Superman is bisexual now!!!

Hawki

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Per recent comments...

Okay, TBH, I'm kind of with Crit on this one. Supes taking part in a climate protest is, well, stupid.

First, "There Is No Planet B" is blatantly false in a universe where multiple alien planets exist. Second, even in Captain Planet, the focus of episodes wasn't on the Planeteers just yelling and screaming. Yes, Cap Planet did often simplify the issues, to the point where some environmental activists have stated that it did more harm than good (e.g. putting the onus on personal responsibility rather than systemtic change), but at least the episodes themselves were entertaining.

And look, to be clear, this isn't me trying to diminish the severity of climate change, nor am I trying to scoff at protesters, but the above image is still silly, IMO. It's silly for Supes to attend a protest when he could be using his strength to set up wind turbines, or drill into the ground for geothermal power, or I dunno, retrieving kryptonian technology or something. It's why allagory is always going to be on a back foot in exploring issues compared to exploring those issues directly.
 

TheMysteriousGX

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Wait, do you think that based on that cover art, that issue of Superman is going to be a 22 page lecture at a climate protest?

You know thats not how covers work, right?

Also, if you agree with the criticism of the onus being placed on individual people instead of systemic change, one dude flying around magically planting alien wind turbines solving the problem would be exactly the wrong kind of message, yeah?
 
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TheMysteriousGX

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Think of it this way: Superman knows he shouldn't be making unilateral decisions on the global infrastructure of a planet with 7 billion people on it outside of immediate existential threats. Alien invasion, natural disaster relief, rogue asteroids, etc

But when the cops and the marshals show up to beat down protestors, they're facing down Superman. And they know how fast he is if they try shit when he leaves. That's something
 
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Hawki

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Wait, do you think that based on that cover art, that issue of Superman is going to be a 22 page lecture at a climate protest?

You know thats not how covers work, right?
Um, generally that is how covers work. If your cover is showing something that isn't based on what's happening in the story (ideally as a main plot point), then something's gone wrong with your cover (or your story, I guess).

Also, if you agree with the criticism of the onus being placed on individual people instead of systemic change, one dude flying around magically planting alien wind turbines solving the problem would be exactly the wrong kind of message, yeah?
Actually, flying around installing wind turbines is an example of systemic change, whereas protests are more a case of individual change. Or at least, the former can do far more than the latter.

Like I said, the DC Universe isn't our universe, which raises all sorts of problems when it wants to represent real-world issues, but in the confines of that universe, there's a hundred things that Supes could do that would be more impactful than attending protests. In the real world, that isn't the case, but the DCU isn't our universe, so...

Think of it this way: Superman knows he shouldn't be making unilateral decisions on the global infrastructure of a planet with 7 billion people on it outside of immediate existential threats. Alien invasion, natural disaster relief, rogue asteroids, etc

But when the cops and the marshals show up to beat down protestors, they're facing down Superman. And they know how fast he is if they try shit when he leaves. That's something
Installing wind turbines wouldn't be a unilateral decision. Someone has to build the turbines, someone has to approve their location, etc. But Supes installing them would cut down on installation time. And hey, if he could share some kryptonian technology with us...

I mean, there's a precedent for this in Superman IV. Supes threw nukes into the sun, but only after the world decided to get rid of them, and launched them into space with the explicit purpose of Supes doing his thing.

Also, if we're talking about police action on protests, if Supes' actions are solely confined to that, then there's still better options, such as protecting "land defenders" in places like South America and Africa.

You may be saying at this point "aren't you overanalyzing this?" and yeah, of course I am. But I can't help but notice these things. Even Captain Planet doesn't escape this issue, even without the alternate universe scenario. For instance, the Planeteers have solar power that can carry a plane all over the world - in the 80s and 90s. Sharing that tech with the world could potentially do more to cut emissions than all their adventures. But of course, you don't have a story then, do you?
 

TheMysteriousGX

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Um, generally that is how covers work. If your cover is showing something that isn't based on what's happening in the story (ideally as a main plot point), then something's gone wrong with your cover (or your story, I guess).
Behold: a Superman story where he goes to a comics convention and nothing else

Jokes aside, Aquaman's on the cover, there's a foreboding atmosphere, huge tentacles framed behind them...if I had to guess, said protest is going to be interrupted by some man-made ecological disaster that wakes up a big ocean monster for Superman to solve. Or there's a big ocean monster problem that Superman solves that catalyzes the protest
Installing wind turbines wouldn't be a unilateral decision. Someone has to build the turbines, someone has to approve their location, etc. But Supes installing them would cut down on installation time. And hey, if he could share some kryptonian technology with us...

