Alan Moore Obscurities: Supreme - The Return (#53-56, The Return #1-6) PART TWO

"You are right master.  I must face up to my responsibilities" - Radar

So it's the year 2000 and Alan Moore is riding high again.  With multiple awards for his work at America's Best Comics, which include such classics as Top Ten, Promethea, Tom Strong and The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, he is going through a Golden Age that I would argue tops even his era of work at 2000AD and DC in the 1980's. From Hell has finally been collected and brought out of obscurity in the process, Lost Girls is getting wider attention.  And somewhere else, published by Rob Liefeld's collapsing company Awesome Comics, his run on Supreme finally breathes it's last and ends... no1curr.  As I said in the previous part which looked at the first five chapters of this compilation, once the twelve issue Story Of The Year was concluded, Moore seemingly didn't know what to do with the character.  So we got clumsy and mean-spirited meta, random pop-cultural references and scattershot satire as he tried to hook the series onto something, anything that he could find that worked. However, by the time these five issues were published Moore was gone from Awesome and the initial ABC comics line-up was starting up under his close supervison.  It took over a year to get these  five comics drawn and put out and lacking Chris Sprouse and Al Gordon to give it a unified if not very good look these last few don't flow with any visual coherence and it all ends very abruptly - more on that in the conclusion.  So here we are, please enjoy the dying gasps of the Image dominated 90's style with this look at issues #2-6 of Supreme - The Return.

We begin with a revisit of the fate of Supreme's arch enemy Darius Dax as chronicled in The Story Of The Year.  He decided to merge with a chunk of Supremium to increase his power but ended up being thrown back in time becoming the original meteorite that gave Ethan his power back in 1925.  And then nothing.  Until we see him coming round on the floor of a street confronted by a black man spouting jive so bad I can't even bring myself to type it out, he's the "Daxman" and he's accompanied by a metal man with a human face called "Daxor" and a large bearded man called "Original Dax".

Darius gets up, wondering where he is, he's told he is in Daxia where all Daxs who are "rubbed out of continuity" go.    Now annoyed Darius snatches Daxs Daxor's molecular disruptor from him. He calls them dopplegangers and threatens them but gets shot in the back by "Darius Duck".  After a brief argument amongst themselves they have Daxor use his levitation field to take him to the "Daxadrom".  Waking up Darius asks why he is in a world dedicated entirely to him, but is told he'll get his answers from the person highest in the pecking order.

Welcome to Daxia.

That turns out to be "Maxi-Dax", sitting on a throne attended by men dressed as Supreme.  Darius says he looks like he did before he died of cancer.

Maxi-Dax: "Cancer?  Heh heh.  Is that how modern viilains die?  In my day, we usually fell into the reactor of our own destruction!"

He takes Darius to the balcony and shows him hundreds of versions of him which Darius thinks is a utopia.  Maxi-Dax says the place only came into existence sixty years ago, before that it was a limbo dimension.  When Maxi-Dax calls over Original Dax, Darius takes offence saying he is the original.

"You and a thousand others" laughs Maxi-Dax, they all share the same date of birth of 1917 but all different 1917's. Orginal Dax says he doesn't remember much of his childhood and he became a crime boss in Omega City in 1939.   But Supreme used to spoil his fun, although this Supreme got his powers from a magical belt.  He killed Original Dax and sent him to an all white dimension, but with bits of the city floating in it.  Everything connected with him got crossed out "like someone had second thoughts about my existence."

Then another Dax joined him a couple of years later and more kept coming.  Darius says "you're talking as if reality was some sort of story, being constantly revised."  Maxi-Dax says he catches on fast.  He was a Dax who's Supreme was an alien from the planet Supron and fighting him made him especially ingenious.  When he came to limbo in 1966 he organised building Daxia using the planet he had populated which had come with him as raw material and his Daxinoids as the workforce.

He tells Darius that they don't know why all this happens, all they can do is pool information with all the new Daxs as they arrive.  He takes Darius to a limosuine where they drive to the "Salon Du Dax".   On the way Maxi-Dax tells him that although Darius believes he was born in 1917, actually he only sprang into existence around 18 months ago according to their sensors.  "You're saying my entire existence before 1966 is.. is retrospective?" says Darius disblievingly.  Maxi-Dax says not to let it bother him, "retro's very big right now, didn't you hear?"

More Daxes.

They go to a table with several other Daxs and Darius tells them the story of how he ended up merging with the Supremium and becoming part of a time loop that created Supreme. They realise that Earth is now currently without a Dax.  Darius asks if he could just go back.  Maxi-Dax says that he's dead and it would be "a breach of continuity logic."  The others say it could shatter all the rules of existence and lead to chaos and universal disorder.  They then all "hmmmm" thoughtfully.

Maxi-Dax decides they will do it.  They summon as many Daxs as possible to the Plaza of Pestilence to observe. Darius then worries some cosmic law might cause him to "wink out of existence altogether".  Maxi-Dax says that's why they are letting him try it out first.  Darius Duck has brought his "prototype dimensional doorway" with him.   They use the energy of "Doomsdax" to power it.  They set coordinates to his secret hideout in Omegaopolis. They bid him farewell and Darius steps through and arrives safe and sound.

Back to life, back to reality.

Grinning evilly, he activates the hideout's computer and requests to know what Supreme has been up to lately.   And all his stuff in the hideout is in perfect working order.  Darius says that now he knows that where there is a Supreme there must be a Dax and this has inspired him to redouble his efforts to find Supreme and kill him.  The chapter ends with Ethan (Supreme's alter-ego) looking distracted at work and shivering.

Then he says to Diana Dane (she writes the comic - Omniman - that he draws) that he thought she and Supreme got along quite well when they met.  He says he can ask Supreme to take her on a tour of the Citadel so she can get a feel for the world of a male superhero which she's been struggling with.   She agrees to that and Ethan is happy again.

Diana is now being shown around the Citadel by Supreme.   She is marvelling at all the cool stuff he has.  She is especially impressed by his garden which has plants from other planets growing in it.  Then he takes her to the large crystal which is Amalynth, where people turned to light by Optilux end up.  Supreme says they can visit, as he hasn't been for a while. Using special helmets their minds can manifest in there, so they suit up and enter.

They appear, both of them now in superhero-style costumes which seem to be the look in Amlynth.  Supreme says he has property and a cover identity here, he's "Rolyat Ladnek" and she can be his visting cousin "Adnil Ladnek".  They drop down and bump into a man who knows Supreme, he tells them they sentenced Optilux to "hard refraction life in our photo penitentary".

The man mentions they have been having trouble with "beam bandits", Supreme pulls Diana away as she asks what they are.  Beam Bandits apparently steal payloads of data which are currency in Amlynth.   Supreme doesn't have his powers here, but he's got some gadgets back in the Citadel which he is using to alter their images so he can become they can become "Dr. Dark and Duskwing" and they fly up to take on the bandits.

Crimefighting in Amlynth.

