Superman #163

Where Monsters Lurk!

Filmed in Superscope!
Superman created by Jerry Siegel & Joe Shuster
Jeph Loeb Thrills!
Ed McGuinness & Paul Pelletier Spills!
Cam Smith Chills!
Tanya & Richard Horie Shocks!
Richard Starkings Rocks!
Eddie Berganza Blocks!

This month's wet-n-wild cover was brought to you by those swimmingly talented folks Ed McGuinness, Cam Smith, and Richard and Tanya Horie! Our cover shows exactly what happens in this issue — Metropolis is flooded and attacked by a giant green monster with a million teeth. McGuinness has a fun, big, bombastic style that perfectly represents all that was awesome about the early 2000s. But perhaps the most terrifying thing about this cover is the small logo of Lex Luthor's bid for presidency. Turns out, DC was just 16 years early in their presidential prediction. Oh, sorry, that's actually an insult to Lex Luthor. :)

Our story kind of begins in the middle of the action, but editor's notes help catch us up fairly quickly. Apparently Aquaman has accused Lex Luthor of committing heinous crimes against Atlantis and has extradited the presidential candidate against his will to make him stand trial in his underwater kingdom. Superman, naturally is opposed to any violation of human rights, even for a known super villain, so he tries to stop this. But the Atlanteans are prepared. Tempest, of the Titans, has flooded Metropolis to keep the Man of Steel away.

Superman gently knocks out Tempest, saying both he and Aquaman will have a lot to answer for. He starts to combat the flooding by knocking down an under-construction Lexcorp building to act as a dam. Superman then gets a helping hand from most of Young Justice — Red Tornado, Robin, Superboy, Impulse and Wonder Girl.

I'm not exactly sure what Impulse was trying to do, but he somehow caused the Super-Cycle to tip upside down. Red Tornado apologetically explains to Superman that the kids were watching TV when their show was interrupted with a report of the flooding so they decided to come help. Noting the streets are now filled with shark-infested waters, Impulse jokes that he gets blamed for leaving the water running. Superman asks Impulse and Red Tornado to help him battle the water, and for the rest to rescue the civilians. Superboy takes on the sharks, while Robin and Wonder Girl load people up into the Super-Cycle and take them to the tops of dry buildings. Suddenly, they spot the giant green monster we saw on the cover. So Robin decides to allow the monster to swallow him and Wonder Girl on the Super-Cycle, with Superboy pulling on the cycle's tow cable from the outside.

Meanwhile, Superman explains to Red Tornado and Impulse that there are several large hydraulic pumps throughout the city that they need to unbury and start manually. So the three of them spin around to create a large vortex that pushes the water away from the turbines. They quickly get the pumps uncovered and working again, and the water level begins to reduce dramatically. Superman pulls Impulse out of the swell of water by the seat of his pants, and Bart spits a small fish out of his mouth.

Superman then spots the others' in the middle of their odd plan to get rid of the monster — a plan that now involves Robin throwing a bunch of smoke bombs around in the monster's mouth for some reason. Superman decides to not even ask, and he helps Superboy grab the tow cable and pull the beast off the Daily Planet building and out to the ocean. (I swear the Daily Planet building gets destroyed more than any other structure in the DC Universe.) Once the monster is over the open water, it opens its mouth, freeing Robin and Wonder Girl. Superman thanks Young Justice for their help, and he takes off for Atlantis to see what's going on between Luthor and Aquaman.


I always love it when Young Justice randomly shows up in other people's books to help out. I'm always confused, though, when a couple of members of the team are missing. I guess you could say this was before Empress joined the team, but where's Secret? She easily could have been here, too. Anyway, Young Justice is always a lot of fun, adding a bit of levity to an otherwise very serious and tense situation. However, I do have to admit that Robin's "plan" completely perplexed me. If he wanted to drag the monster away, why didn't he have Wonder Girl out pulling the cable with Superboy? And why didn't he have the Super-Cycle using its engines or lasers or something to help out? His smoke bombs didn't seem to accomplish anything. Perhaps a few more lines of dialogue would have helped. Or perhaps this was just a failing in the art. I love the styles of both McGuinness and Pelletier, but I found almost all the action sequences in this issue a bit confusing.

The Metropolis Mailbag doesn't have any letters that mention Impulse or Young Justice, so let's jump straight to the new ads:

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Great for rock climbing. Rice Krispies Treats Double Chocolate Chunk.

Next time, we'll see how the whole team is doing out in space in Young Justice #26.