john kalisz

It’s been noted by more than a few people that the current storyline running through the Superman family of books strongly represents the classic “Reign of the Supermen” event from the mid-'90s, where four new Supermen rose up to attempt to fill the absence left by The Man of Steel following his death fighting the monster Doomsday. Currently, we have Lex Luthor, Kenan Kong, Lois Lane and the original Pre-Flashpoint Superman, plus his son Jonathan, all now operating under the Superman banner, as well as Supergirl, Steel and the Cyborg Superman. DC isn’t done there though, as this week’s Superman #2 by Peter J. Tomasi, Patrick Gleason, Mick Gray and John Kalisz saw the return of another would-be Superman straight from the '90s.

A more appropriate name for DC Comics' Convergence event, at least the miniseries that will accompany the main series for two months next spring, may be "Nostalgia Trip." DC has been rolling out titles and creative teams for the 40 planned series week by week. The first batch focused on the publisher's pre-New 52 continuity. The second focused on the 1990s (including WildStorm), and the third seemed to center on the 1980s. The fourth and final group of miniseries, which DC announced Tuesday, covers a much wider time period: All of DC's pre-Crisis On Infinite Earths continuity. And there's another twist: They all take place on defined and listed alternate Earths which existed before the company's last line-wide reboot in the 1980s.

The comic book, animation, illustration, pinup, mashup, fan art and design communities are generating amazing artwork of myriad styles and tastes, all of which ends up on the Internet and filtered into ComicsAlliance’s Best Art Ever (This Week). These images convey senses of mood and character — not to mention artistic skill — but comic books are specifically a medium of sequential narratives, and great sequential art has to be both beautiful (totally subjective!) and clear in its storytelling (not so subjective!). The words and the pictures need to work together to tell the story and create whatever tone, emotion and indeed world the story requires. The contributions of every person on a creative team, from the writer to the artist(s) to the letterers, are necessary to achieving a great page of sequential storytelling. It is the special nature of comic books that we’re celebrating in this recurring feature: Best Sequential Art Ever (This Week).