Welcome to Loneliness & Cheeseburgers Presents: All-Star Superman, Issue #5 – “The Gospel According to Lex Luthor”! In the previous installment, Jimmy Olsen gets to be Dr. Quintum for a day as part of his regular Daily Planet feature, and he fucks up by getting in trouble, making Superman come save him, and exposing him to black kryptonite which turned him Evil for about six pages.

It was horrible. Read my whole post about it, I was in rare form.

This one seems more promising! That Lex Luthor cat always has some evil shit up his delicate sleeves!

All-Star Superman, Issue #5 [September, 2006]
Written by: Grant Morrison
“The Gospel According to Lex Luthor”

Welcome to prison, nerds! Lex stuffed his pants with acorns, which is why he’s about to get his ass kicked by all the other inmates who want to feast upon delicious, delicious acorns.

If you recall from Issue #1, Lex Luthor wants to go to prison. He likes the idea of losing all his freedoms!

“Attila the Hun. Genghis Khan. Al Capone. Adolf Hitler. Lex Luthor… you freely admit that these vile and appalling criminals are the men you revere above all as heroes and role models. Your insane schemes have placed in jeopardy the lives of every man, woman, and child on this planet. Have you anything more to say before I deliver the verdict of this court?”

The judge looks like if Spike Lee aged another 400 years. Lex Luthor snarls and merely tells the judge that Superman made him do all the bad, bad crimes. Put that bitch on trial instead, make him eat his own butt in front of the jury.

Judge Decrepit Old Corpse sentences Luthor to death via electric chair. Luthor makes the stupidest face I’ve ever seen in a comic, and I’ve seen a lot of Superman faces. He looks like he’s trying to squeeze a giant fart out of his tiny butthole.

Elsewhere, Clark Kent is getting flown via helicopter to Stryker’s Island where all the world’s most dangerous criminals play Yahtzee and eat string beans. He’s going to spend an hour talking to Lex Luthor, who is currently busy creating a robot called the Bibliobot Mark 2 — “a roving library”. Goosebumps aplenty! Every Clive Cussler book in existence! L. Ron Hubbard! This thing is great, it’s like an audiobook except less convenient.

Clark responds to Luthor’s invention by flopping around the room like a fish with extra fish chromosomes.

WHOOAAA, WAAAAHH, WUBBA LUBBA DUB DUB *HONK *HONK*

Anyway, Clark has one hour to interview Luthor. Give the Daily Planet his side of the story. Luthor is amenable, and instructs the dingus he sees before him to follow him into the next room where he starts running on a treadmill for no reason. “How does a man like you feel about Superman? Honestly?” Luthor asks, huffing and puffing. A reminder that even the “smartest man in the world” can’t see that Clark Kent and Superman are one and the same.

“I’m…ah… I’m fine with him,” Clark responds, putting on his best Jeff Goldblum impression. “He’s always been friendly around the office.”

“And you don’t feel in any way diminished by his very presence on this planet? Strange.”

“Our jobs don’t tend to overlap.”

Luthor grabs Clark’s notes out of his hands and comments that he, the man who can crack any code in less than a minute, can’t read any of that bullshit chicken scratch. “Why can’t you use an electronic recording device like any normal hack?” he says, throwing the little notebook behind him. Luthor starts deadlifting some weights now, proving his masculinity once again! I’m feeling a little tickle in my pants watching him sweat profusely…

“Imagine life on this world if some opportunistic alien vermin hadn’t decided to dump its trash here, Kent,” Lex says, huffing and puffing and hoofing and poofing. “That’s all I’ve ever asked anyone to do. Imagine how it was meant to be.” Luthor is clearly talking about Lois Lane right now and his penchant for wanting to bone her badly. I still don’t see what everyone sees in this dreadfully boring woman.

Here, catch! Wakka wakka!

But of course, he deflects and makes it about Clark. Why, there’s nothing about Clark that’s so damn unappealing that Lois shouldn’t have her eyes on him! But, alas, that Superman is totally in the way, isn’t he? Ho hum. Too bad, so sad, etc.

After throwing the barbell down at Clark’s feet, Clark is like “huh, buh, is you tryin’ ta intimidate me?” Then Luthor asks Clark to feel his bicep. Clark obliges. “It’s easy to be strong when you just happen to have come from the planet Krypton. This takes hard work!”

I’m tired of Lex Luthor’s laundry list of insecurities. Is Clark gonna ask him a damn question or what?

Lex asks how Superman is doing these days. “Pale? Tired?” That answer is no, of course, but Lex Luthor is like “IT SURE DOESN’T LOOK THAT WAY TO ME!” and walks away.

Clearly, we are not going to cut to the chase here and we’ll hear more about how small Lex Luthor feels when Superman is even brought up in a conversation. Even when he’s not brought up in a conversation! People could be talking about marbles and Lex would be like “that motherfucker”.

“I just don’t get it,” Clark says. “Why squander your resources and intellect on this… frankly, unhealthy… obsession with Superman?” Hear, hear. Now we’re asking the right questions! And the answer is basically “wah, I’m in prison, I’m always in prison, and Superman is never in prison, and I’ve been in prison so many times it’s like a second home, and Superman this, and Superman that, and wah wah wah”.

Lex looks toward the ragtag bunch of incoherent, unstable, smelly, lumpy men in the prison. “They can feel the coming change, the wings of a new human renaissance. I’m transforming this place into a new model of society, Kent, a blueprint for utopian living!”

Clark stares at the misshapen, cone-headed convicts.

