The Kryptonian Time Line Project--Part I

As per my New Year's resolution, I'm going to do something really constructive and figure out that Krpytonian time line I wrote about in earlier blogs.

Lois Lane's attempt to break up Jor-El and Lara. (Lois Lane's Romance with Jor-El, Lois Lane, #59) In one of the most twisted moves of her neurotic life, Lois Lane goes into the past in a misguided attempt to save Krpyton from exploding and romance Jor-El. I guess she was thinking "If I can't have the son, I'll take the father." While on Krypton long before the Els' marriage, Lois tries to prevent the inevitable but is foiled at every turn. The scheming Lois even goes so far as to sabotage Lara at the hairdressers', only to have the scheme backfire and Lois winds with green hair.

KBI Agents While Jor and Lara are still dating, they are working as undercover agents for the Krpton Bureau of Investigation (KBI), Superman #123 "Superman's Return to Krypton." They meet Superman who is there through a magic wish of Jimmy Olsen's but forget all about it when he comes back in Superman #141.

Jor-El and Lara are married (Superman's Return to Krypton, Superman #141) just as Superman winds up on his home world after chasing some space beast so fast he accidentally breaks the time barrier. After numerous attempts to trick fate, Kal-El is determined to out on a brave front and face doom with his parents and new love Lyla Lerrol, Krypton's leading emotion-movie actress. But while filming a movie, Kal is trapped in a prop rocket with a flame-beast whose super-fires shooting from its mouth give the rocket temporary real flight powers. Superman is rocketed into a yellow sun's orbit and regains his powers. He callously concludes he can't change history and returns to the present. In one of many inconsistancies, the city of Kandor is shrunken and stolen by Brianian during this visit. But it was also abducted during Lois Lane's earlier sojourn which takes place years before the Els' marriage.

Superman and Batman drop in. Some years after the marriage,but before the birth of baby Kal-El, Superman and Batman arrive to investigate the first couple of Krypton's brief appearance on modern-day earth (World's Finest #191, "Execution on Krypton"). The Els and Superman have apparently forgotten all about his two earlier visits. (see earlier blog for details of this WF adventure).

To Stop a Predator. At this point, Lois Lane re-enters the picture in her time bubble (still Lois Lane #59, "Lois Lane's Romance with Jor-El.") She can't help herself and before returning to present-day Earth, this twisted woman emerges to give the infant Kal-El a big kiss. How sick can you get? Jor-El aims his newly invented phantom zone ray at her accidentally and she is hurled into the ghost-like dimension (which makes no sense because then she would have disappeared from her earth life and never met Superman.)

Jor-El, Super-Genius. In addition to inventing the Phantom Zone ray, Jor also invents an all-terrain vehicle which can fly, and travel underwater and underground ("The Super-Outlaw from Krypton," Superman #134), and is called the Jor-El.

Even More Earth People Visit. According to "The Man Who Saved Kal-El's Life" (Action #281), an Earth scientist named Prof. Dunn also appeared on Krpyton by means of a matter transmitter Jor-El instructed him to build. The plan was to mass produce the transmitter to save the Kyrpton population. While in the El home, Prof. Dunn helps save baby Kal-El's life when the kiddy is bitten by a snake. There are references to Jor-El monitoring Earth and seeing Al Capone and Babe Ruth, placing this in the 1920s. Dunn returns to earth, but the scheme fails when Krypton blows up ahead of schedule and Dunn's matter transmitter malfunctions so that not even the Els can be saved.

In World's Finest #146 ("Batman, Son of Krypton"), we learn of yet another Earth scientist to wend his way to our favorite planet--actually he saw it by long-distnace telescope. This loser's name is Dr. Ellison, and by sheerest coincidence, he was a neighbor of Baby Bruce Wayne, the future Batman.This "lonely bachelor" would baby-sit little Bruce and dress him up in Kryptonian clothes and have the poor tyke pretend he was a native of the planet and had superpowers on Earth. This guy was even more twisted than Lois Lane.

Krypto and Beppo In test experiments for the rocket which will bring baby kal-El to earth, super dog Kyrpto and super monkey Beppo are launched into orbit. Jor-El is not sued by the Kryptonian equivalent of the ASCAP.

Let's Not Forget Mon-El. Yet another alien befriends Jor and Lara. A youth from the planet Daxam (Superboy #89, "Superboy's Big Brother") crash lands in their back yard. After several weeks, the ship is repaired, but the kid gets amnesia when he crash lands on earth--how unlucky can you get? In his mixed-up memory, he thinks he's from Krypton and is Superboy's older brother. Daxam is similar to Krypton in that its inhabitants would get superpowers on earth. Anyway, Superboy calls him Mon-El because he was found a Monday. After the truth is discovered and Mon recovers his memory, Superboy sends him to the Phantom Zone for 1,000 years (he's dying from lead poisoning and a cure isn't discovered until then by Brianiac 5). The weird part is, we never find out Mon's real name and no one seems to care.

Jimmy Olsen Sticks his Big Nose In. Trying and failing miserably to save Krypton seems to be the thing to do among Superman's buttinsky pals, so Jimmy Olsen takes a shot in "Olsen's Time Trip to Save Krypton" (Jimmy Olsen, #101). Things get really screwy because Jimmy arrives on Krpyton just as Kandor is stolen, but in this version, Jor-El and Lara are married and baby Kal-El is a few years old. Jimmy visits Jor-El and when the erstwhile cub reporter shows the great scientist a future picture of his son, Jor admits to recognizing him from the events of Superman #141. However, he dismisses Jimmy's wild tales about Earth and Superman and tosses him out as a nutbag. Jimmy falls in love with a Krytonian girl named Miri, attempts to warn the population about the impending doom, and but fails. He whisks himself back to the present as the planet meets its end.

