Action Comics vol. 3: At the End of Days
Out of all the “New 52” launches, Grant Morrison’s “Action Comics” arguably came with the highest expectations. At least from me it did. Yes, Geoff Johns and Jim Lee’s “Justice League” was positioned as the flagship of the line, but with Morrison taking on Superman again you have a creator going back to try and recapture the magic of one of his signature works. Doing another run on “Superman” after you’ve already done the magnificent “All-Star Superman” is practically begging the law of diminishing returns to come smack you down. To be honest, that’s pretty much what happens here. It’s certainly not for a lack of ambition on Morrison’s part, though he certainly could’ve used a bit more planning to make sure it all held together in the end.
Throughout the writer’s run, there has been one short evil-eyed character with glasses hanging around and making nefarious-sounding deals with certain characters. Here, we finally learn his name: Vyndktvx. Long-time readers of “Superman’s” adventures should instantly recognize that a name with that many consonants can only mean one thing — that he’s an inhabitant of the fifth dimension just like Mr. Mxyzptlk. Their history, and how Clark Kent’s landlady Ms. Nyxly ties into it, is explained here as an epic tragedy of cartoon imagination. While 230 worlds perished as part of it, Superman’s was one that fought back and Vyndktvx now wants to make him pay for it.
How does he do it? By staging a simultaneous assault on Superman at critical points in his life. With Vyndktvx playing a role in the deaths of Ma and Pa Kent, bringing the Kryptonian phantom prisoner Xa-Dun out of the Phantom Zone, having Nimrod the Hunter and the Kryptonite People hunt Superman under a red sun, and unleashing the corporate Doomsday Superman from his prison between worlds, it all unfolds as if everything is happening at once on the page. Oh, and there’s also the matter of the Legion of Superheroes trying to avert their totalitarian future by preventing Superman’s death put in there for good measure as well.
If that all sounds like way too much plot for even someone like Morrison to juggle, it is. Though the writer has dabbled in mind-bending narrative structures before, most notably in “The Invisibles” and “The Filth,” it proves to be his undoing here. It’s easy enough to follow the beats of the story and to grasp what’s happening, but the narrative logic behind a lot of these events is either not explained or simply handwaved away. Things like having Superman unify gravity and electromagnetism to extend a scalar field into the fifth dimension sound crazy, but we never actually see them being done — it’s just text!
This is too bad because for every moment like this, there’s another which connects back to a previous story from Morrison’s run to show you that he did have a plan for this all along. I will also concede that things do build up a good deal of momentum from the beats of the story that are made clear here. The thing is that when this is all said and done, the narrative in this volume comes off like swiss cheese with all of its holes, yet still holding together in the end.
Why does it hold together? Mainly because Morrison gives us such a compelling version of Superman in this volume. His Man of Steel isn’t someone who will compromise on his beliefs when the going gets tough. When faced with the impossible, his first reaction is to simply “do the impossible.” It’s one thing to see Vyndktvx try to collectively bargain with humanity to turn their back on Superman in exchange for peace, but we all know how that’s going to turn out and the Last Son of Krypton turns the tables on him in clever fashion. Yes, Warner Brothers may have decided to double down on the talents of Zack Snyder and David Goyer after “Man of Steel” garnered a decidedly mixed reception from critic and audiences by letting them do “Batman vs. Superman.” However, if they really wanted to give audiences a Superman they could believe in, then Morrison would’ve been the man for the job.
Also worth mentioning is the opening story “The Ghost in the Fortress of Solitude” which introduces Xa-Dun and tells a spooky Halloween story which Morrison dedicates to Ray Bradbury. It’s illustrated by Travel Foreman, who has shown that he can do creepy from his work on “Animal Man,” and we get to see how the phantom Kryptonian wound up in there and is able to switch places with Superman. This story does suffer one of the same flaws of the main narrative as Superman is able to win apparently for no other reason that the sheer force of his believe that the best in us will always triumph over the worst. Still, it’s a fun little ghost story that gives us a glimpse into Krypton’s society and shows us the love between a boy and the best dog in the whole universe.
As with the previous volumes, the back-up stories from Sholly Fisch in each individual issue are collected here too. I can’t say that I’ve cared much for what he’s given us before, which is why I’m surprised that I enjoyed most of what he’s given us here. They all play off a particular plot point in the issues they derive from to a generally successful effect. Whether it’s Krypto’s chase of his master throughout the cosmos, Superman looking for the orbit of a particular planet, or showing the Legion of Superheroes thwarting a presidential assassination, they all add a little something extra to the existing narrative. However, Fisch uses Morrison’s existing narrative to particularly good effect in “Goodby” when the space-time compression that drives the narrative here allows Superman to have one final conversation with those he loves the most. It’s a well-wrought bit of sentimentality that’s easily the best of these back-up stories I’ve read from the writer. We also get a nice, mostly-wordless, closing short where the influence of Superman is felt far into the future and the galaxy as well.
Even though I enjoyed those shorts, it’s still the main narrative that sticks in my mind. Forgiving flaws that spring from ambition are easier than those that come from laziness or ineptitude. I can see the shape of what Morrison was trying to do here and, even if it doesn’t come together as smoothly as it should have, enough of it works to make it a worthwhile read. If anything, one has to wonder if the constraints of getting each issue out on a monthly basis was the main reason behind the issues with the narrative here. Of course, if you’re not like me and aren’t willing to speculate on whether outside forces are to blame for the issues here rather than the writer himself, then you’re probably going to be far less forgiving of this volume’s flaws.
If you can only buy one “Superman” story from Grant Morrison, “All-Star Superman” remains the one to get. His work on “Action Comics” has been decidedly more uneven, but certainly not without its merits. Supposing he ever comes back for a third go-round with the character, then I’d be up for that as well.