WC: ACTION COMICS #325

Editor Mort Weisinger was certainly putting himself on the line with the cover copy on this next issue of ACTION COMICS, #325. “Best Superman Story of the Year!” he cries, in the manner that was being used by rival Stan Lee. This is maybe a strange thing to say on a cover that features not the Man of Steel in some critical situation or facing an insolvable dilemma, but rather his younger self Superbaby towering over the spires of lost Krypton, a menace to all of the people who will be blown to atoms in a couple of months anyway. Frankly, Mort may have felt that he needed to say something here to hook in prospective readers whose interest wouldn’t be piqued by a gigantic toddler.

Sadly, nobody is entirely sure who it was who wrote the Best Superman Story of the Year! But the art for it was provided by Curt Swan and George Klein, an almost unbeatable team at the moment when this issue was released. their Superman felt slick and fresh and modern yet retained all of the storybook qualities that were a hallmark of Mort’s oversight. Curt’s rendition of the Man of Tomorrow became the yardstick standard by which other artists’ efforts were measured against throughout most of the 1960s and 1970s. His work wasn’t flashy or bombastic in the manner of Jack Kirby or the other Marvel artists, but it had a constrained charm to it. Curt Swan was like the Norman Rockwell of Superman artists.

The story opens with Superman in pursuit of some hostile aliens who are using a magnetic force to steal all of the iron on Earth. As the Man of Steel confronts the space criminals, he’s exposed to an idol of their god, Great XooX, which happens to have some Red Kryptonite in its adornments. Feeling the transformative effects of the Red Kryptonite upon his person, Superman races away, and shortly thereafter finds that he’s been expanded into a skyscraper-sized giant. What’s more, his usual super-powers have been cancelled out by this transformation. So he’s in no condition to stop the raiders. Thinking back, Superman recalls another time in his early life when he’d become a giant.

This was back on Krypton before it exploded, when the juvenile Kal-El was accidentally caught in a discharge from Jor-El’s new expansion ray. (It’s too bad that nobody hung onto the plans for this ray. It would have come in handy in enlarging the denizens of the Bottle City of Kandor.) His son now having become a danger to the community, Jor-El is forced to pretend to be a helpful elf in order to guide him safely away from people. He also uses Kal-El’s gigantic height to take care of some incidental problems that crop up, including one in which Kal-El covers himself head-to-toe in snow. Realizing that this is the solution he needs, Superman cakes himself not with snow but with mud and poses as Greater Xoox, an even more powerful deity than the one the aliens worship. He orders them to return the stolen iron and leave the planet, and they do. I don’t know that I would classify this as the best Superman story by any metric, but it’s solid and inoffensive enough.

The Metropolis Mailbag letters page continues to get crowded by other things, in this case a secret message in Superman Code that also helps to promote the revived Supermen of America fan club. This organization was founded in 1939 in the pages of SUPERMAN #1, and while its activities and presence had lapsed over the years, it was never entirely forgotten. It seems as though DC/National was making a concerted effort to revive and expand it again in the mid-1960s.

The back-up was another Supergirl adventure, this one less about a high-stakes adventure than it was about the Maid of Might solving a more pedestrian and earthly problem. It was written by Leo Dorfman and illustrated by Jim Mooney. The story opens with the news that a popular and idolized chemistry teacher at Stanhope College is resigning in order to get married. Miss Blane’s replacement in the position is Miss Elisabeth Sparrow, who is dowdy, wearing out of date styles as well as glasses. Behaving more like middle school students than college kids, a couple of the students begin to ridicule Miss Sparrow’s appearance, much to the consternation of Linda Danvers.

Despite the best efforts of Supergirl to put a stop to it, this leads to a sustained campaign of bullying and harassment against the new teacher, one that is absolutely cruel in its nature. And eventually, it succeeds in sending Miss Sparrow packing from Stanhope college. What’s worse, when Supergirl blocks the roadway so that her bus can’t ge through (and presumably inconveniences dozens of other passengers unnecessarily at the same time), Miss Sparrow wanders away and promptly falls into a raging river. Supergirl appears in time to save her, and she’s contacted Lori Lemaris to help with a plan.

A brief pause here for a House Ad concerning the next SUPERMAN 80 Page Giant, which will spotlight conflicts between the Man of Steel and his arch-enemy, Lex Luthor.

Supergirl and Lori use advanced Atlantean science to make-over Miss Sparrow completely, improving her eyesight so that she no longer needs glasses and improving her hair and complexion–and most disturbing of all, her personality. Returning to Stanhope in time for the Junior Prom, Miss Sparrow is the belle of the ball and has her former detractors throwing themselves at her feet. But she takes no pleasure from this, realizing that it’s just the cosmetic changes in her appearance that people are reacting to, not her genuine self at all. But just then, a handsome man appears to refute Miss Sparrow’s claims. He’s Professor Mark Hilary, whom she had previously met when she thought him a hobo. Turns out that he was just researching a book about hobo culture, imagine that! And he’s both a dish when he’s cleaned up and clearly enchanted with Miss Sparrow. And so, Supergirl reflects on a job well done, even if some of the method was a little bit suspect if not out and out horrifying. This one’s not going to wind up on any ten-best-Supergirl-stories lists, I’m afraid.