They fly up and Supreme confronts them,  when they refuse to come quietly Supreme makes him and Diana turn invisible.   Diana disarms one of them as they start panicking.  She shoots one of them as a warning and the others surrender without a fight. "I knew you'd see the light eventually" puns Diana.  Supreme says she was terrific and they drop the criminals off at the penitentiary.   They decide to return to their bodies on the Citadel after that.

Next Supreme decides to show Diana the League of Infinity's Time Tower as Suprema is still looking for Slaver Ant and Radar is in a bad mood.  He decides to show her the future as there is less chance of paradoxes that way.  He picks the 22nd century as it's not a place he's been to before.  They enter and the art style changes to a pulp Silver Age one.

They immediately observe two women in superhero costumes called "Fighting American IV" and "Speedgirl."  They are fighting a gang of Middle-Eastern Terrorists wearing fezs, but they outnumbered then a young Supreme called "Supremax" appears to come help.  Also everyone is speaking ridiculously.  Supreme finishes them off and impressed Supremax says:

Supremax: "Zow! That was the Disneyest thing I've ever nashed.  You Tysoned a whole squad of shriners!  What Rubiks me though, is why you're wearing a set of seekays just like mine!"

Alan, I thought we talked about this.  No one likes it when you make up future speech.  It makes it look silly.   Anyway Supreme introduces himself as Supreme from the 20th Century.

Supremax says he's his great grandson.  Supreme stutters that he's not even planning of having children.   But before they can talk more a man -  "Baxter Frunt" working for "Damien Dax" - who is conjoined twins stuck together back-to-back arrives saying that he can wipe out Supreme's line with one blast. Diana however chips in saying why doesn't he explain his origin to her?

Straight to the point Diana.

He starts to tell her then she asks if his anatomy has everything doubled. And when he affirms this she kicks one side of him hard in the nuts leaving him groaning on the floor.  When the heroes congratulate, Supreme lets slip her name is Diana.  Supremax recognises the name and says he has seen her picture in his mom's "digi-vision album".  This baffles Diana and Supreme decides it's time to leave.  Supremax bids them farewell saying it's not every day he gets to meet his ancestors.

Supreme picks up Diana and flies back to the time door saying " it's as if whichever way you travel, the past ends up knowing the future's business."  They arrive back into the Citadel and Supreme decides to treat her by taking her to "The Supremacy"  which is a dimension where Supremes from continuities that no longer exists end up.  They fly through the portal and arrive there.  They immediately bump into 50's Supreme and another Diana Dane.  She decides to take current Diana on a trip to meet other Dianas while Supreme heads off to watch the "Supreme-Bowl".

Diana is having a hard time realising there are other versions of her, 50's Diana introduces her to several other Diana's meeting in a snack bar. They include a black one, the "Sister Supreme" from the 70's, "Traumatised grim 80's Diana", Queen Diana from the 60's and finally "Diana Duck."  Diana realises they're from what she thinks are parallel dimensions where she is Supreme's girlfriend.  They ask if hers had made his move yet.  There is some banter about nobody liking strong career women which leaves Diana confused.  50's Diana decides to take her shopping.

Later Supreme is looking for his Diana, they meet and Diana has bought a few things.  Then 50's Diana spots her Supreme who has snorted Supremium and turned into a balloon.  She angrily drags him off after saying goodbye to Diana and Supreme and Diana return through the portal back to the Citadel.

He offers more of a tour, but Diana asks if he is doing all this to get her attention.  He looks suprised then says "well yes actually. What do people normally do?"  She takes his head and plants a tender kiss on his lips.  They deepen the kiss as he responds, then they break apart with Supreme saying "Oh God.. I've wanted to do that for so long".  She asks why he didn't and he says he was worried there might be repercussions... and the shot widens to show a miserable looking Radar (Supreme's superdog) listening to them.

Diana takes Supreme in hand.

Next chapter begins with Diana and Ethan, with Diana complaining that Supreme hasn't been in touch, at work when their editor Carl comes in.  His dog is heavily pregnant and about to give birth.  But she wasn't pregnant yesterday.  The dog starts giving birth and as the puppy is born it suddent shoots away like a small comet out of the office and into the sky.

Realising what this means Ethan leaves and changes into his Supreme identity.  As he hovers in the air he sees a lot of superfast, flying puppies trashing the city.  Several get together to raid the museum for dinosaur bones.  Angry now, Supreme flies to the Citadel.  Suprema is back and asking Radar help her find Slaver Ant.  But he says he's been a "bad dog" and he's going on a long walk to Betelguese, "don't bother refilling my dog bowl."

He flies off and not long after, Supreme arrives.  Suprema wants to know why he's angry with Radar, and Supreme says that after seventy years "Radar has discovered sex."  Suprema expresses her disgust then asks how he'll find him.  She thinks the flying puppies sound adorable though, but Supreme points out there are hundreds of them, not house trained.  He locates Radar and zooms off, shortly he returns holding Radar by the scruff.

Radar confesses his rapey night out.

Radar admits that he had sex with over three hundred female dogs.  His humping lasted around a fortieth of a second, "but it felt meaningful at the time."   What prompted it was him overhearing Supreme's kiss with Diana.  Suprema scolds him then decides to leave them to sort it out and goes to looks for Slaver Ant so they can brag about their conquests to each other.  She slams the door as she leaves.

Supreme says he doesn't understand women, Radar agrees saying the are both "in the doghouse".   They debate what they can do with a city full of flying puppies.  Some are currently using transatlantic cable as a dog chew.  Radar can hardly believe his "whelps" would behave so badly.  When they fly down to the city, the puppies are now looking like year old dogs.

Radar sends out a very loud command to them and they all congregate close by.   Radar is going to take them to a new planet of their own.  He's going to call it "Fidor" to signify faithfulness.   As all the dogs leave, Supreme says goodbye then says to himself that next time he visits they need to do some "surgery supreme" on him.

Ethan finishes the story to Diana, apparently they contacted Talos and he made them mechanical hands and they built Fidor for themselves.  At least that's what Supreme told him.   Diana grumbles that she has heard from him more than she has.  Ethan says Supreme maybe needs time to think.

Diana tells Ethan about all the cool things she saw, The Supremacy especially interested her.  She says it's exactly like when comic book continuities get revised, and that opens up a lot of possibilities for Omniman.  She's decided to incorporate the Supremacy idea into the comic.

Diana takes Supreme in hand.

Ethan says he really likes it. She says she is pleased with the idea but upset about the situation with Supreme.  Actually she's angry.  Ethan says Supreme wouldn't want her to be angry.  She says why doesn't he get in touch, everytime she think she is getting somewhere he run away.  Ethan doesn't say anything, just stares at her And she suddenly realises he is Supreme and says quietly "Oh. I get it."  Which brings this chapter to a premature end.  The rest of it is a filler story done Silver Age style about the League of Infinity which is so twee and boring I am just going to skip and carry on with the slightly more interesting Supreme storyline.

The next chapter starts with Billy Friday, the postmodern comicbook writer, who Supreme had committed to Miskatonic Asylum after a series of wacky events caused Billy to lose it slightly.  He is waiting to use the phone and when he finally gets to use it, he calls Diana.  He's being let out the next day and he is planning to call in to the office as part of his rejoining society.

