Luthor

I like that early appearances of Superman's nemesis gave him a single name. It makes him more of an institution than even his later corporation could manage. Luthor.

I write about this in the book a bit, but it's worth putting here: one man I interviewed says that he has come to appreciate Luthor as a man who is trying to kill god. Or was it 'a god'? I'd have to go back to my recordings, or my manuscript, neither of which I'm going to do now.

Anyway, that puts the Superman story firmly into one of the two dominant narratives of our time. The first is simply that this reality, the one we all experience and agree upon, is not the real one. It's not really reality. It's just an illusion, and lying underneath or up above is the reality we all crave or know is there and just out of reach. The second dominant narrative, and it's only become so recently (whereas the first is pretty old) is that of humanity overthrowing gods.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, they're related. Gods experience the ultimate reality that humanity longs for.

I wish Luthor always had to wear that suit. Or at least the flower.

Anyway, Luthor is a bit mercurial. Moreso than Superman. Luthor went from mad scientist to mad capitalist. But he's always ego- and megalo-maniacal. The common thing to say about him is that he's the one bad guy to think he's the hero. That's his definition. I tend to think of him in light of something John Steinbeck wrote: to a monster, everyone else is a monster.

So the thing about Luthor comes down to the final issue of All-Star. He gets Superman's powers, and with them he begins to see the world as Superman sees it.  And it's different than the way we normal human beings see it. He sees the ways in which everything is connected, the ways in which we are connected to each other, and how we are all there is. This follows a realization that 'the fundamental forces are yoked by a thought alone.' The animated version gives a slightly different take; instead of 'thought alone', it's 'consciousness.' Either way, he has transcended what humanity can perceive.

So he gets a glimpse into that level of reality lying beneath the one we can see. He becomes a god. Until Superman punches him in the face. He's apparently unconscious for the final few moments during which he has his power.

Sorry, no Quitely art this time.

Luthor in this story (and in "The Black Ring" by Paul Cornell, which ran through Action Comics while Superman was off on New Krypton) gains god-like power. And he uses it to try to kill Superman. I think this is the perfect distillation of Luthor. He could do so many things, but he lets something stop him. I tend to think that, even were Superman out of the picture--or had never come to earth--he wouldn't have done those things anyway. He would never be great enough to satisfy himself; he would always find a foe to fight and waste his time in doing so.

Purple and green.

So, where Superman is the idea of human perfection and perfectability, Luthor is the idea of human flaw-ed-ness. What's the right word for that? Imperfection's too boring. Flawdidity? Superman is what we hope to become. Luthor is what we fear we will always be.

Superman is change. Luthor is the inertia of the present; the ignorance of the need for change, and the pathetic hope that we don't need it at all.

Or maybe Luthor's change, too, but change in the wrong direction. I don't know. I'm just a folklorist.

Luthor-Quintum Update

So I write about All-Star Superman a lot. I like it. It makes people think interesting thoughts. One guy told me that people who don't like All-Star Superman don't have souls. Another guy (actually, several people) seem to think that the character Leo Quintum--invented for the series by author Grant Morrison--is actually Lex Luthor, come back from the future to atone for his crimes by making the world a better place through Science. I wrote about this theory a while back.

What is with this cover?

Interestingly, it showed up in the book Critical Approaches to Comics: Theories and Methods as part of Peter Coogan's essay "Genre: Reconstructing the Superhero in All Star Superman." There's a bit about structuralism, a bit about genres, and he goes through the various proofs that Leo is Lex. He even cites some of the comment threads in which the idea appeared online, originally by Cole Moore Odell. (Coogan wrote Superhero: The Secret Origin of a Genre, a book which I have seen cited a whole lot. It's got an Oedipal analysis of Superman and Luthor, and I have a thing or two to say about that interpretation of the character in my own book--which I hope everyone in the world will get to read some day.)

Denny O'Neil must make a full time job of writing intros now.

People are fascinated by the fact that Morrison himself does not say an unequivocal 'yes' or 'no'.  The whole thing is summed up here. Lurking behind all of this is the notion that Morrison gets the final word on the matter. But does he? People can interpret the stories in whatever manner suits them, even bending the narrative to fit their interpretations, often without realizing they are doing so. Artists tell a story, and people do what they will once they read it.

