I just finished reading "All-Star Superman, Vol 1 & Vol 2" - by Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely with Jamie Grant
I've copied my review from 50 Books thread. And I'd like to preface this by stating that I haven't yet watched the movie. (I do have it on my Netflix instant list, so maybe I'll remedy that tonight.
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Plot: Superman rescues scientists from dying when their spaceship is pulled into the sun. He's overexposed to the sun's super charging effects and told that his body cannot handle it and that he will die. We discover (in Vol 2) if Superman lives and dies. Kind of, sort of, not really. I hope the ending of the All Star Superman (the movie) is more clear.
Artistically, I can't say I like how the characters were drawn. Superman looked downright scary in a few parts and Clark like a clod. Jimmy appeared deformed. Cat like a plastic doll. Only Lois, Steve, Lex, and Perry looked realistic.
I can't say I liked the scientist in rainbow jacket (Quantum?), mostly because he seemed to be working for Lex Luthor at first. Superman seemed to trust him though. Superman discovers that he will have to answer an unanswerable question and do 12 Herculean-type feats before he dies, which gives him a bit of a time table for his death.
Lex was is usual egotistical, megalomaniac self. It was fun seeing Cat Grant, very superficial though, and Steve Lombarti. I also liked when he set Steve's toupee on fire after Steven lit a match under Clark's butt.
Jimmy is more accomplished in this series than I have seen before and, I believe, dating Lucy Lane, who seemed as superficial as Cat. There was even a quick cameo by General(?) Lane.
I would have liked to see more of Perry White though. Clark seemed to do something for Lois and for Jimmy once he found out he now had over-charged DNA due to too much exposure to the sun, but nothing for Mr. White.
Clark's clumsiness was intentional to save people, which I thought was a nice twist.
There was a funny joke about Clark revealing to Lois that he's Superman, but she not believing him because she's guessed it so many times before and been proved wrong. She also tries to kill Superman
because she's thought he's gone insane / bad without really much proof, when he was just trying to keep her birthday gift secret.
There was an interesting bit about Green K not hurting him, and Black K turning him Bizzaro, too. It showed what a good friend Jimmy is to Superman.
I was a bit confused on why Clark went out of his way to continually save Lex Luthor in prison. Was he just trying to get Lex's confession or did he really want Lex to die in the electric chair, or did he know that Lex wouldn't die in the electric chair? Or was it that he kept promising Perry an interview and he didn't want Lex to die before it was written? At the end, it didn't sound like Clark ever turned in the article.
I found it interesting that he kept meeting future generations of supermen (his descendants) but never considered how they may have come to be. (Even telling Lois that they could never have a real family, although at the end of her birthday, it looked as if he was going to propose.) Unless, that was what he was doing when he gave Dr. Quantum samples of his DNA.
The ending wasn't very concrete and vague. Did Clark die? Or was Lois right and he lived? I hope the movie makes this more clear.
What were your thoughts?