I mean, there's a precedent for this in Superman IV. Supes threw nukes into the sun, but only after the world decided to get rid of them, and launched them into space with the explicit purpose of Supes doing his thing.
"after the world decided to get rid of them" is the key point. He didn't rip the nukes out of the ground while the military tried to stop him
Also, if we're talking about police action on protests, if Supes' actions are solely confined to that, then there's still better options, such as protecting "land defenders" in places like South America and Africa.

You may be saying at this point "aren't you overanalyzing this?" and yeah, of course I am. But I can't help but notice these things. Even Captain Planet doesn't escape this issue, even without the alternate universe scenario. For instance, the Planeteers have solar power that can carry a plane all over the world - in the 80s and 90s. Sharing that tech with the world could potentially do more to cut emissions than all their adventures. But of course, you don't have a story then, do you?
Sure. And Superman should de facto rule the world. They've made a lot of stories about exactly that.

That's not this story though.
 

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Agema

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First, "There Is No Planet B" is blatantly false in a universe where multiple alien planets exist.
It is in practical terms if you don't have the spaceships to transport 8 billion people to one of them, never mind the problems of feeding them and building the infrastructure on the new planet to support them.

It's silly for Supes to attend a protest when he could be using his strength to set up wind turbines, or drill into the ground for geothermal power, or I dunno, retrieving kryptonian technology or something.
At this point, Superman is arguably usurping the self-determination and sovereignty of humans. He can protect them from external threats (e.g. natural disaster and alien invasion) for obvious reasons, and from criminals because the authorities have a mandate to govern and maintain order. If he's merely planting turbines that have been approved and resourced, he's doing superfluous work other people could do and preventing workers earning a decent salary in the process.
 

Hawki

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It is in practical terms if you don't have the spaceships to transport 8 billion people to one of them, never mind the problems of feeding them and building the infrastructure on the new planet to support them.
Doesn't seem to stop aliens whizzing around the galaxy though.

I mean, forget Supes, take Green Lantern. Can't he just call the Corps and say "hey, ancient aliens, do you have some tech that might solve our carbon problem?"

At this point, Superman is arguably usurping the self-determination and sovereignty of humans. He can protect them from external threats (e.g. natural disaster and alien invasion) for obvious reasons, and from criminals because the authorities have a mandate to govern and maintain order. If he's merely planting turbines that have been approved and resourced, he's doing superfluous work other people could do and preventing workers earning a decent salary in the process.
Everyone with a brain would want clean energy implemented, so he's not usurping anyone. And if he's doing work that could employ people...okay, sure, but that argument can (and has been) used to keep coal mining going, since mining and burning coal needs more people than setting up and maintaining solar farms for instance.

It's actually something that makes me more sympathetic to coal miners and whatnot, because from a purely jobs perspective, there simply aren't as many jobs in clean energy as fossil fuels. That isn't an excuse to keep fossil fuels, and all the more reason to have a "just transition," but, yeah. "Creative destruction," I believe the economic term is.
 

TheMysteriousGX

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Doesn't seem to stop aliens whizzing around the galaxy though.

I mean, forget Supes, take Green Lantern. Can't he just call the Corps and say "hey, ancient aliens, do you have some tech that might solve our carbon problem?"
They're space cops, they don't give a shit. Besides, alien dominion over earth?

Everyone with a brain would want clean energy implemented, so he's not usurping anyone. And if he's doing work that could employ people...okay, sure, but that argument can (and has been) used to keep coal mining going, since mining and burning coal needs more people than setting up and maintaining solar farms for instance.

It's actually something that makes me more sympathetic to coal miners and whatnot, because from a purely jobs perspective, there simply aren't as many jobs in clean energy as fossil fuels. That isn't an excuse to keep fossil fuels, and all the more reason to have a "just transition," but, yeah. "Creative destruction," I believe the economic term is.
Kinda answering your own question as to why there'd be massive pushback on a single superpowered alien radically altering earth society. And that's ignoring plain capitalistic greed
 
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Drathnoxis

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Can't Superman just fly around the planet 2 million times to turn time back 60 years and then just... blow up all the oil wells or something? Seems more effective than attending a protest.
 
