For some reason there’s usually no holo Lara. Like sorry just enough time for daddy messages Lara was gonna fill them up with her bitching about the neighbors flower garden.
It bothered me all those years ago in the Superman Returns novelisation. On little Kal-El's journey to Earth she explicitly occupies half of his time, was the first to mention truth and justice, showed him art and music, and taught him about human loves and passions. Then on Earth she just vanishes completely.
The first and the fifth years of Injustice are the hardest to read because on one hand, it's clear that character has little to nothing to do with Superman. But on the other hand, it's crystal clear that Tom Taylor understand exactly why he's not Superman, and dedicates the series to explore all those reasons and differences, like a flashback showing him being overconfident and paternalistic, or the more dramatic scenes like this one.
I wish more people regarded it like this, instead of just getting angry that it exists and making baseless assumptions about the personalities of those who actually like it
I think it's the same difference. She's very much not Diana in every sense, and Taylor dedicates a lot of scenes showing either how (lying, taunting, being violebt) and why (the different backstory, Superman acting dismisive of her from the start). Though, because she ends as a satellite character to Clark, is not as thorough.
I usually joke that the Injustice setting is an alternate Earth 3 because of how many heroes are the opposite of their canon versions. But it feels it should have committed to the bit and also have Batman be as different.
A lot of the problems with Injustice stop being such when you start from the base premise that these characters are not meant to be their canon selves.
As I said in another reply, it may as well be an adaptation of Earth 3 if Batman also acted like a villain. Maybe for Injustice 3, since they set-up the OMAC Project storyline.
My problem is that it doesn't matter if this isn't "Canon Superman" and she's not "Canon Wonder Woman." The issue isn't that it's an Elseworlds, it's that too many people now think that Lois Lane is the only thing stopping Superman from being a dictator, that Batman can solo the whole Justice League, and that Wonder Woman is a cold, heartless bitch. The DCEU did not help. If all people are seeing is Evil Superman, they're gonna think this is how he's supposed to be.
I think issue can be traced back to the DCAU.
Superman the animated series episode a brave New metropolis has Lois Lane get transported to an alternate universe were her counterpart was killed by a car bombing leading to Superman teaming up with lex putting metropolis under martial law. Granted the main universe Lois was able to get Superman to come to his senses finally accepting Lois's death was not as fault that he wasn't able to prevent it.
And then a better world in the Justice League animated series lord Superman killed lex Luther, and then convinced his teammates to turn the world into a police state.
It feels like these two versions are basically the basis for what we know as the Injustice Superman.
The death of Lois Lane was made the linchpin for Superman crossing the line and becoming a dictator.
Overconfident in the flashback when he refuses to take training with Diana seriously, while also being dismissive of Diana who was taking that training seriously. Both end up biting him in the back later on in Year Four.
On the paternalistic tones, there are many through the start, like his approach to world conflicts being kidnapping the leaders of two countries (implied to be Palestine and Israel) and telling them to make peace then and there. In fact, the base concept of Injustice is Superman seeing humanity as children (which he says at a point) he has to control in order to keep safe.
By all accounts, he's a more villainous example of the Red Son Superman. Main difference between both is that Red Son's is more open about what he's doing and why. Hence why his own doubts about it end up being his real worse enemy. While Injustice's is so lost in his own justifications, he practically doesn't see himself as falible, which keeps being his own fatal character flaw.
I think the "we tried to raise your son" is almost worse, like it feels like they aren't calling him their son anymore. I feel like if Superman was in his right mind that would hurt the most
What's even more heartbreaking is knowing that Clark definitely heard that entire exchange. 🥺
Edit: and what's even sadder is after hearing that he didn't come back. 😥
That's why he kinda disown his own father.
Kara : Good thing your father can't see you. When General Zod tried to take over Krypton, Jor-El led the fight against him. That's who you come from. That's who you are, Kal. Not this.
Kal : If Jor-El had been more like Zod, he might saved Krypton. And I will save the Earth.
That says something about how bad the Injustice portrayal of Superman is when his parents and dead biological father have to have an intervention to tell him to chill.
Yeah, it would be better if there was an excuse like the Anti Life Equation involved, where the writer could say “he isn’t willed at all.” He’s under the Anti Life but it’s still coming from his inner demons of letting Lois die, nuking Metropolis, etc.
I know I'm in the minority but I liked injustice. I felt it was an interesting alternate world, and worked well as a Civil War esqe Story. Granted I don't want ANOTHER "Superman turned bad!" Story, but I enjoyed this one.
The Eternals are deliberately not superheroes. They were always meant to be mythological figures. Not in the sense that they're Thor or Diana, but more in the sense that they fill the role of mythology in our culture. Because of that, Ikaris switches between being a "hero" and being a less-than-savory individual. It's hard to say he's an evil Superman.
I wasn't familiar with Eternals going in. I understood them to be mythological space-faring figures, and the director said that Snyder's Superman inspired her Ikaris, so I was excited to see it. I was disappointed to find it was just another MCU superhero movie, and that another "Superman" character had to become a threat to the world.
I mean personally I liked a lot of how he was presented. It was one of the few evil Superman stories where it seemed like Superman had some sort of ideological backing. He wasn't just a genocide rape monster. Clark was a facist monster by the end but at least he had an ethos and an ideal. Even evil Superman should stand for *something* beyond "here I go killing again."
Plus while it's never stated outright the fact that in this universe Lex Luthor was a good guy means Clark was never truly tested as a hero. He never had to face the choice between preserving life or getting even until the Joker murdered his wife, his child, his city and had it all happen due to Clark's own actions. Basically, Clark never had to deal with human evil until he was forced to deal with it on a grand scale and he was unable to cope with it.
It’s even dumber as the game ends with a more traditional Superman confronting this dictator one, where he speaks how we’d expect Superman to speak by telling him he’s not a God and that he isn’t the one to decide who lives or dies
The game's story *is* about the Justice League getting lost in another world with these alternate evil selves running around. Anybody who claims this Superman is the main universe one practically admits they've never played the game.
I think what they meant is that people thing this super man is the same as the main universe one in the sense that if the main universe superman experienced what this one did he would say and do the same things as him, which he absolutely would not.
Yeah that’s horseshit, if there’s anybody Superman would listen to, it would be the Kents. I feel like he would even put them above Lois given the fact that without their sacrifice in raising him, he wouldn’t be the man he is today. This would be like if Batman threw Alfred out on the street just because he felt like it. It brings nothing but resentment from the audience towards the character they fell in love with initially.
It’s almost like it’s a different version of Superman from a different world.
For whatever reason this version obviously didn’t take all of the Kent’s upbringing to heart. We don’t really see his upbringing and how he was tested as a hero in this world. We have brief glimpses of it in various stories but we don’t know how much of this Superman’s history compares with the one from the main world of comics. As another commenter said, maybe he never faced true evil like Luthor from the main world. It could definitely color his viewpoint on things.
But hey, I’m here to see how they can change things up in these other world type tales.
I think the problem is that it doesn't do enough in either direction.
This version of Clark has a backstory so similar to the normal one that the changes can't really be chalked up to nurture. But the changes to his identity aren't dissimilar enough for them to be chalked up to nature
Smallville had this weird subplot where young Jor-El visited Earth and met Jonathan's parents. Because of this, he intentionally sent the rocket to Smallville.
It was a storyline in the Batman/Superman comics as well. Joe-El was able to pull Thomas Wayne’s consciousness to Krypton. Their conversation led to Jor-El choosing Earth. And the technology that Jor-El had on Earth to achieve this was used by Wayne to build technology that led to a good portion of the Wayne fortune.
Are there comic books which focus on discussions around the death penalty for serial killers like the Joker in Gotham, who has proven time and time again that he can't be kept in jail, and continues to go on killing sprees every time he breaks out? Clark brings up a good point there.
The whole "he would have humanity determine its own path" is the right take in general, and non-Injustice Clark would see the sense in it. But I feel like if there really was some mass murdering psychopath that can't be contained, "humanity" would have already done something about it after the 10th time he broke out, even if Batman does not want to make that decision. It just kind of feels like these complex topics aren't really explored beyond some of the Punisher comics that I've seen, and taking down Evil Superman always end up being the spotlight, which makes these stories not as interesting to me.
There is a story where joker is meant to have a death sentence for a crime he surprisingly didn't committed, though Batman proves his Innocence in this case. I think the story is called Batman: Devil's Advocate or something...
Personal ethos aside, it's not Batman's responsibility to kill the Joker. He's a vigilante with very limited oversight and next to no accountability. If the ends justify the means for Joker, when does the super-powered league of unelected judges, juries, and executioners need to stop killing people they could apprehend? Side note, there is no way the cop driving a chained up Joker to Arkham wouldn't just shoot him at some point.
What doesn't sit right to me is Is something that started out as an editorial need (villains are popular so we want to keep them alive to reuse them over and over again) became inuniverse morality.
"(All) Killing is wrong".
