Final Crisis Superman Beyond #2 (OF 2)

http://finalcrisisannotations.blogspot.com/2008/09/final-crisis-superman-beyond-1.html

^Annotations for the previous issue for anyone who found it incomprehensible, which is understandable.

Swirling around this mini are some profound ideas about the nature of superheroes and the origin of comic book continuity, but so far Morrison hasn't organized them cohesively enough for my taste, or expanded much upon them.

In my opinion, even as a poor grad student, $4.50 isn't a lot of money, especially not for something that takes almost a half hour to decipher, and then you basically need to read it through at least three times to get a firm handle on.

its about thime!!

i re-read issue 1 this afternoon...  
earlier this morning i finished re-reading Seven Soldiers... 
my head feels like it is going to pop...

yea, i have to re-read #1 again.  hope it ends well

I'll pass on #2, issue #1 made no sense and at $ 4.50- NO THANKS!!!!!!!!!

wait, somebody is expecting a cohesive, fully Comprehendable story from Morrison?

also: FIVE MONTHS LATER....

this warrants re-readS.  just like any morisson's stuff, u just need to reread them then u'll see the little things that you've missed before and discover the genius behind grant morisson.  reading grant morrison's comic is like watching donnie darko --- you find new meanings every read/watch.

so that's a long winded way of saying: BRING IT ON!

The first issue of Superman Beyond (comprehension) was the worst comic book I read in 2008, maybe ever, so I won't be layin' down cash for this.

The first issue did bring about the funniest comment on iFanboy.com in 2008 for me though -- when Kory said he was reading the issue with the 3D glasses on eating cereal at the kitchen table & his girlfriend walked in him & said something along the lines of: "What the hell are you doing?".

Hilarious.

I never cease to laugh at the "re-read" comment about G-Mo's writing. I re-read almost everything. Several times over. In the case of G-Mo, I find there is little incentive to re-read. Make me care about the people, and I'll care about your story.

For me, it's people first.

On a tangentially related note -> http://www.dixonverse.net/ <- scroll down to the untitled article under the pic of Captain America crying. Interesting article.

I don't quit get when people complain about not being able to understand some of Morrison's DCU stuff. Its not near as complex as his vertigo/creator owned work.

The problem with issue 1 of this was the extreamly confusing and pointless 3D. It gave me a headache and not in a good way!

Really looking forward to this. loved the first.

@ jumpingjupiter and friends: If you dont like morrison's stuff then don't read it and definitely don't post about it and if you do come up with and different argument than it's not character driven you've said that enough.

Character is plot, plot is character." - F. Scott Fitzgerald and gnanniv but i think scotty said it first.

 and if you want the story given to you on a silver plate go get a readers digest.

Yea, I took it from F. Scott.

@WadeWilson- Glad you got a laugh out of that one. :)

@sunhero -- I didn't realize you were a mod here ... & what's up with the Reader's Digest thing? You make it sound like if people don't wanna read a book they have to read 12 times to decipher it (which is A LOT of people) they should go read a children's book. 

@Wadewilson  sorry got carried away just sick of people morrison bashing and half of them aren't even reading the books.

If you're not reading book don't post about it, it's annoying.

@Sunhero-You comment Nazi!!  :-P

I finally sat down and re-read the first issue last night.  It makes more sense to me, but I still don't love this series.  Not to sound like a loser fanboy, but I have having an incomplete series when its as short as 2 issues.  And on a heavier week I might skip this entierly.  I don't know, just thinking out loud.  I really really am tired of picking up G-Mo books lately.  Usually I enjoy them but this series is its own little slab of goodness/trash, depending on your taste.

@WintheWonderboy-Agreed.  More people should try reading The Invisibles.  That thing gives you seizures!!

I want to read Morrison's take on Tiny Titans!!!

G-Mo does Owly.  Million seller right there.

G-Mo's Owly?  sign me up! 

I do read my friend's books. Just because something isn't on my pull don't mean I don't read it.

And people trash books I like all the time. Gotta have thick skin.

do you read books justs so you can trash them later on of for enjoyment

Come on guys, everyone needs a job. Jupiter's job just happens to be providing an uncontainable dislike of all things Final Crisis/Grant Morrison. If he didn't have this very important job he would be on the streets, doing God knows what.

