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Zero Hour: Crisis in Time #Superman
Superman: Zero Hour
Time is collapsing in on itself. The villainous Extant has ushered in a series of black holes that are swallowing the universe--past, present and future! Superman, like everyone else in the DC Universe, has seen time loops affect his life. The result? Krypton never exploded. The Kents never found a baby Kal-El in a field. Superman isn't the protector of Metropolis. Then, after the crisis in time has been averted, new details about the origins of Superman, Superboy and Steel are revealed.
Comics writers Dan Jurgens, Karl Kesel, David Michelinie and Louise Simonson team up with Superman artists Chris Batista, Jon Bogdanove, Tom Grummett, Jackson Guice and more to present the Man of Steel stories tying into the classic Zero Hour event, now collected here for the first time. Collects Adventures of Superman #0, #516, Superman #93, #0, Superman: The Man of Steel #0, #37, Superman in Action Comics #0, #703, Steel #0, #8 and Superboy #8, #0.
Comics writers Dan Jurgens, Karl Kesel, David Michelinie and Louise Simonson team up with Superman artists Chris Batista, Jon Bogdanove, Tom Grummett, Jackson Guice and more to present the Man of Steel stories tying into the classic Zero Hour event, now collected here for the first time. Collects Adventures of Superman #0, #516, Superman #93, #0, Superman: The Man of Steel #0, #37, Superman in Action Comics #0, #703, Steel #0, #8 and Superboy #8, #0.
296 pages, Paperback
First published October 1, 1994
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
April 29, 2024
This is no Dark Knight Returns, but the DK2 Batman does show up and that's a lot of fun.
This era of Superman has aged well, in my view. It was well organized, solid storytelling, expanding Superman's potential and living up to the character having four whole titles a month. The changing art and every single issue continuing into a different title was a drawback at times, but during crossovers it worked great.
During Zero Hour, Batman showed up in multiple reality forms and there were other interesting premises such as his Kryptonian parents flying in. Then in the issue # 0s, a slightly retconned origin involving a new villain Conduit from Clark's past. He looked a little like a bad Image Comics/X-Men character, and that hasn't aged well, but it was a worthy attempt to create a new adversary for S-Man.
There's also the matter of the terrible long hair. What can we say, it was another time~
This era of Superman has aged well, in my view. It was well organized, solid storytelling, expanding Superman's potential and living up to the character having four whole titles a month. The changing art and every single issue continuing into a different title was a drawback at times, but during crossovers it worked great.
During Zero Hour, Batman showed up in multiple reality forms and there were other interesting premises such as his Kryptonian parents flying in. Then in the issue # 0s, a slightly retconned origin involving a new villain Conduit from Clark's past. He looked a little like a bad Image Comics/X-Men character, and that hasn't aged well, but it was a worthy attempt to create a new adversary for S-Man.
There's also the matter of the terrible long hair. What can we say, it was another time~
January 13, 2019
Recommended only if you really liked Zero Hour and REALLY want to read more. The first issue where all the various incarnations of Batman show up, including Frank Miller's Dark Knight, is the best of the bunch. There's a few other alternate reality issues before the 0 issues retconn Superman's past to include a kid who always played second fiddle to Clark Kent and is trying to murder him. Also included are the Superboy and Steel tie-in issues. The Superboy ones are alright but the Stell issues are real stinkers.
June 3, 2021
Part of my comic book reread project. Continued from Superman/Doomsday: Hunter/Prey.
Four stars, just like the Batman Zero Hour story, but the the good sections were switched. In Superman, the lead-up issues are pretty okay, but the #0 books are the ones I enjoyed more. More on that in a moment.
Time and reality has gone haywire, and parallel dimensions and time streams are bleeding into each other. The Batmen from all of these timelines have gone to Metropolis to talk to Supes about it, but all of them end up in our Superman's where and when.
