Superman should have a big dick (a very big dick).
In my version, he always does...
Firestorm:
The oldest and most carnivorous of Sun-Eaters, notorious to galactic civilisations as the Firestorm of Life's End, is many parsecs in diameter. With some effort, he squeezes down and adopts a human interface in order to better understand these small sugars-fueled creatures who have repeatedly thwarted him and his brothers. It was intended to be a week's intelligence gathering.
As he enters US airspace, he inadvertantly stops a nuclear catastrophe by consuming the hard radiation and absorbing the blast of an old Soviet hydrogen bomb smuggled into Chicago by neo-Nazi terrorists trying to kill the President.
In doing so, he is hailed by Earth's population as a hero, and discovers to his bemusement that he likes being praised for altruistic deeds.
But Earth's Green Lanterns recognise him for what he is, and with extreme caution seek to capture him. So, resisting the temptation fight and eat the power of their Batteries, he camoflages by taking the identity of an astrophysics student enrolled at the University of Chicago.
When two of his brothers, the Echo of Stars' Graves and the Shadow of Worlds' Dust, arrive in the Solar System to consume the sun, Firestorm of Life's End must make a choice: fight his brothers and be exiled by his species, or save the Earth.
Brilliant. I'd read it. I especially like the idea of the names for the Sun-Eaters. I'm not sure about the longevity of the concept, as the moral ambiguity of the lead character would grow tiresome if not focused one way or the other within about two years of the book. However, on the other hand,
Irredeemable is a perfect showcase for that kind of storytelling, too. Have you read that? Brother, if not, you PM me your mailing addy and I will send you the first trade. That's how much I love it. It's the single comic book I actually buy anymore.
Of all Superman's powers, if I were take away one it would be heat vision. First off, as others have noted, once you can kill people by looking at them, any other power is superfluous. Second, for about the past ten years, it's led to artists thinking they can make Superman look 'kewl' and 'badass' by drawing him with glowing red eyes.
Agreed about the glowing eyes. I am WAAAAY past that. I got tired of it when Jim Lee decided that he walks around and has conversations while low levels of solar radiation is leaking from his pupils. Come on.
As for heat vision itself, I don't know. I think if worked properly from the right angles and written usefully, it would work. Like, perhaps, it drains him to a point he can only use them in short, brief bursts. Like a Hail Mary in a fight when he's down? I don't know. It's worth thinking about. I wouldn't toss it.
besides, I believe the proper look of the heat vision is the one used by Christoper Reeves' Superman, where it's similar to a magnifying glass, and only works like a really effective blowtorch/welder. A lot of comic book artists make it look and act like Cyclops' optic blast.
Agreed, except I hate, hate, HATE seeing the little red beam of light drawn from his eyes to the surface. I much prefer the eyes-light-up-red, surface-spontaneously-burns look of it. Or, like one of the few effects they had right in Smallville, where it just looks like heat radiating from eyes? Again, I don't know.
But why vomit hot radiation through your ocular senses? What crazy evolutionary forces were in play?
Good question. I know that, in my personal reboot up there, Krypton's never even given a name, much less seen and explored. I prefer a Krypton unseen. That way, it's far more alien to the imagination, versus Brando walking around in a robe or something. So, for all we know, what we call heat vision on Earth, might simply be an evolutionary defense mechanism from their ancestors. Where on Earth he can generate an elevated amount of radiation/heat in physical surfaces, on Krypton the eyes might simply "glowed" red for some emotional/autonomic purposes? Again, it's all in the imagination and willingness to suspend disbelief.
But, I'm not so sold on it that I wouldn't be willing to give it away to make the struggle more difficult for the character. That's the whole point for me, anyway, is to get back to a core basics for how I perceive Superman.
Pro, reboot somebody other than Superman for once.
He's really the only one I remain interested in. I simply don't care about any other characters anymore.
Also, heat vision makes no sense.
But a guy flying around in tights and a cape is perfectly sound logic?
Pro does that a lot. Minus the flying part.
He knows. Doc's seen the pics...