No I read them because it's free and I'm curious to see if the theory of "it will all come around" will become fact in this case. And I don't trash the books. You're being over-sensitive about it.

It's just opinions. No matter what you love, there will be someone who doesn't. I loved that first part of Denny O'neil's Detective Comics, it got trashed quite a bit. Life goes on.

I must have been the only person who thought the 3-D artwork was AWESOME.  I'm looking forward to issue 2!

but you don't find me posting on 50 or so comics that i don't read or like saying their shit just for the sake of it.

@Crippler - I had fun with the 3-D art. It seems to fit the multiverse.

Sunhero, I'm not you. Show me the 50 comics I posted on and where I said they are shit. Admit it, I happened to be the scapegoat here.

i was excited about the 3D before the last issue came out...  it was neat, but i could do without...  especially with something this challenging...  it seemed to make it more difficult to comprehend what i was reading...  some larger and more comfortable glasses might have helped...

I thought the 3D art was slightly fun, but it wasn't worked into the narrative well at all. There's an otherwise nonsensical storypoint about Superman needing to "upgrade to 4D vision" or something in order to experience the multidimensional story. I get the feeling that Morrison might have intended that to coincide with the reader putting on the 3D glasses...but some 3D portions of the book occurred BEFORE Superman's vision "upgraded". And then after he did "upgrade", not all of the pages after that point were 3D. Maybe this was the fault of the editor or whoever organized which scenes got the 3D treatment, but on the other hand I doubt Morrison gave instructions about this either. Instead it was just so random. Slightly--slightly--fun, nonetheless. I ain't mad at it.

The previous issue, I extrapolate, contained the idea that the creation of the Superman archetype eventuated some sort of fractured ramifications, disrupting and complicating the continuity of comic books. I think this is an extremely interesting idea but as it is now it seems very, very half-baked. Morrison just laid this stuff on us via a flashback from the "book that contains all stories". If in this next issue he can SHOW us how this conflict metaphorically plays out, I'll be content. This SHOWING would come in the form of Superman's interactions with the Dark Monitor, who I guess represents the continuity-obsessed comic reader gone mad/bad.

@JumpingJupiter: The incentive people have for re-reading Morrison is so they can better understand the stories that so many other readers find incomprehensible. Or, in the case of Superman Beyond, it pays off to reread issue 1 after having read FC 6. I think you're right about liking the characters being beside the point in this process, though. Morrison's better at little *moments* that say something about the nature of what a character's archetype blah blah blah *means* blah blah blah, than he is about the gradual process of getting readers to really CARE about characters as if they were real people or whatever. But, personally, I don't want to care about his characters that way.

@Flap: Yup, you get where I'm coming from.

ps: I love G-Mo's Arkam Asylum.

I noticed that all of the 3D pages happened after sups gets his cheesy upgrade.  The only ones were the first couple, but those took place later on in the story.  It would have been nice for them to throw in a little indicator at the top of the page, but I guess thats too much to ask for.  

Either way, I also found it interesting how he was exploring that the superhero altered comics, but something like that is something I seriously would not have picked up on if people had not mentioned it on forums and podcast.  I don't know, maybe I still don't really look for this sort of stuff as often as I would like.  Or maybe G-Mo just likes to make it more of a trip.  I think its a combination of both. 

@flapjaxx: "The previous issue, I extrapolate, contained the idea that the creation of the Superman archetype eventuated some sort of fractured ramifications, disrupting and complicating the continuity of comic books. I think this is an extremely interesting idea but as it is now it seems very, very half-baked. Morrison just laid this stuff on us via a flashback from the "book that contains all stories". If in this next issue he can SHOW us how this conflict metaphorically plays out, I'll be content. This SHOWING would come in the form of Superman's interactions with the Dark Monitor, who I guess represents the continuity-obsessed comic reader gone mad/bad."

