It's amazing how the company that has Superman always seems to be one of the only ones to think he's old and busted. Injustice Superman being influential to some Hollywood directors who will not be named shouldn't be a precedent to just make our Superman into that Superman.
indeed it's amazing these idiots still believe injustice superman is a good direction for his character where it clearly it's not a great direction for his character from the start.
Injustice superman only "worked" in the injustice universe (go figure, right?) more importantly, he only worked ONCE. There's a reason why Brainiac's the bad guy in the second game/comics. The initial idea [bad superman] was only applicable once, and they knew it. just don't think dc as a whole or a certain director/figurehead for a failed cinematic universe (kind of?) didn't get that memo.
@@iangraham1138 indeed and personally for me I am just tired of evil superman and injustice superman being popular to the point that even in adventures of Jon kent superman that storyline failed to fix anything with injustice superman and frankly my point is in general is that Hollywood needs to stop doing terrible superman adaptations or evil superman that nobody likes to see myself included, bottom line is in general the only superman stories i want to see adapted are Superman clark kent being married to his wife Lois lane and they have there son Jonathan Samuel Kent superboy as his little 10 year old self being a great hero and learning from his dad which is amazing storyline, and seeing that adapted into a animated movie or animated series would be freaking fantastic and badass at least in my opinion.
Well superman isn't hard to figure out. He's supposed to be "The best of us." With practically infinite power. It's the fantasy or wish fulfillment or whatever of "what if the guy with the most power was also genuinely the best person." That's why it's important he not be an authoritarian asshole, and why edgey interpretations of the character are. It's literally the difference between "Actually being the best of us" and "being a hypocritical tyrant." That's what defines the character: how he handles all that power. I mean, that's the..... that's the central concept. No what defines the character is all the human details but what defines the MYTH is that.
@@akwilson1676The journey to becoming a hero is not a journey in the light. It is a journey through the darkness. Only by seeing our heroes in tough and hard situations, do we see how they can truly rise about darkness and pain and mature and realistic situations. By playing it safe, you are telling us they are heroes but by playing it risky and grand and dangerously close to "the line", you are showing us that they are heroes. Superman is always Superman, but the situation you put him in shows how those in his life make him stronger and more heroic. Like in the Snyderverse. Zack Snyder and his fans understand that. But "True DC fans that know everything" don't understand that.
@@richardabia9735 Except he has been in tough and hard situations. He's been raised by Stalin and ultimately ended up on the side of good. But he doesn't need to be "scathed", he can be a pure force of justice and that work's perfectly fine.
We didn’t dodge a bullet with 5G we dodged a full on nuke, Morrison is a great writer (obviously) but they’ll always have a fan in me just for stepping in and saving Superman
Every loves hating 5G, but who knows? One thing I find tiresome about comics is how nothing is ever allowed to grow or change nowadays. I’m not saying it wasn’t a thing to restore status quo back in the day as well, but they did allow many characters to grow and change. Robin to Nightwing. Flash died and Wally replaced him. Hal Jordan became a villain. Now things seem to be played much much safer. So perhaps allowing the characters to grow old and change could have been very interesting. And of course, the toys could always be put back in the toy chest as they always were.
@Akkbar21 the problem with 5g is that it was going in the opposite direction of the new 52 without understanding the flaws of the new 52. It's clear that dc thought the problem was "people don't like new younger takes on heroes" when in reality the problem was more that they didn't like seeing stories and relationships they were invested In for literal decades randomly erased and continuity changes that were nonsensical or contradictory. They also didn't enjoy some of the new storytelling that clearly resulted from the fact that the new 52 went into effect behind the scenes rather abruptly. 5g would have been another new 52 except with all the heroes aged and new random ones getting more prominence that might have been good but who readers had to build new relationships to. Inevitably 5g would have led to a reset back to the status quo.bim all for characters getting older and changing (its why I wish spider-man was still married and why I'm reading hickman's ultinate spider-man right now) but I don't think 5g was the way to do it.
@@joseabreu-nn5cu That's what the dude prefers to be referred as so I'm just going with that. I'm glad it's not 2020. Nobody should be bothered enough to comment about it.
@@hayzyuston6209 OH GOD DONT EVEN seriously im obsessed with their NXM and they even handle Magneto so well early in the run, with him delivering a posthumous speech about legacy and judgment, and then completely erase the impact of that speech and even turn that specific speech into an attack by magneto against the world's defense systems
I’m actually soon to teach a class on Grant Morrison in school, using All Star Superman, Animal Man, and Doom Patrol. I always like to see videos on Morrison! What do you think about a video on Frank Quitely?
