#kitty faulkner

Here's some late night art posting, and this time we're back in the hard drive archives :D I found some I*ktober doodles from 2016, back when that whole thing was popular.

Superman: The Man of Steel #39 (December 1994)

"Dead Again!," Part 5! After ruling out the Eradicator, Superman thinks he's figured out the only person who could possibly have put a fake corpse in his tomb to convince everyone he's an impostor: Lex Luthor! Well, him or Brainiac, and Lex is closer (at the S.T.A.R. Labs facility where they've kept him since he turned into a Cryptkeeper-looking invalid), so Superman decides he'll check on him first.

Meanwhile, over the past issues we've seen Superman's friends, fiancé, and even his parents have their doubts about his identity, but there's one person who will never doubt him: Superman's Little Pal, Keith the Unlucky Orphan. (Actually, we haven't seen Superman's Large Pal, Jimmy Olsen doubt him either, but Jimmy's opinion doesn't count.) Keith even gets into a fight with another kid who says the real Superman is dead and dares Keith to prove he isn't. While this happens, a frail figure watches Keith and is glad that he's "doin' good."

(I don't know if "getting punched under the rain" counts as "doin' good," but okay.)

At S.T.A.R., everyone's on edge because the guy they hired to build a safer cell for Conduit after he broke out and killed a bunch of guards hasn't delivered yet. Some guards spot someone sneaking around the lab, assume it must be Conduit, and shoot him to hell -- but it's not Conduit, it's Keith! Good thing Superman happened to be coming by to check on Lex, or this issue would turn out even sadder than it already does.

Keith says he wanted to sneak into the lab to prove that the Superman corpse they're studying there is a fake. Awww. I don't think he has the scientific expertise to make that happen, but it's a nice thought. At least his little stunt attracts the press and gives some good publicity to Superman (who kinda needs it after the asshole he's been lately) and Keith himself, making it more likely that he'll be adopted. Keith, however, doesn't wanna be adopted, since he still thinks his mom will come back for him after all these years. Dream on, little buddy.

Anyway, the folks at S.T.A.R. agree to let Superman see Lex if he finishes those tests he's been putting off over the past couple of issues (because he's afraid they might prove he's not the real Superman). Superman lets Professor Hamilton run the damn tests, and Hambone lets him know as politely as possible that he's firmly in #TeamCorpse.

Back to Keith (this is a "Keith issue," if you hadn't noticed), he's still being followed by that frail figure who watches him from afar. Keith sees the figure collapse and goes over to help her -- only to find out that it's his mom. She's been alive all along, which means Keith the Unlucky Orphan was never really an orphan... but might be soon, because she's looking pretty bad. Keith's mom is taken to a hospital, where she explains that she left him because she's got AIDS and she wanted him to be adopted by some nice, non-immunodeficient family.

As it happens, Alice White, who's been palling around with Keith since she started volunteering at the orphanage, wants to adopt him and tries to convince her husband Perry to do it. This is a big ask, since 1) they're super old and 2) they already had a kid and kinda botched that one (Lex Luthor's genes probably didn't help)...

...but Perry eventually says yes. The Whites tell Keith about their decision as they're driving him to the hospital, and at first he's enthusiastic (they'll let him keep his cat Tiger, unlike his former foster parents... maybe they thought it was an actual tiger?), but he suddenly turns sullen, says he can't abandon his mom, and runs out of the car to go see her. Turns out Keith's mom is close to dying, but during her last moments, she gives Alice her blessings and signs some papers to turn her into Keith's legal guardian.

Meanwhile, Superman's been doing Superman stuff (more on that in Don Sparrow's section below), so he's too late to console Keith when his mom dies, but he's glad to see the Whites are there for the kid like the Kents always were for him. Sniff.

Back to the plot of this storyline: the lab results are in, and Hamilton tells Superman that he found a discrepancy... in his readings. As in, he's not the real Superman. Hamilton also lets him ("who... whoever you are") finally see Luthor, which makes it clear that Lex is in no position to pull off any evil schemes. Hell, he can't even perform basic bodily functions on his own.

Superman rushes out and, as he yells "I'M SUPERMAN!" from S.T.A.R.'s rooftop, he thinks to himself that if Luthor isn't manipulating him, then there's only one possibility left: Brainiac!

NEXT: THE NEW GODS! OH, AND BRAINIAC!