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TheMysteriousGX

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Again, there are many comics and stories where Superman takes over the planet. This is not one of them
 

Hawki

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They're space cops, they don't give a shit. Besides, alien dominion over earth?
I assume guarding Earth and its sector would involve saving Earth without the domination part. Green Lantern (whoever he is right now) seems to have done a good job there.

Kinda answering your own question as to why there'd be massive pushback on a single superpowered alien radically altering earth society. And that's ignoring plain capitalistic greed
Wait, I'm not following. Are you referring to the greedy capitalist who's invested in fossil fuels, or the greedy capitalist involved in renewables? Because if it's the latter, your hypothetical capitalist would probably welcome Supes setting up wind turbines for peanuts rather than having to employ and pay people.
 

ObsidianJones

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So, yesterday I had a talk with someone who knew that I didn't like Kaldur'ahm being Bisexual (or poly, I'm not sure which), so he thought I would be on the hate train of Supes Jr being Bisexual. I wasn't. And he was so ready to pounce. He thought he had his gotcha moment.

People. Stop with gotcha moments. Things are usually more nuanced.

I want ample representation. I believe when different representations become ubiquitous, all this anti-woke and woke bs will just die down. However, The Minority Twofer is a trope as old as media. Let's put all of the 'out there' representation in one place, so people can more easily ignore one character instead of writing off more than one member of the cast.

But then we run into the problem of... yes, there are minorities who are gay, disabled, or the like. And I'm so primed to dislike that in media that they just lump everything 'not the norm' in one character to fit in all the representation they can get so they can continue the focus on those other characters and have a 'normal' story, that I have to do more to open my mind for those twofers than I would for other characters.

And like I said, this isn't the fault of the characters. But of Media for years just making one character to represent the world beyond the cis-gendered heterosexual white viewpoint that it became tiresome.

Simply put, the lack of the representation and the attempt to make it all better by making a twofer is what annoys me about Kaldur'ahm, not the character himself. And not the concept of, yes, there's a minority who has a certain sexuality. But the decades upon decades attempt to just contain all the 'other' into one character to show how progressive a piece of work is.

I love Young Justice. I thought it was criminal how underused Kaldur'ahm was in the first season. And that he sadly suffered from the [urlhttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khary_Payton]Khary Payton Curse[/url].

... in case you don't know, Payton usually voice acts for characters that receive the most damage yet contributes the least in a fight. He voiced Cyborg. You might remember how often Cyborg has been ripped apart...
 

TheMysteriousGX

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I assume guarding Earth and its sector would involve saving Earth without the domination part. Green Lantern (whoever he is right now) seems to have done a good job there.
There's like 5 of them and they only do defense work
Wait, I'm not following. Are you referring to the greedy capitalist who's invested in fossil fuels, or the greedy capitalist involved in renewables? Because if it's the latter, your hypothetical capitalist would probably welcome Supes setting up wind turbines for peanuts rather than having to employ and pay people.
And Superman is allowing corporations to rent-seek his alien wind turbines why?
Installation of the physical parts is the least complicated part of the process
 
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Hawki

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There's like 5 of them and they only do defense work
And what about the rest of the Green Lantern Corps? Don't they have any tech they could share?

And Superman is allowing corporations to rent-seek his alien wind turbines why?
Installation of the physical parts is the least complicated part of the process
Well then what's the problem? We get wind turbines installed quickly, and scientists keep their jobs. Sucks to be a blue collar I guess, but blue collar work is doomed to be reduced under renewables anyway.
 

TheMysteriousGX

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And what about the rest of the Green Lantern Corps? Don't they have any tech they could share?
Nope. That's not how their tech works

Well then what's the problem? We get wind turbines installed quickly, and scientists keep their jobs. Sucks to be a blue collar I guess, but blue collar work is doomed to be reduced under renewables anyway.
Land rights, territory, self determination, etc.

Like, is the argument "Superman isn't imposing his will on the population of earth, comics are SJW?"
 

Hawki

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Land rights, territory, self determination, etc.
Which would be determined outside of Supes. Once they're negotiated, he could set them up.

Like, is the argument "Superman isn't imposing his will on the population of earth, comics are SJW?"
Well first, I don't think any of this is Supes imposing his will.

Second, I wouldn't say I'm making an argument, it's just a combination of me overanalyzing, and being irritated with analogy overtaking consistency.

I mean, even Captain Planet understood that if you want to impart environmental messages, having them as part of a story is better than the Planeteers just attending protests.

