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Topic: Q for JB - Boy of Steel (Topic Closed Topic Closed) Post ReplyPost New Topic
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Pat Ditton
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Joined: 19 June 2007
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Posted: 04 February 2008 at 8:19am | IP Logged | 1  

JB --

You've mentioned a couple of times (and I paraphrase) - that you sometimes regret not having Superboy be part of the back story in MAN OF STEEL.

Had you made Clark Superboy in your story - would your teen Clark still have been a football player, etc ?   I recall your use of that aspect of adult Clark being used to explain his large muscular size, etc.

How would your MOS teen Clark (as Superboy) have differed from the one we saw in MOS?

Thanks

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John Byrne
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Posted: 04 February 2008 at 10:41am | IP Logged | 2  

My Superboy would have been a more traditional take on the character.
Only the time period would have been updated, to about 1976.
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John Young
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Posted: 04 February 2008 at 10:51am | IP Logged | 3  

Mr. Byrne you have shared previously that the Legion of Superheroes are not to your taste, but would you have included them with your Superboy?
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Don Zomberg
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Posted: 04 February 2008 at 11:01am | IP Logged | 4  

Would he have called himself "Superboy", John?
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John Byrne
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Posted: 04 February 2008 at 11:04am | IP Logged | 5  

Would he have called himself "Superboy", John?

••

Yes, but I would have included a scene of young Clark musing over a name
he could still use when he grew up.
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Don Zomberg
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Posted: 04 February 2008 at 11:17am | IP Logged | 6  

MOS is the definitive Superman for me, but your take on the character's young adventures would have been neat (and more stories in Smallville are always a good thing).
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John Byrne
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Posted: 04 February 2008 at 11:39am | IP Logged | 7  

The appeal of Superboy is the appeal of the Superman DC had said they were going to let me do, before they double-crossed me. That's a Superman who is "new to the job" and not good at it yet. Or, at least, not as good as he will become. This is what Superboy would be. (Oddly, this element was hardly ever touched, outside of flashbacks, in Superboy's adventures. He was already every bit as good as Superman. Considerably better, in fact, in the pre-Earth2 days!)
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Charles Tzu
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Posted: 04 February 2008 at 12:04pm | IP Logged | 8  

Double-crossed? Do you feel as if you were personally betrayed, JB?
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John Byrne
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Posted: 04 February 2008 at 12:44pm | IP Logged | 9  

Yes.
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Glenn Greenberg
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Posted: 04 February 2008 at 12:49pm | IP Logged | 10  

I've said it before here and I'll say it again: dropping Superboy from the
canon is one of my favorite aspects of the JB reboot of Superman.

I never liked Superboy. I thought the whole concept was silly and hokey
and completely without any sense of drama or suspense. I liked that JB's
Superman was a throwback to the Golden Age version--he makes his
debut as a super hero when he's an ADULT. That was also the way it was
done in the first Christopher Reeve movie, which is the first version of
Superman that really "spoke" to me.

In fact, I'd have to say that the only Superboy story that I ever truly
enjoyed was the Superman/Legion of Super Heroes crossover that JB and
Levitz did.   
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Don Zomberg
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Posted: 04 February 2008 at 12:50pm | IP Logged | 11  

And so were the fans, by proxy.

You almost have to wonder if those in charge of the Big Two have meetings where they say things like, "We've got a great thing going here--what can we do to completely f#*$ it up?"

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Ron Chevrier
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Posted: 04 February 2008 at 12:57pm | IP Logged | 12  

It's too bad that Superboy was declared off-limits to you, JB. I imagine that there would be a great deal of material to be mined not just from the point of view of a young Clark Kent dealing with his powers, but also with the conflicts this would cause between him and the Kents. After all, how do you ground a disobedient boy who can lift a mountain or fly to the moon? That is, working from the assumption that the teenage Clark might be at least a little willful and eager to test the limits and boundaries not just of his abilities, but of the relationship he has with his parents. I imagine that the teenage Clark is more himself and not yet the carefully crafted Clark Kent "persona" that serves as the cover for his superheroic guise.  
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