MID-OHIO CON DEATH OF SUPERMAN VIDEO

Someone sent me a link to to this video.  In fact, I think two people sent me a link to this video, one of them being Travis Fowler.  I forget the other person’s name and for that I am genuinely sorry.  I like to give credit where credit is due.  In any case, this video was shot at the 1992 Mid-Ohio Con, which apparently took place somewhere around the death of Superman.

As always, enjoy.

httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tNJTdhLSIjo

Bullet points!

• The use of the John Williams Superman music was a nice touch to this video.  I dug it.
• It was cool to see the interview with Roger Stern, complete with bow tie and long hair.  He is quick to point out that Doomsday as a story was creator driven and I think that is extremely important.
• Stern also mentions that Dan Jurgens wanted to do a death of Superman story and create a character that could physically take on the Man of Steel and it seems like those were two separate ideas that just happen to come together in Doomsday.
• Again, he doesn’t mention the wedding being postponed for the television series.  Let’s hear it for consistency.
• The story where John Byrne killed Superman and brought him back in the same issue was Action Comics #595, which was also the first appearance of the Silver Banshee.  Now that I really think about it, that issue had a nice riff on the classic Silver Age death of Superman story.  I never really thought about that before.
• Byrne comes off a little snarky with his comments concerning fan reaction to the news of Superman’s death and how it is just a ploy to sell comics.  To me his comments are fair and to a large extent correct.  Doomsday was conceived partially to draw a little attention to the Superman titles to boost sales and as I have said in the past there is absolutely nothing wrong with that.  It just so happened that it was also a really good story.
• It was cool to see Byrne interviewed as he was the reason I started collecting the Superman books in the first place.
• It was also cool to see Jim Shooter interviewed.  I have become a big fan of his blog (which you can find by clicking on this link) so it was neat to get this “vintage” bit of commentary as well.
• The comparison between the death of Jean Grey and the death of Superman was interesting.  I am not sure that I buy it but Shooter’s reasoning is sound and he was quick to point out that Superman’s death was getting more attention simply because of his place in the hearts and minds of the public.
• The guy doing the interviewing tried to paint James Miller’s comments as being somewhat negative but I thought he was fairly positive about the whole thing.  He made a very valid point and I have to agree that if the creators hadn’t brought Superman back with dignity and then followed through with some fantastic stories that it would have been sad.  I wonder what he thought of Reign of the Supermen?
• I agree with everything Don Thompson said.  I dug that he stuck to the bright side of the death of Superman, which is odd to write but there you go.
• As with James Miller’s comments I am curious as to what the comic fan that was interviewed thought of what came after the death and if it changed his mind about the decision to kill the character.

I am glad Travis Fowler and the other person whose name I don’t remember pointed me in the direction of this video.  It, like just about everything else I have posted here, is an interesting artifact and gives the people of today that are just now discovering the story some perspective on what it was like in 1992 when everything went down.  I would have loved to have seen this at the time, especially since John Byrne and Roger Stern were part of it but seeing it now is just as cool.

Next time: Some more television news coverage of the death of Superman.

More to follow…