He asks what the noise is in the background and we cut to her saying it's just the TV as Ethan strips off to reveal his Supreme costume.   She has to break the news to him that he didn't win any Eisners.  And she brings the call to an end.  Supreme stands over her and she says "so... here we are then."

Supreme says that she's taking it all well, she says she actually in shock still. She wonders why she, why nobody realises that Ethan is Supreme.  He says that's just the way things are for him, "part of my story" he concludes.  But she recognised him, and she says maybe that means she's part of his story too.

Meanwhile Darius Dax is talking with his computer which is called "Torquemada".  They are discussing how across all the realtities there is a version of him in conflict with a version of Supreme, "...it's almost as if our conflict was the sole reason for reality to exist... any reality!"  Torquemada says there is another constant across each reality - Supremium.

He muses that Supremium was synthesized by Supreme in the sixties, twenty-five years later he fused with it becoming Supremium Man. Then he fell back through time to 1925 where the meteorite gave Supreme its power and no Supremium exist outside of this time loop.   But Torquemada says there is an alternate world source of Supremium, Supremium Man Mk.1.  Dax says he remembers him from the 1930's, he was a teenager from an alternate world obssessed with collecting Supremium.  Back then he was called "Master Meteor."

Retro Master Meteor.

We then get a retro flashback.  A young Darius Dax has completed a machine to destroy Kid Supreme when suddenly a young man comes through a portal.  The being recognises the younger Dax and remembers to tell him he's called Master Meteor.  He introduces himself as an expert on Supremium and collects all different kinds which have different powers.  For example Emerald Supremium promotes growth in organic life.  Sapphire Supremium affects probabilities. Amber Supremium alters time and so on. 

Dax notes he doesn't mention White Supremium, and Master Meteor says that's what he's here for.  He knows it only exists in a narrow time-loop, "I suspect it's the point all Supremium originates from!"  Dax decides to show him where some is and they fly to Erwin Wells lab, Erwin tries to stop them but Master Meteor makes his lawn grow and traps Erwin in it.

Inside Master Meteor chips a small piece off the chunk and while he does so it turns his hair completely white. Then Kid Supreme and Radar arrive to stop them.  Master Meteor uses Sapphire Supremium power to make the house fall in on them, but that doesn't hold them.   He tries to trap them in a Ruby created bubble, but that doesn't work.  Finally he uses the White Supremium which starts to kill Kid Supreme and Radar.  Dax eggs him on but Master Meteor says he can't kill them now, it will cause a time paradox.

But then all his Supremium samples start flashing at random.  It starts to affect his mind. He stammers that he was in an asylum and had mental problems.  Supreme was the one who had him committed and now he wants revenge, but he must take it when Supreme is an adult to avoid a paradox.  And he activates his Amber Supremium and steps through a portal into the future.  This leaves Dax at the mercy of Kid Supreme and he gets a punch in the face for his antics and the flashback ends.

Dax digs out his Enigmatron while he wonders if he's part of another paradox and he is Supremium Man Mk.II as well.  He fires it up and watches.  At Dazzle comics a portal has opened and Master Meteor has come through it from the time of the flashback. Diana and Ethan arrive and Master Meteor suddenly confronts them calling himself Supremium Man.  Ethan hurries off and gets changed into his Supreme costume while Supremium Man rants about his vengeance.

Supreme and Supremium Man square off, but then Billy Friday shows up.  Supreme yells to keep him away from the Supremium, he doesn't want Billy exposed to it and mutating again.  When Diana tells him to stay away from the dangerous super-villain, Billy comes closer saying that actually villains are "plausibilty and differently moral". He asks to talk to him like he did in group.

Billy and Supremium Man merge.

He introduces himself to Supremium Man, while he talks about all the villains he met Supremium Man is panicking about the reaction his Supremium is having to Billy.   Billy takes Supremium Man by the hand.... and suddenly Billy disappears but his mind is transferred into Supremium Man's body.  He can hear Supremium in his head though and blames Supreme for deliberately trying to destroy his mind, but it hasn't worked "my personality is completely stable! In fact both of them are!"

He seems to be struggling though and says his Supremium collection is ruined as the White Supremium has burned out and it no longer exists in this reality.  So using the Amber Supremium he makes a portal into the time-loop and goes back in time saying the sentence he finished in Dax's flashback.  Later Diana and Ethan go to Ethan's apartment. She's surprised he has one when he has a Citadel in the sky.  He says he likes being round real people sometimes. Diana says she hopes that includes me and has he got over what repercussions their relationship might have. He says after last night he doesn't have any anxieties, he's Supreme dating the most beautiful girl in the world, "have I forgotten anything?"  End chapter with a close-up of the issue of Omniman they are working on.

The next and final chapter is one long tribute Jack "King" Kirby, a man of incredible imagination who created so many iconic characters for Marvel and DC and who at the time of when the scripts were obviously written had recently died.  With this finally struggling out in 2000 it was a little further away from his death.  Anyhoo, the story is that Supreme has got a call that something large has appeared in a Himalayan valley and he's gone to investigate. When he reaches to city and enters the mists he is drawn in a Kirbyesque style by Rick Veitch, but hilariously the couple of pages at the start and end are drawn by Rob Liefeld.  A man who never met his publishing dates, who showed no understanding of anatomy and page layout and whose credited characters were actually made who they were by other artists and writers that followed.  He is the anti-Kirby.

Anyway, through the mist Supreme finds a bunch of mechs and a whole city, it's industrialised but has statues of Roman Gods looming over Brooklyn Bridge.  I'll say now, I think all the characters he meets are pastiches of Kirby created ones, but I couldn't recognise some of them so forgive me for that.

While lost on thought his reverie is broken by "The Little Tough Guys" who he asks why they are there.  They say they are here because of the Monarch's will.  Then a man dressed in blue with a bin lid for a shield appears called "The Custodian", he says he and the Little Tough Guys are on a mission so Supreme should get lost. Supreme says he'd be glad to help, so he is told they are after "Dread" a master of science and sorcery he's currently "planning to awaken a diabolical monster who will destroy the Earth!"

"Dread" summons a monster.

Suddenly the monster "Baragoom, the creature that walked like a thing!"  Dread is with them and orders then to cower before his might.  Supreme starts beating up Baragoom and it starts to try and escape through the mists.  Supreme chases it but when he comes out of the mists it's World War II and "Sgt. Strong's Dambustin' Dogfaces" are ready to leap into action against a giant Nazi robot, which the various heroes there like "The Battlin' Yank" are also fighting.

Supreme says he's not needed here, so Sgt. Strong directs him to the East treeline, where he'll find what he's looking for.  So Supreme travels through to a post-apocalyptic world.   Supreme asks where he can find the Monarch, one of them tell him he's also the "All-Father, the source of our existence".  He needs to go beyond this world into the realm of the Gods themselves.