Huh?  This 2-issue mini is supposed to be central to understading Final Crisis (a publisher-wide storyline), and Final Crisis in turn was the conclusion to Morrisons's multi-year run on Batman, and you're suggesting that at heart it's all Grant Morrison's (unflattering) critique on DC Comic's core customer base?  How vain and egotistical do you think Grant Morrison is, and how stupid are Dan Didio and DC Comics, if you're correct?  If Morrison wants to tell allegories in lieu of interesting and cohesive fictional stotries I'd rather he head to a different medium or choose a focus point other than a line-wide event.  Because if that's the case then I'm neither his desired audience nor in the least bit interested.

Wait are we talking about JJ here or me?

Or a super ifanboy who is like both of us but waaay cooler?

@rw: There's that too.

@TNC-Why do you always have to involve yourself?  geez man, it stopped being funny a while ago

@Drake: I did not recall anyone laughing in previous weeks.

Where are my kudos?

@rwpos - "If Morrison wants to tell allegories in lieu of interesting and cohesive fictional stotries I'd rather he head to a different medium or choose a focus point other than a line-wide event.  Because if that's the case then I'm neither his desired audience nor in the least bit interested." -- Amen to that.

I enjoyed the first issue more than I at first thought. Wasn't too keen on the 3-D stuff (as a 'normal' glasses wearer, it's not easy to combine the 2!!)

@sandgrounder - I hear you about the glasses over glasses thing :-)

 I do have to say that I loved the first issue, but only after being confused through my first few reads, and it makes more sense the more Final Crisis continues.  I am one of those few people who really enjoy a challenging comic book.  I look forward to each issue of FC for a few things :  First, the anticipation of what Morrison is coming up with now, Second, the heated discussion among friends and online folks, and Third, I enjoy reading all of the annotations and reviews noline to find stuff that I may have missed or differeing takes on certain scenes.

I've read every Final Crisis and all of the tie-ins....and I still have no clue what is going on......don't know if it's Morrison's writing (because I enjoyed AS Superman and for the most part, his run on Batman) or that I don't know anything about Darkseid and the New (old?) Gods.  And the 1st issue of this was absolute crap to me. 

this wasnt bad but im still not sure what happened. in the end it was a story that was just save lois so it was ok

Read this story and definity enjoyed it. 

!SPOILERS!?

Now it does look like Superman is showing up all pissed from The Legion tie in and not from this which was a little surprising.

@DemonBoy: "I do have to say that I loved the first issue, but only after being confused through my first few reads, and it makes more sense the more Final Crisis continues.  I am one of those few people who really enjoy a challenging comic book..."

How many times do you feel like you should have to read a story before you're able to understand it?  Can you imagine if Melville wrote in such an obtuse fashion that you had to read Moby Dick 3 times before understanding what the story was about?  You'd be pissed!  Well, I suspect that you just wouldn't bother finishing it the first time.  But when Grant Morrison can't tell a clear story people call him a genius.  Why is that?  Seriously, what's the special quality that makes his worst shit shine for some people?  In my opinion, a great idea poorly written is still a bad story, no matter how cool it could have been if it had been well written.  I have a full time job, a wife, two children and not enough time to re-read a single comicbook (for which I've shelled out $4!) multiple times in the hopes that it might eventually make sense.  And with a Morrison story, that isn't even a garauntee!

Seriously, every week this happens.  No one is going to win this little Morrison debate, no one ever does.  So just say your piece and drop it.  Yes he is confusing for some.  Yes others don't think so.  Move on.

Anyway, it was a mediocre story for me.  As far as G-Mo stories go, this is a forgettable one.  He was aiming pretty high it seems, but ultimatly didn't do what he planned.  At least not for me.  

@Spoons-Is Sups in the Legion book?  I haven't been reading it, so I have no idea.  It would make more sense, since I was wondering why the hell he would be with Brainiac 5 if he wasn't even in this story.

@Drake agreed about the GMO debate. Also, supes is a part of the FC: Legion of 3 worlds book (though it's been so long since the last issue came out that I had to check).

 I like Morrison. I don't think this worked very well. Most of time I was reading this I was thinking "I don't know what that's supposed to mean but I guess I'll just go with it." Some of this seemed like a parody of Morrison. I don't know what was with the vampires or what this has to do with final crisis. But between the Doug Mankhe art, some cool action, and a few interesting concepts here and there, this book was still enjoyable. Not hugely enjoyable. Just enjoyable enough so that I wasn't angry at it.

