* Clark Kent is real, Superman the mask: With John Byrne's more assertive revamp of Clark Kent as well as Superman's greater grounding in Earth culture and humanity ( as opposed to the everpresent Kryptonian heritage of the Pre-Crisis version ), Superman is considered the " mask " and Clark the person.

While in previous comic versions of the mythos, it was assumed the " S " simply stood for " Superman "; in Birthright, Waid presented the symbol as a Kryptonian symbol of hope ( borrowing and modifying a concept from Superman: The Movie, where the " S " represented the House of El, Superman's ancestral family ).

Superman's symbol is given a Kryptonian origin in the film ( as Smallville and Mark Waid's Superman: Birthright would years later ).

The novelization by Marv Wolfman further expands on the " S " as well, stating that one of Superman's ancestors helped civilize Krypton long ago, and the crest was considered one of the three most respected icons in Kryptonian culture.

No longer was she Superman's cousin or even Kryptonian.

Its plot concerns Supergirl, Superman's cousin, leaving her isolated Kryptonian community of Argo City for Earth in an effort to retrieve the unique " Omegahedron ", which has fallen into the hands of the evil witch Selena ( Faye Dunaway ).

In an episode of Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman, he played Superman's deceased Kryptonian father Jor-El, who appeared to his son through holographic recordings.

When she learns that Kal-El ( Superman's Kryptonian name ) prefers the company of a certain Terrestrial named Lois Lane, Mala turns against Superman and later releases General Jax-Ur ( a version of General Zod, although named after another villain from the Superman comics ) to take over Earth.

At the end of the fourth issue of the arc, a new Nightwing and Flamebird appear in Superman's Fortress of Solitude to stop two of Zod's followers ( who were living in Kandor ) from releasing the Kryptonian General from his Phantom Zone imprisonment.

During this time, he also played an important role in Superman's defeat of Brainiac 13 ; when Brainiac took control of the robotic heroes until they were shut down by an EM-pulse generated by Lex Luthor in a stolen Kryptonian battlesuit, Kelex, Superman's fortress robot, reactivated Red Tornado so that they could use him to break Brainiac 13 down into his component nanobots and trap him inside Luthor's battlesuit.

It is shown that Doomsday's skeleton was retrieved and his flesh regrown by Lex Luthor ( using Superman's Kryptonian DNA ), who handed Doomsday over to Darkseid to repay Earth's war debt to Apokolips.

Despite being weakened by kryptonite exposure when Luthor attempted to exploit Doomsday's Kryptonian origins, Superman's heart was restarted by Black Lightning and he reached Doomsday just as the monster was struggling with the Martian Manhunter.

Once he gained some of Superman's Kryptonian DNA, he became susceptible to Kryptonite.

In the 2006 weekly series 52, a grief-stricken Ralph Dibny is contemplating suicide when he is informed that Sue's gravestone has been vandalized with an inverted version of Superman's ' S ' symbol — the Kryptonian symbol for resurrection.

Light Lass is later needed to extract the Kryptonian Chrysalis buried deep within Superman's Fortress of Solitude, buried there a thousand years ago by Starman.

It is revealed that the Last Son is, in actuality, the Eradicator, an ancient Kryptonian weapon, and the Cyborg is the deranged consciousness of Hank Henshaw, which used Superman's birthing matrix to create a physical duplicate of his body.

Supergirl used the remnants of the black Kryptonian suit to recreate Superman's traditional costume, and the group returned to Metropolis.

As a Kryptonian, Superman's alien genetic material enables him to absorb sunlight and perform superhuman feats.

This is an allusion to the history of Superman ; Rao is the red giant sun around which Superman's homeworld of Krypton once orbited, as well as the Kryptonian God.

The Eradicator's body is created from the genetic template of Superman's, when Superman dies at the hands of Doomsday, giving him physiology similar to a Kryptonian.

Due to Superman's Kryptonian heritage and Batman's Lazarus Pit treatment, the two have aged at a very slow rate.

Superman's Kryptonian robot Kelex subsequently confirms that Cir-El is not the Man of Steel's biological daughter ( despite the evidence from S. T. A. R.

Upon landing on Earth, Krypto is a fully grown dog, possessed of superpowers similar to those of Superman's ( since all Kryptonian life-forms gain superpowers from exposure to a yellow sun, such as Earth's sun ).

In the newer continuity, Superman also became aware of his alien heritage only sometime after his debut as a superhero-initially assuming himself to be a human mutated in some manner and launched as part of an Earth space program -, when a holographic program encoded into the craft which brought him to Earth uploaded the information into his brain ( Although Lex Luthor had earlier discovered his alien heritage when his attempts to create a clone of Superman were complicated by the unexpected x-factor of Superman's alien DNA ).

Traditionally, Lois Lane ( and sometimes others ) would often suspect Superman of truly being Clark Kent ; this was particularly prominent in Silver Age stories, including those in the series Superman's Girl Friend Lois Lane.

* Superman is real, Clark Kent the mask: Pre-Crisis interpretations of Superman assumed that Clark Kent was the " mask " and Kal-El the person ( in the classic story Superman: Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow ?, when Superman's dual life is revealed, he completely abandons his Clark Kent persona ).