Then a being that is a humanoid cricket called "Davey Krikkit" offers his services as a guide to Supreme.  He'll take Supreme to the Sapphre Stairway and the Celesital Palace beyond.  As they travel, Supreme asks how all this could have just come into existance in one day.  Davey just says that's the Regeant "creates a whole...universe before breakfast like it was nothing!"
Supreme asks if the Regeant is one of the Gods they are off to meet, but Davey says he's much more important than that.   After flying up high and observing all the cities, they fly even higher and are confronted by a huge armoured man who wants to know what business they have here.  Davey says he's escorting a outlander who's looking for the monarch.

The armoured man takes them to "the grand trial of the proto-deities.  They will decide your fate, as they decide the fate of all who live." What does he mean by "proto deities" asks Supreme.  They are the basic models, the original essences of Earth's Gods, whether Norse, Greek or Egyptian.  They reach the council and Davey bows and scrapes. Supreme says he's just here because he's curious.

The Gods say that if he wishes to know the ways of things he truly needs to see the Creator.  It asks Supreme to get on his hands and it will deliver him there. Davey says goodbye, and Supreme is lifted up to a tunnel and walks foward to see...

Hail to the King baby!

... Jack Kirby's big giant head.  He tells Supreme to call him "King" and then asks what he wants.  Supreme asks what he is.  Kirby tells him about the world of ideas, and Supreme says he has access to a realm called "idea space" and Kirby says the name should be punchier like "the psychoverse" or the "cognitive zone".  But he calls it home. He used to commute here when he worked everyday.  He farmed ideaspace for produce, "they call us Imagineers".

Back then he was a part-timer in the World of Ideas but now he's a full time resident.  He physically died but that doesn't matter.

Kirby: "It ain't the physical stuff that's important.  It don't last, you know what I'm sayin'?  What's important is the idea of a thing.  See, all we are is ideas."

When Supreme queries thing, Kirby says that the ideas people have about you and the ideas we have about ourselves well what else makes a personal identity.

Supreme asks if being in Ideaspace limits him in any way.  Kirby says that actually he's free and not limited by a body with pens, brushes and hands, "it all slows you down."  Even on a good day he could only manage maybe nine or ten pages.  Subtle jibe at the Image creatives whose worke suffered from hugely slipped scehdules, including this very comic.

Now he is in the world of ideas they can just pour out of his mind.  Supreme asks what he's doing in his world.  Kirby says he spent a lot of time in worlds like his, he likes the excitement, magic and costumes in them.  So he's come on a quick holiday.  Supreme thinks he can do no harm where he is.  Kirby then calls him a "Wylie" and when Supreme doesn't understand, he says that it's after a guy called "Phil Wylie" who wrote a book called "Gladiator" which introduced the whole Superman archetype, which is Supreme.

The mists starts to cover Kirby up as he says he never created a Wylie, although he handled a few.  He starts thinking up an idea that there were two words, one good, one evil.  And then they have a war.  Supreme says that's unlikely in his world.  As the mists finally claim Kirby he says that he'll never know what might yet happen in his world.  Then the whole area disappears leaving Supreme back outside on the edge of the misty valley.

Supreme flies back home and has dinner with Diana while still in Supreme gear and she teases him, saying she's seeing another guy at work, a nerdy guy called Ethan.  She then discusses the comic they have put together with her trip to the Supremancy working well with Omniman.  She thinks this will be a pivotal issue.  She teases him again saying she thinks this Ethan might be gay, because he's not laid a finger on her. Grinning Supreme looks at the comic and she asks if the Supremes of the Supremacy won't mind me basing this issue on them will they?  He says of course not, "I mean how could a comic book affect the Supremacy?"  And he holds her close saying "now about this gay thing..." And that brings this volume to a close.

And we end on a page of shitty Liefeld art.  How appropriate somehow.

There is of course the infamous issue #63. The next script was written but never drawn until a few years ago.  The numbering returned to what it would be if The Return had been numbered normally. This was meant to kick off a new run of Supreme but it stumbled and fell pretty much straight away.  I do own #63 but I am so bored of Supreme and I have quite a lot to say about it that I shall cover it at a later date, probably when I do a round up of some of his one--shots. Anyway with that all done, once again this was a real chore to get through.  The artwork is downright distressing in places and gives the series no real consistent look.  The flashback stuff once again is good stuff by Rick Veitch, but otherwise it's just a mess.  And it also makes me wonder again just who these comics were aimed at.  The younger "90's kids" would probably think the retro bits are stupid and lame, while older readers would be put off by the atrocious Liefeldian art in the rest of the comic.  The epic stretched out release sechdule couldn't have helped and as I said in the intro Moore had moved on leaving Image and Awesome comics, which finally died before Moore's run could conclude, far behind. The tribute to Jack Kirby is touching though, I do like the idea he lives on imagining strange new worlds and populating them with hereoes and villains on a whim.  Some nice Kirbyesque drawing from Veitch as well.  So that was Alan Moore's last published work for Image (apart from #63), work he probably felt he'd left far behind.  Typical of his work for Image, there is always a feeling of barely hidden contempt for the audience in this mainstream stuff, mostly I think born of frustration, that to keep food on the table he had to work in the mainstream again to fund his passion projects From Hell and Lost Girls which struggled to find indie comics that lasted long enough to run the whole storylines. This isn't quite the last of his Image work, there are a couple of minseries I am hunting down on Amazon which will likely appear on here later in the year.  But Supreme is indicative of Moore's attitude, he started strong with The Story Of The Year arc, then didn't quite know what to do next.  So it looked like he was setting up for another "revision" so the next writer could reinvent the character how they wanted. But back then this is all we got.  Mediocre.

Alan Moore Obscurities: Supreme - The Return (#53-56, The Return #1-6) PART ONE

"By the Merciful Magellanic Cloud, what's happened to everything?" - Supreme

Let's kick off the new year with a two part look at the second compilation volume of Alan Moore's time writing the Rob Liefeld Superman expy Supreme while also working for Liefeld's Awesome comics label.  Or was he?  The first twelve Supreme issues I covered in my look at The Story Of The Year told a tight overall story while turning Liefelds psycho Superman into a old skool Superman pastiche with various aspects of Golden and Silver Age Superman being explored.  Now it's no secret that Liefeld's company was in some financial trouble by then, and Moore had some scathing things to say about Liefeld's management at the time.  Which might explain why these ten issues have a more chaotic feel to them. The first four concluded the main Supreme series, then the second six which were published when Moore had long ago left to work for ABC comics became Supreme: The Return.  I get the feeling when I read this volume that Moore, who usually has such firm control of how his stories would look just faxed them the scripts and went back to drawing up his plans for the ABC comicverse, I have no evidence but it sure feels that way. The issues also had lateness problems, the first in this volume is dated 1997, three years later we get the final issues of The Return, three years to produce ten comics, tsk tsk.  All-in-all behind the scenes was something of a clusterfuck for example there are eight pencillers and six inkers credited across these ten issues, including Rob Liefeld himself, but are the stories still worth reading?  Let's find out first with the final four issues of Supreme's original run and  the first issue of The Return, because the story started in #53 concludes in The Return #1. And in a few days time the rest of the issues making up The Return.

