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The Reign of the Super-Man
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- The subject of this article is not to be confused with the Reign of the Supermen storyline published by DC Comics. For that subject, see The Death of Superman.
"The Reign of the Super-Man" (January 1933) was a short story written by Jerry Siegel and illustrated by Canadian-born Joe Shuster, a writer/artist duo who would later become famous for creating the fictional superhero Superman. This short story marked their first published use of any form of the name Superman.
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Encyclopedia
- The subject of this article is not to be confused with the Reign of the Supermen storyline published by DC Comics. For that subject, see The Death of Superman.
"The Reign of the Super-Man" (January 1933) was a short story written by Jerry Siegel and illustrated by Canadian-born Joe Shuster, a writer/artist duo who would later become famous for creating the fictional superhero Superman. This short story marked their first published use of any form of the name Superman. Although hyphenated as Super-Man in the story's title, the term is Superman within the story's text.
Publication
High school friends Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster tried selling their stories to magazines in order to escape Depression era poverty. With their work rejected by publishers, 18-year-old Shuster printed the duo's own typewritten, mimeographed science fiction fanzine titled Science Fiction: The Advance Guard of Future Civilization, producing five issues.
According to a 1983 interview with Siegel, he first wrote the short story "The Reign of the Super-Man" in 1932. Inspired by Friedrich Nietzsche's idea of an Übermensch, Siegel's original story featured his first Super-Man as a powerful villain bent on dominating the entire world. Siegel's short story appeared in Science Fiction, the Advance Guard of Future Civilization #3 with accompanying art by Shuster. For this publication, Siegel used the pen name Herbert S. Fine, combining the first name of a cousin Herbert with the maiden name of Siegel's mother.
The name Superman originated in the English translation of Friedrich Nietzsche's statement, "Ich lehre euch den Übermenschen" ("I will teach you the Superman"), in his 1883 work Also sprach Zarathustra. George Bernard Shaw popularized the term with his 1903 play Man and Superman. The character Jane Porter refers to Tarzan as a "superman" in the 1912 pulp novel Tarzan of the Apes by Edgar Rice Burroughs, and Siegel would later name Tarzan as an influence on the creation of his own Superman.
Story
A mad scientist, a chemist named Professor Ernest Smalley, randomly chooses raggedly dressed vagrant Bill Dunn from a bread line, and recruits him to participate in an experiment in exchange for "a real meal and a nice suit". When Smalley's experimental potion grants Dunn telepathic powers, the man becomes intoxicated by his power and seeks to rule the entire world. This superpowered man uses these abilities for evil, only to discover that the potion's effects are temporary. Having killed the evil Smalley, who had intended to kill Dunn and give himself the same powers, Dunn cannot recreate the secret formula. As the story ends, he realizes he will be returning to the bread line.
Subsequent evolution
Siegel re-wrote the character in 1933 as a hero bearing little or no resemblance to his villainous namesake, resulting in a five-year quest to find a publisher. When Siegel saw the 48-page black-and-white comic book titled Detective Dan, Secret Operative No. 48, he decided that a Superman who was a hero could make a great comic character. He went on to write a crime story which Shuster would draw in comic format. Titling it "The Superman", Siegel and Shuster offered it to Consolidated Book Publishing, the company that had published Detective Dan. Although the duo received an encouraging letter, Consolidated never again published comic books. Discouraged, Shuster burned all pages of the story; the cover surviving only because Siegel rescued it from the fire. Siegel and Shuster compared the character to Slam Bradley, a private detective the pair later created for Detective Comics #1 (March 1937). "We had a great character," Siegel later said, "and were determined it would be published."
Siegel and Shuster would next use the name in June 1938's Action Comics #1, featuring the superhero Superman.
Later references
- After DC Comics' "The Death of Superman" storyline and before Superman's return from the dead, four other characters would replace him during the "Reign of the Supermen" storyline which ran through Action Comics and other Superman titles (June - October 1993).
- In 52 #35 (January 2007), numerous superhero characters abruptly lose their powers and fall from the sky in a story titled "Rain of the Supermen".
- In 2008, DC Comics is publishing the series Tangent: Superman's Reign.
Collector's value
Few intact copies of Science Fiction #3, the original publication for this story, survive. Collectors value it both because of its rarity and because of its importance in the history behind the development of the DC Comics character Superman. In September 2006, Heritage Auction Galleries in Dallas, Texas, auctioned off a copy for $47,800.
Reprints and digital reissues
- The Official Overstreet Comic Book Price Guide #18 reprints the first two pages with opening text and Shuster's splash art.
- Nemo, the Classic Comics Library #2 (August 1983) p. 20-28 reprints the entire story.
- A digital copy of the magazine issue that includes this story is available from the University of Florida's digital collections.
Bibliography
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