Character-Watch:

And so Keith the Unlucky Orphan, who was never really an orphan, is now officially Keith White. As we've mentioned before, Keith will continue appearing but won't really have a running storyline anymore, and eventually he just sorta falls off the face of the Earth(s). According to the DC wiki, he was last seen in a short story from Superman 80-Page Giant 2011 (reprinted in the Superman's Pal's Jimmy Olsen's Boss, Perry White special in 2022) where Perry tells Wildcat of the Justice Society that Keith, now grown up, is leaving Metropolis.

(Wildcat: "Yeah, well, my kid's a talking cat, for some reason.)

But the DC wiki is wrong, because Keith also shows up in last year's Action #1075, in a story (drawn by Jon Bogdanove and Norm Rapmund!) where Perry wins Metropolis' mayoral election and Keith is there with Alice for the celebration. It doesn't look like this version of Keith appears in other comics, so maybe Bog slipped him in?

(Is it me or is Alice is looking very Louise Simonson-esque?)

Plotline-Watch:

This concludes the looooong storyline about Keith's mom, first mentioned just over two years ago in Man of Steel #16, when Keith mistook an Underworld mutant for her. They did have kinda similar hair, as it turns out. This is what led Keith into the Underworld sewers during the "Doomsday!" storyline, which means there are millions and millions of casual comic book readers out there who knew Keith was looking for his mom but never read the end of the storyline. Hope they DuckDuckGo it one day and come across this post.

I like how Superman says "Lex Luthor tried to clone me once that we know of" to prevent Mike Carlin's office from being flooded with letters saying that, actually, there were two Bizarros. Yep, but only the second one was firmly linked to Lex -- at the time, Superman saw the first one as kind of an inexplicable thing that happened to him one day. (Should have called him Inexplicablo.)

The last time we saw Lex in Action #701, he was completely paralyzed but able to think (about murdering Superman, to be more specific), but now we're told that he has no brain activity. He was also very thin but not, like, practically a skeleton. What are they feeding him at S.T.A.R.? Are they feeding him at S.T.A.R.? Did they forget? To be fair, they have a lot going on there these days.

Speaking of which, there's a funny scene where Conduit, from his temporary cell, spooks a guard at S.T.A.R. by just saying "I'm free!," causing the guard to shoot his big '90s laser gun at nothing. The guy they hired to make a new cell, Carl Draper, says he hasn't finished it because he ran into "a setback," which I'm guessing means he blew most of the budget fighting Superman as Deathtrap. (Is it me or is he looking very David Copperfield-esque?)

Shout Outs-Watch:

Definitely not impostor shout outs to our SUPporters, Aaron, Chris "Ace" Hendrix, britneyspearsatemyshorts, Patrick D. Ryall, Mark Syp, Ryan Bush, Raphael Fischer, Kit, Dave Blosser, and Bryan! Join them (and get extra articles) via Patreon or our newsletter's "pay what you want" mode! NOTE: If you subscribe, please check your junk mail for the activation email! I will continue saying this until Jas, Tonio, and l34fd get activated, dang it.

And now, as promised: the great Don Sparrow's also great section!

Batgirl #41

Adventures of Superman #517 (November 1994)

"DEAD AGAIN!," Part 3! Superman fights a villain called Deathtrap (or "Death-Trap," according to the title page) and, oh yeah, finds out he himself is dead. Quite a morbid issue, really.

Last week in Superman #94, Professor Hamilton finished analyzing the corpse that was found in Superman's supposedly empty tomb and determined that it is, in fact, the real Superman. So who's the other guy? You know, the one who's alive and also uses more shampoo than Superman used to? The living "Superman" (if that's even his real name) agrees to be examined by Hamilton too, but he has to put that off when an emergency comes up: an old lady had her purse snatched!!! Right in front of some cops, too.

"Damn, now I'll never be able to afford the rest of the hair plugs..."

The old lady is thankful, but both she and the cops have their doubts about this so-called Man of Steel (she actually asks him if he's "not like that... that killer cyborg person," as if he'd just say "oh yeah, I'm totally like that, super evil"). Even he admits that he only bailed from Hamilton's lab at S.T.A.R. Labs because he's worried about those tests proving he's not the real Superman. He could always adopt a new identity, like "The Scarlet Strongman" or something.

Back at S.T.A.R., the scientists not currently occupied analyzing super-buff corpses have called a specialist called Carl Draper to build a new cell for the villain Conduit (who has appeared in seven issues in a row as of this one, so they should really start giving him co-star billing). As a reminder, they need a new cell because Conduit broke out of the last one when someone pissed him off during lunchtime.