We find out after the defeat of his arch-enemy Darius Dax that Supreme has spent his time fixing up the Citadel for a while.  He also has the aged comatose body of Judy Jordan, the woman who Dax took over so he could live on past his first death from cancer.  Supreme is trying to find a way to retrieve her original personality which Dax overwrote with his own.

Suprema, his sister, comes and tells him he is needed in the "Hell of Mirrors" where he had placed writer Billy Friday after he became a huge bulk of limbs from his exposure to Supremium.  He's actually back to normal now, and the other villains contained in the mirrors are demanding he be taken away.

Suprema: "They're really anxious to get rid of him.  Apparently he's been asking them questions about their childhoods and motivations."

They let Supreme retrieve Billy from the Hell of Mirrors without incident although Supreme feels a bit sorry for him because he'd been through such a lot recently.  When he leaves the mirrorworld, he hysterically demands they send him back to get his laptop, but Supreme and Suprema gently lead him away. Supreme decide to send him to an expert in "super-power breakdowns" and Billy ends up at the "Miskatonic Mental Institution" under the care of the Batman expy.  By the way, Billy Friday is almost certainly a parody of arch-enemy Grant Morrison who made his name with the Batman graphic novel "Arkham Asylum".  Tee flippin' hee.

We return to Supreme who is in his civilian disguise as mild-mannered comicbook artist Ethan Crane telling all this to his writer Diana Dane, although she doesn't know he is Supreme.  Diana then pulls out what should have been an issue of "Omniman" but somehow it's turned into a comic about Supreme.  Ethan starts to panic saying it could reveal all Supreme's secrets and they must stop it going to press.

Supreme meets Omniman.

As he runs, he takes off his suit and turns into Supreme, he arrives at Dazzle comics and his editor is as suprised as he is to see the comic has changed. But when Supreme says they must run the original Omniman plates, the supposedly fictional Omniman appears and says he couldn't allow anything to compromise his secret identity.

Supreme says he can't be real, but Omniman says that Supreme is the comic book character.  Supreme says it's a mistake, "I'm not some made-up fantasy hero".  Omniman insults him so an annoyed Supreme suggest they fight it out and Omniman delivers a huge punch which smashes Supreme through the walls and into the pavement.

Diana has just arrived.  Supreme says she should stay out of the way, but she says she's the Omniman expert and she knows all about the powers Supreme doesn't have like "Omni-ventriloquism, Omni-exhalation".   This distracts Supreme and he takes another hit from Omniman's super-breath.  Oniman asks if he's had enough and is ready to crawl back into his comic?  Supreme say he know's Omniman isn't evil, "you're just badly written" and he punches him.

Diana and the editor watch as Supreme and Omniman duke it out.  The editor say with the industry the way it is this is the last thing they need.  As the fighting pair crash back into the offices, an assisstant editor called Carl Chambers arrives and asks if they are their models.  When told they are real he exclaims:

Carl: "Boy, that's incredible.  I never realised... I mean, I always thought the artwork on these character's anatomy was ludicrous, but they're actually built like that!"

Very droll Alan.  Anyway suddenly Omniman grins at Supreme and says he's given a "tremendous performance" and he transforms into a super-deformed version of Supreme, he is actually the imp "Szazs" who says he's now a "shoo-in at the Impolympics!"

Szazs.

Szasz explains that the Impolympics is a competition between each super-hero's personal imp antagonist, "there is only really one event, and that's to see who can come out with the most irrational and pointless stunt." He thought up the Omniman routine for his opener and now he's going for gold to reward all the patient weeks he spent in "nuisance training." He grows to huge size as Supreme flies Diana to a safe place.  He then flies up and tells Szazs to cut it out.

Supreme: "Earth's changed since the sixties!  Nobody finds this kind of stuff funny or appealing any more!"

Take that, the nineties! Szazs shriks back to his normal size, then transforms the sky into a reflection of the city.  Supreme tells him people will go crazy trying to navigate the mirror-sky.

He then flies down to Diane and she tells him if he still has the Supreme comicbook he can flip to the end and find out how he defeats Szazs.  Supreme reads it nothing that even this moment is in it now.  He defeats Szasz with a "logical proposition".  Szaz flies down to see what Supreme is up to.

Supreme tells him that Szazs can only exist in prime-numbered dimensions and that logically they are actually here in the fourth-dimension not the third because time is the fourth dimension.  And as four is not a prime number, Szazs shouldn't be able to exist here.  Szazs starts fading away:

Szazs: "No! It can't be!  You're disproving my existance with a syllogism supreme!  I'm becoming completely... unbelievable..."

And he pops out of existance and the city returns to normal.  Supreme still has the comic, but he says Szaz always leaves a souvenir of his visits and the real comic is back as Omniman again.

Moore can do postmodernism too!

We then cut to him at the Citadel, finishing off telling his story to the android and member of Youngblood, Diehard (who also starred in the Prophet reboot I covered on this blog).  This then leads into a discussion of the murder of one of the team by another and the trial they are going to have. This was covered in the Moore penned miniseries "Judgement Day" also covered by me, ages ago.

As they walk through the Citadel, Diehard comments that whatever comic book he's in has "turned pretty grim recently" and he'd like to close the covers and begin a whole new chapter (which I believe is reference to Moore's aborted run on Youngblood).

Supreme: "Look on the bright side.  We've both been in this business long enough to know that no era lasts forever... even a dark one!"

Diehard agrees and says it's no use worrying about what might happen, the future has already been written right? Supreme says that it might not have been written but it's definitely being advertised.  And that brings this chapter to an end.

The next chapter starts with a poem about Judy Jordan which recaps her story which was told in The Story Of The Year.  We see how wrapped up she was in her love of Supreme and weeping when she reads he's leaving Earth for a while.  Left aging and lonely she recieves a book from Supreme's arch-enemy Darius Dax who infused his conciousness into dust and when she opens the book the dust takes her over and she is left paralysed on the kitchen floor as Dax slowly takes her over, and she dies...

... but then she wakes from the blackness and see's Supreme looking down at her.  We then see that he's resurrected her mind and put it in a new and young looking robot body. Actually it's one of his Supreme robots, "S-1".  He tells her she looks wonderful.  She is completely bewildered.  She says one minute she was dying on the kitchen floor and now she alive and twenty-five years younger, "oh god! What's happened...?"

Chris Sprouse didn't draw this issue, Rick Veitch did and OMG Rick I know you can do better than this!

Supreme's super-dog Radar tells her what happened to her, and if she checks the room next door she'll discover it was true.  And she looks, seeing her comatose body in its seventies.  Radar says it's been thirty years since she opened the book and it's now 1997.  Radar say that Supreme found echos of her in her aged body once Dax was gone from it.  He rebuilt her mind like an electric jigsaw puzzle. Also, "he thought you might prefer a younger, friskier body" so now she's a Suprematon.

He tells her that her body is the most advanced robot there is and only S-1 is close to it.  She's now strong, fast and almost indestructible.  Judy says this isn't what she wanted, she wanted to be Supreme's wife.  He can't love her as either a robot or an old woman, so "what point does my existance have?"  Radar says Supreme couldn't bear to see her "consigned to oblivion".  Tearfully she ask to be left alone, she needs to have time to think.