It was fun seeing all these incarnations and their attendant idiosyncrasies. I would like to have seen Adam West with a can of Entropy Fissure Repellent, or something, but you can't have everything. After all the bats go back to their own dimensions, Jor-El and Lara (yes, Superman's dead biological parents) show up in Smallville to take Superman home to a Krypton that never blew-up, but they disappear mid-conversation. When Superman gets back to Metropolis, he discovers Alpha Centurion is now the city's hero, is dating Lois Lane, and Superman never actually existed at all. Everything has a Roman Empire slant to it which is kind of cool, but then he's shunted back to his real world. Later he returns to Smallville to check on his parents again only to find he's in the time his spaceship arrived when he was a baby, but instead of being found by the Kents, he was discovered by a man who took the ship, but left baby Kal-El in the crater where he died. That was how the Kents found him, and now we're in another world without a Superman. They go after the creep who left a child to die, and then the stuff from the main Zero Hour: Crisis in Time happens, and we're back to reality, ope, there goes gravity, ope, there goes rabbit, he choked, he's so mad, but he won't give up that easy, nope, he won't have it, he... Sorry. I often in those lyrics when I utter the phrase that fires it off.
Anyway, Superman is now back to... the real world... though there have been a few changes. Metropolis was a bunch of rubble after Lex Luthor destroyed it, and it would've taken years to rebuild it. Enter Deus ex Machina, stage right, and with time being restored, so is Metropolis. Nobody is able to explain why, but I don't reckon it's important. However, there's a strange inconsistency here. If the time reset with minor changes was able to put Metropolis back to rights, couldn't it have done the same to Superman's hair? When he came back to life, he came back with a mullet, and I'm sorry, but that's just wrong. If Metropolis being destroyed is wrong, then so is the mullet.
I don't care! It's wrong, I tell ya! I would've been fine with Metropolis staying in ruins if the Zero Hour reset had given Supes a haircut, but que sera, sera. Unfortunately, I believe we still have a couple years left before he chops his mop, and we can all sing hallelujah.
With the #0 issues, we get introduced to Conduit (Kenny Braverman) whom I've always liked as a villain.
He was born the day Superman landed on Earth. They were friends who grew up together, but the poor kid was always a dollar short and a day late when pitted against Clark. He would've been Smallville High's star athlete and student, but Clark was just a bit better at everything. This all happened before Clark got his superpowers, but Kenny doesn't believe that when he finds out Clark and Supes are one and the same... However, that's at the next checkpoint. Anyway, Kenny is fueled by deep-seated resentment, hatred, and jealousy, and I always love that kind of motivation in a villain. It makes them a bit insane and thus more interesting.
Conduit's attacks on Clark are always foiled by Superman who just happens to show up when the shit is going down. Of course, you and I know why, but Kenny is initially baffled though he chalks it up to the good luck Clark has seemed to have since he was born. Conduit became the way he is because he was exposed to Kryptonite radiation the day he was born when Clark's spaceship crashed nearby. It slowly ate at him, and he was often sick, but eventually it made him more powerful. As a result, he's an equal for Superman because of the radiation he carries, though most other DC superheroes could probably handle him. Supes puts Conduit away, but Superman's old memorial statue/tomb was damaged during the fight, and Superman's body is discovered in it... but that's for next time.
And now a word from our sponsors. Here's an ad for some shitty shows you could see Saturday morning on NBC in the fall of 1994:
Thank God I had sense enough not to watch any of them on the reg after checking them out... And for the sake of full disclosure even though it might be akin to heresy for one of my generation to admit it... We can all probably agree that Saved by the Bell: The New Class was complete crap, but I was never impressed with the original series either. I certainly watched plenty of them, but it was never anything I had to see because, well, it sucked. And if that makes you think less of me, I guess there's nothing I can do about that.
Next checkpoint: The Death of Clark Kent.
Four stars, just like the Batman Zero Hour story, but the the good sections were switched. In Superman, the lead-up issues are pretty okay, but the #0 books are the ones I enjoyed more. More on that in a moment.
Time and reality has gone haywire, and parallel dimensions and time streams are bleeding into each other. The Batmen from all of these timelines have gone to Metropolis to talk to Supes about it, but all of them end up in our Superman's where and when.