@Drake: Ya he is.  I got the first one but it didn't do anything for me.  I also thought it wouldn't really matter to the main storyline and it appears I was very wrong on that end.

I would write a review, but I'm not sure what I read.

Ok, so I re-read the part where they read the book in issue #1, and then I re-read this whole issue...really...slowly.  And I understood a lot more of it!  Sadly, I still didn't enjoy it a whole lot.  Cool to see that it plays into issue #1 of Final Crisis, with the monitors.

@Drake: What's the point of not discussing or critiquing or debating about this on an opinion website where user reviews are featured? It's part of the deal.

Word up, JJ.

It's funny how the die hard Morrison defenders talk about not needing stories "spoon fed" to them, but then go & read web pages of annotations & interviews by the writer explaining what he wrote -- isn't this spoon feeding? I honestly don't see the point of reading something you don't understand (without help) & the people who admit it makes zero sense to them until the 6th or 7th read & they still like it ... that boggles my mind. But ... different strokes for different folks & all that, I guess.

Sorry, I'm not hating, or trolling. Just can't get my head around it. 

Anyway, I actually picked this issue up in the store & almost bought it based on the awesome Mahnke art alone .. then I read the very 1st word balloon one page 1 & I put it back on the shelf. I knew I wouldn't be able to decipher it. But, I am reading Final Crisis & am interested in how this ties into it, so if someone could explain the story in a way that makes sense, that'd be awesome. Thanks. 

See, I think multi layered stories are great! But I think it's a much better tactic to have one of those layers easily accessible so that on first pass you get some enjoyement out of it.

I'll use The Watchmen as an example. It's very dense and layered. Each reading reveals something new to me. But my first reading of it was immenseley entertaining. because the writer took upon himself to incite me and compel me to go in deeper and deeper into the story. The writer gave me a health piece of story and character to hang on to.

When I read G-Mo, I get the impression that each layer is equally opaque. He makes me work for EVERYTHING. And gives nothing away easily. I find that to be a lack of respect and generosity towards the reader.

I'm the reader. The story can not exist without me. That story exists within a world of the author's creation. GIVE, me the story and I will dive into your world with great enthusiasm. Dangle tauntingly the story in front of me just out of reach and I will flee from the world you so lovingly created.

It's just like sex. I like a tease, but if I see your not gonna put out, I'm a dump you like a sack o' potatos bitch!

loved this morrison can don no wrong when he write's superman.

but if you haven't read animalman this would be incomprehensible, and this was very hard going and only few readers will understand it.

but its worth it.

Final Crisis is to Comics what James Joyce's "Ulysses" is to Literature.

Anyway, I enjoyed this issue. I have to say, Morrison has the ability to make me care about Superman. I finally get why he's so important, when his deeds are shown on a cosmic scale. Certainly this story was "A job for Superman." It could have been toned down a bit in insanity.

@sunhero It's not quite incomprehensible to people who haven't read Animal Man. My friend has not read it, and understood this issue just fine. In fact, I would argue Animal Man's presentation of a very similar idea is easier to understand and digest than Superman Beyond.

@wadewilson To a certain extent, I understand the griping many fans have. It's not a matter of understanding the story, but personal taste in storytelling honestly. And that's fine, to each their own. But I am a little tired of hearing about how people who say they understand it are lying, or just pretending to get it. I've not reread any of the issues of Final Crisis yet (I plan on doing so after rereading Seven Soldiers again), nor have i consulted any annotations nor Morrison interviews. So, no, I don't need the story spoon fed to me, nor do I have to go look for other peoples interpretations of events. But then, I got back into comics when New X-Men #114 came out, so my past 7.5 years of mainstream comics reading have been heavily Morrison laden. Perhaps that's change my perspective on reading Morrison? Maybe I have a Morrison sense? I don't know.

"so my past 7.5 years of mainstream comics reading have been heavily Morrison laden. Perhaps that's change my perspective on reading Morrison?"

I can see that happening.

@sunhero - "but if you haven't read animalman this would be incomprehensible, and this was very hard going and only few readers will understand it." -- I wish I knew this before I read issue #1! I wouldn't have bought it.

