Today, we look at how the Superman comic books of the 1980s, 1990s and early 2000s dealt with the concept of Superman as an “American.”
Knowledge Waits is a feature where I just share some bit of comic book history that interests me.
As you know by now, DC has caused a bit of a stir by “officially” dropping the “American Way” part of Superman’s famous pledge to fight for “Truth, justice and the American Way.” I’ve already written about how our understanding of Superman fighting for the “American Way” is almost entirely built around the long-running Adventures of Superman TV series, as it remained in syndication long after it stopped doing new episodes, so multiple generations of fans were exposed to its opening, which used that pledge. And we also obviously know that things started getting particularly crazy in 2011, when Action Comics #900 had a story where Superman renounced his American citizenship so that he could things internationally without having his actions be blamed on the United States. But what about BEFORE that point?
SUPERMAN’S LONG IMPLIED RELATIONSHIP TO AMERICA
Here’s the interesting thing, outside of a period during World War II when DC did a number of propaganda covers to help support the war effort, none better than Fred Ray’s brilliant Superman #14 cover…
Superman comic books were just sort of, like, IMPLIED to be patriotic. Remember, the “American Way” aspect of the Superman character was really just the TV series, not the comic book. This isn’t to say that Superman wasn’t patriotic in the comic books, as he obviously was, but it was just like I said, an implied patriotism. You know, basically “Why would he be anything BUT patriotic?” ya know? So they didn’t really go out of their way to do stories about how Superman fought for the “American Way,” as everyone just KNEW that he did.
There’d be the occasional story involving Superman doing stuff for the government (and there’s the famous story in Action Comics #309 by Edmond Hamilton, Curt Swan and George Klein where Superman turns to President Kennedy to help him hide his secret identity, as who can you trust more than the President, right?).
But because it was just SO obvious, there really weren’t a whole lot of stories about it.
SUPERMAN DECLARES WAR ON A MIDDLE EAST COUNTRY
Things got different after Crisis on Infinite Earths. First off, it is important to note that DC’s marketing still leaned into the “American Way”, like this school poster…
and the cover of the first issue of Adventures of Superman #424 by Jerry Ordway…
However, it is interesting to see that when Superman decided to invade the Middle Eastern country of Qurac (a stand-in for Iraq and Iran) after some Quraci terrorists tried to attack Metropolis, it is made clear that this isn’t Superman as an AMERICAN doing this, but Superman as Superman. He even notes when he fights some Quraci superhumans who are messing with his head that he fights for truth and justice, he notably doesn’t mention America…
SUPERMAN FIRST WONDERS IF HE IS TOO TIED TO AMERICA PUBLICLY
In early 1991, Jerry Ordway (who was now writing as well as drawing Superman, with inker Dennis Janke) did a story about “Truth, Justice and the American Way”…
The people who grew up on the TV series were now adults and so they were beginning to react to that phrase in a way that the earlier Superman comic book writers never did. Superman in the issue is caught up in a complex plot of the American military to deal with an underground nationalist group working within the military, but Superman still feels used (and they totally DID use him) and he first reflects on the fact that he really has to be a citizen of the world, while still being very patriotic (I think Ordway toed the line beautifully)…
LEX LUTHOR STEALS “TRUTH, JUSTICE AND THE AMERICAN WAY”
A controversial bit in the Superman titles was when Lex Luthor ran for (and was elected) President of the United States. Luthor cleverly co-opts the “Truth, Justice and the American Way” pledge for his campaign motto and, well, you can imagine how that made Superman feel (as we can see in Superman #162 by Jeph Loeb, Ed McGuinness and Cam Smith)…
SUPERMAN EMBRACES “TRUTH, JUSTICE AND THE AMERICAN WAY” AS A RETORT TO DARKER COMIC BOOKS
After Luthor is elected President, Joe Kelly wrote a famous one-shot story in Action Comics #775 (with art by Lee Bermejo, Doug Mahnke and Tom Nguyen and a legion of inkers and a Tim Bradstreet cover) that seemingly dealt with the phrase, defending it…
As I wrote about over a DECADE ago, the story was a Meta-Messages where Kelly was contrasting Superman against the then-popular Authority comic book series, where the heroes of that group took on outside threats directly and violently and without any fear for government interference. A distraught Superman talks to his adopted father, Jonathan Kent, about how the opposite of their approach is “Truth, Justice and the American Way”…
But while I really DO love the comic book, I have to admit that Kelly doesn’t really do much to explain how “the American Way” really factors into this discussion one way or the other. It’s more “Superman’s beliefs” vs. the Authority’s beliefs, and I suppose we’re to believe that Superman believes in “The American Way,” but it really isn’t defined in the comic book.
In any event, Superman challenges the Elite (the Authority stand-in) to a fight and then seemingly slaughters them all, but reveals that he only wanted to show how he COULD if he WANTED to, but he doesn’t, since he believes in truth, justice and the American way and he will always believe in that dream, while the whole thing is paralleled to a Clark Kent article asking, “What’s so funny about Truth, Justice and the American Way?” It is worth noting that the head of the Elite is British, as are the two main writers of the Authority at the time (Warren Ellis and Mark Millar), so perhaps that was the point of the reference?
Either way, it was probably the last great embrace of the “American Way” by the Man of Steel.
SUPERMAN REFLECTS UPON THE AMERICAN WAY
Superman #178 (by Loeb, McGuinness and Smith, with special thanks to Patrick Gerard) was released soon after 9/11, but it was obviously written well before that point…
The issue sees Superman attacked by an unhinged Uncle Sam…
And we see that Lex Luthor being President has tarnished the spirit of America so much so that even Uncle Sam, the living embodiment of America’s spirit, is acting like an over-aggressive xenophobe…
Superman snaps him out of it and they talk a bit about the effect Luthor’s presidency is having on the country…
In the end, Superman again wonders if he should be thinking more globally than simply “the American Way”…
And obviously, later writers did just that.
If anyone has suggestions about interesting pieces of comic book history, feel free to drop me a line at [email protected].
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