So when you have Supes attending a protest, it fails both the in-universe and out-of-universe litmus test, at least if we're assuming that the protest is the plot point. It fails the former because of all the things Supes could do to address environmental issues, attending a protest is one of the least effective ways to do it. It fails the latter because the DCU isn't our world, and there's multiple compounding factors that make it hard to do analogy. Again, Captain Planet for instance at least took place in our world as we understood it, with no real deviations in technology or setting. Heck, it directly addressed the Rio Earth Summit, and adjusted accordingly after the collapse of the Soviet Union.
 

TheMysteriousGX

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"Go woke go broke, *sob*"

Imagine setting your dream job on fire to own the libs

Which would be determined outside of Supes. Once they're negotiated, he could set them up.

Well first, I don't think any of this is Supes imposing his will.

Second, I wouldn't say I'm making an argument, it's just a combination of me overanalyzing, and being irritated with analogy overtaking consistency.

I mean, even Captain Planet understood that if you want to impart environmental messages, having them as part of a story is better than the Planeteers just attending protests.

So when you have Supes attending a protest, it fails both the in-universe and out-of-universe litmus test, at least if we're assuming that the protest is the plot point. It fails the former because of all the things Supes could do to address environmental issues, attending a protest is one of the least effective ways to do it. It fails the latter because the DCU isn't our world, and there's multiple compounding factors that make it hard to do analogy. Again, Captain Planet for instance at least took place in our world as we understood it, with no real deviations in technology or setting. Heck, it directly addressed the Rio Earth Summit, and adjusted accordingly after the collapse of the Soviet Union.
Lmao, Superman can't even fix Gotham City without throwing away everything that makes him Superman. And usually not even then.

The reason for that is because DC comics isn't the "Superman fixes everything" show
 

Eacaraxe

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"Go woke go broke, *sob*"
I'd be careful with that statement, and throw out some heavy disclaimers about it...

From what I was just able to read, the initial print run was 68,000 copies across...four variant covers for direct market and retail, presumably split across Penguin House, Lunar Distribution, and UCS, since COVID finally broke Diamond's monopoly on direct market distribution. Which...isn't exactly great for a flagship IP, and doesn't display a great deal of faith on DC's part in the title. With one possible excuse, they under-printed to make a news item of "selling out".

You can see here, Son of Kal-El was 17th in sales for July 2021, while the top three sold over 100,000 copies. And 56th in August, with figures for September and October pending.

And, let's not forget what we learned during 2017, through Comicsgate and the Marvel sales crash. Sales are reported in the number of copies ordered by stores from distributors, not copies sold to consumers. Once copy is in the stores' hands, zero fucks are given in terms of sales figures which is precisely why in 2017, Marvel was claiming huge sales figures at the same time comic shop owners were reporting they were overstocked with merchandise that wasn't selling.

And, most importantly, zero word on digital sales, nor what would be the far smarter move for DC were they expecting heavy demand for readership: move the title direct to trade paperback. TPB is what sells when people want to read comics, as opposed to stick them in polybags and file them away in their closets hoping against hope that maybe, one day, it'll be worth money. That, and the number of variant covers, tells me they're banking on the collector market to hoover up copies so that they can claim high sales figures and therefore massive popularity, because people who continue to collect after the '90s comics crash, let alone nowadays, are very, very stupid.
 
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TheMysteriousGX

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I'd be careful with that statement, and throw out some heavy disclaimers about it...

From what I was just able to read, the initial print run was 68,000 copies across...four variant covers for direct market and retail, presumably split across Penguin House, Lunar Distribution, and UCS, since COVID finally broke Diamond's monopoly on direct market distribution. Which...isn't exactly great for a flagship IP, and doesn't display a great deal of faith on DC's part in the title. With one possible excuse, they under-printed to make a news item of "selling out".

You can see here, Son of Kal-El was 17th in sales for July 2021, while the top three sold over 100,000 copies. And 56th in August, with figures for September and October pending.

And, let's not forget what we learned during 2017, through Comicsgate and the Marvel sales crash. Sales are reported in the number of copies ordered by stores from distributors, not copies sold to consumers. Once copy is in the stores' hands, zero fucks are given in terms of sales figures which is precisely why in 2017, Marvel was claiming huge sales figures at the same time comic shop owners were reporting they were overstocked with merchandise that wasn't selling.