@Prax -- I was generalising, mate. I didn't mean EVERY single person.

what the fuck did i just read?  has there ever been a duller fight?  in 3-D?  I will admit, the pages where Superman's reaching out for the audience was pretty cool, but i think Morrisons running out of acid trip ideas, because this kinda feels like a retread of his ideas from Animal Man.  Wheres the Morrison that brought us JLA and New X-Men?

@mikeandzod21-I think he is stuck in Arizona on some kind of peyote trip

@ drakedanderz   who, grant morrison or superman?

Wow, that was FUN.

@mikeandzod21-both?

The Next Champion and Jumping Jupiter are sort of like the Superman and Ultraman of these boards.

@Wade: "It's funny how the die hard Morrison defenders talk about not needing stories "spoon fed" to them, but then go & read web pages of annotations & interviews by the writer explaining what he wrote -- isn't this spoon feeding?"

No, the "spoon feeding" metaphor means that you DON'T have to do any extra work to digest the story. It's just there on the page and is easily understandable. I see your point, though, that if a Morrison defender is just taking his understanding from what someone else laid out on a list of annotations, then he's not really exercising his brain all that much. That's why I never read the annotations until I've read the book a few times on my own

@rwpos: "Huh?  This 2-issue mini is supposed to be central to understading Final Crisis (a publisher-wide storyline), and Final Crisis in turn was the conclusion to Morrisons's multi-year run on Batman, and you're suggesting that at heart it's all Grant Morrison's (unflattering) critique on DC Comic's core customer base?"

Stories can refer to more than one level of reality. To give a simple example, Animal Farm is about the politics of little talking animals; it's also about George Orwell's ideas regarding real-world communism. I don't think that EITHER level of Morrison's satire works very well independently, though, which is a problem; whereas you could read Orwell's story just as a fairy tale, and not "get" much of the outside social criticism, and still take a lot away from it. Morrison's metaphors here are pretty mixed, and they aren't so clear. You can't really read this story as JUST Superman fighting vampire gods, because it isn't very interesting or cohesive on that level--and I think that's a shortcoming.

"How vain and egotistical do you think Grant Morrison is"

REALLY VAIN AND REALLY EGOTISTICAL! :)

"and how stupid are Dan Didio and DC Comics, if you're correct?"

Ha, honestly, I doubt Didio understands the subtext of what Morrison might be saying. Or maybe he just doesn't care. Oh, and some guys on another board set up a decent analogy about how the Dark Monitor could also represent Alan Moore. Some people seem confused about whether the Monitors might represent readers or creators--but to that I would say that ALL CREATORS ARE READERS TOO, they're just readers who have been able to realize what's in their imaginations by actually changing the DCU.

"If Morrison wants to tell allegories in lieu of interesting and cohesive fictional stotries I'd rather he head to a different medium or choose a focus point other than a line-wide event."

That's understandable. I think RIP would have been better received if it wasn't billed as "a Bat-line event". And I think people would like FC more if it wasn't billed as a big Crisis. 

@Prax: "But I am a little tired of hearing about how people who say they understand it are lying, or just pretending to get it."

flapjaxx: Can.....Can I be Ultraman?

@TNC-You already are him...a one-note character!

OOOOHHH SNAP!!

@drake: Ha Ha....Good one.

*bites hand and mumbles* Why was I born?

well all this lively banter aside, I enjoyed the issue and think it points the story in a more interesting direction.  I do appreciate how all the associated FC books are fleshing out the main series very well.  I wouldn't want to just be reading the main series without the associated stories.  I'm loving it though.

That means I'm Superman? F%&kin A! I'm gonna shoot you with my heat vision bee-otch!


8}

"How many times do you feel like you should have to read a story before you're able to understand it?  Can you imagine if Melville wrote in such an obtuse fashion that you had to read Moby Dick 3 times before understanding what the story was about?  You'd be pissed!  Well, I suspect that you just wouldn't bother finishing it the first time.  But when Grant Morrison can't tell a clear story people call him a genius.  Why is that?  Seriously, what's the special quality that makes his worst shit shine for some people?  In my opinion, a great idea poorly written is still a bad story, no matter how cool it could have been if it had been well written.  I have a full time job, a wife, two children and not enough time to re-read a single comicbook (for which I've shelled out $4!) multiple times in the hopes that it might eventually make sense.  And with a Morrison story, that isn't even a garauntee!"

