Superman and Batman: Public Enemies (Graphic Novel)

Superman and Batman: Public Enemies is a graphic novel adaptation of an animated film. I haven't seen the film yet, but I picked up the book at Goodwill, and it was in surprisingly good condition. The artwork was dark and swirly, sometimes hard for the eye to take in, or discern exactly what was going on, panel for panel (and the artwork often broke free here and splashed across the page). No one in the comics industry seemingly thought about the plight of the nearsighted when creating their books; at least not in this era, and they really should have. All of their fans are bespectacled, pre-diabetic Simpsons characters who opine that this, that, and the third is the "Worst [fill in the blank] ever!"

But I'm jumping ahead of myself.

Superman and Batman talk about each other in this comic in a running narrative that is like two old lovers mooning over the peccadilloes, peculiarities, and foibles of each other, all the while being on the lam from the demented President of the United States, the bald and wildly buff Lex Luthor, who is attempting to halt the dead-on collision trajectory that a killer asteroid has with the Earth. He's not successful in this, so he blames Superman, natch.

Superman is fighting Metallo, and then Bruce intervenes, and the whole thing ends up at Gotham City Cemetery, where Metallo (missing half of his face and revealing the cybernetic skullbone beneath), buries both of them alive. Bruce takes a badly wounded Man of Steel to the Bat Cave, where a future weirdo Superman materializes from a transdimensional "Boom Tube" and wreaks havoc. Alfred the Butler saves the day by performing surgery on Superman and removing a kryptonite bullet. Both of them wonder what the hell is going on, but keep talking about each other as if wedding bells are right around the corner. They're both grotesquely buff, too, as if they spend all day shooting supersteroids and doing Romanian Deadlifts at Planet Fitness.

One dude who IS taking 'rhoids is Luthor, who jacks up some shit that is a mixture from Venom and something else I can't quite remember, just before sexually assaulting the short, squat, and frankly, wildly unattractive Amanda Waller, Presidential Head of "Metahuman Affairs." Superman and Batman are wanted fugitives now, Superman getting the blame for the asteroid, and did I mention this whole thing starts with memories of Smallville? (Then we cut to Bruce's memory of the "Night His Parents Were Murdered and He Decided on the Life of An Immortal Crime Fighter Who Stalks the Shadow in the form of a Bat." Whew! Heavy stuff, mang!)

So Banshee and Atom Man and Major Force and Power Girl and some Teen Titan I can't quite remember get together a posse and everything ends up with an atomic singularity in Tokyo, and that little annoying brat the "Toyman" who is thirteen and a supergenius and can build amazing things but no one ever sees him doing much of anything but walking around with bigger, worse folks being a snot, and saying things like, "It's TOYMAN! I'm Hiro to my friends. You guys are clients!"; and also, the little presumptuous shit says, "I can't die. Not before I get a chance to make out with Power Girl. What a hottie!" As if! (Snort. Giggle. Fart.)

As a subplot, Bruce is uber pissed at Clark: Clark knew somehow that Metallo might have been the Author of Evil that pulled the trigger on Bruce's parents outside that James Cagney movie so many eras ago (time works differently in comic book land), but it never really develops. Luthor dons some sort of cybernetic exoskeleton after Atom Man dies and the SHTF royally. I love the look on his face when he does this. I've probably given away too many spoilers.

Nice little graphic novel. Up, up, and away. Because this is Christmas time, and as everyone knows who has heard the DC Superheroes adaptation of "Jingle Bells": Batman smells.

But here, Robin doesn't lay an egg. or anything else.

Ciao, kiddies.

Superman and Batman: Public Enemies was written by Jeph Loeb and Ed McGuinness.