And, most importantly, zero word on digital sales, nor what would be the far smarter move for DC were they expecting heavy demand for readership: move the title direct to trade paperback. TPB is what sells when people want to read comics, as opposed to stick them in polybags and file them away in their closets hoping against hope that maybe, one day, it'll be worth money. That, and the number of variant covers, tells me they're banking on the collector market to hoover up copies so that they can claim high sales figures and therefore massive popularity, because people who continue to collect after the '90s comics crash, let alone nowadays, are very, very stupid.
You just linked me an article showing that sales were up double digits since 2019. Shorting comic runs when reprinting due to demand makes much more sense than over printing to start
 
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Eacaraxe

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You just linked me an article showing that sales were up double digits since 2019. Shorting comic runs when reprinting due to demand makes much more sense than over printing to start
The article says Diamond's sales are up. Diamond no longer distributes for DC, and hasn't for a year. DC's distributors are Penguin House, Lunar, and UCS. Which means Diamond's yearly or monthly sales figures have absolutely zero impact on DC's sales.

" When Diamond Comic Distributors returned to releasing indexed sales charts in June, it became clear not only that comic-book order volumes had swelled during the pandemic, but that its comic-book sales of other publishers had completely made up for the loss of DC comics items."

Literally the first sentence in the article. And in the second paragraph,

"... Looking back at the last pre-pandemic July, we find that all comics sold in July 2019 by Diamond amounted to 7.62 million copies for around $33.4 million. That's an increase of 13% in units and a 16% in dollars — and remember, the July 2021 tally doesn't include items above 400th place or DC's reorders."

I just explained this.

Now, I want to be clear I'm not opining on the state of the industry, DC, or politics in comic books, though I certainly have my opinions on it. I could give a toss who or what DC decides any iteration of Superman is, and I haven't since the "Death of Superman" arc damn near twenty years ago.

If anything I support the decision, because I do feel that if there's to be LGBTQ+ and better PoC representation to comics, the solution is not to retcon existing characters or play "mantle" shenanigans but rather to pull from past characters with established pedigrees or create new ones. This is precisely what DC has done, and I hope they can back that decision up with good quality writing, compelling storylines, and a substantive place for the character within their own mythos. As opposed to play identity politics shell games, to shield themselves from rightful criticism based upon poor quality work, as Marvel does.

That said, I've put my "take a step back and observe the situation impartially" hat on.

Due to how periodical print sales figures are accounted, they don't actually reflect readership -- or interest in the books themselves. Periodical print figures are predominantly driven by the collector market, and this is something the industry exploits to drive sales figures. That was the cause of the '90s comics crash, and the situation never really improved -- comics collectors simply forgot the lessons of the crash, and went straight back to CONSOOMER mentality once the industry recovered. If anything, the situation is worse now than it was prior to the crash itself, and is only really buoyed by consumer stupidity and stubbornness.

68,000 copies sold doesn't necessarily mean the comic actually sold well, or that there's interest in it. It means comics stores ordered 68,000 copies, and in all likelihood 15,000 neckbeards (at most) gobbled them up to polybag and box them, and stuff them in a closet somewhere never again to see the light of day. Because the state of comics collection and condition grading is actually so fucking stupid that merely inspecting a comic for print defects is enough to drop its condition from "near-mint" to "very fine" on account of spine stress from simply opening the thing. It's literally dumber, more consumer-unfriendly, and a bigger scam than cash-for-gold and gold assay.

And I'd lay cash most of 'em are probably the exact same people whinging on social media about how Jon Kent likes penis in his mouth, and they bought it because they think Jon Kent putting penis in his mouth actually means those comics will be worth something some day (it won't). Because that's how neckbeards do.

That's why the digital and TPB sales figures matter. People buy digital and TPB when they're actually reading the damn things. And DC's silence on digital sales is fairly telling, along with a decision to reprint periodicals rather than move the title straight to TPB. That's where I see a shell game at play.

You're absolutely right to say it's better to under-print and reprint if the demand's there, than it is to over-print and have to pulp unsold copy. But, that's a two-edged blade: sure, it's cost-efficient to do it that way, but it also means the company can pronounce they sold out as a marketing and PR move to drive buzz...or in this case, what has been and will be the kind of controversy-for-cash clickbaitery to which we've all been hopelessly inured since the rise of viral marketing. That's just good business...but it doesn't necessarily mean the reality meets the marketing.

If DC had faith in the title, and if the reality did meet the marketing, the smart move right here and now would be to announce the publication of a TPB for its first issues, and open pre-orders for it.
 
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