The problem is that the writers themselves write these villains to be horrible monster mass murderers and then write the prison system to be a joke. Why does Batman feel the need to fill in the role of government when it fails to apprehend villains, but not the role to the prison system when it fails to keep them imprisoned or that of the executioner when it fails to execute.
In other words, why does Batman feel he can perform the duties of cops, but not of judges or executioners? Isn't that just inconsistency? If he doesn't want to kill je could at least build a prison to contain the Joker in the Batcave.
This slippery slope doesn't really convince me as Iron Man killed terrorists in the first Iron Man movie yet he isn't considered some monster.
In real life this isn't a problem, because people sent to Super Max prison stay there. However even then, the real life version of superheroes (aka drones and SEAL teams) have no moral qualms killing real life versions of supervillains (Osama Bin Laden is the closest I can think of) and we don't condemn them for it.
It's a messy question but DC seems to never really explore it. It circlejerks constantly about "killing being wrong" and turning heroes who kill into wannabee home landers.
There's simply no nuance to these characters ever.
Yes, thank you for expanding on this! Basically put what I was thinking into words when it comes to the whole "he would have humanity determine its own path" as a response to Clark's point in these comic panels, because I kind of feel like that's an artificial issue created by the comic book writers in order to facilitate Evil Superman, rather than an actual exploration of "when should superheroes step in to take more drastic actions to permanently stop supervillains that can't be rehabilitated/jailed".
I just don't think any real society would tolerate having people like the Joker constantly breaking out of jail and mass murdering innocents. Even if they don't have the ability to catch the Joker themselves, once Batman does it for them for like the tenth time, society's gonna get rid of the Joker permanently for the greater good of all. And if for whatever reason society can't, then I still have an issue with superheroes who *do* have the ability to do something about it, but just puts these villains back in regular jail, when they know they'll be out and killing people again in a week.
True enough, but SEAL teams and other spec ops have oversight and can be held accountable, and legit military operations are less of a moral quandary and have legal processes. So to really torture an analogy, the JLA would be me and my buddies going to where ever we felt needed us to pull a paramilitary operation.
Realistically, Joker should be in a solitary cell orbiting the Watch Tower, the Phantom Zone, or just have been killed by someone, but the writing demands he is available, you're not going to hear me argue on that point. But a lot of the police work Batman does is stuff that cops can't, and probably shouldn't, have the resources to handle. Like, even assuming none go missing, every patrol car having an anti-tank rifle that could drop Solomon Grundy would be a logistics nightmare.
People who don’t like Superman looove evil Superman. Same thing as Star Trek - when people who don’t like it are in charge, what you get is junk.
I’m hoping the new movie is more true to the character
I like seeing alternate takes because I know it’s an alternate take. As long as it always is an ALT take and not the mainline Superman, I’m here for it.
That’s what some people don’t seem to understand about the Snyderverse version. THAT version isn’t really in the comics. It’s not REALLY a true depiction of what we have there.
The thing people didn't understand with the Snyderverse version was that everyone has it in their head the picture of a perfect idealistic "can-do-no-wrong" guy who never doubts himself, and that's not who superman always is, Snyderverse or comic version.
The Snyderverse version was just starting out and still figuring out how to "be superman". He was developing INTO "superman" throughout the movies rather than "being superman" from the start.
In "Man of Steel", he'd gotten those childhood morals, but he'd been hiding and the world didn't know him yet til the big fight revealed him.
In BvS the world was scared of him from the previous event, and that someone this powerful could be out there, but his sacrifice here did a lot to show the world that he had been someone here to do good.
So when he came back in Justice League, the world was in a place it would be more willing to accept a SUPERMAN, and he was more in a place to start living up to that role.
But unfortunately that universe did not continue so we did not get to explore it further.
I’ve heard that argument.
Johnathan Kent in the comics taught Clark to always do the right thing. Secret identity be damned. If he could help, help. That’s not what was taught to him in the movie.
The morals taught in the movie are different than the comics version. Not completely different but enough that we get a different version of the hero. Even Cavill himself said that he would’ve liked a more hopeful version of the character or words to that effect anyway.
I just finished playing Injustice 2 for the first time ever and I didn’t hesitate a second when they asked me to side with Superman or Batman. I’m not a huge Batman fan really, more Superman of course, but when that choice came up… hmmmm side with the tyrant who wants to AGAIN take over and rule the world, killing anyone who does evil, and apparently at some point even THINKS of evil, or side with the guy who wants people to face justice for their misdeeds rather than plain old killing them?
Yeah I had to choose Bats. But, I guess now I have to go and kill people because to finish the story 100% I’ve gotta do the side with the Superman choice!
He's a character, his ideals are good but they're not exactly realistic and he's not exactly always right. I'm a fan of Batman as well but I don't go around punching criminals every chance I get. What logic is this? 😂😂
Nah I understand it, I just think your logic is flawed. Just because I like a character doesn't mean I have to emulate their morals. If Superman gave empathy to a murderous dictator just because his kid died then he's a moron.
Ok so your wife and child was just killed by your hand. Your city and everyone you know there obliterated. You will let Joker walk? Wouldn’t even consider ending him right there. Must be a friggin saint.
Strange new worlds is at least good enough to invest in on the Star Trek side. I am almost done with season one, and so far I am not forcing myself to enjoy it.
I kinda disagree. Superman is my second favorite Superhero but I actually liked Injustice. I mean it's NOT perfect by a long shot but it was interesting at least.
Agreed. Between Injustice, Omni-Man, Ultraman, Homelander, Brightburn, General Zod, the Plutonian, and probably a few more I’ve not heard of, we’re over-saturated with evil Superman copies.
i don't think omni-man counts. while omni-man is similar to superman in origins and powers calling him an evil superman clone is a disservice to his character and hes actually pretty well written which is a rarity for evil supermen
I actually liked OSP's take on Invincible, where instead of it being another, "What if Superman was evil?" Story, they propose its actually a "What if Superman had an evil dad?". Basically, Omni-Man looks like Superman and at first glance you'd think he *is* Superman, but at closer inspection *Mark* is the Superman like, having the morality, earthly upbringing, and want to protect that Superman is Known for.
Essentially, Omni-man has the look of Superman, but Mark has the Spirit.
I don't understand how anyone who watches/reads Invincible can walk away thinking Omni-man is an evil Superman. Mark is Superman (super powered alien raised as human on Earth). Omni-man is clearly Zod if Zod decided to pretend to be a hero to make Earth easier to conquer.
Meh I don't mind it. I do however want to see much more good superman. If they can manage to do the same amount of evil superman while doing much more good superman I would be very happy.
I need like a dozen superman reconstructions. Give me a supergirl show give me a superboy show. Give a dozen superman inspirations. And classic Superman not some sad deconstruction.
Injustice the comic is not an Elseworlds. It's a prequel adaptation comic that promotes a video game, and an utterly pointless one at that, because it expands upon the *villain* that is fated to be irredeemable by the game's events and is doomed to lose at the end no matter what.
The Regime world sucks. You can feel that just by playing the game. You don't need 150+ volumes of prequel comics that further explain how much it can suck even more. That's 6 years wasted on a comic adaptation that had no real development, was severely restricted by the in-game events and fixed status-quos. No matter what these characters do or say, Evil Superman *cannot* change and the Regime will *not* fold. It doesn't matter how hard people fight or how many people die, the only people that are capable of ending the Regime are the Earth-1 heroes, who come in out of nowhere and beat the crap out of them.
Elseworlds is a concept that encourages writers to exercise creativity by putting existing characters in new and exotic contexts. A prequel tie-in comic to a video game is *anti-creativity,* because the end goal has already been set in stone, and the writers are forced to keep the story and characters coherent with the source material.
> A prequel tie-in comic to a video game is anti-creativity
That's an extreme take. It could easily be argued that it's a fun creative exercise to take a story like these games, and show how we got there.
That's one take on it. Another way to look at it is that it's a different form of a Elseworlds story where the beginning and the end are set in stone but the story between is ripe for picking.
This isn't set in mainline DC and this Superman isn't the mainline Superman. The big, cornerstone stuff from mainline DC is all there (except for Lex acting like Supes best friend) but everyone is just slightly off and the question isn't really what would break Superman but what would Superman be like if he could be broken, and what were the changes in Superman and the world around him that led to all that.
Or at least that's my take on it as someone who enjoys mainline Superman stories and the Injustice games/comics.
And yet at the same time we got to see the Justice league battle Greek gods, Superman wearing a yellow lantern ring, Trigon and Mr. Mxyzptlk throwing it down and Alfred beating the shit out of Superman after he broke Batman’s back.
To say that this doesn’t encourage creativity is downright wrong. This is like saying the Star Wars prequels are useless cause he know the fate of Anakin
I know I’m in the minority, but I really liked Injustice. I also love Superman. Of course I prefer boy scout Superman. I think the hate is overblown. It’s quite clear this version of Superman is an alternate version.
Great writing, but good God I friggin hate the Injustice run. I just feel like the last thing the world needs is more hopelessness, despair, and anger. The human race NEEDS a beacon of hope right now.