Argo City cuts loose. A lot was going on at the big-bang moment. As baby Kal-el's rocket is launched, an entire chuck of Krypton containing Argo City breaks off which is conventiently covered with a plastic bubble and has enough food to survive for many years. Never mind that this is physically impossible. On this impossible chunk of life lives Zor-El, Jor's brother, and his wife. While floating aimslessly in space, they give birth to a girl who, after Argo city is destroyed, is a saved in a manner similar to that of her cousin by crashing landing on earth. She later becomes Supergirl.

Scenes from the Life of an Amateur Comic Book Collector (10)--Superman and Batman Visit Krypton

Among the comics bought at the Phila. comic show was one with so many holes in the plot, I just had to comment. It's World's Finest no. 191. This was a series in which Superman and batman teamed up and was extremely popular. In this issue from the late 1960s, Supie and Batty journey back in time to the planet Krypton because Superman's parents mysteriously appear on Earth, mention they are about to commit a crime and then vanish. To begin with, has Superman forgotten he'll have no superpowers on Krypton? How will they get back before the panet explodes? They don't even travel in a time bubbble, Batman just puts on a space suit, hitches a ride on Superman's back and off they go (maybe he was used to riding bareback, if you know what I mean).

This also ties in with the theme of an earlier blog about how everyone and his brother--Lois Lane, Jimmy Olsen, Mon-El, and now Batman and Superman--seems to have visited the doomed planet and Jor-El and Lara. I will have to do a time line at some point.

So Superman and Batman materialize on Krypton during a student protest against robot professors--yes, even though we are on a different planet and it's about 40 years before the 1960s, there are long-haired kids kicking up a ruckus just like on earth. Ridic! The two heroes break up the kiddies' fun by taking over the local weather-control station and starting a downpour. Evidently, Krypton was advanced enough to control the weather and have robot teachers, but they hadn't mastered space flight which would have saved them.

Jor-El, one of the few human professors, takes an interest in the costumed clowns--I mean visitors--and invites them to his home. They pass a Krypton movie house showing patrons carrying their own helmets with speakers and mini-screens (this contradicts another version of Krypton moviegoing shown in a Jimmy Olsen story wherein he visits the bottle city of Kandor and patrons experience the sensations of the movie including kissing without the aide of helmets. But maybe this was a fad in Kryptonopolis which did not take hold in Kandor.) But I digress.

The two earth heroes are welcomed into Jor-El and Lara's home. The scientist's wife remarks, "I have the feeling I've seen you before," referring to their brief appearance on earth. What Lara and the writers of this story have forgetten is that Superman did know his parents before. He was trapped in a time-vortex (or something) and wound up on Krypton just before Jor-El and Lara got married. He got to know them well and spent much time with them as Jor-El's scientific protege. He even fell in love with Lyla Lerrol, Krypton's leading emotion-movie actress (which goes back to the contradicting methods of Krypton cinema, perhaps I should write a disseration on that.) The four of them went out all the time, dancing and drinking in Kryptonian nightclubs. Superman was resigned to remaining on his homeworld and dying with his parents and new love, but he accidently was trapped in a movie rocket, took off, and headed into the same time vortex, returning to present day Earth.

All of this must have slipped Lara's mind. Anyway, it turns out the Els aren't crooks, but are leading a select troop of recruits to perform a secret mission on a Kryptonian island where committing crimes is the law and being honest is outlawed. So having proven his parents aren't theives, Superman heaves a sigh of relief and suddenly recalls he and Batman have no way of getting back to earth. He actually says, "I forgot about that." Luckily, the superheroes get caught in the same time thingie his parents did and are back on earth. It was part of a top-secret government project which must now be destroyed; otherwise Battie and Supie would be drawn back to Krypton. Sort of like the Time Tunnel. Remember that show? I recall asking if we could go to my great-aunt's house on Wednesday nights because she had a color set so we could watch it there.

Krypton--The Place to Be

Just finished reading the new Superman Silver Age collection--Tales from the Phantom Zone. It got me to thinking that a lot was happening on Superman's home planet Krypton before it blew up and it was all happening to Superman's parents Jor-El and Lara. Before the fatal explosion, several Earth people visited the doomed world--Lois Lane, Jimmy Olsen, two doctors (both healed an ailing baby Kal-El), even the grown up Kal-El himself--and they all dropped in on Mr. and Mrs. El. In one version, Kal-El is a phantom because he hasn't been born yet. In other, he's just as flesh and blood as any Kryptonian and falls in love with a glamorous movie star. In addition, the Els were visited by the youthful Mon-El of the planet Daxam who later crashed on earth and caught amnesia, then thought he was Superboy's older brother. He recovered his memory but was sent into the Phantom Zone for 1,000 years so he wouldn't die of lead poisoning. In the 30th century, Brianiac 5 developed a serum to cure Mon who then joined the Legion of Super-Heroes. But I digress.

Jor-El was a jack of all trades evidently. Not only was he a leading scientist, but also an undercover agent for the KBI (Krpyton Bureau of Investigation) and chief executioner (before he invented the Phantom Zone projector--a more humane way of dealing with criminals). This leaves a question, if Jor was such a respected member of society, why didn't his fellow citizens believe him when he said the planet was about to explode? Some day I will have research this and develop a time line of all the events that occured on Krypton before the big bang. I know there is a sci-fi novel on this topic. Perhaps I'll check it out for consistancy with the mythos of the comics.