Updated on December 10, 2021
Yes, September’s comic solicitations are here already…and here’s what’s of interest from DC Comics. Full solicitations are available here.
Comics
- Batman ’66 #3, on sale Sept. 18, $4 (digital-first)
- Adventures of Superman #5, on sale Sept. 25, $4 (digital-first)
- Batman: Li’l Gotham #6, on sale Sept. 11, $3 (digital-first)
- Astro City #4, on sale Sept. 11, $4
Trade paperbacks
- Superman: A Celebration of 75 Years (HC), on sale Nov. 27, $40
- Lois Lane: A Celebration of 75 Years (HC), on sale Nov. 27, $28
- Superman Adventures: The Man of Steel, on sale Oct. 30, $10
Comments
This month sees the newest crossover-du-jour at DC. This one has the regular titles replaced by various villains, ranging from A-listers like Lex Luthor and Brainiac to villains at the other end of the scale like, well, Eclipso.
More interesting is the large number of trade paperbacks out this month, including ones for Superman’s 75th anniversary this year. Not only does Superman get an anniversary volume, but Lois Lane gets one, as well! Why they waited until the fall to release these instead of June (with the release of “Man of Steel”), I don’t know, but better late than never. Though I wonder why the solicitations didn’t list Kurt Schaffenberger among the Lois Lane artists; despite the Silver Age Lois Lane stories’ tone, Schaffenberger’s probably the most famous artist associated with Lois.
The Superman and Lois volumes’ solicitations fail to distinguish between which era some stories with ambiguous numbering (“Superman” #168 for instance) come from. From what I can tell, the Lois Lane stories collected will consist of:
- Action Comics #1-2: the first appearance of Lois, in the very first Superman story.
- Action Comics #6: the first appearance of Jimmy Olsen.
- Action Comics #484: the wedding of the Earth-2 Superman and Lois Lane.
- Action Comics #600: a post-Crisis anniversary issue.
- Action Comics #662: the post-Crisis story where Clark Kent proposes to Lois, and reveals to her his secret identity.
- Adventures of Superman #631: a 2004 story involving Lois helping others in the middle of a battle scene (plus supervillains involved).
- All-Star Superman #2-3: two issues of the Grant Morrison written miniseries.
- Man of Steel #2: the first post-Crisis appearance of Lois Lane.
- Showcase #9: the first solo Lois Lane story of the Silver Age, which led to her getting her own ongoing series.
- Superman #29, 33-34, 58: The first three issues are backup solo Lois Lane stories from the Golden Age. The fourth issue is a Golden Age story where Lois tries to date/love Clark instead of Superman.
- Superman (volume 2) #168: a 2000s story that sees Lois teams up with Batman to plan to steal back the kryptonite ring then-President Luthor has in his possession.
- Superman 80-page Giant 2011 #1: one of the stories sees Lois team up with Lana Lang on a story. While probably not published here, the Bizarro Lois Lane also appears in the issue’s Bizarro story.
- Superman: Lois Lane #1: the “GirlFrenzy!” series of one-shot stories in the late 90s saw this Lois issue.
- Superman’s Girl Friend Lois Lane #5, 16, 23, 42, and 106: the Silver Age Lois Lane solo series. To summarize: #5: Lois gains a large amount of weight thanks to a scientist’s ray; #16: Lois gains kryptonite vision, gets her own signal watch, and investigates with Clark the mystery of “Skull Island”; #23: an imaginary story about being married to Superman, plus Lois discovers Lex Luthor’s sister Lena; #42: Lois visits ancient Atlantis, gets a monkey’s paw, and gets turned younger; #106: the famous story where Lois uses a Kryptonian device to experience life as a Black woman for a day.
- Wonder Woman #170: the 2001 Phil Jimenez story where Lois follows Wonder Woman around for a day.
The selection seemed a bit too tilted toward recent/recent-ish material to me. I’d have welcomed the solo Lois or Earth-2 “Mr. and Mrs. Superman” stories from “Superman Family.” Still, not bad otherwise. Since this ran rather longer than expected, I’ll leave the Superman volume’s stories for another day… or someone else to catalogue!