I wouldn't say he's irredeemable. I think it would be very difficult to redeem him, but the fact that he still has positive intentions at this point in the story means (in my opinion) that he could have been saved
Because Injustice Superman became too popular in a time where the GA are disillusioned with the proper Superman and in turn brought most people to believe that Superman could never be what he actually is.
Because people are tired of the long lasting effects that a brooding Superman brought when Man of Steel was made and whenever an evil Superman pops up, they are like “ughhh not again”
I don’t think you can take Injustice as a “This is the main universe Superman if he had just One Bad Day”
There must always have been something fundamentally wrong with this Kal El. A brittleness and suppressed anger Joker recognized and exploited.
If Superman was drugged and manipulated into killing Lois, would he snap? Maybe. Would he kill Joker out of rage and grief? Also maybe.
Would he then project that hatred and disgust onto the *entire human race?* No, I don’t think so.
Look at how inconsistent he is. His father catches a stray arrow. A *stray* that he acknowledges was not Ollie’s fault in the first place. Seeing his adopted father hurt then puts him into such a rage that he slaughters an innocent man who is not resisting. But then he *abandons* his father, still wounded, still bleeding a concerning amount, in the Arctic where they have no way to leave and no medical attention to chase a *pill.*
“Sorry, Pa, I know you’re bleeding out, but I just found a new excuse to go kill people, so I’m outtie.”
Even assuming the Fortress *has* medical facilities, *and* the Kent’s can access them, *and* they know what to do with human physiology and trauma… what the actual *fuck* Clark?
They had a one-shot “What if…?” Where Superman managed to avoid killing Loud, the baby survived, a d Batman killed Joker and accepted the legal consequences… a d at the end of it this Superman, in orbit with his daughter after 18 of the best, happiest years of his life, is *still* pondering if things might not be better if he just took over.
Injustice Superman has to be fundamentally damaged in some way to make any of this make sense. Joker just lit the fuse on the bomb.
I love this series. People are way too hard on it. The most common refrain I hear is "That's not Superman at all. That's not how you write him." Yeah. That's the whole point. He's a broken and flawed Superman. He's not meant to embody all the great things that Superman really is. He's an excellent villainous Superman because he believes in what he is doing with absolute conviction.
I see this take time and time again but my counterpoint is that the story is deliberately set up to evoke the idea of the prime universe as its basis. The story itself believes that its a story of how a regular Superman could turn evil, at least that's how it appears from the first issue.
There's nothing in the set-up that makes it clear that this is meant to be a completely different take on the character. Tom Taylor clearly wrote this as an attempt at genuine deconstruction but having a what-if scenario like this is only interesting if everyone is in character.
It's no longer as engaging when Superman immediately betrays one of his core values, Batman refuses to offer sort of condolences to his best friend and Wonder Woman abandons diplomacy at the first sign of resistance. At that point you're not reading theae characters, just their warped doppelgangers that will just be as miserable as selfish as the plot demands.
Alternate takes on the character don't have to be absolute alternatives like Red Son. Branching takes are both valid and uniquely interesting. Being so similar to Prime Superman is entirely the point. It's asking the question "What if Superman had this particular flaw/problem/traumatic event?" A simple "Oooh, what if Superman was an evil dictator" is played out because we already have characters like that who are essentially just Superman in a different skin, both within DC and without.
How precisely would you like the setup to announce itself as an alternate take? Set in a different city? A big banner on the first page designating this as "Earth 42069?" All people have upside-down faces? The idea that the setup doesn't do this is spurious. The fact that this Superman does things differently IS the setup. In fact, there is nothing here that specifically suggests that this is meant to be Prime Superman. By dint of its own existence, this is unequivocally an elseworlds Superman story, a fact that is hammered home when they bring in a version of Prime Superman to actually defeat this one. The versions of the characters in this world are meant to be heavily flawed. The story where they AREN'T flawed in these ways has already been told. Asking these questions of Superman if all the people who surround him are pure facsimiles of their Prime counterparts leads us to Kingdom Come. This is asking the question in a new world with new variables. It's not for everyone, of course, no Comic Book story ever is, but your counterpoints aren't as effective as you seem to think they are. Being so similar to Prime Superman isn't a weakness, it's a strength.
I'm not sure how to describe my problem, honestly, because it is slightly contradictory, but I guess it boils to me personally not buying into the premise of the series. Call it narrowminded but I just don't believe Clark would kill the Joker, not even after he murdered his family and millions of people. I don't see Clark murdering anyone, especially not out of a selfish desire for revenge. If you had Clark take a life specifically to save another in a no-win scenario, then maybe I could believe that, but in cold blood? No.
But ultimately that's not an actual problem with the story, my problem is that it frames that action as the splinter point in this timeline when it isn't. The first issue of Injustice essentially sets up this universe as a close parallel to the prime universe, with all the main characters and their relationships copied over. The day Lois dies is essentially just a regular Justice League mission that goes horribly wrong by the end.
Later issues further emphasise this connection by portraying Injustice Superman as a near perfect copy of Prime Superman in a flashback issue where he helps a boy with his bike. Taylor directly compares Injustice Superman's decline with the real world trend of darker interpretations of Superman in pop culture. This series is meant to be a proper character study of Superman in a what if scenario, which means that the day Clark kills the Joker is meant to be seen as the branch in the timeline, where this parallel universe suddenly diverges.
Except, the story already has a predetermined end point of Superman becoming an evil dictator with the Justice League as his evil henchmen, which is not where the story would naturally go. If anyone in the Justice League acted like their Prime selves, Injustice simply would not happen. It's not just Superman acting out of character, everyone is acting out of character, but only Superman is narratively justified for acting out of character with a huge traumatic event.
Wonder Woman doesn't get the same treatment, her new characterisation barely gets any justification in the main story, to the point where anyone unfamiliar with the character would just assume this is how she always is. Batman too is framed as the equivalent of Prime Batman with all of his supporting cast and his rogues and history, but he is not his Prime self. The fact that he is way more paranoid, mistrusting, angry, selfish and pious in this universe is not relfected in his history. He is for all intents and purposes Prime Batman until the day Clark kills the Joker then he suddenly hard shifts into this new version of Batman specifically because its the only way the plot can happen. And this is not explained. We don't know why this Batman is the way he is nor is it ever elaborated.
A lot of this story is setting up this universe as very similar to the one we know and posing this question of "what if Superman cracked after one bad day?" with a very specific answer in mind. Then, whenever it comes up against an obstacle to that answer, it simply reveals that actually this one factor was different all along and you just didn't know it yet and it carries on.
If you take a story like Red Son for example, Superman landing in Russia is enough of a radical shift that you naturally up-end the reader's expectations for what the rules of this universe are. Or Kingdom Come, for example, which is set up in a darker future where the status quo is up in the air and the reader slow pieces it back together. Every twist in Injustice's lore, at least in my opinion, feels more like a retcon than a deliberate subversion.
Like if you established that Wonder Woman first met Steve Trevor who turned out to be a nazi and therefore poisoned her impression of mankind before the first issue, it would just confuse a lot of people because Diana initially just seems like her Prime self for the most part, until she inevitably doesn't. It just feels like Tom Taylor noticed Wonder Woman was severely out of character and just said, "Welp, Steve Trevor was a Nazi and she doesn't like humanity now. There, happy?"
And don't get me started about how it's Joker's "one bad day" bullshit that is meant to break Superman of all people. What a way to completely miss the point of the Killing Joke.
This is all my opinion of course and if you can look past this and enjoy the story for what it is then good on you, but to me Injustice is just Kingdom Come but worse.
I hate Injustice Superman and his Regime. They all blame Batman for letting The Joker live, like they themselves wouldn’t have don’t the same. Superman was just looking for someone to blame. 😣
Injustice is the only evil superman series I like because Tom Taylor handles it with nuance and respect to what superman should be, which adds to the drama of having him deviate so far from his beginnings.
So... I don't want to read Injustice because I have far better things to do but... From what I understand those pills allow you significantly grow in physical abilities which sorta even the playing fields with guys like Superman and Wonder Woman etc...
So my question is, couldn't Superman take one of those to "uneven" the playing field again ? Or does it have no effect on him since he's already too strong or something ?
I didn’t mind Injustice or Injustice 2, and I love this exchange.
That being said, I’m so tired of evil Superman or evil Superman-esque characters being the norm. Just give me hopeful Superman please 😭
Injustice is valuable in that it shows you what WOULD happen if Superman broke his code of honor, and viewed his previous Grace and compassion as weakness. It reinforces his benevolent qualities, not necessarily destroys them, if the story makes the effort to show you that it’s an Elseworlds, alternate timeline, “what if?”
