Superman Poster #25 FRAMED Legion of Super-Heroes Action Comics #863 (2008) Gary Frank

Description

You are purchasing the item pictured, framed. Priority mail, tracking and $50 insurance is included with purchase. Item will be bagged to protect from dust, packed in packing peanuts and boxed. Just open box and hang it on the wall…makes a perfect gift!

Superman with Blok, Colossus Boy, Cosmic Boy, Shrinking Violet, Saturn Girl, Polar Boy, Lightning Lad, Invisible Kid and Dawnstar…the Legion of Super-Heroes! Gary Frank draws a trim, Christopher Reeve-inflected Superman backed by nine of his BFFs from the Legion of Super-Heroes for the cover of the climactic installment in an acclaimed six-issue story arc that unfolded in the pages of Action Comics. Writer Geoff Johns incorporates echoes of Kal-El’s first meeting with the Legion in Adventure Comics #247 into a politically charged storyline that definitively reestablished a number of pre-Crisis on Infinite Earths Legionanaires in continuity. Frank even redesigned several of the Legionnaires’ costumes for the occasion. “I hope that the reader sees in Superman a man they can understand and identify with. With a characters as iconic and powerful as this, I think you can sometimes lose sight of the humanity and then he can feel a little like a cipher. A great super hero I think nobility is a far more important element than power in the mix that makes a good Superman. Curt Swan’s Superman has it and Christopher Reeve’s Superman just dripped the stuff. It’s what lifts this character out from today’s crowded super-hero ranks.”-Gary Frank. “Gary Frank is the single best Superman artist of this generation.”-Geoff Johns. To save the galaxy, Superman and the Legion must clear the good name of Krypton’s Last Son, but to do that, they must defeat the greatest villains of their time: the JLA! In the year 3008, the Earth’s sun has turned red and several failed Legion applicants who were born on Earth have banded together to form the Justice League of Earth under the leadership of Earth-Man after he claims that Superman was a human who gained his powers from “Mother Earth”. Earth-Man uses the claim to have Earth secede from the United Planets and ban all aliens from Earth, resulting in several Legionnaires going underground. With the help of Superman, the Legion eventually restores the Sun to its normal state and defeats Earth-Man and the Justice League of Earth just as the United Planets is about to attack the Earth. Geoff Johns understands the iconic heroes of the DC Universe. His current work on “Green Lantern” has amplified the cosmic proportions of that series and turned it into the space-opera-with-a-heart that it always aspired to be. Here, in “Action Comics,” he presents a Superman who is confident, assured, and kind. A super MAN who will do what’s right because it’s right, and he will do so with all of the resources at his disposal. Johns’ work on this title, sometimes with collaborator Richard Donner, and sometimes without, has provided scenarios in which Superman can be examined in relation to others with similar powers. First it was Chris Kent, the Phantom Zone child and surrogate son of Superman. Then it was Bizarro, the twisted doppelganger. And now it is the entire Legion of Super-Heroes and the villainous Earth-Man, a fascist with the power of the entire Legion at his disposal. The Legion presented in this story is certainly not the Legion as currently published in the comic bearing its name, and it’s not exactly an older version of the once-popular Paul Levitz version of the team. It’s Johns’ version of that Legion — an idealized, iconic version — that reminds us of how thrilling the concept of an entire Legion of Super-Heroes can be. When Superman hovers in the air on the double-page splash in the center of the issue, with eighteen Legionnaires flying down from above, we must recognize the majesty of such an occasion. It’s a moment that signifies that the Legion is back. Not just in the context of this story, where they’ve just risen from the metaphorical ashes to regain their status as heroes, but in the context of the DC Universe, where their impact has diminished to insignificance over the past decade. And they wouldn’t be who they are without Superman. And, as Johns seems to imply, Superman wouldn’t be who he is without them. As he says when he defeats the ridiculous Earth-Man, “I’ve been an outsider every day of my life.” Not when he was with the Legion, though. For those moments, both past, present, and 1,000 years in the future, Superman belonged. And in those moments, surrounded by dozens of peers with special powers, Superman could feel like a human. Gary Frank (born 1969) is a British comic book artist, notable for pencilling on Midnight Nation and Supreme Power, both written by J. Michael Straczynski. He has also worked with author Peter David on The Incredible Hulk and Supergirl. He had a creator-owned series, Kin, which he wrote himself, published by Top Cow in 2000. Writer Geoff Johns, who has collaborated with Frank, has opined that Frank’s rendition of Superman is the best of his generation, and that the only other artist in the same league with Frank in this regard is Curt Swan. On 10 May 2007, having worked several years on a Marvel exclusive contract, Frank signed a new one with DC Comics. He most recently served as the regular series artist on Action Comics with writer Geoff Johns. Frank and Johns will still be working with Superman, however, in a six-issue mini-series entitled Superman: Secret Origin. The story features what Johns and DC Executive Editor Dan DiDio are calling a “definitive” telling of the origin story of Superman, dealing with his life in Smallville, his first adventure with the Legion of Super-Heroes as Superboy, and his arrival in Metropolis and at the Daily Planet.