I've been fighting for my universities to have creative writing and literature courses centered around comic books and graphic novels for years! All your future students will be so lucky to have a teacher like you
Nice! There's so many great comics from Morrison that could be used as teaching material both for the comics medium and literature in general. The Invisibles, The Filth, Seven Soldiers Of Victory, Final Crisis, Batman, etc. Are you including Morrison's Flex Mentallo series as part of Doom Patrol?
@@davetheimpaler204No. It’s pretty short on time, so I had to make the hard decision of choosing only 3 trades. Had I had more time we would go through all of Doom Patrol.
Good choices for Morrison’s strengths. Might be useful to throw in one of their weaker books though. Perhaps Final Crisis or the oddity that was Wonder Woman Earth One. I do feel like analyzing a writer only reading the best works does miss a major part of learning about writing.
It is amazing to see Superman in a comic where he is teaming up with The Authority since that team was described by their creator as villains who were fighting worse villains, with The Elite being a jab at them. However, Superman's ideals are that people can be better, and Manchester Black's return after his famous debut said he wasn't past redemption. So I am all for a story where he redeems a villain. It is an affirmation of Superman's ideals if he heals a cynic. I do agree with Morrison's issue about how the Big 2 have slipped away from talking about real issues and focused too much on cosmic stuff.
Missing those days when Grant Morrison, Geoff Johns, Mark Waid, Greg Rucka, and Keith Giffin work together in one studio. [EDIT] For Marvel, the best modern era to me was when Bendis, Brubaker, Fraction, Straczynski and Warren Ellis worked together during the dark reign. Hickman was also involved for writing the secret warriors.
While I’m definitely not wild about some of the details of 5G (geez that direction for Superman is NUTS), I did like the overall idea of a comics universe that exists and moves in real time. We’ve more or less had the same status quo of characters for nearly a century. I’d love to see one of the Big Two really shake it up and make a whole continuity that’s basically “what If Spider-Man: Life Story but a whole line”.
This alongside the comics Superman Up In The Sky & Superman Red & Blue & the animated series My Adventures With Superman are some of my favorite content for the character in years!
As a really big Wildstorm fan and a fan of Morrison's take on Superman, this is probably the book that captured my imagination most in recent years. Really wish we could have got a longer run.
I’ve been reading a lot of Superman comics for the past couple of months. And Superman and the Authority along with Superman: Warworld are two stories that I would like to read. Morrison has certainly impressed me. Not just with All Star Superman, but with JLA. And hopefully Superman and the Authority will impress me as well.
I really appreciate what you're doing Owen. You're putting a lot of awareness on stories and even creators I never really would have taken a second glance at but starting to really appreciate their works...and regretting what I've been missing over the years!😂 Thank you again for your awesomeness and know that I will always favor your videos!❤
This is the book that got me to understand and love Superman. The combo of this book, the Future State prequel to Warworld, and the actual Warworld run is where it clicked for me. Watching Superman walk into this slave planet without invincibility and still essentially saying "this is what I fight against" made me sit back. Yeah, YOU'RE the leader of this publishing house.
Great video! Didn't know Grant used They/Them pronouns, and I hate seeing the mean-spirited comments over someone's preferences. Also I loved this story when it came out!
Morrison's shake-up of Superman was interesting and opened the door for different stories. When other writers shake-up established characters, they make everything so different that it may as well be a new property that has nothing to do with the original.
This really explains quite a bit. I liked the series but I was confused by the time period differences, now this makes sense. Thanks for the great videos!
Grant Morrison IMO is a fantastic writer especially when it comes to Superman. He really understands the character from top to bottom. His All Star Superman series is still my favorite Superman comic of all time.
I’ve never read Superman & the Authority, but I’ll be damned if this video doesn’t make me want to go read it. Also, glad to see you making good use of that photo of you meeting Grant Morrison for the video.
I really hope Grant Morrison gets to one more DC book where they can talk about superhero genre itself with all the characters. Something like how Paul Dini did the book on Batman. But if not then they've given us so much already!
So that's where the T-Shirt look comes from. I really like The Authority Superman look, but I always thought he was inspired by Kingdom Come instead, which i'm not really familiar with.
Fucking love Superman. He's really relatable to me, in the way that I consider myself way stronger than any person I know, yet I have to hold back my selfish or violent impulses to try and always do the right thing
Now as for superman and the authority as a whole this storyline I thought was confusing and kind of all over the place, which as a storyline as a whole it isn't a bad storyline no no mostly because as a superman fan its a interesting older superman storyline taking place in the main continuity and having the authority be the main catalysis for this new team and having superman help fight the good fight with this new team in warworld was really awesome and badass at least in my opinion.
Yeah I gotta agree, I got into reading comics again with Superman warworld when went back to read Superman and the authority for some context. I didn’t really like the story as it felt too much like Morrison’s action comic run which I found lack luster. I don’t think it’s a bad story and honestly I wish he could’ve told another kind without having to be bogged down with 5G. But I appreciate how he helped step in and save Clark Kent Superman from being ruined by the 5G storyline.
