guilt for helping them win. At a memorial service for Overgirl (whose death was a plot point in Final Crisis) when the New Reichsmen (think Nazi Justice League: Underwaterman/Aquaman, Brunnhilde/Wonder Woman, Leatherwing/Batman) come under attack from Uncle Sam and the Freedom Fighters, they capture the Human Bomb and take him to the Eagle’s Nest (the Justice League watchtower).

It takes about half the issue to see the Overman from Final Crisis, the one who helped the heroes fight off Mandrakk’s armies and sacrificed his own blood so Zillo Valla could live. Jurgen Olsen, in a tv interview, calls Overman on sympathizing with the Freedom Fighters and expressing remorse for the atrocities committed by the Nazis to create the “utopia” they were living in, but doesn’t press the issue. Then, during the annual performance of Wagner’s Ring Cycle, the Human Bomb goes off in the Eagle’s Nest, sending it crashing down to destroy Metropolis, despite Overman’s best efforts. Olsen narrates the entire issue, and he closes it by pointing out that he believes Overman knew what was going to happen, that he was party to the terrorist attack that killed millions when the Eagle’s Nest crashed into a city full of people.

None of this is Supermannish (Supermanly? Maybe just Super? Yeah, let’s just go with Super). Clark Kent Superman (or Calvin Ellis Superman, or Captain Marvel, or any of the good versions of Superman we’ve seen to this point) would have never been party to the atrocities of Nazi Germany, and if he inadvertently was, he would have figured out a way to solve the problem that didn’t include killing millions.

The point of Mastermen was to show a Superman without the nurturing component that the Kents provided. Jonathan and Martha provided his moral compass: take that away, Godwin’s Law it, and you get a Superman who still finds his way to a similar moral compass, but not before doing horrible things. You see points of comparison on both sides of this issue: with how Superman reacts to being turned into an asshole by the black kryptonite in All-Star Superman #4, and again in the following issue.

Collected in The Multiversity

All-Star Superman #6-12

The back half of All-Star deals with Superman settling his Kryptonian accounts: he saves the world from a Bizarro invasion, then saves himself from Bizarro Earth; stops two Kryptonian explorers from taking over the planet before saving their lives by parking them in the Phantom Zone; and he defeats Solaris the Tyrant Sun (which you might remember from DC One Million) before inspiring Lex to be a better man. But before that, the entire story hinges on where it flips from his Earth heritage to his Kryptonian.

The sixth issue of All-Star Superman goes back in time to when Clark is still a teenager learning to use his powers. Three mysterious men show up to “help with the harvest,” but are actually Supermen from varying points in the future who travelled to Clark’s teenage years to stop an escaped Chronovore, a monster that eats time. Before they can stop it, it eats three minutes of his life. Three minutes he needed to save Pa from a heart attack, preventing young Superman from saving him. Here’s what he says at the funeral:

“Jonathan Kent taught me that the strong have to stand up for the weak and that bullies don’t like being bullied back. He taught me that a good heart is worth more than all the money in the bank. He taught me about life and death. He taught me that the measure of a man lies not in what he says but what he does. And he showed me by example how to be tough, and how to be kind and how to dream of a better world. Thanks, Pa. Those are lessons I’ll never forget.”

Moreso than the often-cited panel where he saves Regan from suicide in issue 10, I think this is the crux of All-Star Superman: that he’s the sum of his parts, that these varying components – Jimmy, Lois, the Planet, his Kryptonian heritage, his status as an adoptee and immigrant, both sets of parents, even Lex – all combined to make the hero that saves the sun. Issue 10 is usually called one of the best Superman comics of all time, but I think 6 is stronger, and I think the whole story is worth every bit of praise piled on it.

Collected in All-Star Superman

The Multiversity #2

There is one thing noticeably absent from Morrison’s summary of everything that’s great about Superman from All-Star Superman, and that’s the Justice League. But! The conclusion of The Multiversity is all about the League.

It jumps around the multiverse to begin, but very quickly picks up where both issue 1 and the Guidebook left off, with the Hall of Heroes under attack from Hellmachine and the fake Rock of Eternity built by the Sivanas, and Nix Uotan as DARK SUPERJUDGE and our Superman stand in, battled by the combined might of a multiversal Justice League and a group of Avengers analogues.

The League battles Nix as he tries to solve a Rubiks Cube in 17 moves and open all the doors of reality to the Gentry, who plan to then destroy the multiverse. But he’s defeated by Red Racer, who summons every Flash from 52 worlds for an infinite mass punch, then immediately references the scene in JLA where Flash punches the Hyperclan speedster into space. With all the doors to reality open, heroes come pouring in from every world, and the Gentry are defeated. After that, a team of Justice League analogues – Captain Carrot (Martian Manhunter), Atomic Knight Batman, Aquawoman, President Superman, the Thunderer (Wonder Woman), Abin Sur (the Green Lantern of Earth 20) and Red Racer lead a group back to the Thunderer’s world, where they’re greeted by a giant that looks like Trigon but all in shadows, with Ultra Comics’ logo on his forehead, who calls himself The Empty Hand.

We could talk about the craft that went into this, like the panel layouts once the Rubiks Cube is solved shifting into an infinite grid; or we could talk about how the Empty Hand represents DC Editorial, and how by fighting off the Gentry, Operation Justice Incarnate proved the value of a multiverse as an editorial tool; or we could talk about the Gentry being plagues that affect comics specifically (ennui, overanalysis, a flooded market, inanity, etc). But this is a Superman story, and that’s the point too: Nix planned for the attack, and ultimately won because he trusted that the heroes of the multiverse would be up to the task. Comics are saved because Superman has faith in them.