With 87 years of history, you could fill a lot of books about nothing but Superman, his stories, supporting cast, and various exploits.
And they have, what with the thousands of individual issues of Superman comics that are out there.
If you wanted a comprehensive look at the Man of Steel, though, that would be quite the undertaking to fit all of his history into a single volume.
With the help of writer Matthew Manning, Penguin Random House’s DK imprint have sought to do that very thing with Superman: The Ultimate Guide New Edition. Over the course of 216 pages, Manning packs in decades worth of information covering Superman, his powers, his closest allies and deadliest enemies, and his most famous– and infamous– stories. It’s an ambitious goal, to be sure, and I’m pleased to say that for the most part they succeed.
The book kicks off with a foreword from Joshua Williamson, which I get, on the one hand. After all, he’s kind of been the architect of the Superman titles for the past few years, so it would make sense that he would be asked to write a couple hundred words for something like this. Still, with the likes of Jerry Ordway, Dan Jurgens, Jon Bogdanove, Louise Simonson, Mark Waid, and John Byrne still out there, all of whom have put even more of a stamp on Superman over the decades, I would have liked to see some insight from some veteran talent.
Not to say it’s not a good foreword, or one that doesn’t fit with where Superman comics are right now. Just from a personal standpoint, the more voices present in a book like this, the better.
What becomes clear pretty quickly is that this is a history of Superman in the comics, and not as a multimedia presence. That means no television shows, movies, video games, prose novels, or radio dramas. Just comics.
It’s a good thing I made that point about Superman having a pretty robust history then, right? After all, the foundation of Superman’s history is comic books, just as Superman is the foundation of superhero comics.
The book is divided into multiple sections, with the first 70ish pages devoted to aspects of Superman’s world, and the rest of the book focused on different comics eras. Every entry is packed with very well-written descriptions, bullet points, and asides, accompanied by high-quality images ripped directly from the comics page. The layouts of each entry differ as well, with a page dedicated to Superman’s power set looking different than the evolution of his costume over the years. That makes the book just as interesting to look at as it is to read, which keeps the material from becoming rote, dry, and repetitive.
As a comics fan at heart, I love the focus on the medium, and really appreciate the looks at different eras of Superman’s history. There are occasional Key Issue spotlights, going in depth with Action Comics #1 from 1938 and 2011, Superman #22, Infinite Crisis #1, Action Comics #1000, and several others. It is a bit disappointing that the Golden, Silver, and Bronze Ages are given a bit of a short shrift compared to more modern comics, with the Silver Age curiously being relegated to a subsection under the Golden Age. What’s there is good material, but so much went on in the Golden and Silver Ages that you could conceivably devote dozens of pages to each alone.
What are referred to as the Dark Age (Crisis on Infinite Earths to around the turn of the Millennium) and the Modern Age (early 2000s to the New 52, through Rebirth to Supercorp, along with Jon Kent, Supergirl, and alternate realities) get the main focus of the bulk of the book. Given that it’s a modern book for modern audiences, updated from a previous volume to include more material. It’s not supposed to be comprehensive, nor could it be to be readable and cost-effective, but a little more focus on different eras would have been nice to balance everything out.
By and large the book is meticulously researched and put together very well, though there are a few minor editorial hiccups here and there. The most obvious error is in the “Style Evolution” pages, where different designs of Superman’s suit are highlighted. Manning covers everything from the original design to the Electric suit and other variations of the classic red and blue. The image used for when Electric Superman split into Red and Blue is wrong, however, with the “jeans and T-shirt” thumbnail for the New 52 Action Comics look used in error. Nothing outrageous, but disappointing given the care taken with the book as a whole.
Retailing for $29.99, Superman: The Ultimate Guide is great for fans of the Man of Steel new and old, and a perfect way to scratch the Superman itch after you see the new movie in theaters.
Superman: The Ultimate Guide is available now.
Disclaimer: DK provided a copy of this book for review.
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