It was fun seeing all these incarnations and their attendant idiosyncrasies. I would like to have seen Adam West with a can of Entropy Fissure Repellent, or something, but you can't have everything. After all the bats go back to their own dimensions, Jor-El and Lara (yes, Superman's dead biological parents) show up in Smallville to take Superman home to a Krypton that never blew-up, but they disappear mid-conversation. When Superman gets back to Metropolis, he discovers Alpha Centurion is now the city's hero, is dating Lois Lane, and Superman never actually existed at all. Everything has a Roman Empire slant to it which is kind of cool, but then he's shunted back to his real world. Later he returns to Smallville to check on his parents again only to find he's in the time his spaceship arrived when he was a baby, but instead of being found by the Kents, he was discovered by a man who took the ship, but left baby Kal-El in the crater where he died. That was how the Kents found him, and now we're in another world without a Superman. They go after the creep who left a child to die, and then the stuff from the main Zero Hour: Crisis in Time happens, and we're back to reality, ope, there goes gravity, ope, there goes rabbit, he choked, he's so mad, but he won't give up that easy, nope, he won't have it, he... Sorry. I often in those lyrics when I utter the phrase that fires it off.
Anyway, Superman is now back to... the real world... though there have been a few changes. Metropolis was a bunch of rubble after Lex Luthor destroyed it, and it would've taken years to rebuild it. Enter Deus ex Machina, stage right, and with time being restored, so is Metropolis. Nobody is able to explain why, but I don't reckon it's important. However, there's a strange inconsistency here. If the time reset with minor changes was able to put Metropolis back to rights, couldn't it have done the same to Superman's hair? When he came back to life, he came back with a mullet, and I'm sorry, but that's just wrong. If Metropolis being destroyed is wrong, then so is the mullet.
I don't care! It's wrong, I tell ya! I would've been fine with Metropolis staying in ruins if the Zero Hour reset had given Supes a haircut, but que sera, sera. Unfortunately, I believe we still have a couple years left before he chops his mop, and we can all sing hallelujah.
With the #0 issues, we get introduced to Conduit (Kenny Braverman) whom I've always liked as a villain.
He was born the day Superman landed on Earth. They were friends who grew up together, but the poor kid was always a dollar short and a day late when pitted against Clark. He would've been Smallville High's star athlete and student, but Clark was just a bit better at everything. This all happened before Clark got his superpowers, but Kenny doesn't believe that when he finds out Clark and Supes are one and the same... However, that's at the next checkpoint. Anyway, Kenny is fueled by deep-seated resentment, hatred, and jealousy, and I always love that kind of motivation in a villain. It makes them a bit insane and thus more interesting.
Conduit's attacks on Clark are always foiled by Superman who just happens to show up when the shit is going down. Of course, you and I know why, but Kenny is initially baffled though he chalks it up to the good luck Clark has seemed to have since he was born. Conduit became the way he is because he was exposed to Kryptonite radiation the day he was born when Clark's spaceship crashed nearby. It slowly ate at him, and he was often sick, but eventually it made him more powerful. As a result, he's an equal for Superman because of the radiation he carries, though most other DC superheroes could probably handle him. Supes puts Conduit away, but Superman's old memorial statue/tomb was damaged during the fight, and Superman's body is discovered in it... but that's for next time.
And now a word from our sponsors. Here's an ad for some shitty shows you could see Saturday morning on NBC in the fall of 1994:
Thank God I had sense enough not to watch any of them on the reg after checking them out... And for the sake of full disclosure even though it might be akin to heresy for one of my generation to admit it... We can all probably agree that Saved by the Bell: The New Class was complete crap, but I was never impressed with the original series either. I certainly watched plenty of them, but it was never anything I had to see because, well, it sucked. And if that makes you think less of me, I guess there's nothing I can do about that.
Next checkpoint: The Death of Clark Kent.
July 21, 2020
Superman's Time is Running Out
A unique chronological anomaly is collapsing time in on itself. Superman must fight on multiple planes of reality to save his world.
Dynamic artwork and a compelling storyline make this a must read collection.
A unique chronological anomaly is collapsing time in on itself. Superman must fight on multiple planes of reality to save his world.
Dynamic artwork and a compelling storyline make this a must read collection.
November 26, 2023
A tie in to the event, which was supposed to clean up DC’s post single timeline (spoiler: did it buggery.) DC got around, belatedly, to issuing tie-in collections, only to stop after SUPERMAN and , instead releasing the expensive which collects nearly everything vaguely related.