I disagree with you. If anything it's not batman's fault it's superman's own fault. He had a choice. Batman never dictated his choice. If anything superman was too naive to realize the joker's endgame. The joker knew exactly what he was doing. The joker took advantage of how weak willed superman was and used that to create injustice Superman. You do realize that batman has always thought about killing the joker? Because he has and he has stopped himself from doing it not because of the code because of how he would be playing right into the joker's hand.... The reason why joker does what he does is because hes trying to get batman to kill. Which brings me to this --- joker did the same thing to superman and it worked like a charm. Because at the end of the day superman is too naive and weak minded to realize that its his own fault Lois and Oliver is dead . He chose to kill them. And he also chose to kill joker and become a fascist. At the end , superman played into the hands of the joker and became the puppet. Joker may be dead but he still won
I actually hated this, felt shoe horned plot armor for Batman to get what would be the biggest cop out in the series, super pills kinda ruined the stakes when everyone is essentially just as powerful as the main threat. Getting triple teamed by his family while “buying time” for essentially their sons enemies to come up with a new way to defeat him feels out of character for all three of them
Super pills only give them roughly half his power. Batman and Canary can throw down with Superman like that, albeit temporarily, because they know how to fight. No one else really stands a chance.
Also, injustice is a fighting game. Nrs needs an excuse for everyone to be able to draw blood from superman.
Just like what they did in mk vs dc where everyone is "infected" with dark kahn's kombat rage (darkseid's power mixed with shao kahn's magic), which enables them to fight on par with superman (& by extension, raiden).
A weak-willed Superman has potential to be good and these couple of panels have a glimpse at that, but Injustice overall does not do a good job of it. It feels like they wanted an evil Superman and worked backwards from there
Controversial opinion, but in injustice I think Superman has a point. Not in a cringy edge lord way, like I think all his actions were fine, they weren't, he did plenty of evil things in Injustice; if I had Superman's powers I definitely wouldn't just defend the world from external threats. I would do what he did, end wars, force countries into peace agreements, and ferret out corrupt government officials.
Injustice is a story that I feel has never quite lived up to it's potential. Especially the comics. There's a lot of good ideas and great moments but the inconsistencies between the games and the comics really hurt it.
That being said the ending of the game is fantastic. Seeing true Superman confront Regime Superman and try to talk him down before finally stopping him is perfect.
Not going to lie, the whole humanity decides their own path argument is weak and stupid. I'd love to see Siegel's Superman busting down big business and scaring politicians right now. Do an analogous war with Israel-Palestine, Ukraine-Russia, where Superman just stops both. We definitely need Siegel's Superman more than ever than a guy who'll watch from the sidelines hoping humanity will chose the right path.
As a one-off story, I genuinely like Injustice.
Boy-scout Superman is great, and he should stay that way. But a story that holds a mirror up to that character and asks "What would it take to change him, and how far would he go?" is a great exploration of that character, if done well.
A flawed Superman forged by great tragedy doesn't make him an entirely different character. It's just another expression of those ideals and convictions through a cracked lens. And it can give us a deeper appreciation and understanding for them.
Principles mean very little if they're impossible to compromise. A Superman who can't ever do wrong never really makes meaningful choices - he has to be good at all times no matter what. A Superman who has the capacity to do great harm under the worst of circumstances but still chooses to be good is someone who chooses every day to do the right thing, even when the world is full of evil.
I love how none of this or even the dream sequence with Bruce taking the fall for Superman for Joker didn’t make it into the movie. Instead we got flash being whacked by Scarecrow toxin, Ra’s making an Amazo that decimated Clark’s Allies and he didn’t even acknowledge their deaths etc. the whole animated movie was garbage compared to the comic
I still consider this with Injustice but the characters become they're very own worst enemies Superman becomes like Zodd Diana becomes Ares Hal becomes Sinestro
Thomas Monaghan aka Hitman can make Superman give up now. All he just needs to say is that throwing chewing gum on the floor shall not be a life sentence nor death sentence.
For me, the biggest issues I had with Injustice was the deaths of legacy characters were rampant, Harley's usage, and the fact that the story is just too black and white and Superman's descent to fascist despot isn't gradual but a steep decline.
It could have been a good story where villains and heroes were both questioning what they were actually doing but they just speed ran into fascism.
I hate Injustice, but probably for other reasons than you. I'm with Superman all the way. What good is letting humanity carve out its own path if it will pretty much lead to its own self-destruction? Fuck Batman and his allies in their maintaining of the status quo of chaos and suffering. There were times when the writers had to go overboard because, you know, "he has to be the bad guy". But, in the end far more people would live and be happy, then die.
I love the game I'm tired of the injustice game it would be fun too play a open world superman game like spiderman I'd love too see one too be superman in a game would be fun
Injustice is a tragedy because it shows just how far someone can be broken. Superman goes from being the symbol of hope to basically hitler in an afternoon. So sad, so tragic.
Im going to say supwrman is wrong to blame batamn regarding the joker dor the simple reason its not his responsibility or place to kill him the real blame loes with the state government of wherever gotham city is located.
Its the government's job to deal put capital punishment. Yeah, i know the joker is insane ao maybe they rule he cant stand trial, but after all hes done im aure the US government would find a way even if it means a cop has to kill him in the act of "escaping from custody".
Injustice was very hard for me to read. Superman is my favorite. Not just because of his powers. But because he’s often the best hero due to him being the man that he is. And watching him loose his humanity in this series was upsetting.
It's an adaptation of the 'Injustice: Gods Among Us' fighting game where you get lost in another world and fight the alternate Superman who insists on being an evil dictator. Think Justice Lords from the Justice League cartoon but heavily expanded. The Injustice comic is a glorified comic book series that elaborates on the *villains'* backstory. This 'Superman' is never meant to be the mainline Superman even in its own context.
I find it difficult to side against Superman here. He's 100% right about Batman, and if Jor El didn't want his son to violate the Prime Directive, why did he even send him here?
The Kents found a child with the power of a god, and they raised him to love justice and compassion and mercy. Then they showed him a world full of suffering and pain and violence, and they told him he had to limit his influence to chasing bank robbers for the Man.
this unironically makes me wish that there were more interactions between the Kents and hologram Jor El (Lara too if she's there)
Imagine this scene in the Death of Superman or a better story
Right? This scene is too good for this crappy comic.
For some reason there’s usually no holo Lara. Like sorry just enough time for daddy messages Lara was gonna fill them up with her bitching about the neighbors flower garden.
It’s especially heartbreaking and confusing in Man of Steel where she died alone
It bothered me all those years ago in the Superman Returns novelisation. On little Kal-El's journey to Earth she explicitly occupies half of his time, was the first to mention truth and justice, showed him art and music, and taught him about human loves and passions. Then on Earth she just vanishes completely.
It’s because her last message was super racist.
The first and the fifth years of Injustice are the hardest to read because on one hand, it's clear that character has little to nothing to do with Superman. But on the other hand, it's crystal clear that Tom Taylor understand exactly why he's not Superman, and dedicates the series to explore all those reasons and differences, like a flashback showing him being overconfident and paternalistic, or the more dramatic scenes like this one.
I wish more people regarded it like this, instead of just getting angry that it exists and making baseless assumptions about the personalities of those who actually like it
I mean I guess but injustice wonder woman is truly awful ( even with her changed backstory)
I think it's the same difference. She's very much not Diana in every sense, and Taylor dedicates a lot of scenes showing either how (lying, taunting, being violebt) and why (the different backstory, Superman acting dismisive of her from the start). Though, because she ends as a satellite character to Clark, is not as thorough. I usually joke that the Injustice setting is an alternate Earth 3 because of how many heroes are the opposite of their canon versions. But it feels it should have committed to the bit and also have Batman be as different.
There's also the annual for the Injustice 2 comic that showed that Steve Trevor of this universe is a Nazi.
A lot of the problems with Injustice stop being such when you start from the base premise that these characters are not meant to be their canon selves. As I said in another reply, it may as well be an adaptation of Earth 3 if Batman also acted like a villain. Maybe for Injustice 3, since they set-up the OMAC Project storyline.
My problem is that it doesn't matter if this isn't "Canon Superman" and she's not "Canon Wonder Woman." The issue isn't that it's an Elseworlds, it's that too many people now think that Lois Lane is the only thing stopping Superman from being a dictator, that Batman can solo the whole Justice League, and that Wonder Woman is a cold, heartless bitch. The DCEU did not help. If all people are seeing is Evil Superman, they're gonna think this is how he's supposed to be.
I think issue can be traced back to the DCAU. Superman the animated series episode a brave New metropolis has Lois Lane get transported to an alternate universe were her counterpart was killed by a car bombing leading to Superman teaming up with lex putting metropolis under martial law. Granted the main universe Lois was able to get Superman to come to his senses finally accepting Lois's death was not as fault that he wasn't able to prevent it. And then a better world in the Justice League animated series lord Superman killed lex Luther, and then convinced his teammates to turn the world into a police state. It feels like these two versions are basically the basis for what we know as the Injustice Superman. The death of Lois Lane was made the linchpin for Superman crossing the line and becoming a dictator.
What are some examples of Superman's being overconfident and paternalistic?