Later we see Radar and S-1 discovering she has gone.  She has also taken the hero costume from an exhibit and we see her clad in it and flying over the city.  She flies to where Suprema is saying she is "Super-Judy" and starts dealing with the emergency Suprema was dealing with. Suprema objects saying Judy has no training as a superhero.  Judy just sneers that she's afraid of the competition.

But she almost allows a passing plane be hit by the space debris, so Suprema yells at her saying she doesn't "have what it takes as a cheesecake champion!"  Judy says super-heroing is her new career.  They bitch at each other about their costumes and when Suprema tells her the Suprematons are disposable an angered Judy punches her right in the face.

Dat ass.

Judy says she should pack up and go, Omegaopolis has a new "dame defender".  Suprema is pissed about her costume getting messed up and does a flying smash into Judy's stomach.  She flies them both up to the moon so they can fight without wrecking the city and they really go at each other until Judy is rendered unconcious and a regretful Suprema takes her back to the Citadel.

S-1 and Suprema bring Judy back round and Judy apologises for lashing out at Suprema, "I just felt so frustrated and angry is all."  Suprema realises her pain is also being caused by not being able to be loved by Supreme in return and she gets mad at Supreme for not taking that into account. Supreme himself appears saying he needs to face up to that.

He and Judy go and sit in the roofgarden.  He apologises for not being there when she woke up, he was dealing with a rogue comet. He tells her that the body she has is more than just a robot, but she snaps "what' the point of giving me life if you can't give me love?"  He says he thought he did what was right.  She hugs him saying he always does that and she isn't really angry at him just the ridiculous situation she's now in.

They walk through the Citadel and Supreme says he still loves her, but circumstances are different now, she still has the same personality just not the same organic body.  Then S-1 approaches them and Judy says to let him speak because he seems different from the other Suprematons.  S-1 says he is different, his mind is an exact digital copy of Supremes and he alone amongst his fellows knows independent conciousness.

He then says that for a great many years he has loved Judy and now would "know no greater happiness than if you would consent to be my wife".  Supreme wonders if he is lapsing into the robot madness again which he had while Supreme was in space and recreated all Supreme's family and friends on the Citadel.  S-1 tells Judy this and that when Supreme reprogrammed him he didn't remove his love for those people.  Supreme says he doesn't understand, but Judy does and looks at S-1 with a curious expression on her face, then she asks Supreme to leave them and as he turns away they kiss.

We then get an epilogue.  Supreme is now Ethan again and is telling this story to Diana and Carl.  S-1 took the name "Talos" from the metal man of Greek legend and Judy made him a new costume  They married in the Citadel stadium, "Suprema was maid of honour.  Radar was Best Dog".  Diana wants to know what happened next.  Supreme lent them his deep space vessel and learned from it's log when it returned unmanned a week later.

This was the last we heard of them.  Still it's sweet all the same.

He doesn't know how physical their relationship was, but maybe androids have "more options for mutual pleasure and communium than us organic beings."  Eventually they found an uninhabited planet and they have started building a civilisation there, populated by their "digital children".  They are going to call they planet "Suprematonia".

Back in the office Carl says it's taking him a while to adjust to all this casual talk of superhero antics.  And Billy Friday has contacted them from Miskatonic Asylum still anxious about his laptop communicator.  Diana says he's still in trauma.  Ethan just mulls over the fact that at least they know somebody far away got a happy ending, and we finish on an image of Talos and Judy kissing on their new world.

The next chapter begins with Ethan waking up and putting on his Supreme outfit which ominously has the Confederate flag's starry blue cross on it.  Then he puts on his civilian clothes and sets off for work.  The bus stop is labelled "Whites Only" and when he arrives at Dazzle comics, Carl (who is black) is mopping floors.  Ethan asks Carl if he thinks things are a bit odd around the city today.

Carl speaks in a thick accent that he knows nothing and wants no trouble.  Ethan asks him if this is some sort of joke, but then Diana arrives and has looks like a Southern Belle with accent to match.  She orders Carl to get back to work and when the editor arrives turns out she's married to him.  She says to him that Ethan is acting peculiarly, "talkin' with coloureds an' everythin'!"

This really jolts Ethan, he asks if this is really Dazzle comics and that they all work on Omniman.  The editor says he's been drinking, Ethan draws their most famous character, "Klansman". Ethan reads it in horror then leaves, turning into Supreme as he does so.  He heads for the Citadel as someone points to him and calls him "The Supremacist."

Hah as if America would ever tolerate being ruled by a racist elected along a right wing populist agenda.  The very idea!

He arrives to find the place looks different and he is greeted by a stereotypical black servant, "Ro-Boy, R-1". Supreme finds everything is nightmarish because his hall of exhibits covers adventures he never remenbers happening. He decides to check what's going on from outside time, and heads for "The League of Infinity's Time Tower" (the League are an expy of DC's Legion of Superheroes).

However the Time Tower is shattered.   The various members are standing of different pieces and Supreme is told that one of the League has betrayed the "oath of infinity".  He's altered time and history has collapsed upon itself.  They remember the old history, but are unsure why Supreme still does.  He wonders if it's because he has gone through a reordering of history during his trip to the Supremacy in the first chapter of The Story Of The Year. Turns out the member who changed history was Wild Bill Hickok who changed who won the American Civil War.   When Supreme asks how and why, Future Woman tells him to get comfortable and she'll tell him the full story.

Wild Bill was born in 1837 and fought for the north during the war.  When it was over he settled down as the Marshal of Abilene.  He actually got along with the Texan cowboys who fought for the Confederates and they respected him. He had a crush on a woman called Jessie Hazel, a  dance-hall girl. Unfortunately so did the co-owner of the tavern she danced in, Phil Coe who hated Bill as did the other tavern owner Ben Thomson.  A feud that started over a petty event.

With Hickok and Coe in love with the same woman, "something had to give".  One night Hickok accused Coe of cheating at cards.  There was an explosion of violence, and Coe was killed as was one of Hickok's deputies.  This made something inside Hickok snap, "he went berserk and drove all the cowboys out of Abeline that very night".

And this didn't win him his love.  Hazel called him another "damn Yankee" who'd humiliated her people.  He still tried to court her, over the next four years he grew more desperate and unbalanced.  With his access to the Time Tower as one of its "most trusted founders" he decided to prove to Jessie Hazel he loved the South as much as she did.

Those captions were impossible to read unless I scanned and brightened them. Grumble.

He went forward in time and took plans for a crude nuclear bomb and then went down to the time of the Civil War and gave those plans to the Confederates.  They built it and smuggled it into Washington in a covered wagon.  Using a primitive radio crystal transmitter General Lee triggered the explosion himself, "the unconditional surrender of the Union forces followed the next day."

We return to the destroyed Time Tower and Supreme is aghast at what happened, slavery is still legal and Atlanta is the capital of the USA. Future Woman says they have to do something, Supreme ask what can they do.  Then a goth looking woman called Witch Woman says that they must repair the rend in time before Wild Bill "worked his mischief." They must cut the thread to stop the rip in time ever started.

