Superman Unchained #5 – Review

By: Scott Snyder (story), Jim Lee (pencils), Scott Williams (inks), Dustin Nguyen (art), Alex Sinclair & John Kalisz (colors),

The Story: If Superman’s image of himself 40 years from now is that bad, what hope is there for the rest of us?

The Review: While some folks may decry any grimness that enters the ultimately cheerful Superman mythos, I always thought Clark’s halcyon childhood in the comics was a bit too sugar-coated to be credible.  If Smallville and Man of Steel did the comics one better at anything, it was giving the young Clark some actual trauma and a bit of a temper—too much at times, sure, but my point is the changes weren’t inherently bad ones.

Since the DC relaunch, the comics have aligned more closely with Superman’s TV and film appearances by emphasizing that Smallville life was not always watching sunrises/sunsets from wheat fields.  Now, I may join the pitchfork-bearers when it comes to things like killing off the Kents,* but I have no problem with the notion of Clark’s burgeoning powers as a consistent source of tragedy for him.  It’s logical that his nature would invite more dramatic consequences to his actions than the typical farm boy.  With his origins, it’s asking too much to make it seem as if he experienced the ups and downs of childhood and adolescence like everybody else.

Snyder understands this paradoxical demand well; his work in this and past issues has been to force the traditionalists, through Clark, to confront the naivety of trying to live a completely or even mostly ordinary life.  At this point, Snyder hasn’t revealed whether he thinks Clark should continue striving for that life, or if he’s a fool if he does, instead challenging Clark on a purely rhetorical level.  Indeed, this issue sees Wraith leading Clark through a kind of thought exercise, imagining the pathetic farce of pretending to age while inexorably outliving all his friends and loved ones.  “So be it, then,” Clark says before abruptly changing the subject, pointedly avoiding, rather than accepting, the point of these musings.

It’s true, however, that Wraith has chosen an unfortunate time to indulge in these troubling thoughts, as Ascension strikes with a move that seems beyond the combined powers of the Justice League, much less Superman.  Frankly, the really difficult question in this issue is what, exactly, is Ascension’s beef?  He calls General Lane a “traitor,” but never clarifies how; he says America used advanced alien tech “to chart a course for this country, and mankind” as if that’s a bad thing, but doesn’t exactly clarify the alternatives.  Even more baffling is how nuclear Armageddon is supposed to right these supposed wrongs, rather than compound them further.

Still, Snyder has enough integrity to his raw ideas to keep the story engaging, even though his grasp on the characters weakens somewhat.  Lois, in particular, once again gets reduced to a cipher.  Sure, Snyder instills her with all the skepticism and sarcasm you expect from her, but these qualities are mostly employed to keep Ascension talking than to reveal any greater depth to her personality: “So unless my father secretly knocked up a Best Buy, I don’t believe a damn word you’re saying.”

The art similarly takes a slight downward turn, though this could just as easily be from the talky script than from shortcomings in Lee and Nguyen’s work.  But it’s also apparent that there are noticeable defects in this issue’s art that didn’t seem so clear before.  Lee doesn’t quite leverage the script’s few action scenes, depicting Lois escaping from Ascension’s multiple-man clutches with a single elbow thrust,* and Nguyen’s thin, flexible lines seem rather susceptible to getting lost among themselves during the flashback sequences.

Conclusion: Snyder crosses the line into getting too cerebral with the writing, slowing down the pace of the issue and minimizing the character work in the process.

Grade: B

– Minhquan Nguyen

Some Musings: * Lee also seems stymied by the task of depicting age changes among the Superman cast, portraying Lois as excessively drawn and Perry near decrepit in a future only 10 years from now.

– Young Clark is either the biggest nerd or worst liar—or both.  His excuse for staring at his teacher’s chest area?  “It was an interesting sweater, is all.  The green fading to black, with those little gold bead…things.”  Notice the rapid subject-change: “Look, I like astronomy.  Tell me her introduction wasn’t interesting.  The moons of Jupiter?  How different they are?”