Superman #45 Review and *SPOILERS*

Can You Smell What Superman's Cooking?

Written By: Gene Luen Yang
Art By: Howard Porter, Hi-Fi, Rob Leigh
Cover Price: $3.99
Release Date: October 28, 2015

*Non Spoilers and Score At The Bottom*

It's so hard for me to put this comic into a timeline because anyone who read the Truth arc will know
that Superman was the prequel to the series, where Superman had his identity revealed and had his powers begin diminishing, which immediately would have led to the May Sneak Peek and then instantly into the Action Comics story.  That all lines up for me, but here we pick up where we left off from Superman with only the May Sneak Peek in between and now the timeline is all screwy with me.  So yeah, going into this all you need to know is everything we just talked about.  Identity revealed, powers diminished and besides for that, Superman is going back after Hordr.  Let's jump into this issue and see if the story is better than it was before.  Let's check it out.



Explain It!:

Our issue begins with Superman trying to catch everyone up on what's going on with him by laying down what happened in the previous four issues of Superman and the Sneak Peek.  After that's all over though, we get to the actual story.  Superman, wanting to get all the information he can on Hordr, contacts that blue haired girl Condesa, who previously worked for Hordr in uncovering personal secrets of people and companies.  Before Clark's and Condesa's meeting was interrupted by Lois Lane trying to plead her case, Condesa tells Clark all about this company called Sungetix in Oakland, California, that Hordr acquired after a bit of blackmail.  With that knowledge and the fact that Lois Lane showed up, Clark hopped a plane to go check out the company and when I say hopped a plane, I mean hopped a plane............ he rode on top of it....... I thought it was funny.

In Oakland, Clark quickly spots the company and finds the secret holographic door inside that leads to the super secret Hordr complex.  It's just too bad that all he saw before being welcomed by Hordr_Root, was an assembly line of Quarmers.......... or as I call them, the energy sucking robots.  Don't worry boys and girls, Superman doesn't get sucked off in this issue, instead he's attacked by a strange mo-hawked guy named Apolaki, who appears to be controlled by the body hopping Hordr_Root.  The fight makes it's way outside when the two smash through the wall and now everyone on the street watches as Apolaki shoots Superman with heat vision, only for our hero to grab a loose Quarmer head that just happened to have been thrown through the wall with them and use it to somehow turn Apolaki to sand after absorbing his energy............ Yeah, I'm not sure what went down here or even what exactly the Quarmers are capable of, the only thing I'm certain of though is that people are pissed that Superman killed Apolaki........ who we find out "Rules House Thousand One"....... That's the worst name ever and it's even worse when I find out that it's an underground wrestling show.

In the end, Superman shows up at the House Thousand One and I'm not a fan of wrestling and even more than that, I'm not a fan of not understanding what's going on.  There's this big fight between two combatants that is supposedly reenacting an old tale about two gods who were brother and sister and Superman seems to think that they're simply meta-humans using their powers for money and fame, but later on after Superman breaks it up and is asked to join the God Wrestling Federation, we find out that these two and Apolaki are all gods and do these matches so people won't forget them and with that they extend their lives........ because you have to believe in gods and all that....... like fairies and shit.

Now I'm okay with this explanation, even if I'm not too terribly fond of the story, but the promoter of these fights seems to heal one of the injured gods and then says that she's resetting her story.......... that's some cryptic shit right there and for whatever reason it makes me think that it has something to do with machines........ simply because of the reset statement.  I don't really know what's going on, it's probably the god explanation and in the end Superman, after all his moral bitching about what one should do with powers, agrees to fight for Mythbrawl so he can earn some cash during this down and out time in his life.

That's it for this issue of Superman and while this story is better than anything we got from the previous story arc, it still isn't very good.  This could just really be my annoyance that Superman; during this terrible time in his life, where he's trying to uncover and take down a blackmailing conspiracy, decides that wrestling for cash is just as productive.  It's just a strange place for this story to go, especially with all the other aspects going on from the four Superman books dealing with this depowerment and identity thing.  Also, it's kind of odd to me that Superman would stop his assault on Hordr in this book so he could go check out a club that hosts these wrestling matches, when he was just outside the main Hordr complex........ that he was just inside.  It's all very strange to me, but like I said, it's already better than the majority of the previous Superman Truth issues.  The art in this book was great though and I love that Howard Porter is now on this title.

Bits and Pieces:

Superman takes an odd turn in his quest to take down Hordr in this book, but even with how out of place this issue feels during this crossover story.......  It's still better than what we've had from this series since Superman went and got himself all depowered, but that isn't very hard to do at this point, especially when we have the terrific art of Howard Porter rocking this title from here on out.

6/10