Happy Birthday, Krypto

Today marks the 71st anniversary of the first appearance of Krypto the Superdog in Adventure Comics 210.  

Krypto appeared 17 years or so after Superman first appeared and 10 years after we'd been introduced to Superboy - tales of Superman when he was a boy.  In short, Superman had been around, had a radio show and had been on television for three years by the time Krypto appeared in a Superboy story.

Until Krypto appeared, four years before Supergirl, Superboy had been really the only survivor or Krypton.  And was his first real, direct connection to not just his home planet, but his actual parents and home.

While Krypto was shown to be an untrained pest (shades of 2025's Superman movie), he was also a Kryptonian.  

His story in this comic was that he was the El family dog who had been sent by Jor-El in a test rocket that got knocked off course and lost in space until the events of this issue, Superboy arriving on Earth and becoming a teen in the interim.

Kids like a dog, Krypto was popular, and Mort Weisinger bit.  Krypto returned to become a mainstay of the Silver Age Superboy comics, only occasionally appearing in Superman stories, the idea being Krypto f'd off to space at some point and Superboy couldn't be bothered to find him, I guess.  It was easier than saying "Krypto went to live on a farm upstate".  

There have been multiple iterations of Krypto over the decades - Crisis on Infinite Earths and the Byrne directive for there to be no other Kryptonians other than Superman (that outstayed its usefulness), the New 52, cartoons, and a feature film all have Krypto slightly different takes.  I'd argue modern Superman writers *still* don't really know how to write in Krypto, which is odd to me.  Surely someone has a dog?  And aren't dogs a huge part of your life if you have one?

Krypto appeared in a Superboy Cartoon in the 1960's, and received his own show around 2005.  

He's been in the comics on and off since 2000, originally a weird alien replica of a Kryptonian in a story I won't get into - then, subsequent writers forgot that was the case and he was just plain 'ol Krypto complete with Silver Age origin.

During the New 52, DC decided looking like a pittie/ lab mix was not edgy enough, and he was made into a sort of Dire Wolf sort of dog?

That was kind of silly, relatively, and it didn't last.  

With Rebirth, Krypto was paired with young Jon Kent.

But for reasons I won't go into - that ended.  Which is too bad.  It was a really nice take, and I think people loved the Kent-Lane's as a family unit with a dog.

Meanwhile, Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson voiced a full, live-action, and-way-better-than-you'd-think movie version of Krypto in League of Super-Pets, a movie fully ignored because of its release during the covid lockdown.

But it's a good movie!  Sincerely! (I have a poster Stuart nabbed me - not this one - and it's a treasured item.)

Sometimes in the comics Krypto is depicted as partially Kara's.  I think it worked great for Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow.  I miss Streaky in a way, but Krypto hanging with Kara works, too.

Oddly, that seems to be the take their going with for the DCSU.   And that's fine!  I think they managed to give Superman some depth just caring about Kara's dog the way he did.  We all have affection for family members' pets.  

Anyway, the world is now more aware of Krypto than probably any time in the past 70 years.  

Fun fact, it was super cheap to get vanity plates when I lived in Arizona.  For a couple of years, my Subaru had plates that read "KRYPTO" and I had a big Superman sticker on the rear window.  Because I'm a @#$%ing nerd, but it was fun.  

Only once did I see someone in my rearview mirror laughing and pointing to the sticker and the license plate.  

My basic take as a Superman fan is that if you don't like Krypto, you can go to hell you're missing out on part of what has made Superman what the character and his world is over the decades.  There's so much history, mythology and fun in Krypto - and his inclusion was when I knew James Gunn really got Superman in a way almost no one else coming to the character in film has done/ been willing to do.  We were going to go into Superman with no apologies and unafraid of how awesome he really is.

Now, it's a different take.  Krypto is usually given the mannerisms more or a lab, or every-dog.  But I kind of love what they've done with our guy in the movie.

Here's to years to come for our super-guy.