Superman (Vol. 2), Issue #154 – “Whatever Happened to the City of Tomorrow?”

* Part 2 of 5 of the Superman: Endgame collection *

Welcome to Loneliness & Cheeseburgers Presents: Superman (Vol. 2), Issue #154 – “Whatever Happened to the City of Tomorrow?”!

In the previous issue of the Superman: Endgame collection, the Superman: Y2K one-shot, it’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve 1999 in Metropolis. The first half of the story is this very interesting lead-up to the New Year with Lex Luthor’s gala event and flashbacks to various other New Year’s Eves in the far past featuring other members of the once-altruistic Luthor family. The second half is a trainwreck of a turd with Brainiac taking over the city as the world is blacked out. It was awful. I’ll never read it again!

In the previous issue of Superman (Vol. 2), Superman and Mongul beat up a guy who is supposed to be Imperiex but he only answers to Imperiex, who is even bigger than Fake-Imperiex! Also, Mongul betrays Superman for roughly 45 nanoseconds before Superman turns the tables.

I hope there’s no more Mongul stuff! Mongul is not very subtle!

Superman (Vol. 2), Issue #154 [March, 2000]
Written by: Jeph Loeb
“Whatever Happened to the City of Tomorrow?”

Ah, the cover indicates “Y2K Two of 5”, which means there will continuity. I love me some continuity, but I don’t love me the end of Superman: Y2K. Let’s see if Jeph Loeb can turn this sucker around.

“It all happened so fast,” Clark thinks as he, in an irate fashion, asks Perry White why the FUCK his parents aren’t at the Daily Planet? After all, the city was just taken over by Brainiac and there’s no electricity anywhere. Those dumb hicks wanted to come to Metroplis and now they’re eating shit because of it. And you’re telling Clark that his parents AREN’T here? *slaps Perry White on the mouth* Give him his parents you piece of shit! *slaps Perry White on the ass*

Lois offers to help Clark find his parents, but he’s going to do this alone. “I’m sorry,” butts in Perry White, “I was under the impression that we were still trying to get a newspaper out, and whatever is happening to Metropolis – it certainly qualifies as news!”

Yes yes yes, everything qualifies as news. Death and destruction. Dogs playing basketball. What isn’t news these days?

“One second, we were celebrating the New Year–” Lois narrates as Clark rips off his very expensive suit to reveal his very cheap costume. “–and the next… Metropolis started changing. Erupting with all this… this tech. People were stranded… separated from their loved ones. And somewhere out there, Ma and Pa Kent got lost.”

“What a way to start the millennium!”

*Cheers music starts playing; opening credits start rolling*

“UP, UP AND AWAY!” shouts Superman in big, blocky letters. Awful lumpy muscles, lookin’ like complete dogshit. Impossibly huge wrist muscles, just these ugly bulbous lumps from lengthy sessions of jerking off.

The sun is rising, which means the Daily Planet is already too fucking late with their January 1st, 2000 edition of the daily news. Superman doesn’t get to look at the sunrise for long, since a big PHTOOM from behind indicates Brainiac’s presence. The PHTOOM in question is Brainiac’s blue light blast ray! A very pleasant hue, not at all unkind to the eyes. Superman doesn’t like it, though. He likes only one color of blue.

You see? Even when he’s fighting big, bad guys there’s always a FAP right around the corner.

Lois’ narration continues fellating Superman’s private parts… in a verbal way. “Metropolis and Superman kind of mirror each other. Proud, tall – forever reaching into the sky. It’s sort of like Gotham City and Batman. Dark, foreboding – wrapped in shadows.”

Yeah yeah. Superman tries to beat Brainiac up, but he’s like a hologram. You can pass right through him. “Intangible. Wonderful. You’ve got to become solid again sometime,” Superman says, frustrated. I didn’t know Superman even knew the word “intangible”. Inconsistent characterization of Jeph Loeb’s part to be sure.

“I’m proud of what Metropolis has done to my husband. And I know it sounds crazy, but I’d be less than honest if I didn’t feel just a hint of… envy.”

Lois is kind of a boring gal when you really boil it down. It’s like her only role in the comics is “wife”. WHERE’S THE SMACK-TALKING AMBITIOUS GO-GETTER FROM SUPERMAN: BIRTHRIGHT?? This lady is more like “Wonder Woman, waaaah”.

Through all this, Superman fights Brainiac. It’s exciting! Kicks and punches and punches and kicks, it’s got everything!

And now guess who shows up? Fuckin’ Metallo, whom I barely know, and he’s the size of a skyscraper! Tall as the dickens! “Yeah, and I been upgraded, y’know. Just like Brainiac 13 is gonna do to this city – and even the whole world.”

That doesn’t seem to be a single through strung together, but I get the jist. “So it’s Brainiac 13 now?” Superman asks, and like Shania Twain, that don’t impress him much. Oh oh oh-whoa. “It doesn’t matter what you’ve got planned – it’s all about to fall apart!”

Punch kick slam clang boom.

“‘The City of Tomorrow’. Luthor coined that phrase,” Lois continues. “And in one of those rare times that he and Perry agreed on anything – the Daily Planet picked it up and it stuck.”

Baboons? No. Howler monkeys? Yes!