Future Woman realises she means they should kill Wid Bill.  They take a vote and it carries, so Supreme flies Future Woman with him to Wild Bill's time of the tower.  As they fly down Supreme says he has a no-kill policy but his gut is telling him Witch Woman is right.  Future Woman says that it would save so much tragedy but they must make sure they kill the right one.

They find two doors one for each strand of his life, Future Woman identifies the correct door which is the North dominated one in 1876 and Witch Woman conjures up some period specific clothes for them and the other members of the League who have come with them. As they walk out into Abeline, they begin to remember how Wild Bill originally died, shot because he had his back to the saloon door.  Maybe they are here to provide the reason why a hyper-cautious man like Bill would drop his guard like that.

Witch Woman makes Future Woman look like Jessie Hazel, she walks in and says to Wild Bill that she loves him.  He gets up and smiles at her and one of the League (who looks a lot like young Wild Bill) shoots him in the back. They rush back to the Time Tower which is now mended and Supreme's costume is back to normal.  They head up to the League's 24th Century headquarters and see there is a memorial statue of Wild Bill is there.  Future Woman says they all have statues, even members who haven't joined yet.

Time is repaired, all is well.

Supreme bids them farewell and heads back to 1997. He arrives back at Dazzle Comics as Ethan.  Diana tells him that Bill is still bugging them about the laptop communicator he left in Supreme's mirror prison.  Carl orders them to get back to work and Diana says he treats them like slaves, which gets her a strange look from Ethan.  This chapter ends inside the Hell of Mirrors and Billy's laptop communicator is discovered by the villains in there.

Inside the Citadel two Suprematon's are doing some monitoring of what everyone is up to in the various rooms of the place.  Then they see the "Televillain" and chase after him saying he should be imprisoned inside the Hell of Mirrors.  The Televillain then disappears through a TV monitor.  The two Suprematons figure out that he must be involved in a jail-break and we cut to them both smashed to bits by the rest of the villians now freed from the mirror prison.

While Shadow Supreme tramples all over the androids wrecked bodies, "Korgo" who is a viking-esque villain says it's good to be free again. Other villains emerge, including "Sentinel", the murderer from Judgement Day who just flies off.  A female one called "Slaver Ant" says she'd like to go and find some children for servants.  But for now she'll hang out with Televillain and they both find the "Prism-World of Amalynth" and then they find a big crystal next to it and Televillain cackles and tells Slaver Ant to fetch the others, "tell them it's showtime."

Shadow Supreme, Korgo, Televillain and Slaver Ant.

Round at Ethan's place, Diana is there helping him with his reference files.  Diana asks if he has any life outside of drawing Omniman.  She turns on the TV saying he should watch Friends.  She describes it to him while he starts watching.  Suddenly the Televillain appears on the screen and interacts with the actors... magically somehow because it's not broadcast live is it?

Televillain: "I'm here to deliver a message to the networks.  Basically, I get a million dollars, or I kill your ratings...like this".

Then he shoots Monica execution style then says if they don't pay up tomorrow or he whacks "Commander Picard and the fruity robot guy."  Hey now, Picard is a Captain and Data is an android not a robot.  Destroy crappy sitcoms as much as you like but hands off Star Trek: The Next Generation!

Ethan calls up Youngblood HQ to ask if his sister Sally (ie: Suprema) is still there.  But he is told she has gone to meet Radar at the Citadel.  As Ethan leaves, the TV announces that the cast of Friends are all OK and just as puzzled as everyone else regarding the interruption.  Ethan heads out saying he has to warn Supreme about the Televillain.

The Televillain returns to the Citadel where he picks up the large crystal, he, Slaver Ant, Korgo and the lionheaded "Vor-Em" leave Shadow Supreme hunting down and destroying Suprematon and head back to Earth.  Meanwhile Suprema has returned to the Citadel and calls out for Ethan.  But she comes face to Shadow Supreme standing by Radar's corpse, "by the way... I killed your dog... eventually".  Suprema is horrified and says "oh my God."

A genuinely horrible moment.

Shadow Supreme snarls that god is dead, his god was Darius Dax and she and Supreme destroyed him.  He punches her round the room saying that when he and Korgo rule the Earth she can be their concubine and they'll share her.   But then Supreme appears and lays into Shadow Supreme saying, "leave... my... sister... alone" punctuating his words with punches.

With Shadow Supreme knocked back down to Earth, Suprema says she'll deal with the rest if Supreme handles the Shadow Supreme.  He decides to review their cases to see how they came to be in the Hell of Mirrors, which he built in 1954, in the first places.  And that sends us into a flashback drawn in the Silver Age style.

He is showing Judy's nephew and niece around the Citadel and takes them into the Hell of Mirrors.  In there are villains who are too evil to keep anywhere else.  The glass is special, it's a barrier of hard light between here and another world.  He discovered the glass in 1954 when he investigated the disappearance of a professor called Daniel Dodgson.

He found out that the old mirror in his study could be walked through into another dimension which was like that described in "Alice Through The Looking Glass."  The professor was a descendent of Lewis Carroll, real name Charles Dodgson.  He rescued the professor from the Jabberwock and took him home.  Then he was given the mirror and was abl to duplicate the glass and have it open in a different area of the same realm, and that's how he constructed the mirror prison.

Our one flashback this time.

The first he imprisoned was the space tyrant Korgo.  Then Vor-Em a freelance executioner hired by Darius Dax to kill him. Then he trapped the Shadow Supreme and the Televillain and more recently Optilux a being made from light who he isn't sure the prison will hold.  Finally he caught Slaver Ant who stole children to rear as servants.  He has imprisoned Supremium Man II but he tricked his way out. Also Emerpus the reverse Supreme tred to "un-jail" the mirror villains, but he and Suprema stopped him.

The boy asks wouldn't it be safer to execute all these villains but Supreme says it goes against his sworn oath not to kill.  The girl then finishes this flashback with a groanworthy pun saying that the villains are in "no better place for them to reflect upon their crimes."

Back in the present Supreme says Optilux did escape, (see The Story Of The Year) but the rest had stayed put until today.  Shadow Supreme is rampaging down below, so Supreme goes down to face him while Suprema goes putting out the fires he's started then she'll go deal with the rest.  They others are tough, but nowhere near as powerful as Shadow Supreme.

She finishes dealing with the fire and finds Televillain sitting on a TV aerial.   She asks him where the others are. He tells her Korgo and Vor-Em decided to go to Washington and Slaver Ant is off looking for children to enslaves.   He also tells Suprema that he's set up a guest act in Omegaopolis stadium, and he points down to a shining blue figure standing on the stage inviting everyone to become light.  It's Optilux.

Optilux.

And that brought the first run of Supreme to a close with a cliffhanger.  Over ONE YEAR LATER the story was finally resolved not in issue #57 but in a new series called Supreme The Return. So we continue this story with issue #1.