I'm kind of obsessed with the art of Frank Quitely.

This is really what's at the heart of my study. I spent a lot of hours talking to people to find out just what they think of Superman, how they incorporate him into their lives, and what meanings they find. Some people find it compelling to think of Quintum as a reformed Luthor. They hunt for clues in the manner of conspiracy theorists. They make their arguments. They find meaning there. And in that meaning, we might look for clues as to their own nature, their own worldview. The Quintum-Luthor identity complex is a fascinating look at, perhaps, a need to find redeeming qualities even in the most base of villains. It's the idea that we all can be redeemed in the end.*

More about redemption, though not about Superman, next time.




*It's interesting to note that, while the comic book version of All-Star offers in an off-hand manner the fact that "Even Luthor seemed to find some closure in the face of renewed global calls for his execution", the animated movie of it has Luthor play a more prominent role at the end. The fact that he gives Quintum the formula for Superman that leads to Project and the Superman dynasty suggests a more fully realized redemption, in spiritual if not in legal terms.

all star puzzle: is leo quintum really lex luthor?

I've got to keep these handy. It's the idea that the character Leo Quintum in All-Star Superman is actually Lex Luthor, who has come back from the future after having seen the error of his ways as a result of seeing the world as Superman does.



Not-The-BeastMaster posted this one last year. Also, this one.



From the Savage Critics. Also relevant are the comments, as it's the first place I've seen theorizing that Quintum is Luthor. Let's see if I can find another...here...and here...we'll throw this one in there, too, though the part on Superman's a bit down the page...and here...and this one is relevant...and so's this, more or less...

I hadn't even thought of this, and after examining the evidence...I have no comment to make either way.

Stuff and whatnot

A more and more prominent issue in the study of folklore is creator's rights and copyright. This is paralleled by its prominence in the world of comics. It's particularly relevant where Superman is concerned. The creators, Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, sold the rights long ago. There has been a great deal of legal conflict over this, as Siegel himself felt cheated. His (and Shuster's heirs) have continued the fight. I don't feel the need to go into the history of this conflict here, nor am I qualified to comment on the technicalities of copyright.

That said, I side with creators.

There has been a new ruling that seems to favor Warner Brothers and DC Comics, who own the copyright at the moment. The only really interesting piece of news here (to me) is the fact that the heirs will gain all rights to the character in 2013. If I were them, I'd have a giant clock counting down the seconds, like the Chinese used to have in Beijing, right by Tiananmen Square, to count down the time until Hong Kong was once more part of China. That thing was huge.

I found this article on Smallville. I don't have much to say about the writer's opinions, other than I'm not a fan of the show. He makes some interesting comments about "canon" and "straying too far", but the one thing I have to get down in writing is that Smallville's creators didn't come up with the notion that Superman and Luthor were friends as kids. That was Jerry Siegel. He wrote a story in 1960 called "How Luthor Met Superboy" where the true reason behind Luthor's hatred of Superman became known. Superboy made Luthor lose all his hair. I'm not even kidding about that. See this article. This phenomenon of thinking the first time YOU encounter something is the first time it happened is pretty common, I think. I've certainly fallen victim to it a number of times. On TV Tropes they call it "Older Than They Think." TV Tropes is one of my favorite websites. I could read that thing all day long.

In other international news...

The new Prime Minister of Bulgaria is referred to as Superman.

So is Michael Jackson.

Bailout

I suppose the best part about doing this is that it will get me to look at all sorts of things, some of which are hilarious. Like this one, where Lex Luthor asks the government for a hundred billion dollars to bail out his company.



Then there's this, by the comics artist Alex Ross. Apparently it's available as a t-shirt.



And this.



And this.

This stuff is fascinating. While I'm on the subject of Obama as Superman, I'll link to this BBC article from December called "Superman Obama." It makes some interesting points about how various world economies and stock exchanges rose because Obama said he was going to invest in America on an unprecedented scale. Then there's this photo on flickr. Apparently it's by someone named Mr. Brainwash.

Enough for now, I think.