Tales from the $3.99 Bin! - Superman #18: "The Truth"

Next up is another big moment that Brian Michael Bendis pulled in his run on Superman: the revealing of Superman’s identity! I wasn’t a fan when I first heard this. I imagine most weren’t because this isn’t the first time in recent memory where DC’s revealed Clark’s double life to the world. That being said, I was curious on how it would be handled especially since the last time was… a bit much. I’ll get to that later this month. Luckily, Bendis did state that he would handle it differently, and when it came, I will admit that I was surprised. Superman #18 was written by Bendis, of course. Ivan Reis and Joe Prado, who have been regular artists on the book, handle the artwork.

Superman #18

Writer: Brian Michael Bendis

Pencils: Ivan Reis

Inks: Joe Prado

Colors: Alex Sinclair

Letters: David Sharpe

Editors: Brian Cunningham, Mike Cotton, and Jessica Chen

“Truth”

The issues starts out with the Daily Planet holding a press conference in Metropolis. Superman then shows up to speak. Before he gets to reveal anything, we then flashback to the week before. Superman is in space observing the first meet of the United Planets. He helped form this alliance a couple of arcs back. While he’s there, he ends up talking to Adam Strange a bit. A lot of stuff happened in the last couple of stories (it turns out that Jor-El had a secret past with a shady group called the Circle). Superman’s feeling uneasy about secrets these days, and Adam questions him about it.

Later, Superman does admit to Adam why he kept his double life a secret for years. He wanted to protect the people he cares about. Now that Jor-El’s secrets have gotten him killed, he’s questioning if he should let more folk in. Later, he ends up going back to Earth and telling Perry White at the Daily Planet. He also lets Jimmy know, but in a funny way, Jimmy tells Clark that Lois already told him. Later, Clark and Lois talk about how they kinda knew this moment would come.

In the present day, Superman lays it out with everyone at the press conference. He tells them about his upbringing and why he kept his life as Clark secret. He doesn’t regret keeping it a secret, but now, he feels that he needs to be more upfront since his whole motto is “truth.” He says that he’ll plan to live both lives in the open and that he’s proud of both heritages. After he thanks the folk of Earth for inspiring him, he flies off in probably the coolest way ever. Yeah, Ivan Reis rocks.

Anyway, we see that pretty much the entire world has seen this. Any hero or villain has seen this take place. The issue does end with us on the reaction to the Injustice League. Lex doesn’t look pleased, and he even shapeshifts (just look at Scott Snyder’s Justice League run) into his more traditional businessman look.

 

OPINION

So, what did I think? While I’m not the biggest fan of the idea (yeah, still), this was the best way to handle this reveal. Instead of it being forced upon him or revealed without his input (yeah, I’m getting to the other Truth storyline), Clark actually has agency in it. Because of recent revelations, he feels that he should be more open about his life. While I have a couple of issues with that (I’ll touch on that later), at least it’s him having these issues and not some outer force making it a problem. I liked his interactions with Perry, Jimmy, and Lois. The speech he gives is also pretty good.

This whole page was pretty funny.

The artwork is phenomenal. I have no issues with Reis and Prado whatsoever. The fact that this is pretty action-lite helps out a lot. Yeah, it’s an issue of talking, but the artwork is so good that you don’t care about that. Reis gets to go out with this one. Not only do we get to see different heroes and villains, we also have the United Planets playing a small role too. The layouts were good especially during Superman’s speech.

As for any dislikes, Bendis does have his quirks with the dialogue. Y’all know Bendis, man.  I also don’t know how to feel about Superman’s secret being out. I get the reasoning thrown in, but at the same time, I don’t.  Would folk need to know that Clark is Superman? The guy should be allowed to have secrets as long as they ain’t hurting anyone. In fact, his secret doesn’t hurt anyone, though the revelation could hurt folk he knows. Does that happen later? Well… keep reading. Either way, I’m curious how this will go in the DCU if it stays around for a while.

Overall, this was a good issue of an idea I’m not too fond of. I’ll have to see where this moment goes as we keep going. With everything going on at DC right now, who knows if this will even be a thing in the next few years. Anyway, I’m off to bed. Next time, I’ll look at something from the distant past of 1985… ha ha. Until then, Peace, God Bless, and be careful out there.