It’s not that hard to see why � this collection exists as a disconnected entity, collecting issues of multiple series that tend to end on a “to be continued� � good luck finding connecting volumes. The Steel issues are particularly awkward as they don’t really connect with the event, and they’re pretty much the middle of an ongoing story in the book.
Some of the issues are nearly standalone, fortunately, and there’s some great moments (the multiple Batmen business is both a hoot and a little sad) but as a whole the collection fails to gel.
It’s not that hard to see why � this collection exists as a disconnected entity, collecting issues of multiple series that tend to end on a “to be continued� � good luck finding connecting volumes. The Steel issues are particularly awkward as they don’t really connect with the event, and they’re pretty much the middle of an ongoing story in the book.
Some of the issues are nearly standalone, fortunately, and there’s some great moments (the multiple Batmen business is both a hoot and a little sad) but as a whole the collection fails to gel.
March 8, 2019
This book collects the Zero Hour tie-ins installments of the four monthly Superman titles. I've never read Zero Hour, so it is possible to follow along, understanding that there is a crisis affecting all of time and Superman is stepping away from it occasionally to deal with personal crises. The stories themselves are solid if not exceptional - although credit to Jon Bogdanove for his excellent aping of classic Batman art styles in his chapter. Karl Kesel and Pete Krause do a solid job of Superman's slide into a parallel world and encounter with another hero of Metropolis.
It then follows with the #0 issue of each Superman title, where the DC's creators got to flesh out pieces of backstory. Here, the Superman team introduces never-before-seen Smallville classmate Kenny Braverman, who hates Clark's success and wants to murder him. It's a decent revenge tale, although it's a little peculiar to see Clark as the champion athlete.
Finally, the Zero Hour tie-in issues of Superboy and Steel and their #0 issues round out the book. The Superboy are solid, classic-style fun. The Steel might've been easier to read if I were versed in the series, but I found it jammed too full of characters, with far too generic villains, and some choppy pacing problems.
Overall, it's a decent book, but not vibrant enough (nor sufficiently accessible) for me to recommend to a casual Superman reader.
It then follows with the #0 issue of each Superman title, where the DC's creators got to flesh out pieces of backstory. Here, the Superman team introduces never-before-seen Smallville classmate Kenny Braverman, who hates Clark's success and wants to murder him. It's a decent revenge tale, although it's a little peculiar to see Clark as the champion athlete.
Finally, the Zero Hour tie-in issues of Superboy and Steel and their #0 issues round out the book. The Superboy are solid, classic-style fun. The Steel might've been easier to read if I were versed in the series, but I found it jammed too full of characters, with far too generic villains, and some choppy pacing problems.
Overall, it's a decent book, but not vibrant enough (nor sufficiently accessible) for me to recommend to a casual Superman reader.
May 4, 2022
The Zero Hour crossover tie-in worked pretty well here. Seeing Clark deal with multiple Batmen was funny. Him seeing a possible life on a never destroyed Krypton was heartbreaking. There were some very good elements involved. There was some unneeded fluff as Steel and the second Superboy chapter didn't help the story at all. The introduction of Conduit was good but as usual with DC, he became much too powerful, much too quickly. The art, by handful of artists, was good for the most part. Overall, a good read that, although dated, still does it's job.
February 2, 2023
Collects tie-ins from one of the most infamous DC events from the '90s - but don't let that make you skip this book; there's some really interesting ideas here, such as a story where the Kents are visited by versions of Jor-El and Lara from a Krypton that was saved at the last second. It also includes the famous story where several alternate Batmen come to Metropolis seeking Supes' help, which singlehandedly convinced me of how good an artist Jon Bogdanove is.
August 9, 2019
Did not finish. A little messy because of the tie-ins, and the lack of conclusion on each chapter, but I liked it nonetheless. I've missed the classic, soft Clark of the 80s and 90s, and seeing Lois and Clark work together again gave me the feels :')
July 2, 2018
Recommended only for serious fans of the 90s Superman books.
I have to imagine it would be pretty hard going for anyone else.
I have to imagine it would be pretty hard going for anyone else.
July 2, 2022
Superman, Superboy, and Steel face a variety of zaniness in the throes of Zero Hour. Fun 90’s comics.
May 1, 2023
Fun read, 90’s style.
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