I still don’t know this woman’s name, but she’s Lena Luthor’s caretaker. Lex grabs her and jumps out of the way just as one of Metallo’s giant digits comes crashing down to the ground. After deciding that Superman almost killed him on purpose, and that safety is of the essence, they attempt to get into Lexcorp Tower.

He starts punching in his security clearance code. “One inside, Lena, we’ll–”

“Access denied.”

“Denied,” Lex repeats, defeated. “My own building has been molested.”

Yes, Lex, show me on the LEGO tower where the bad man touched the building. He tries a manual override – no luck.

Meanwhile, Jimmy Olsen zooms in to 30x magnification on Superman’s crotch. I wish I were kidding about that. He starts talking to Lois about how he’s been hacking into his work computer lately and all those conduits and junction boxes remind him of what’s going on in Metropolis. Just this big fuck of a thing, y’know? “It’s like Metropolis is turning into one big PC!”

Yeah, I’m not seeing much of that from a reader’s perspective. I just see Superman fighting a Brainiac and all the people around them trying to flee like it’s Godzilla vs. Mothra.

“You’ve got no idea what you’re up against, Superman. Brainiac’s got all the energy of this whole planet zappin’ into Metropolis – and he’s jacked me up so I can tap into all kinds of frequencies and light spectrums and stuff – makin’ me the MAN WITH THE KRYPTONITE HEART like you’ve never seen!”

Well ain’t that just ducky. Metallo is now unstoppable because Superman gets a tummyache from glowing green rocks. This wimp just keels over and plummets to the ground below. “NNGGGNNN!” Disgusting.

Suddenly, a team of blowjobs known as the METAL MEN are here to help Superman, whoever they are. They each pep each other up. “You’ve got this, Tin!” “Let’s go, Mercury!” “Do you think you can handle it, Platinum?!” “You’re doing a good job, Dave!”

Superman recovers and calls his buddy Lead over. He’s got a great idea! He makes Lead wrap his sexy body all over Superman’s sexy body. LEAD ARMOR! Toxicity through the roof! Kryptonite scrambles this guy’s circuits, but he can eat lead for breakfast. Comic books, man. Remarkable.

Metallo is frightened now. Is this the end of the fun? I hope so, because I want to go home.

Remember that time that we weren’t in Kansas anymore, Martha? That was loads of fun. Those munchkins were delicious!

Ma and Pa Kent are definitely not murdered, at least. Pa’s even kind of cheery! Hey, Martha, isn’t it fun to be in the middle of an apocalyptic disaster? Where’s muh camera?

They’re underground waiting for a Metropolis bullet train. The sucker’s gotta be three stories high, this thing. Elon Musk, you’ve outdone yourself yet again! Since the city is developing these incredible technological advancements in real time, the train’s tracks actually build themselves right in front of the speeding train! Remarkable! Stay away from one of those fake tunnels that Wile E. Coyote paints on a rock.

Lois continues to narrate, but it’s less than interesting and half as essential. Lois helps an old bearded man who fell down on the street. That seems pointless. Narration talks about Clark’s New Year’s resolutions being all about spending more quality time with Lois. That seems inane. This old bearded man looks like he’s about to do something nefarious. That seems unimportant. Jimmy and Lois run to Superman to discuss some matters. That seems trivial. My dinner is ready. That seems topical.

“Have you two learned anything?” Superman asks, eyes clenched shut and chin jutting out stupidly. I thought at first that he was scolding these two, but he’s actually asking if they’ve learned anything. Lois doesn’t allow Jimmy to speak for himself. “Jimmy’s got this crazy idea that Brainiac’s turning [Metropolis] into a super computer–”

That doesn’t sound so dumb! This is the year 2000 now, anything is possible! Clean energy, terrorist attacks, iPhones, stolen elections, pandemics, Kobe Bryant helicopter crashes, and gay people having rights!

Jimmy doesn’t do a very good job of explaining himself, so maybe Lois needs to speak for him again. “I don’t do science, Superman, but I do know something about this computer stuff, y’know? And looking around at all this cable and how the city’s being turned into digital material – I mean, to me it looks like modem lines being used to carry digital through the bit stream.”

What the fuck is this kid talking about? He looks all serious too, like he’s not 14 years old. Superman’s going to go off of this information and try to “sever the energy flow” with respect to bit streams and KaZaA torrents and Grateful Dead concerts on archive.org. Pressure’s on, Jim. Don’t be wrong or your head will be crushed between Superman’s thighs like a walnut in a nutcracker.

BZZZOTT

Superman severs the energy flow. He does this by finding a random tube somewhere and blowing it with his laser vision. This, in turn, causes Brainiac to become solid and perfect for beat-’em-ups. OR, now that I look again, Superman seems to have become absorbed within the machine. That’s gonna make it difficult to perform marital relations with Lois for 90 seconds tonight.

“Instead of cutting off the power… Brainiac actually sucked him into it,” Jimmy explains. Poorly. Superman’s been digitized and this will actually energize Brainiac. The situation is much worse, I guess. It’s probably going to up to John Henry “Mr. Steel Guy” Irons to sort this all out, and you know how much I love that second-rate superhero (I don’t).

“With Superman gone, who’s going to stop that lunatic?” Lois asks with a look that evokes mild interest instead of desperation.

“ME. I’M BACK,” booms a Superman/Brainiac hybrid? I think? Who cares.