Superman: The Silver Age Dailies, Volume 2

Superman : Silver Age Dailies #2

by Jerry Siegel, Wayne Boring, Dean Mullaney (Editor)

The second volume of the Superman Silver Age daily newspaper strips presents the never-before reprinted stories from August 1961 through November 1963. Wayne Boring and Stan Kaye provide the artwork, and once again, Superman co-creator Jerry Siegel scripts adaptations of stories that first appeared in comic books. Siegel and Boring offer alternate versions of now classic stories originally written by Siegel himself, Batman co-creator Bill Finger, Edmund Hamilton, and Leo Dorfman -- and drawn in comic books by Curt Swan, Al Plastino, Kurt Schaffenberger, and Boring himself. Stories include "The Feud Between Superman and Clark Kent," "The Day Superman Broke the Law," "The Reporter of Steel," "Lois Lane's Revenge on Superman," "The Invisible Lois Lane," and "The Man Who Betrayed Superman's Identity," among others. More than 750 daily strips -- over two two years worth of stories -- from Earth-N (for Newspapers) that comic book fans have not previously seen. Edited and designed by Dean Mullaney, Introduction by Sid Friedfertig, and cover drawing by Pete Poplaski.

Genres: Comics

288 pages, Hardcover

First published April 8, 2014

About the author

Jerome "Jerry" Siegel, who also used pseudonyms including Joe Carter, Jerry Ess, and Herbert S. Fine, was the American co-creator of Superman (along with Joe Shuster), the first of the great comic book superheroes and one of the most recognizable icons of the 20th century.
He and Shuster were inducted into the comic book industry's Will Eisner Comic Book Hall of Fame in 1992 and the Jack Kirby Hall of Fame in 1993.

Reviews

[Michael P. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Look, the stories are fun if familiar, Jerry Siegel is writing at his best, but the boring Wayne Boring art is a major drawback. Still, these daily newspaper comics are collected for the first time and that is something to celebrate.

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

Chintzy and cheeseball, but plenty of offbeat fun.

[Hannah Kayla]

this is one of my dad's books. i didn't know he was on goodreads, and i want to immortalize him here too.

[Adam Graham · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book collects 27 months of Superman comic strips from August 1961-November 1963. These stories were adapted by Jerry Siegel from a wide variety of different stories published in Action Comics, Superman, and Superman's Girlfriend Lois Lane.

The stories reflect perfectly the silver age goofiness of Superman and are a lot of fun. The only story that hasn't been reprinted in its original form was, "The Man With the Zero eyes" which features Superman's x-ray vision emitting cold instead of heat.

The best stories in are, "The Day Superman Broke the Law" which fines Superman visiting a smalltown where a City Councilman tries to get Superman charged with technical violations of the law for some other nefarious purpose. "When Superman Defended His Arch-Enemy" has Lex Luthor landing on a world where robots rule and being charged with "the murder"of an android setting up a situation where Superman has to prove Luthor has the right to a trial and then defend him. The twist ending is classic. "Superman, Please Marry Me" is probably the most meta story in the book. A comedian makes a record in which he pokes fun at Lois' matrimonial pursuit of Superman and later makes another mocking an imarginary marriage. Given that most of the Lois Lane comic was full of these stories, it's definitely interesting. I love Superman's thought, "Poor Girl. I don't blame her for being upset! It must be humiliating to lovely, celver...and yet to be laughed at by everyone."

The downside is that this book has some pretty repetitive storylines. Of the twenty stories in the book, four involve amnesia with Superman getting amnesia twice, Lois Lane once, and Perry White once. There's also two or three super masquerade plots. Overall, despite some repetitive moments, this is another fun collection of Superman comic strip stories.