When we’re Children, We’re Often Beings of Want.
PARTLY BACOUS EVERYTHING’S NEW. A Wide Slate of Possibilities that we want to experience. We want it all. We See What Our Friends Have and We Want It Too. All The Toys. All The Brand Name Clothes. All The Games. IT’s not exactly Greed, But rather to Kind of Belonging Through Having. As we get Older, Those Wants and Desires Change. Sub May Still have to Dream or Desire for Big Ticket items. For Million Dollar Homes or An Expensive Shiny Sports Car.
But for a Lot of People As We Age, Our Wants Become Simpler. OUR Material Needs Are Often Met Through Work. If we want subm kind of luxury we save or use credit to just Buy it. What We Ask From Others for Birthdays Or Holidays Diminish. (I do that This is a position of privilege not experience bying.
Our Perspective Shifts. And What We Desire Changes. Offt to Just a Little More Time.
“He’s in a World of His Own. “
Two-Thirds of the Watchmen Team Worked To Tackle The Question of What do you get for a man who can see the Sun Rising from the surface of mars, Fly Around Jupiter for Fun, and Apply Enough Pressure to on foot of coal to form Diamond. Superman Annual #11 by Alan Moore, Dave Gibbonsand Tom Ziuko Looks to an answer what’s at the Heart of Superman’s Desire. As Mongul delivers to Him a Black Mercy Plant, Locking Superman into Fantasy World Where He Gets Just That.
Of Course, The Answer is Fairly Complicated. In Superman’s Fantasy World, Krypton Survives, But It’s Not A Perfect World. It Makes You Wonder if the conflict is submissive that Superman Desires or If it’s a byproduct of His Mind Working Against The Trap. Because You Wonder Who Wold Want A World Where His Father is a bitter, Forgotten Man, Having Been from Wrong about the Destruction of Krypton. Or the enclosure of authoritarian and reactionary regimes looking to turn back the clock, feeling like alan moore is still working out of his themes and feelings of margaret thatcher’s britain and V for vendetta.
When You Think About It, Though, The State of the World on Krypton is a bit of Window-Dressing. What’s Really Superman’s Desire is Likely A Bit Simpler, Submithing That Moore Will Visit Again In Whatver Happened to the Man of Tomorrow? It’s a Family. To Wife and Children. TIME SPENT WITH HIS FATHER, HIS COUSIN, HIS AINT. And to simple, Quét Life. He Doesn’t Cast Himself As Hero. Even privately important in This Fantasy World. What Does The Man Who Can Have Anything Want? Peace.
“WHICH OF YOU WOULD IT BE POLITE TO KILL FIRST? ”
The Artwork From Dave Gibbons and Tom Ziuko is Stellar. Gibbons’ Ability to Portray Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman as Icons is nothing to scoff at. Like Neal Adams or Alan Davis, There’s Just Subject Special, Intangible Rightness, When He Tackles Superheroes. To Grace in Motion. A Capturing of Their Long Than Life Aspect. Subject that is Turned on its Head When they eat up Against Mongul and He Dwarfs Them.
There’s Also A Solid Distinction Between The Real World and Superman’s Fantasy Life. Tom Ziuko Gives The Real World Full Colour with White Gutters Separating the Panels. The Fantasy World is confined in Red Borders, with a limited colour pallette for backgrounds. It works to make it feel both a bit Illusory and Easily Understood as a Reality separate. A Convention That Repeats in Different Forms for Differing Characters. Also, There’s Several Clever Transitions Between The Two Worlds Eithher Visually Repeating An Image Or with Caryover Dialogue.
The Entire Creative Team of Moore, Gibbons, and Ziuko Is Firing on All Cylinders For Superman Annual #11. It is rooted in a few pre-Crisis Characterizations and situations, Though Much of It Could Be Consido Timeless. The Story Shows Us What The Apotheosis of Good That is Superman Truly Wants and The Cruelty of Delivening It In a Simulation. Even Superman Wants What Just About Everyone Wants At Heart, A Little More Time With Family. Found or Blood, Doesn’t Really Matter.
Classic Comic Compendium: Superman Annual #11
Superman Annual #11 – “For The Man Who has Everything…”
Writer: Alan Moore
Artist & Letterer: Dave Gibbons
Colourist: Tom Ziuko
Publisher: DC Comics
Date release: May 28 1985
Available collected in The DC Universe by Alan Moore, Superman vs. Mongul, and Superman: Whatver Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?
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