@@masenguerra7835 same here as well and honestly while yes I am still pissed off and angry with Jonathan Samuel Kent Superboy still being aged up for garbage stories nobody likes myself included and dc refusal to deage Jonathan Samuel Kent superboy back as his little 10 year old self, I am so happy that Grant Morrison saved Superman from dan didio horrible ideas with 5G which just sounded garbage from the very beginning at least in my opinion. That being said though I do agree with you that I did wish Grant Morrison was able to tell a superman storyline not under the mandate of 5g similar to what happened to his new 52 Action comics run which also got sidetracked thanks to that reboot it ends up being a lackluster storyline that really went nowhere but went nowhere in my opinion. Which is a shame because Grant Morrison is a good writer and I know his work on superman is way better then this mess and he knows how to write a great superman and he did even in this lackluster superman story he still writes Clark Kent superman ten times better then what bendis and taylor did with superman and failed badly really badly but Morrison wrote superman freaking fantastic and amazing even in this storyline which is a mess and tie down to 5g Morrison still writes a great superman and this team did had a great payoff with warworld which I approve at least in my opinion.
@@TevyaSmolka oh yeah warworld was awesome, it’s what got me into collection the physical copies of comics again. However with the exception of midnighter and steel, the entire team is kinda pointless to the point where you can tell Philip Kennedy Johnson really didn’t wanna use enchantress, or Manchester, and probably not OMAC as much. When it comes to Morrison’s writing of these older characters it also comes off as he has to twist the older stories like how he wanted to use red and blue Superman. Which maybe might be a fun idea if we didn’t already do it in the 90s and if his versions wasn’t going to be right wing vs left wing. It’s like zurenar Batman, some stuff should just be left as the goofy kid adventures and not made gritty. But I’m a little sad to see Morrison leave the big two comics for the time being since they always show love to these characters. I’d just like to see Morrison be given oversight rather then restraint.
@@masenguerra7835 that's true and and you're right about that and honestly i am glad that team got sidelined because lets be honest this team was only formed to stop mongol which failed badly, and superman only needed that team to help him which they did at the end but it was mostly a superman story which that made me so happy in my opinion.
Damn I think I might actually have to hold off on this video because I want to read The Authority's content starting from Warren Ellis' run on Stormwatch.
I've been raving about Grant Morrison's Superman work for a while but I didn't know this particular run is their last Superman run ever (presumably). A bummer that Grant's done with the character but at least they went out with a banger of a run
Morrison has written some of the best comic books of my life time in DC and his x-men in Marvel. I hate that DC doesn't understand its own flagship character. Thank god Grant Morrison saved Superman
Think this version is greatly taken from the Superman movie with Christopher Reeves as its template and acr and the other is classic Superman a bit of a mash-up before Crisis and after and a bit in between too. The legacy of the last son of Krypton and the man of tomorrow has remained the same with some major updates to his powers and core history revolving around his recent years. The best thing has to be his powers and his gaining a son a little bit more human. It's been 70 years since he flew into the world of comics and still so much has changed except his outlook on his identity as Clark Kent ( Kal El) the man and now husband and father his evolution to this point has given him a new challenge but inside this his story has changed it is transforming but his still Superman a little different but the iconic hero of DC Comics the next phase will be surprising and possibly unique but his family will take centre stage. Superman Family the new generation Crant thanks to you, you gave something more to the man of steel humbleness and respect where Kal El came from two men who were his creators and one actor who was our Superman Christopher Reeves. Superman Forever the Last Son has a home in our imaginations on-screen on the pages of comics where a man flew.
* And people say Zack Snyder doesn't get Superman while Dan Didio wanted to go with THAT direction for the character. * I'm a little confused; if this was set during present day, how did Superman know Kennedy?
Originally in the 5G timeline he would have met JFK in real-time. In normal continuity, I think Morrison explained that Superman was travelling through time from the present and met him (which is why he also has King Arthur's roundtable)
Hey Owen! After a few one-offs, I'm diving into a Superman "run" for the first time with Morrison's tenure on Action Comics, thinking that it would be a fitting beginning to pair with "All-Star Superman's" ending. Seeing as Morrison is your favourite comics writer, I'd love to see your take on their time on Action Comics at some time.
One comic that is sadly very much forgotten is "Batman/Superman Authority Special". I have very positive memories of this issue. It also lays the foundation for a later story, which unfortunately ends very rushed in "Action Comics 2023 Annual". Since PKJ has left the book. Which is really a shame.
