Superboy: The Greatest Team-Up Stories Ever Told

I love DC's 'Greatest Stories Ever Told' series. They featured classics of the silver and bronze age of comics. A big reminder of my childhood, they were great money savers on my wallet as well since the originals would be astronomical for me to collect.

The Superboy books were a lot of fun. They were designed for kids. But the adult readers of Superman really took to the series as it offered glimpses into Clark Kent's childhood. As a result, fans started seeing early connections between the Boy of Steel. Fans just couldn't get enough. Over time, just about every adulthood acquaintance that Clark Kent/Superman would encounter. And this book is chock full of them!

Jimmy Olsen. Lori LeMaris. Robin, The Boy Wonder. Supergirl. Green Arrow and Green Lantern as teenaged versions of themselves. Witness Clark Kent, cub reporter in his very first run-in with Perry White. 

There's the classic origin story of how Superboy met a boy genius named Lex Luthor. When a fire breaks out in Lex's lab, Superboy rushes in to save him. As a result of the whole mishap, Lex loses his hair and that's how a personal vendetta against the Man of Steel is born!

This collection boasts a dozen amazing team-ups. I won't spoil all the surprises. But if you are looking for DC Comics Presents #87 in which Superman of Earth-1 meets Superboy Prime for the very first time, I am sorry to disappoint. It's an essential team-up that explains why the Superboy of the New Adventures of Superboy had a different looking set of parents and other confusing things. Probably because of all of the back-story needed is why this quintessential Superboy team-up is missing from the collection. 

Don't worry. I actually have the issue in my collection. IT WASN'T that expensive to obtain.

Worth Consuming!

Rating: 9 out of 10 stars.

Superman's Pal Jimmy Olsen: Who Killed Jimmy Olsen?

I read a lot of insane, wacky stuff. I love The Tick, Madman, Deadpool, Harley Quinn, Tales From Bizarro World. Oddball stuff just seems my nature. But I don't think I've ever rad anything so off-the-wall, strange and sometimes down right silly as the 12-issue Jimmy Olsen miniseries from Matt Fraction!

After accidentally destroying a giant lion statue erected by one of Lex Luthor's ancestors, the whole city of Metropolis has it out for Jimmy Olsen. Perry White would fire him if it wasn't for all the revenue generated by Olsen's online reporting. Still, the high ups at the Daily Planet advise Olsen to lay low for a while. So when someone makes a hit on Jimmy's apartment, Superman's pal must fake his own death and go into hiding to find out who did it!

It was Luthor! WE all know it was Luthor, right? 

Actually, Lex Luthor might be trying to keep Jimmy Olsen alive. Now why would he want to do that?

And why did Olsen steal one of the wheels off the Batmobile and it's not even the holiday season? 

And why is the feline Red Lantern Dexx-Starr and his acidic blood vomits involved in all this?

There is so much going on in this story and none of it is in order. It's like Matt Fraction (Hawkeye) decided to make a Quentin Tarantino Superman story. Oh, my God! This book should be Tarantino's final film! It's got nostalgia. It's got mystery. It's kinda noirish but silly. And there's a lot of blood, death and mayhem. 

You don't have to be a fan of the old Jimmy Olsen books from the 50s, 60s and 70s. But it helps! What you do need is to be someone who looks at the world a little askew. Like me! Or Fred Hembeck. This is not a serious Superman story. But it is very much a Superman Family tale told with love.

The only thing I wasn't a fan of were the variant covers by Ben Oliver. I mostly didn't like Jimmy Olsen's face. Oliver makes Superman's pal look like a SAWK (scary-ass white kid. See: Village of the Damned). But the inks, color palette and tributes to the Saturday Evening Post covers of Norman Rockwell were really cool. Though I must warn you- stay away from the cover gallery until you finish the story. The alternate cover for issue #12 is in my opinion a real spoiler to the very end of Fraction's yarn.

Be ready for anything with this one!

Worth Consuming!

Rating: 9 out of 10 stars.