Adventures of Superman: Book of El #8 – Philip Kennedy Johnson, Writer; Cian Tormey, Artist; Matt Herms. Colorist
Ray – 9.5/10
Ray: For the first seven issues of this series, Superman has been on a journey across the universe in search of his missing children, meeting his descendants in the far future and encountering one cosmic concept after another. His daughter even casually became the new Black Racer, and seems to be handling it well! He’s seen that his distant relatives have become warriors, heroes, Green Lanterns, and everything in between. But most of the Supers he’s met in the future have been his great-great-great grandkids or what have you, with a distant trace of full Kryptonian blood left in them. That’s not the case for the character who is becoming the main villain of the series – Phyrrus the Red, a warrior-sorcerer who is the actual second-born son of Superman. His mother? Circe, released from a magical prison by accident. We don’t know how she and Superman had a child, but the implications aren’t great – and neither is he.
Phyrrus has captured Superman’s son, with the intention of extracting the Phaelossian power he has within him and ascending to godhood. That would kill the boy, of course – but that’s not a concern of his. At the same time, the other main villain, Kryl-Ux, continues his march across the universe to Tamaran, where his forces launch a brutal invasion, One of the many descendants of Superman is the queen there now, but she’s seemingly controlled by her cruel prince consort, and willingly surrenders the planet. We don’t know who this Rasputin-esque figure is yet, but he delivers a lot of menace in only a few pages. The story spans across the universe, and creates a picture of a world where Superman’s bloodline dominates – but only a few of the descendants have his heroic spirit. It’s one of the most original Superman stories in ages, and so far it’s the perfect coda to Johnson’s epic run on the character, which really kicked off Superman’s current DC renaissance.
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