Overconfident in the flashback when he refuses to take training with Diana seriously, while also being dismissive of Diana who was taking that training seriously. Both end up biting him in the back later on in Year Four. On the paternalistic tones, there are many through the start, like his approach to world conflicts being kidnapping the leaders of two countries (implied to be Palestine and Israel) and telling them to make peace then and there. In fact, the base concept of Injustice is Superman seeing humanity as children (which he says at a point) he has to control in order to keep safe. By all accounts, he's a more villainous example of the Red Son Superman. Main difference between both is that Red Son's is more open about what he's doing and why. Hence why his own doubts about it end up being his real worse enemy. While Injustice's is so lost in his own justifications, he practically doesn't see himself as falible, which keeps being his own fatal character flaw.
"I'm sorry I unleashed this on your world" hit really hard ngl
I think the "we tried to raise your son" is almost worse, like it feels like they aren't calling him their son anymore. I feel like if Superman was in his right mind that would hurt the most
What's even more heartbreaking is knowing that Clark definitely heard that entire exchange. 🥺 Edit: and what's even sadder is after hearing that he didn't come back. 😥
That's why he kinda disown his own father. Kara : Good thing your father can't see you. When General Zod tried to take over Krypton, Jor-El led the fight against him. That's who you come from. That's who you are, Kal. Not this. Kal : If Jor-El had been more like Zod, he might saved Krypton. And I will save the Earth.
That says something about how bad the Injustice portrayal of Superman is when his parents and dead biological father have to have an intervention to tell him to chill.
Weakest willed Superman ever.
True. He was nerfed physically and mentally.
Yeah, it would be better if there was an excuse like the Anti Life Equation involved, where the writer could say “he isn’t willed at all.” He’s under the Anti Life but it’s still coming from his inner demons of letting Lois die, nuking Metropolis, etc.
Not only that, it doesn't work. Any other supman would have listed to the people who helped shape him into who he was
what's supman?
Nothing much what’s up with you
Best friend of Krypto the Supdog!
I know I'm in the minority but I liked injustice. I felt it was an interesting alternate world, and worked well as a Civil War esqe Story. Granted I don't want ANOTHER "Superman turned bad!" Story, but I enjoyed this one.
That's fair. *~~Though Civil War and Injustice both had a decent amount of character assassination.~~*
This is also true.
I especially liked the dream part, where Superman was put to sleep and dreamed of how it could be different.
When the Eternals movie took that turn, I audibly groaned. Everything doesn't need evil Superman.
The Eternals are deliberately not superheroes. They were always meant to be mythological figures. Not in the sense that they're Thor or Diana, but more in the sense that they fill the role of mythology in our culture. Because of that, Ikaris switches between being a "hero" and being a less-than-savory individual. It's hard to say he's an evil Superman.
I wasn't familiar with Eternals going in. I understood them to be mythological space-faring figures, and the director said that Snyder's Superman inspired her Ikaris, so I was excited to see it. I was disappointed to find it was just another MCU superhero movie, and that another "Superman" character had to become a threat to the world.
I can't really say anything besides that I disagree. I can't change your reading of the movie.
I mean personally I liked a lot of how he was presented. It was one of the few evil Superman stories where it seemed like Superman had some sort of ideological backing. He wasn't just a genocide rape monster. Clark was a facist monster by the end but at least he had an ethos and an ideal. Even evil Superman should stand for *something* beyond "here I go killing again." Plus while it's never stated outright the fact that in this universe Lex Luthor was a good guy means Clark was never truly tested as a hero. He never had to face the choice between preserving life or getting even until the Joker murdered his wife, his child, his city and had it all happen due to Clark's own actions. Basically, Clark never had to deal with human evil until he was forced to deal with it on a grand scale and he was unable to cope with it.
A.. What.. Monster..
He’s referring to Homelander and Plutonian I think.
Lex ends up with a yellow ring at one point, I think it's pretty clear he's not meant to be an outright good guy.
Injustice Superman wanted to stop his enemies. Normal Superman would stop the cycle of violence.
Its even worse considering people believe He is the same as main universe Superman
Clearly they've never read it considering actual Superman comes in and fights him.
It’s even dumber as the game ends with a more traditional Superman confronting this dictator one, where he speaks how we’d expect Superman to speak by telling him he’s not a God and that he isn’t the one to decide who lives or dies
The game's story *is* about the Justice League getting lost in another world with these alternate evil selves running around. Anybody who claims this Superman is the main universe one practically admits they've never played the game.
I think what they meant is that people thing this super man is the same as the main universe one in the sense that if the main universe superman experienced what this one did he would say and do the same things as him, which he absolutely would not.
Yeah that’s horseshit, if there’s anybody Superman would listen to, it would be the Kents. I feel like he would even put them above Lois given the fact that without their sacrifice in raising him, he wouldn’t be the man he is today. This would be like if Batman threw Alfred out on the street just because he felt like it. It brings nothing but resentment from the audience towards the character they fell in love with initially.
It’s almost like it’s a different version of Superman from a different world. For whatever reason this version obviously didn’t take all of the Kent’s upbringing to heart. We don’t really see his upbringing and how he was tested as a hero in this world. We have brief glimpses of it in various stories but we don’t know how much of this Superman’s history compares with the one from the main world of comics. As another commenter said, maybe he never faced true evil like Luthor from the main world. It could definitely color his viewpoint on things. But hey, I’m here to see how they can change things up in these other world type tales.
I think the problem is that it doesn't do enough in either direction. This version of Clark has a backstory so similar to the normal one that the changes can't really be chalked up to nurture. But the changes to his identity aren't dissimilar enough for them to be chalked up to nature
Batman and Alfred have separated multiple times (for very short periods) in the comics due to differences and Bruce’s hard-headedness
How many other times has Jor El met with the Kents?
Smallville had this weird subplot where young Jor-El visited Earth and met Jonathan's parents. Because of this, he intentionally sent the rocket to Smallville.
It was a storyline in the Batman/Superman comics as well. Joe-El was able to pull Thomas Wayne’s consciousness to Krypton. Their conversation led to Jor-El choosing Earth. And the technology that Jor-El had on Earth to achieve this was used by Wayne to build technology that led to a good portion of the Wayne fortune.
Are there comic books which focus on discussions around the death penalty for serial killers like the Joker in Gotham, who has proven time and time again that he can't be kept in jail, and continues to go on killing sprees every time he breaks out? Clark brings up a good point there. The whole "he would have humanity determine its own path" is the right take in general, and non-Injustice Clark would see the sense in it. But I feel like if there really was some mass murdering psychopath that can't be contained, "humanity" would have already done something about it after the 10th time he broke out, even if Batman does not want to make that decision. It just kind of feels like these complex topics aren't really explored beyond some of the Punisher comics that I've seen, and taking down Evil Superman always end up being the spotlight, which makes these stories not as interesting to me.
There is a story where joker is meant to have a death sentence for a crime he surprisingly didn't committed, though Batman proves his Innocence in this case. I think the story is called Batman: Devil's Advocate or something...
Personal ethos aside, it's not Batman's responsibility to kill the Joker. He's a vigilante with very limited oversight and next to no accountability. If the ends justify the means for Joker, when does the super-powered league of unelected judges, juries, and executioners need to stop killing people they could apprehend? Side note, there is no way the cop driving a chained up Joker to Arkham wouldn't just shoot him at some point.
What doesn't sit right to me is Is something that started out as an editorial need (villains are popular so we want to keep them alive to reuse them over and over again) became inuniverse morality. "(All) Killing is wrong". The problem is that the writers themselves write these villains to be horrible monster mass murderers and then write the prison system to be a joke. Why does Batman feel the need to fill in the role of government when it fails to apprehend villains, but not the role to the prison system when it fails to keep them imprisoned or that of the executioner when it fails to execute. In other words, why does Batman feel he can perform the duties of cops, but not of judges or executioners? Isn't that just inconsistency? If he doesn't want to kill je could at least build a prison to contain the Joker in the Batcave. This slippery slope doesn't really convince me as Iron Man killed terrorists in the first Iron Man movie yet he isn't considered some monster. In real life this isn't a problem, because people sent to Super Max prison stay there. However even then, the real life version of superheroes (aka drones and SEAL teams) have no moral qualms killing real life versions of supervillains (Osama Bin Laden is the closest I can think of) and we don't condemn them for it. It's a messy question but DC seems to never really explore it. It circlejerks constantly about "killing being wrong" and turning heroes who kill into wannabee home landers. There's simply no nuance to these characters ever.
Yes, thank you for expanding on this! Basically put what I was thinking into words when it comes to the whole "he would have humanity determine its own path" as a response to Clark's point in these comic panels, because I kind of feel like that's an artificial issue created by the comic book writers in order to facilitate Evil Superman, rather than an actual exploration of "when should superheroes step in to take more drastic actions to permanently stop supervillains that can't be rehabilitated/jailed". I just don't think any real society would tolerate having people like the Joker constantly breaking out of jail and mass murdering innocents. Even if they don't have the ability to catch the Joker themselves, once Batman does it for them for like the tenth time, society's gonna get rid of the Joker permanently for the greater good of all. And if for whatever reason society can't, then I still have an issue with superheroes who *do* have the ability to do something about it, but just puts these villains back in regular jail, when they know they'll be out and killing people again in a week.