There actually exists a novel like the hypothetical version of Moby Dick you are describing. It's called Ulysses. It is over 600 pages. I spent 2 months reading it, and re-reading its various episodes to different degrees. And it was the most fun I've ever had reading a novel. Ever.  This is neither here nor there as far as the quality of Superman Beyond is concerned. But I just wanted to dispel the notion that somehow a challenging read that require multiple re-reads that doesn't even garuntee full comprehension is bad. 

Its great that you have priorities outside your reading material, and if that limits the time you spend on it just remember that the comic wasn't written for you. No need to be facetious.

I just read this and... wow. To me that was just a perfect expression (well, since ASS anyway, lol) of the essence of superman. I think I might knock up a review in a sec actually, I feel like spoilering, ha!

Actually, scratch that, biftec said it as well as I ever can. To me though, this issue was all about the pure plantonic ideal of superman and was so powerful. It was like a whole story with the same power as that sun-superman page from ASS, just the immense cosmic psychological power of the idea of superman. I loved it. It makes me believe.

Have read this through once so far, and enjoyed every page.  I know I'm going to enjoy reading this again and again. Pretty much sums up Morrison's Final Crisis run for me.

Just a quick note about what this comicbook really was - it was part of a major marketing plan to draw together line-wide stories in an effort to boost DC comics' sales and to engage a larger readership.  That's what comicbook events are about.  That's what my prior posts here were about.  So when people respond to my posts that it's "okay" for it to be obtuse and challenging, and indicating that this comicbook wasn't for me, you're missing my point.  Marvel and DC publish line-wide events in an effort to produce "grand" comicbooks that appeal to every reader.  They publish Animal Man and Deadpool to reach out to different niche audiences.  My point is that this story (Final Crisis and Superman Beyond) is completely out of step with what this comicbook was meant to be.  There is a place and an audience for stories like Superman Beyond, but serving as an anchor to a line-wide, mass-appeal event isn't one of them, in my opnion.  As a side note, this comic was out-pulled on iFanboy by three-post Secret Invasion books, #37 of Green Lantern (by hundreds of pulls), and yet another several-times-monthly issue of Spider-man.  And I'm near-certain it won't be in this month's top-10 for sales.

@rwpos-no, it won't be in the top 10, Hulk will be though

@rwpos -- "Marvel and DC publish line-wide events in an effort to produce "grand" comicbooks that appeal to every reader.  They publish Animal Man and Deadpool to reach out to different niche audiences.  My point is that this story (Final Crisis and Superman Beyond) is completely out of step with what this comicbook was meant to be.  There is a place and an audience for stories like Superman Beyond, but serving as an anchor to a line-wide, mass-appeal event isn't one of them, in my opnion."

Thank you for articulating what I have been trying to say in the Morrison thread all week!

PS - I posted this on Thursday & got no response: "Anyway, I actually picked this issue up in the store & almost bought it based on the awesome Mahnke art alone .. then I read the very 1st word balloon one page 1 & I put it back on the shelf. I knew I wouldn't be able to decipher it. But, I am reading Final Crisis & am interested in how this ties into it, so if someone could explain the story in a way that makes sense, that'd be awesome. Thanks."

Can someone help out? The user reviews do't say much ...

@WadeWilson-I'm not entirely sure how it connects to FC.  I have heard that the vampire monitor that is the main villian in this book is actually whats causing the Multiverse to collapse.  That each universe is expieriencings its own "crisis" and this dude wants to destroy it all.  So some say he will actually show up in FC #7.  If that happens, I won't be happy.  Not having a guy mentioned at all in the main series and then have him show up at the end to threaten everything?  Even for G-Mo, thats bad storytelling.  Then again, he has Sups using a god weapon that can do anything.  So I guess I don't really have a point, so I'm going to stop rambling.

Also, the preview on Newsaram seems to show the Captain Marvel from this book doing what Sups told him to do.  So it's looking like this will indeed play a role in the end

Thanks, drake!

I hated the first issue of this.

This issue, however, was REALLY FREAKING GOOD!!!