09:25 - I found it a bit sad how 5G used a variation of Kingdom Come Superman's El-Crest. It showed how the upper editorial never understood Clark Kent's true nature. Desiring to turn Clark into a paternalist authoritarian, they've completely lost the plot of who Superman is. However, Grant Morrison actually understands the character; they helped to create one of the character's seminal stories. Even the idea that Superman will outlive all of his creators as a legend is true to how mythological the character will be.
You know its funny thay dandio was going to turn morrison biggest contribution to batman , ( damian) in to main villain for 5g he must have been little pissed
A great final Superman story from perhaps one of the greatest superhero comic book writers of all time. An interesting parallel to Mr. Morrison's own legacy as well as an alternative take to the "final" Superman story as compared to All-Star. Side note: Now, I love Phillip Kennedy Johnson's Warworld Saga and see it as another all time great (would love a video on that btw!), but I also prefer to read Superman and the Authority as a proper Elseworlds too just to complicate it less. It reads best as a Superman who really was older and towards the end of his career instead of being artificially aged and temporarily depowered while also going through an off-panel time travel adventure to meet JKF in the past.
That book was good, but not Morrison at their best. But it did set up Warworld saga, which might me my favorite in continuity Superman comic, that isn't an origin.
That was a great story with quality artwork. The costumes were a bit controversial to some but that's beyond the art aspects. The characters' human nature were well portraited.
I always interpret the presence of Ultra Humanite, Superman's first villain in the comics, as way of Morrison to bring his story full circle with his previous works on Superman, specially his Action Comics that took heavly inspiration from the Golden Age.
While I know I probably would have hated the actual project, I do want to know as much as possible about what 5G would have entailed. Even stories I don’t like, I like to know the concepts they would have explored.
It's hilarious how every comic, movie and video game writer have no ideas what to do with Superman aside from transforming him into some kind of omnipotent fascist, and then Morrison managed to writng out on if the most interesting arcs in YEARS by going "actually, what if he got a bit old and grumpy". It really shows what a writer who understands character nuance can do in comparison with writers who rely entirely on narrative spectacle.
Morrison it’s my favorite writer ever but i know when he’s messing up with anything and this is not the exception, Superman and the authority was awful, one of the worst modern era Superman comics, but i’m glad that Phillip Kennedy Johnson knew how to use that mess and making actually good with his warworld saga
He isn't actually 82 years old. After Didio was fired, 5G as it was intended to go down was scrapped. Some things were repackaged into the Future State story, but that still mostly functioned as a "possible future" storyline as opposed to a true in-continuity jump forward like 5G was supposed to do. Superman aging in real time was one idea of many that were jettisoned. He's still a middle aged guy. They still wanted a connection between the Authority story and PKJ's Warworld saga though so it was just changed that Superman only temporarily got gray hair as a result of him weakening, not older chronological age, and thus that was reversed when his powers returned in full.
He didn't like the idea of Superman becoming authoritarian as he became old, because it's too close to reality and very believable LMAO 😆 and probably he got hit by it 😂
It does not surprise me that Dan Dideo who decided to assassinate Damian as a murderer for no reason thought it was a good idea to make Superman a right-winged extremist. Dan, what the fuck were you smoking? Thank you, Grant Morrison, for saving Superman.
They were smoking a "Let's make Jon Kent Superman The Great" pack. That's why they were going to make Kara fascist too. Everyone had to fall for him to rise. When you have an inherently bad character it requires tearing other stuff down to prop a bad idea up. And I wish I were joking. In Bendis's terrible Legion reboot, they actually refer to Jon as Superman The Great. It would have been funny if not so infuriating.
We saw what happens when Superman is written without his trademark morality countless times. Ironically it was the comic against Manchester Black's team that illustrated it most clearly. But Injustice, the Boys, and Henry Cavill's Superman movies did as well. Then there was Superboy Prime. Haven't we had enough of a deconstructed superman who is in "better sync" with society?
Thank god those 5g plans were stopped because holy shit as a fan of Superman clark kent and Lois Lane and Jonathan Samuel Kent Superboy as his little 10 year old self, I hated this idea of turning superman into a fascist similar to injustice superman but set in the mainstream dc universe and to make it even worse they were going to have superboy Jon kent fight against his own father and kill each other, which in my opinion just sounded so bad and garbage on so many levels it wasn't even funny but just sad and garbage that I never wanted to read this crap at least in my opinion. My point is in general I am just happy Grant Morrison saved Superman and stopped dan didio plans with his horrible plan with superman and saved him from dan didio plans which just sounded garbage from its inception to its ending but that's just my opinion.
This series is morrison saying i have nothing else to prove at dc as well as telling the editors the SUPERMAN DOSENT HAVE TO BE DARK AND GRITTY TO BE RELEVANT IN THE MODERN ERA. When its all said and done you have to say that morrison is not one of the best superman writers of all time they are one of the best comics writers of all time