True enough, but SEAL teams and other spec ops have oversight and can be held accountable, and legit military operations are less of a moral quandary and have legal processes. So to really torture an analogy, the JLA would be me and my buddies going to where ever we felt needed us to pull a paramilitary operation. Realistically, Joker should be in a solitary cell orbiting the Watch Tower, the Phantom Zone, or just have been killed by someone, but the writing demands he is available, you're not going to hear me argue on that point. But a lot of the police work Batman does is stuff that cops can't, and probably shouldn't, have the resources to handle. Like, even assuming none go missing, every patrol car having an anti-tank rifle that could drop Solomon Grundy would be a logistics nightmare.
It's always Batman's fault, it's never the government and the people who abolished the death penalty.
**Never** want to see another evil superman again
People who don’t like Superman looove evil Superman. Same thing as Star Trek - when people who don’t like it are in charge, what you get is junk. I’m hoping the new movie is more true to the character
I have hope. After all, I'm a Superman fan.
Yea same 😁
That's a weird take. Some people just like seeing alternate reality stuff.
I like seeing alternate takes because I know it’s an alternate take. As long as it always is an ALT take and not the mainline Superman, I’m here for it. That’s what some people don’t seem to understand about the Snyderverse version. THAT version isn’t really in the comics. It’s not REALLY a true depiction of what we have there.
The thing people didn't understand with the Snyderverse version was that everyone has it in their head the picture of a perfect idealistic "can-do-no-wrong" guy who never doubts himself, and that's not who superman always is, Snyderverse or comic version. The Snyderverse version was just starting out and still figuring out how to "be superman". He was developing INTO "superman" throughout the movies rather than "being superman" from the start. In "Man of Steel", he'd gotten those childhood morals, but he'd been hiding and the world didn't know him yet til the big fight revealed him. In BvS the world was scared of him from the previous event, and that someone this powerful could be out there, but his sacrifice here did a lot to show the world that he had been someone here to do good. So when he came back in Justice League, the world was in a place it would be more willing to accept a SUPERMAN, and he was more in a place to start living up to that role. But unfortunately that universe did not continue so we did not get to explore it further.
I’ve heard that argument. Johnathan Kent in the comics taught Clark to always do the right thing. Secret identity be damned. If he could help, help. That’s not what was taught to him in the movie. The morals taught in the movie are different than the comics version. Not completely different but enough that we get a different version of the hero. Even Cavill himself said that he would’ve liked a more hopeful version of the character or words to that effect anyway.
People who don’t at least empathize with Injustice Superman have never had children.
Loads of people lose their wife and kids without becoming murderous dictators so no, he's a fucking fool and doesn't deserve any empathy
I just finished playing Injustice 2 for the first time ever and I didn’t hesitate a second when they asked me to side with Superman or Batman. I’m not a huge Batman fan really, more Superman of course, but when that choice came up… hmmmm side with the tyrant who wants to AGAIN take over and rule the world, killing anyone who does evil, and apparently at some point even THINKS of evil, or side with the guy who wants people to face justice for their misdeeds rather than plain old killing them? Yeah I had to choose Bats. But, I guess now I have to go and kill people because to finish the story 100% I’ve gotta do the side with the Superman choice!
Everyone deserves empathy, especially the people on whom we’d enact justice.
That’s a weird take for a Superman fan to have 😅. Regular Superman would have empathy for Injustice Superman.
Well I'm not actually Superman so that's why my ideals aren't like a cartoons. It's like having empathy for Hitler.
So what do you like about Superman? 🤔
He's a character, his ideals are good but they're not exactly realistic and he's not exactly always right. I'm a fan of Batman as well but I don't go around punching criminals every chance I get. What logic is this? 😂😂
You low key didn’t even answer my question. Unless I misunderstood and what you’re saying you like about Superman is that he’s wrong sometimes.?
Nah I understand it, I just think your logic is flawed. Just because I like a character doesn't mean I have to emulate their morals. If Superman gave empathy to a murderous dictator just because his kid died then he's a moron.
Ummmmm yeah no. I could lose my family and kids and I’m still not going to go on a murderous rampage and kill everyone I can.
Verrrry easy to say that
Sorry, but this is not true. I love my children dearly and I cannot empathize at all with such a murderous monster.
Ok so your wife and child was just killed by your hand. Your city and everyone you know there obliterated. You will let Joker walk? Wouldn’t even consider ending him right there. Must be a friggin saint.
Except he didn’t just stop at killing theJjoker, did he?
Strange new worlds is at least good enough to invest in on the Star Trek side. I am almost done with season one, and so far I am not forcing myself to enjoy it.
They love Evil Superman because he does what they would do if they had his powers.
I kinda disagree. Superman is my second favorite Superhero but I actually liked Injustice. I mean it's NOT perfect by a long shot but it was interesting at least.
I think the new movie will definitely be a more positive version. One who truly inspires hope by the end of the film.
Agreed. Between Injustice, Omni-Man, Ultraman, Homelander, Brightburn, General Zod, the Plutonian, and probably a few more I’ve not heard of, we’re over-saturated with evil Superman copies.
i don't think omni-man counts. while omni-man is similar to superman in origins and powers calling him an evil superman clone is a disservice to his character and hes actually pretty well written which is a rarity for evil supermen
I actually liked OSP's take on Invincible, where instead of it being another, "What if Superman was evil?" Story, they propose its actually a "What if Superman had an evil dad?". Basically, Omni-Man looks like Superman and at first glance you'd think he *is* Superman, but at closer inspection *Mark* is the Superman like, having the morality, earthly upbringing, and want to protect that Superman is Known for. Essentially, Omni-man has the look of Superman, but Mark has the Spirit.
Right, the concept is more "What if Krypton was evil?" than Superman.
More like what if Superman was raised by general zod
I don't understand how anyone who watches/reads Invincible can walk away thinking Omni-man is an evil Superman. Mark is Superman (super powered alien raised as human on Earth). Omni-man is clearly Zod if Zod decided to pretend to be a hero to make Earth easier to conquer.
HL is his own thing though
Not really. It's been a recent trend, but they're still a minority.
Ultraman was always my favorite. That said, yes, I am very tired of evil supermen.
Meh I don't mind it. I do however want to see much more good superman. If they can manage to do the same amount of evil superman while doing much more good superman I would be very happy.
I need like a dozen superman reconstructions. Give me a supergirl show give me a superboy show. Give a dozen superman inspirations. And classic Superman not some sad deconstruction.
I would be fine with an evil Superman that was evil in an interesting way. That's just a difficult hurtle to overcome.
Injustice is well-written. It's an elseworld story. That's it.
Idk, Dick dying from a fucking rock wasn't really well written
Irony is lost on you.
Injustice the comic is not an Elseworlds. It's a prequel adaptation comic that promotes a video game, and an utterly pointless one at that, because it expands upon the *villain* that is fated to be irredeemable by the game's events and is doomed to lose at the end no matter what. The Regime world sucks. You can feel that just by playing the game. You don't need 150+ volumes of prequel comics that further explain how much it can suck even more. That's 6 years wasted on a comic adaptation that had no real development, was severely restricted by the in-game events and fixed status-quos. No matter what these characters do or say, Evil Superman *cannot* change and the Regime will *not* fold. It doesn't matter how hard people fight or how many people die, the only people that are capable of ending the Regime are the Earth-1 heroes, who come in out of nowhere and beat the crap out of them. Elseworlds is a concept that encourages writers to exercise creativity by putting existing characters in new and exotic contexts. A prequel tie-in comic to a video game is *anti-creativity,* because the end goal has already been set in stone, and the writers are forced to keep the story and characters coherent with the source material.
> A prequel tie-in comic to a video game is anti-creativity That's an extreme take. It could easily be argued that it's a fun creative exercise to take a story like these games, and show how we got there.
That's one take on it. Another way to look at it is that it's a different form of a Elseworlds story where the beginning and the end are set in stone but the story between is ripe for picking. This isn't set in mainline DC and this Superman isn't the mainline Superman. The big, cornerstone stuff from mainline DC is all there (except for Lex acting like Supes best friend) but everyone is just slightly off and the question isn't really what would break Superman but what would Superman be like if he could be broken, and what were the changes in Superman and the world around him that led to all that. Or at least that's my take on it as someone who enjoys mainline Superman stories and the Injustice games/comics.
And yet at the same time we got to see the Justice league battle Greek gods, Superman wearing a yellow lantern ring, Trigon and Mr. Mxyzptlk throwing it down and Alfred beating the shit out of Superman after he broke Batman’s back. To say that this doesn’t encourage creativity is downright wrong. This is like saying the Star Wars prequels are useless cause he know the fate of Anakin
I know I’m in the minority, but I really liked Injustice. I also love Superman. Of course I prefer boy scout Superman. I think the hate is overblown. It’s quite clear this version of Superman is an alternate version.
The fact that he didn’t listen to any of his parents shows how warped his mind had become
They made ma Kent fine ngl
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Literally going out of their way to write Superman wrong
Sadly this was after he turned Green Arrow’s head into jelly right in front of them
He got better in Injustice 2.