Throughout the series, Clark never officially adopted a costume until around the eighth season, but prior to this was seen wearing Superman's traditional colors of red and blue, more often as the series progresses ( more commonly a blue shirt underneath a red jacket, reflecting Superman's uniform and cape colors ).

It was used as both a plot device and as a means to allow Superman's actor, Bud Collyer, to take occasional time off.

Over time, kryptonite was depicted as being so abundant that many ordinary criminals kept a supply as a precaution against Superman's interference.

In several accounts, it was explained that the explosion of the planet Krypton had opened a " dimensional warp " ( similar to a wormhole in modern theoretical physics ) which allowed the vehicle carrying the young Kal-El to reach Earth in a relatively brief time, and a large amount of planetary debris had also passed through this " warp " and emerged near Earth at virtually the same time, accounting for the seemingly improbable abundance of kryptonite material and its availability to Superman's enemies.

In time, through the use of Batman's notes, Ra's al Ghul was able to fashion a synthetic red kryptonite, this version turning Superman's skin transparent and leaving him almost exploding with power as the sunlight that gave him his powers was sent directly into his muscles without being filtered by his skin.

Although Luthor would not appear until two years after Superman's debut, a central theme to his character — a dichotomy of science versus superpowers — was in place.

He returns in Superman # 4, first trying to use a stolen Earthquake machine and challenging Superman to a duel of his science vs Superman's powers, which Superman wins ; however, this was just a distraction to allow him to steal the machine.

This was predicated by an attempt on Luthor's part to link Superman to a kryptonite asteroid that is hurtling toward Earth, claiming that he had ' evidence '- which he declined to share while claiming that it would make the public laud his actions if they knew it-that the asteroid was being drawn to Earth by Superman, offering a billion dollar reward for Superman's capture that pitted Superman and Batman against an army of villains, all of whom they defeated.

Some find it strange that while some audience members took issue with the flimsiness of Superman's disguise, they didn't take issue with the idea of the existence of a superbeing whose only weakness was kryptonite.

The Silver Age Superman was not alone in the survival of Krypton's destruction, being joined by his cousin Supergirl, the Phantom Zone criminals, Beppo the super-monkey, Krypto the Superdog, a juvenile delinquent named Dev-Em, and the entire population of the city of Kandor, Supergirl's real parents and even Superman's real parents ( in hibernation on a space ship-Superboy # 158 July-1969 ), When the planet exploded, one entire city of Krypton, Argo City, survived the cataclysm.

A three-issue miniseries entitled The Krypton Chronicles, published in 1981, tells of Superman researching his roots when, as Clark Kent, he was assigned to write an article about Superman's family by an assignment editor impressed with the television miniseries Roots.

* Krypton was very briefly depicted in the first Fleischer Studios-produced Superman cartoon in the early 1940s as " a planet that burned like a green star in the distant heavens where civilization was far advanced and it brought forth a race of Supermen whose mental and physical powers were developed to the absolute peak of human perfection ," implying that all Kryptonians had Superman's abilities even on their own planet.

With the mandate to reduce the number of Kryptonians in the DCU, her origin was changed to being a descendant of ancient Atlanteans who mistakenly believed herself to be Superman's cousin.

" Captain Marvel's sales soundly trounced Superman's self-titled series and Action Comics alike, and the comic at one point was issued biweekly to capitalize upon that popular interest.

In later Silver Age accounts, Zor-El and Alura In-Ze survive the death of Argo City when, shortly before the radiation reached lethal levels, Zor-El projects them both into the immaterial Survival Zone, a separate dimension resembling the Phantom Zone ; later they are released from the Zone and go to live in the bottle city of Kandor, preserved in microscopic size at Superman's Fortress of Solitude.

For instance, the depiction of Krypton reflects the older idealized version in the Silver Age of Comic Books while the scope of Superman's powers reflect the more restrained contemporary concept as developed by John Byrne in that the superhero has to struggle to perform spectacular feats, while Clark Kent is shown to be openly, if quietly, self-confident.

During this period near the end of the industry revival historians call the Silver Age of comic books, Adams was soon assigned his first superhero covers, illustrating that of the Superman flagship Action Comics # 356 ( Nov. 1967 ) and the same month's Superman's Girl Friend, Lois Lane # 79 ( Nov. 1967 ), featuring Superman and a mysterious new costumed character, Titanman.

Catwoman made her first Silver Age appearance in Superman's Girl Friend, Lois Lane # 70 ( November 1966 ); afterward, she continued to make appearances across the various Batman comics.

Also, entries for characters such as the Silver Age Superman and Wonder Woman recounted their post-Crisis histories only, which at the time were only a few months old, while their entire Silver Age histories ( and all the unique elements of those characters during that time, such as Superman's Fortress of Solitude and Wonder Woman's powerless period ) were ignored.

Blaze is involved in the creation of Superman's enemies Silver Banshee and Skyhook.

In Silver Age continuity, the police force of Superman's home planet Krypton was also called the Science Police.

Schaffenberger was best known for his work on Captain Marvel and the Marvel Family ( during both the Golden Age and Silver Age of comics ), as well as his work on the title Superman's Girl Friend, Lois Lane during the 1950s and 1960s.

Silver Banshee battles Supergirl in Supergirl # 34, and is expected to be a recurring nemesis for Supergirl, as well as Superman, as part of an attempt to tie Supergirl's book in with Superman's titles.