Draper overhears Lois Lane and Jimmy Olsen talking about how Superman might not be Superman, which, combined with his teenage daughter telling him he couldn't build a prison to hold an authentic Kryptonian, gives him an idea for a little side project: he's gonna find out if this is the Real Steel Deal by making a trap only Superman could escape from. Naturally, this involves creating a supervillain persona for himself, the aforementioned Deathtrap.

Deathtrap uses that little gizmo up there to trap the supposed Superman in an airtight force-field that will suffocate him pretty soon, even with super lungs. Superman tries frying the gizmo with his heat vision, but its "learning computer" has calculated his reaction times and knows how to avoid him (freaking AIs, man). He tries flying out of the atmosphere, but the little thing is speed-proof, space-proof, and even reentering-the-atmosphere-proof.

Next, Superman tries crashing into one of Metropolis' many condemned buildings (demolition companies HATE this man), but nope, the gizmo's still there. He tries shocking it with electricity, but all that does is recharge its batteries. With his oxygen running out, Superman tries one last thing: flying into a steel foundry's blast furnace. That finally does the trick and, more importantly, gains Superman some believers among the foundry's workers. Not everyone's totally convinced, though...

Superman snaps (very un-Supermanly) at that worker who dared question the logic of his current hairdo, telling him that the corpse is "just part of some scheme -- and I'll find whoever's behind it."

NEXT: Superman tries finding whoever's behind it!

Character-Watch:

First appearance of Carl Draper, who in the old continuity went by "Master Jailer," but I guess that name wasn't '90s enough so they changed it to "Deathtrap." Curiously, the original Draper was an old classmate of Clark Kent (nicknamed "Moosie"!) who hated his guts, so it's probably not a coincidence that he debuted on a comic that also includes Conduit, this continuity's foremost Clark Kent hater.

This issue also introduces his daughter Carla, who overhears her dad monologuing about ways to trap Superman at the end of the issue. She will eventually go into the family business and pester Superboy.

At some point in the '00s, Carl would revert back to "Master Jailer," because "Deathtrap" was too '90s.

Plotline-Watch:

That foundry worker who says Superman's hair grew too fast is absolutely correct. As we've pointed out before, Superman had short hair when he went into the Awesome Kryptonian Battle Robot in Action #689 and long hair when he stepped out in Man of Steel #25. I'm gonna assume Karl Kesel added that line as a reference to the 300 letters they got on the subject.

Before being derailed by Deathtrap, Superman recaps the events of his resurrection: first he died (a common prerequisite for being resurrected), then his corpse was placed in a cozy tomb, and then the Eradicator took it from that tomb and brought it to the Fortress of Solitude (as told in Action #690). However, Superman only has the Eradicator's word that this is what happened, and that guy hasn't always been the most trustworthy. This is a teaser for a crossover happening in the next issue of Action.

Speaking of "only having one person's word," this entire storyline relies on Professor Hamilton being truthful, since he's the only one analyzing the Super-corpse (and even if he wasn't, he was perfectly positioned to fudge with the results). I'm not a fan of Hambone reverting to his criminal ways, but if one storyline had to have him as the surprise villain, it should have been this one. The twist could have been that he'd had his mind hijacked by some villain, maybe even one with somewhat similar facial hair...

There's a scene where Lois is trying to have a romantic dinner with Clark to make him feel better about himself, but Lucy Lane invites herself in with one of the Riot Grrrls and they completely ruin the vibe. I think Lucy just wanted to show off that she's got friends other than Jimmy Olsen now. Can't say I blame her.

Shout Outs-Watch:

Explosive (but not damagingly so) shout outs to our SUPporters, Aaron, Chris “Ace” Hendrix, britneyspearsatemyshorts, Patrick D. Ryall, Mark Syp, Ryan Bush, Raphael Fischer, Kit, Dave Blosser, and Bryan! You are the wind beneath our capes. Join them (and get extra articles) via Patreon or our newsletter's "pay what you want" mode! NOTE: If you subscribe, please check your junk mail for the activation email!

You might be thinking "Two posts in two weeks?! What is this, 2016?!" That's all thanks to the great Don Sparrow, who wrote up his side of this one so fast that he spurred me to get off my butt and do the same thing for once. So read on for Don's section!