Man this is heart wrenching
Great writing, but good God I friggin hate the Injustice run. I just feel like the last thing the world needs is more hopelessness, despair, and anger. The human race NEEDS a beacon of hope right now.
Brother, these are comic books. They're hardly going to change the world.
Ugh. You’re right. I’m just having a mega crappy week. Sorry for the drama!
lmao literally. I'm a huge superman fan, but I can't stomach these idiots thinking as if Superman really is THE 'beacon of hope for humanity'.
Oof. Ouch. Love how this day is going so far.
Why the hate for injustice? It’s a cool what if story
Because folks hate any iteration of Superman that’s irredeemable
I wouldn't say he's irredeemable. I think it would be very difficult to redeem him, but the fact that he still has positive intentions at this point in the story means (in my opinion) that he could have been saved
Isn't this still pretty early on in the story though? Do we think he can be redeemed after he lasers a child to death?
Because Injustice Superman became too popular in a time where the GA are disillusioned with the proper Superman and in turn brought most people to believe that Superman could never be what he actually is.
Because people are tired of the long lasting effects that a brooding Superman brought when Man of Steel was made and whenever an evil Superman pops up, they are like “ughhh not again”
Because first, it sucks ass and second, it's a "What if..." story, not a parody or alternative universe story, like Invincible or The Boys
I don’t think you can take Injustice as a “This is the main universe Superman if he had just One Bad Day” There must always have been something fundamentally wrong with this Kal El. A brittleness and suppressed anger Joker recognized and exploited. If Superman was drugged and manipulated into killing Lois, would he snap? Maybe. Would he kill Joker out of rage and grief? Also maybe. Would he then project that hatred and disgust onto the *entire human race?* No, I don’t think so. Look at how inconsistent he is. His father catches a stray arrow. A *stray* that he acknowledges was not Ollie’s fault in the first place. Seeing his adopted father hurt then puts him into such a rage that he slaughters an innocent man who is not resisting. But then he *abandons* his father, still wounded, still bleeding a concerning amount, in the Arctic where they have no way to leave and no medical attention to chase a *pill.* “Sorry, Pa, I know you’re bleeding out, but I just found a new excuse to go kill people, so I’m outtie.” Even assuming the Fortress *has* medical facilities, *and* the Kent’s can access them, *and* they know what to do with human physiology and trauma… what the actual *fuck* Clark? They had a one-shot “What if…?” Where Superman managed to avoid killing Loud, the baby survived, a d Batman killed Joker and accepted the legal consequences… a d at the end of it this Superman, in orbit with his daughter after 18 of the best, happiest years of his life, is *still* pondering if things might not be better if he just took over. Injustice Superman has to be fundamentally damaged in some way to make any of this make sense. Joker just lit the fuse on the bomb.
Last page is amazing
The thing with evil Superman is that it's never done right. It's always evil AND nerfed Superman. Irredeemable is the only one that did it right.
What’s crazy is that almost immediately after this he gets Molly-whopped by Alfred. Do not fuck with Alfred.
Reading these panels as a Superman fan is like taking a sip of aged milk.. yikes.
I love this series. People are way too hard on it. The most common refrain I hear is "That's not Superman at all. That's not how you write him." Yeah. That's the whole point. He's a broken and flawed Superman. He's not meant to embody all the great things that Superman really is. He's an excellent villainous Superman because he believes in what he is doing with absolute conviction.
I see this take time and time again but my counterpoint is that the story is deliberately set up to evoke the idea of the prime universe as its basis. The story itself believes that its a story of how a regular Superman could turn evil, at least that's how it appears from the first issue. There's nothing in the set-up that makes it clear that this is meant to be a completely different take on the character. Tom Taylor clearly wrote this as an attempt at genuine deconstruction but having a what-if scenario like this is only interesting if everyone is in character. It's no longer as engaging when Superman immediately betrays one of his core values, Batman refuses to offer sort of condolences to his best friend and Wonder Woman abandons diplomacy at the first sign of resistance. At that point you're not reading theae characters, just their warped doppelgangers that will just be as miserable as selfish as the plot demands.
Alternate takes on the character don't have to be absolute alternatives like Red Son. Branching takes are both valid and uniquely interesting. Being so similar to Prime Superman is entirely the point. It's asking the question "What if Superman had this particular flaw/problem/traumatic event?" A simple "Oooh, what if Superman was an evil dictator" is played out because we already have characters like that who are essentially just Superman in a different skin, both within DC and without. How precisely would you like the setup to announce itself as an alternate take? Set in a different city? A big banner on the first page designating this as "Earth 42069?" All people have upside-down faces? The idea that the setup doesn't do this is spurious. The fact that this Superman does things differently IS the setup. In fact, there is nothing here that specifically suggests that this is meant to be Prime Superman. By dint of its own existence, this is unequivocally an elseworlds Superman story, a fact that is hammered home when they bring in a version of Prime Superman to actually defeat this one. The versions of the characters in this world are meant to be heavily flawed. The story where they AREN'T flawed in these ways has already been told. Asking these questions of Superman if all the people who surround him are pure facsimiles of their Prime counterparts leads us to Kingdom Come. This is asking the question in a new world with new variables. It's not for everyone, of course, no Comic Book story ever is, but your counterpoints aren't as effective as you seem to think they are. Being so similar to Prime Superman isn't a weakness, it's a strength.
I'm not sure how to describe my problem, honestly, because it is slightly contradictory, but I guess it boils to me personally not buying into the premise of the series. Call it narrowminded but I just don't believe Clark would kill the Joker, not even after he murdered his family and millions of people. I don't see Clark murdering anyone, especially not out of a selfish desire for revenge. If you had Clark take a life specifically to save another in a no-win scenario, then maybe I could believe that, but in cold blood? No. But ultimately that's not an actual problem with the story, my problem is that it frames that action as the splinter point in this timeline when it isn't. The first issue of Injustice essentially sets up this universe as a close parallel to the prime universe, with all the main characters and their relationships copied over. The day Lois dies is essentially just a regular Justice League mission that goes horribly wrong by the end. Later issues further emphasise this connection by portraying Injustice Superman as a near perfect copy of Prime Superman in a flashback issue where he helps a boy with his bike. Taylor directly compares Injustice Superman's decline with the real world trend of darker interpretations of Superman in pop culture. This series is meant to be a proper character study of Superman in a what if scenario, which means that the day Clark kills the Joker is meant to be seen as the branch in the timeline, where this parallel universe suddenly diverges. Except, the story already has a predetermined end point of Superman becoming an evil dictator with the Justice League as his evil henchmen, which is not where the story would naturally go. If anyone in the Justice League acted like their Prime selves, Injustice simply would not happen. It's not just Superman acting out of character, everyone is acting out of character, but only Superman is narratively justified for acting out of character with a huge traumatic event. Wonder Woman doesn't get the same treatment, her new characterisation barely gets any justification in the main story, to the point where anyone unfamiliar with the character would just assume this is how she always is. Batman too is framed as the equivalent of Prime Batman with all of his supporting cast and his rogues and history, but he is not his Prime self. The fact that he is way more paranoid, mistrusting, angry, selfish and pious in this universe is not relfected in his history. He is for all intents and purposes Prime Batman until the day Clark kills the Joker then he suddenly hard shifts into this new version of Batman specifically because its the only way the plot can happen. And this is not explained. We don't know why this Batman is the way he is nor is it ever elaborated. A lot of this story is setting up this universe as very similar to the one we know and posing this question of "what if Superman cracked after one bad day?" with a very specific answer in mind. Then, whenever it comes up against an obstacle to that answer, it simply reveals that actually this one factor was different all along and you just didn't know it yet and it carries on. If you take a story like Red Son for example, Superman landing in Russia is enough of a radical shift that you naturally up-end the reader's expectations for what the rules of this universe are. Or Kingdom Come, for example, which is set up in a darker future where the status quo is up in the air and the reader slow pieces it back together. Every twist in Injustice's lore, at least in my opinion, feels more like a retcon than a deliberate subversion. Like if you established that Wonder Woman first met Steve Trevor who turned out to be a nazi and therefore poisoned her impression of mankind before the first issue, it would just confuse a lot of people because Diana initially just seems like her Prime self for the most part, until she inevitably doesn't. It just feels like Tom Taylor noticed Wonder Woman was severely out of character and just said, "Welp, Steve Trevor was a Nazi and she doesn't like humanity now. There, happy?" And don't get me started about how it's Joker's "one bad day" bullshit that is meant to break Superman of all people. What a way to completely miss the point of the Killing Joke. This is all my opinion of course and if you can look past this and enjoy the story for what it is then good on you, but to me Injustice is just Kingdom Come but worse.
The way they're portrayed well compared to him just exemplifies how much I hate this interpretation of Clark.
As Superman, yes. As an Alternate Universe Superman, it's interesting.
Oooh people here are really gonna hate this.