Korgo has arrived at The White House and has demanded that the President - a this point in time it was Bill Clinton - come face him.  So Bill and Hilary go to meet him as we see a smoking heap of what was Presidential security behind him and Vor-Em.  Korgo demands that Bill face him in a fight issued under the "Formal Rules Of The Cosmic Dictators Guild".

Bill tells him that the President doesn't engage in brawls on the White House lawn.  "What's the matter? Scared?" taunts Korgo. Bill blusters at him and Korgo mocks him further saying he's going to cry and run and tell his mother. This makes Bill mad and after more taunting, he lays a punch on Korgo's face.  This doesn't hurt Korgo who then knocks Bill out with one strike and he declares himself America's 43rd President.  He then declares Hilary his wife number one and demands she make his supper then "have yourself perfumed and brought to my chamber.  We have a new Dark Age to celebrate". 

Satire for the Liefeld generation.

Meanwhile Supreme is still battling the Shadow Supreme, Supreme thinks to himself that they are too evenly matched and at this rate they'll be fighting forever.   He suddenly flies away only to do a fast U-turn and smash back down into Shadow Supreme and driving them both through Earth's crust.  He then uses the Earth's core magnetic field to hold him and flies back up to aid Suprema against the rest of the super-villains.

Meanwhile we see Slaver Ant using her chemical scents to turn loving parents against each other and in the process make off with their babies.  She notes Suprema hasn't appeared yet.  Suprema is tied up trying to figure out how to defeat Optilux, a being made entirely of light.  She thinks to herself that the audience is rather badly dressed but then has an idea, she sucks up the adhesive glitter the audience members were wearing and blows it at Optilux where it starts to break his signal up.

This causes Optilux to drop the "photo-plasmic convertor" he was holding and it has just enough mass for Suprema to pick up, he demands she give it back but she fires it at him and blasts him back into Amylynth.  Supreme arrives and she says that she sent him back there but not before he'd sent "a few hundred Bon Jovi fans there as well".  Uh... was Bon Jovi still a thing in the late nineties?  If they were I don't think they'd be  appealing to the youth anymore.  Supreme responds "Oh well. Can't be helped".  Heh.  Heh heh heh heh, nice one grandad.

He asks if Televillain is still around and Suprema points him out nearby, asking if she should send him to the prism world too?  Supreme says no, they shouldn't burden that place with too many nuisances.  He then uses an electric charge to zap the Televillain and fry his circuits so he can't "network" any more.  Then a crowd spot him as the person who shot Monica and they start beating him up. Suprema says they can leave him with his new friends for now, "nobody told him it was going to be this way..."  Alan.  STOP IT NOW.

Suddenly the Shadow Supreme burst up through the ground. Suprema tells Supreme that he killed Radar, but suddenly Radar appears:

Radar: "When a dog is mad, mistress, you must pay no attention to its bark. You must be merciful... and put it to sleep."

Supreme says that Shadow Supreme must have wrecked a Suprematon Decoy and lied about it to demoralise them. Well no one told the colorist as we saw an awful lot of blood round "Radar's" body.  Still I'm glad Radar isn't really dead.

Go get him Radar!

Shadow Supreme says he will kill Radar for real now but Radar says he knows that he relies on Supreme's no-kill policy to keep him safe.  But he is a dog and then he launches himself at Shadow Supreme and starts mauling him.  A somewhat shocked Supreme calls him off, an injured Shadow Supreme flies off and Supreme tells Radar to follow him while they deal with Slaver Ant.

Then they see a news report on a TV in a TV shop.  In a hastily convened press conference by "First Lady, Ms. Hilary Rodham Space-Tyrant" she says that there are many positive aspects to Korgo's new administration including the new president's "radical views on health care."  When asked about Korgo's record of scouring entire galaxies leaving no survivors she accuses the media of being too downbeat and that there won't be any more "bimbo scandals" surfacing.

The TV also reports a spate of child abductions which galvanises the pair into going to look for Slaver Ant.  Turns out she's pretty easy to find using their super "scent-supreme" which detected her formic acid.  And they recapture her without a fight.

Meanwhile Radar has chased Shadow Supreme to the White House, he arrives and whines to Vor-Em that he's hurt.  Vor-Em says he is Vice President now and too important for this.  But then he sees Radar and decides to help Shadow Supreme. Then Supreme drops Slaver Ant in-between them, Shadow Supreme and Vor-Em both crash into her and pick up her aggression causing scent and begin fighting each other instead.

Vor-Em and Shadow Supreme go at it.

As they battle, Supreme tells Radar that Suprema is busy reuniting the kidnapped babies with their families and then "scraping up what's left of Televillain".  He says only Korgo is left to deal with, but he surrenders to Supreme willingly.  Under his breath he asks Supreme to make his capture look convincing:

Korgo: "Just make this look good, all right?  Then put me back in the mirror.. anywhere away from that woman!  Gods, I thought I was ruthless!"

Alan, are you a time travelling Donald Trump supporter? So Supreme complies and lays him out with one punch.  He tells Hilary that Korgo is defeated and it was a wise choice playing along but she can rejoin the real President now. "Huh? Oh, him.  Yeah, sure.  Whatever" she responds. In the background Radar is dragging an unconcious Shadow Supreme up to the Citadel while Supreme picks up the similarly KO'ed Vor-Em and Korgo.  And that brings that plotline to an end.  Bet the people who waited over a year for that were pleased.

If I can describe my journey through these five issues as anything it would be increasingly as a chore written while looking longingly at my Xbox One.  The tone is all over the place and much of the humour is derived from rather hypocritically denouncing the very Image-led movement Moore had been a part of.  For all his spiteful stabs at Grant Morrison, Morrison spent the nineties working on exactly what he wanted to work on within the mainstream and indeed his mid-nineties reboot of the JLA went a long way to signalling that the Dark Age of comics was going to be coming to an end combining as it did a retro feel feel with a modern outlook.  The rest of the humour in this veers from actually pretty funny to stuff that makes you groan like when your dad makes a joke. The more whimsical stuff about contrasting the modern era of comics with the Silver and Golden Age is pretty much gone now, with only one flashback this time.  And the art, oh my lack of God it's bad. Chris Sprouse did four of these issues and I have no doubt he was most likely tailoring his preferred style to appeal to what was perceived to be the style Liefeld's readership wanted.  Compared with his work on Tom Strong which is beautiful stuff it's clear who is to blame for this and it's not him, and not really inker Al Gordon's either as he inked Tom Strong as well so all-in-all I blame Rob Liefeld for this crappy art even though he had nothing physically to do with it.  I have no excuse for the Rick Veitch issue as he inked it too and isn't known for pandering to an audience, a dreadful lapse there. As I said in the intro, considering the chaotic circumstances at Awesome comics and matching the release dates with the artists implies that issue #1 of The Return was written and arted on time but for some reason sat on and slipped out over a year later under a rebooted title.  Even though it was the conclusion to what became the final issue of the first series.  Crazy. I think it's fairly obvious as well that once The Story Of The Year arc was concluded Moore didn't have a clear idea of where to go next with the series, and we'll see how things pan out in the final five issues of Moore's run on Supreme in a few days time.