All-Star Superman

Grant Morrison is a prolific comic book writer for DC Comics as well as its Vertigo imprint line.

He has a knack of finding the off-kilter and blending it into the soup of what plays as reality in comic books. And it is a delicious bowlful.

So, is his take on the superhero of superheroes — Superman.

“All-Star Superman” issues 1-12 can be found collected in a big, beautiful trade paperback.

Here, Lex Luthor has plotted a means to kill Superman by overexposing him to the source of his strength.

Earth’s yellow sun.

Superman dives into the sun to rescue a troubled space mission to our solar system’s star. The close proximity to the sun distends his capacity to absorb its rays, effectively triggering cell death.

So, Superman makes the best of the time he has left.

Morrison takes readers on a homage to the career of Superman. Several incidents read like Superman comics from the 1950s-70s.

Clark Kent is a bumbling hayseed in the big city here.

Daily Planet staff from decades ago are resurrected here.

Because he’s dying, Clark confirms Lois’ suspicions by stating he is Superman. But once he confesses, Lois can’t believe it and thinks it is a joke being perpetrated by Clark and Superman.

Clark is Superboy in Smallville. Teenage Clark has Krypto the Superdog as a pet.

Supermen from future centuries and dimensions visit young Clark.

Bizarro makes a play to create a Bizarro World in his skewed, upside-down image.

Survivors of Krypton arrive and must be stopped.

The Phantom Zone and the Fortress of Solitude remain viable.

Lois gets Superman’s powers for a day as a birthday present.

Morrison brings a great sense of fun to the book … even though Superman is dying.

Frank Quitely pencils the book with a series of beautiful contour drawings. He creates a plausible physical difference between Clark and Superman. Clark is too big for the city in a bumbling, shoulders-slumped, belly-out kind of way. 

All of the drawings are digitally inked and colored by Jamie Grant with a technicolor palette.

The book is also part of the DC Black Label line, meaning the works are not connected to the ongoing chronology in the other Superman books. Instead, Black Label stories stand on their own.

And “All-Star Superman” doesn’t just stand on its own.

It soars. Up, up and away.