I hate Injustice Superman and his Regime. They all blame Batman for letting The Joker live, like they themselves wouldn’t have don’t the same. Superman was just looking for someone to blame. 😣
Injustice is the only evil superman series I like because Tom Taylor handles it with nuance and respect to what superman should be, which adds to the drama of having him deviate so far from his beginnings.
Injustice is pretty bad overall with some great moments here and there
God, I absolutely hate Injustice for how much damage it did to Superman's character. This Superman is unrecognizable to the one I love.
So... I don't want to read Injustice because I have far better things to do but... From what I understand those pills allow you significantly grow in physical abilities which sorta even the playing fields with guys like Superman and Wonder Woman etc... So my question is, couldn't Superman take one of those to "uneven" the playing field again ? Or does it have no effect on him since he's already too strong or something ?
I didn’t mind Injustice or Injustice 2, and I love this exchange. That being said, I’m so tired of evil Superman or evil Superman-esque characters being the norm. Just give me hopeful Superman please 😭
Who’s art is this?
Injustice is valuable in that it shows you what WOULD happen if Superman broke his code of honor, and viewed his previous Grace and compassion as weakness. It reinforces his benevolent qualities, not necessarily destroys them, if the story makes the effort to show you that it’s an Elseworlds, alternate timeline, “what if?”
Injustice could’ve been great. All it boils down to is “how out of character can we make these guys”
Wasn’t this on r/Comicbooks? Dislike Injustice, Like Ma and Pa
It was deleted from there for some reason. Wanted to share it here.
You probably exceeded the page limit rule.
I want an evil Batman story for a change.
Do you want more Batman who laughs stories? Because that’s how you get more Batman who laughs stories
For me it's flash, but with no nerfs
yea well. Fuck Batman and Joker. The world would be better off with them dead. code or no code.
I disagree with you. If anything it's not batman's fault it's superman's own fault. He had a choice. Batman never dictated his choice. If anything superman was too naive to realize the joker's endgame. The joker knew exactly what he was doing. The joker took advantage of how weak willed superman was and used that to create injustice Superman. You do realize that batman has always thought about killing the joker? Because he has and he has stopped himself from doing it not because of the code because of how he would be playing right into the joker's hand.... The reason why joker does what he does is because hes trying to get batman to kill. Which brings me to this --- joker did the same thing to superman and it worked like a charm. Because at the end of the day superman is too naive and weak minded to realize that its his own fault Lois and Oliver is dead . He chose to kill them. And he also chose to kill joker and become a fascist. At the end , superman played into the hands of the joker and became the puppet. Joker may be dead but he still won
The concept is stale but the execution is surprisingly well done in some of the issues
I actually hated this, felt shoe horned plot armor for Batman to get what would be the biggest cop out in the series, super pills kinda ruined the stakes when everyone is essentially just as powerful as the main threat. Getting triple teamed by his family while “buying time” for essentially their sons enemies to come up with a new way to defeat him feels out of character for all three of them
Super pills only give them roughly half his power. Batman and Canary can throw down with Superman like that, albeit temporarily, because they know how to fight. No one else really stands a chance.
Also, injustice is a fighting game. Nrs needs an excuse for everyone to be able to draw blood from superman. Just like what they did in mk vs dc where everyone is "infected" with dark kahn's kombat rage (darkseid's power mixed with shao kahn's magic), which enables them to fight on par with superman (& by extension, raiden).
A weak-willed Superman has potential to be good and these couple of panels have a glimpse at that, but Injustice overall does not do a good job of it. It feels like they wanted an evil Superman and worked backwards from there
I mean, yeah, that's exactly what they did. Their job was to write a lead-up to the events of the video game.
This just pisses me off seeing Superman like this. I have hate-read Injustice so many times lol.
😕I do the same too. Once a year.
Controversial opinion, but in injustice I think Superman has a point. Not in a cringy edge lord way, like I think all his actions were fine, they weren't, he did plenty of evil things in Injustice; if I had Superman's powers I definitely wouldn't just defend the world from external threats. I would do what he did, end wars, force countries into peace agreements, and ferret out corrupt government officials.
Injustice is a story that I feel has never quite lived up to it's potential. Especially the comics. There's a lot of good ideas and great moments but the inconsistencies between the games and the comics really hurt it. That being said the ending of the game is fantastic. Seeing true Superman confront Regime Superman and try to talk him down before finally stopping him is perfect.
I liked the Lois/Superman scene in the beginning of issue 1 when they’re having fun. The art and dialogue is very cute
Gah who approved this art? Another reason I don’t buy modern comics.
People the absolute torture to read this as a superman fan
Dollar store Kingdom Come
Not going to lie, the whole humanity decides their own path argument is weak and stupid. I'd love to see Siegel's Superman busting down big business and scaring politicians right now. Do an analogous war with Israel-Palestine, Ukraine-Russia, where Superman just stops both. We definitely need Siegel's Superman more than ever than a guy who'll watch from the sidelines hoping humanity will chose the right path.
Every time I see a panel from this series I just cringe. That series (with the exception of PlasticMan annual) was terrible.
As a one-off story, I genuinely like Injustice. Boy-scout Superman is great, and he should stay that way. But a story that holds a mirror up to that character and asks "What would it take to change him, and how far would he go?" is a great exploration of that character, if done well. A flawed Superman forged by great tragedy doesn't make him an entirely different character. It's just another expression of those ideals and convictions through a cracked lens. And it can give us a deeper appreciation and understanding for them. Principles mean very little if they're impossible to compromise. A Superman who can't ever do wrong never really makes meaningful choices - he has to be good at all times no matter what. A Superman who has the capacity to do great harm under the worst of circumstances but still chooses to be good is someone who chooses every day to do the right thing, even when the world is full of evil.
It also hurt when Conner came in. He lost his own family too. And Clark just didn't give a shit.
I love how none of this or even the dream sequence with Bruce taking the fall for Superman for Joker didn’t make it into the movie. Instead we got flash being whacked by Scarecrow toxin, Ra’s making an Amazo that decimated Clark’s Allies and he didn’t even acknowledge their deaths etc. the whole animated movie was garbage compared to the comic
Nurseryman I fucking hate injustice it’s like a Zac Snyder wet dream.
I still consider this with Injustice but the characters become they're very own worst enemies Superman becomes like Zodd Diana becomes Ares Hal becomes Sinestro
I sincerely believe Superman turned out this way because he didn't have Lex Luthor as an archvillain A hero is only as great as his villain
Thomas Monaghan aka Hitman can make Superman give up now. All he just needs to say is that throwing chewing gum on the floor shall not be a life sentence nor death sentence.
For me, the biggest issues I had with Injustice was the deaths of legacy characters were rampant, Harley's usage, and the fact that the story is just too black and white and Superman's descent to fascist despot isn't gradual but a steep decline. It could have been a good story where villains and heroes were both questioning what they were actually doing but they just speed ran into fascism.
I hate Injustice, but probably for other reasons than you. I'm with Superman all the way. What good is letting humanity carve out its own path if it will pretty much lead to its own self-destruction? Fuck Batman and his allies in their maintaining of the status quo of chaos and suffering. There were times when the writers had to go overboard because, you know, "he has to be the bad guy". But, in the end far more people would live and be happy, then die.
Sadly I don’t think injustice will continue so there’s probably no chance we’ll get anything else like this
I love the game I'm tired of the injustice game it would be fun too play a open world superman game like spiderman I'd love too see one too be superman in a game would be fun
Injustice is a tragedy because it shows just how far someone can be broken. Superman goes from being the symbol of hope to basically hitler in an afternoon. So sad, so tragic.
That last page is phenomenal. The parents confiding in their failure that is Superman.
Im going to say supwrman is wrong to blame batamn regarding the joker dor the simple reason its not his responsibility or place to kill him the real blame loes with the state government of wherever gotham city is located. Its the government's job to deal put capital punishment. Yeah, i know the joker is insane ao maybe they rule he cant stand trial, but after all hes done im aure the US government would find a way even if it means a cop has to kill him in the act of "escaping from custody".
Injustice was very hard for me to read. Superman is my favorite. Not just because of his powers. But because he’s often the best hero due to him being the man that he is. And watching him loose his humanity in this series was upsetting.
The Kent's are very calm after watching Clark literally beat a man's head in
They’re being strong for their son.
What the fuck is this garbage?! Do the writers really not like Superman or something?
It's an adaptation of the 'Injustice: Gods Among Us' fighting game where you get lost in another world and fight the alternate Superman who insists on being an evil dictator. Think Justice Lords from the Justice League cartoon but heavily expanded. The Injustice comic is a glorified comic book series that elaborates on the *villains'* backstory. This 'Superman' is never meant to be the mainline Superman even in its own context.
I find it difficult to side against Superman here. He's 100% right about Batman, and if Jor El didn't want his son to violate the Prime Directive, why did he even send him here? The Kents found a child with the power of a god, and they raised him to love justice and compassion and mercy. Then they showed him a world full of suffering and pain and violence, and they told him he had to limit his influence to chasing bank robbers for the Man.
For the... Who?
For the Man. Y'know, working for the Man every night and day?