Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Everyone say good-bye to Superman's red trunks. It is the end of an era.

Just look at those trunks, people. Those terrific, red trunks that were the source of so many people snickering.



After 73 years of freaking out the squares, come this evening, Superman is storing his underwear on the inside.

This here picture above is a "turn-around" by comics artist Jose Luis Garcia Lopez, a personal favorite of mine. They use these to show characters from all sides for reference for artists.
One aspect of the DC Relaunch is that Superman is getting a costume that won't be the source of jokes, thanks to those red undies.  It likely also is being done to combat the potential effects of a lawsuit by the Siegel estate, which could claim they own the original look of shorts and belt over blue.

As a reminder, as of midnight, Superman is supposed to look like this:


In time, I guess I'll get used to it, though I have a hard time believing it will be the permanent solution once a new regime comes to DC. And I really, really don't know how this works with their massive licensing group where most of DC's real money is made.

Anyway, we hate to think we cannot deal with change, so we're embracing the new uniform on our Man of Steel.  But we just can't quite let it go...


5 comments:

Jake Shore said...

I guess I'll get used to the new one. I like the old one, but you can only wear your underwear on the outside for so long.

I too am a fan of Joe Luis Garcia Lopez's rendering of Superman. His art kinda defined DC in the 80s for me. I have this great double-sided poster drawn by him, of Superman doing a Clark Kent in a phone booth on one side, and taking off on the other. I found it at some little shop in Seattle about 13 years ago. It's now framed in my son's room.

It's the closest thing to a Superman collector's item I have, along with a Randy Bowen Superman.

The League said...

I guess I was... 26 or 27 before I finally figured out who JLGL was, or at least the name of the guy who did all the licensed art for DC that I thought was awesome. He did a couple of issues of "Batman: Confidential" a few years back, a King Tut themed thing, and the story is mostly above average, but the art is as good as you'd think it would be.

It sounds like those are two top-notch collectors items, if you're going to have any Superman collectibles. I don't have any Randy Bowen Superman stuff, and I sure wish I did.

RHPT said...

What's up with the collar?

The League said...

Jim Lee is what is up with that collar.

Anonymous said...

Collars are cool. Pop that collar Supes, it's what all the bros do.

All he needs now is some Affliction tshirts for casual Clark wear. Some Adidas sliders and Abercrombie shorts.

-NTT