Superman's Metropolis

Superman's Metropolis is a comic book, published by DC Comics, under its Elseworlds imprint. Written by Jean-Marc Lofficier, Randy Lofficier, Roy Thomas and illustrated by Ted McKeever. Based on German Expressionist cinema, the book is the first part in a trilogy. The story of Superman's Metropolis is "patterned" after Fritz Lang's film Metropolis, which had in fact been the inspiration for the city in Superman canon.

Characters

DC characters which appear in the story (in order of appearance):

• Clark Kent-son
• Lana Lang
• Lois Lane
• Perry White
• Jon Kent
• Jimmy Olson
• William Henderson
• Lutor/Metallo
• Marta
• Dan Turpin
• Futura

Plot

In an undetermined future, the giant city of Metropolis is starkly divided between upper classes who live in luxury and lower classes who toil under harsh conditions. Clark Kent-son, son of Jon Kent, the Great Architect and apparent Master of Metropolis, becomes aware of the social inequality after meeting Lois, a teacher from the undercity. He joins the workers to experience their daily lives, then begs his father to improve their lot, but in vain. In reality, the city is in thrall to the scientist Lutor, an old colleague of Jon Kent from before the "time of smoke and soot" that came before the foundation of Metropolis. Both Jon and Lutor fell in love with the same woman, Marta. When she chose Jon over Lutor, the scientist killed her, then used advanced hypnosis to turn Jon into his mind-slave.

Concerned about a potential revolution, Lutor identifies its leader, Lois, who prophesies about a coming savior who will reunite the city. Later, Lutor captures Lois and uses her to create a robotic duplicate which he names Futura that will lead the workers to their doom. Meanwhile, Clark discovers that he was a foundling adopted by Jon and Marta after he was found in a capsule that fell from the sky, and that Lutor, who discovered his powers while trying and failing to kill him along with his mother, blanked away his memories and blocked off his powers, turning him into a social drone.

As Futura, disguised as Lois, leads the workers to a doomed rebellion, Clark, now the Super-Man, the savior of Metropolis, intervenes. He fights, and defeats Futura by throwing her into a tank of molten metal. Meanwhile, Lutor reveals his metallic body powered by a kryptonite heart. He kills Jon Kent who, in the end, sacrifices his life for Clark. Lutor is later destroyed by Clark after a fierce battle. Clark and Lois become the new, enlightened rulers of a reunited Metropolis.

Publication

• Superman's Metropolis (64 pages, 1996, ISBN 1-56389-242-1)

Trilogy

This is the first of the trilogy:

• Superman's Metropolis
• Batman: Nosferatu
• Wonder Woman: The Blue Amazon

Writer Jean-Marc Lofficier had a fourth and final volume planned, entitled The Green Light. Which would have introduced counterparts of The Flash, Green Lantern and the Martian Manhunter (based on Leni Riefenstahl's The Blue Light (1922), and Arnold Fanck's Weiße Rausch - Der Neue Wunder des Schneeschuhs (a.k.a. The White Flame) (1931)) and a female Aquaman (based on Georg Wilhelm Pabst's Die Herrin von Atlantis (a.k.a. The Mistress of Atlantis) (1932)). The book would have dealt with the rediscovery of Earth.

Trivia

• In the original script for the movie Metropolis, the name of the robot was Futura. The fact that the robot in the story is named Futura is an in-joke referring to the movie.
• The city Superman protects was actually named after the silent movie Metropolis.
• This timeline was designated as a former part of the DC Multiverse called Earth-1927 in the Absolute Crisis On Infinite Earths HC.
• There has been no report yet of Earth-1927 appearing as one of the 52 worlds in the new multiverse.

See also

• List of Elseworlds publications
• Mekanique

External links

• The Lofficiers' page on Metropolis