“This is my final revenge – to be right. My “survival of the smartest” doctrines command absolute respect in here…”

A couple of inmates yell at Luthor. “I’LL FUCK YOUR ASS TO HADES”, stuff like that, sorta. “Ignore it,” Lex grumbles. “Every society has its monsters.”

I like the way the purple toilet man thinks!

Guards are rolling out this ranting purple thing. His face looks like it’s covered with potato chip crumbs. Clark wonders if this “parasite” is behind lead shielding, as he should be. He’s obviously not, he can see him from where he’s standing. Doofus.

The parasite starts blowing up like a balloon. “POWER! MORE POWER THAN I EVER HAD!” he bursts out of his restraints. Clark Kent gets nervous, knowing that the parasite feeds on Superman energy. You know, if Superman were walking by or something. Odd, huh? “What’s the matter, Kent?” Luthor sneers. “Scared he’ll absorb your last reserves of cowardice?” And Clark’s like “YES” and starts trying to run away.

The parasite bounds toward Clark. “MORE! MORE POWER!” A riot breaks out. Luthor looks pleased. Guards start deploying the tear gas. Everyone has a love-in.

Clark warns Luthor that he’s in danger, but Lex Luthor laughs at danger! Like this: “NYEEEAHH!! HYEEEEEEEAAAHH!!” I didn’t say it was a good laugh. Luthor sees Clark run right into the tear gas and thinks that he’ll be dead shortly. “Some other slob of a journalist can have Lex Luthor’s story of a lifetime!” Luthor says while a crazed inmate who looks like a mustachioed Zach Galifianakis picks up a gun and aims it right for his head. Clark saves him just in time. Like a moron.

Luthor then hoists up Clark, who is coughing and hacking from the tear gas, and urges him to run with him. Together. Cavort like lovebirds. “You know, part of me would be happy watching these animals tear you apart, you sanctimonious ox.” Luthor continues down a corridor. “But I want you alive. I want you to tell my story. The story of a man who refused to bend the knee to an alien invader. A man who dared to ask the question ‘Who does Superman think he is?’”.

Clark thinks this is still a waste of time, but whatever. Unhealthy obsessions and all that. Like jacking off to the JCPenney catalog. Anyway, Luthor is leading Clark down to his cell, but they get ambushed again by the ever-growing parasite. The other inmates are like “ok, Luthor, prove to us you’re not some bald hack piece of shit and lead us, you dumb cunt”, which Luthor is happy to take them up on.

Quick, before I take a huge, ugly dumb right here in the hallway.

Luthor shoots at the dumb beast, which only makes him grow bigger. Pretty soon, he’s tumbling under his own bulk and crashing into walls like Louie Anderson at an open bar. The parasite collapses, choking to death on the excess energy.

“See what happens to anyone who crosses me, Kent? Anyone who underestimates Luthor?” Then he starts kicking and stomping the beast’s remains. “Liquefying! And that’s exactly how he’ll look!” Pink liquid spurts out with every kick and stomp. “That’s how Superman will look at the end! Nobody threatens me! NOBODY GETS IN LUTHOR’S WAY!”

Stable genius, this guy. Clark is simply appalled, clutching his pearls, eating his hat.

“Anybody else want to challenge my ideas?” Lex gives the ol’ wild-eye to all the other inmates, who don’t look like they care much about anything Lex says or does or whether or not he’s even in the room or at his grandma’s house kitting mittens. “Didn’t think so.”

He tells everyone that he’s heading back to his cell, and wait for his signal if they want change.

Clark tells Luthor that he’s not all bad, which Luthor amazingly doesn’t refute. “I’ve always liked you, Kent. You’re a humble, modest, uncoordinated human. You’re everything he’s not.” This is a good time to remind the audience that the self-proclaimed smartest man on the planet can look right at Clark Kent, who has the same height, build, haircut, face, and voice as Superman, and fail to connect any dots. “But you’re just another weapon in my war against Superman. Watch how I easily make you, your paper, and your entire penal system seem completely unreliable.

Then this happens:

Just another normal day in the peniteniary.

Anyway, Lex Luthor lifts up a floor panel and reveals a secret passageway excavated by his Library Robot. Clark is to take an underground boat down an underground river. His guide will be Nasthalthia, or “Nasty”, an 18-year-old woman who speaks 30 languages and wants to run the world one day. How cute.

Clark is like, what the fuck? Really?

“You could escape anytime you wanted, Lex.”

“I’m going to the chair fulfilled. Don’t worry about me. I have friends in high places.”

“I can’t believe you’re getting ready to die like this. You and Superman could have been friends.”

Nope. Clark Kent is going to die before Lex dies, and he’s going to be there for it. “I used the sun itself, Kent. The source of his powers – to overload his cellular batteries and destroy him from within, do you understand? I killed Superman.”

Nasty paddles away with Clark on the boat. He whimpers that Lex has no proof, but Lex insists that the entire story is Clark’s to run with. “You wanted my story, ‘The Gospel of Lex’, and now you have it.”

“How would you feel if someone deliberately stood in your way, over and over again? IF IT WASN’T FOR SUPERMAN, I’D BE IN CHARGE ON THIS PLANET!”

Painting is fun. You could learn to paint. Or, hey, gardening! You could grow a tomato!

Final Thoughts

Really ran off the rails at the end there, but I can always count on Lex Luthor to bitch and moan and whine about not being able to rule the world like an entitled piss-pants. At least Batman villains are like “I WILL EAT YOUR KIDNEYS RIGHT THROUGH YOUR BODY BECAUSE I AM A CRAZY PERSON WITH NO AGENDA.”

In Superman it’s either Lex Luthor or some alien nobody from Glarglax who wants Superman’s Saturn Juice.