Superboy

5 years ago - When Superman is killed by Doomsday, Cadmus labs accelerates it's attempts to clone him, secretly using Lex Luthor's cloning technology. The Clone reacts to it's rapid growth & learning programs and escapes their custody, severing his ability to ever age. He takes the name Superman for himself, although everyone calls him Superboy. He assists in the fight against Hank Henshaw & Mongul. After Superman returns, He relocates to Hawaii, where he fights Nanaue & Caitlyn Snow.

4 years ago - Superboy joins Young Justice, where he meets Cassie Sandsmark. He begins to develop a relationship with Clark Kent.

3 years ago - Connor has a crush on Traci Thirteen after she helps him in Hawaii. He is recruited by Cyborg into the new Teen Titans. When Superman opens up to him about his identity, Superboy takes the name Connor Kent, and moves to Smallville to stay with Jonathan & Martha Kent, where he meets Kara Zor-El. Superman introduces him to 10-year-old Krypto, who comes to stay with him in Smallville.

1 year ago - Connor joins all the surviving Titans on the homeworld of the Titans of Myth to save Donna Troy. He and Cassie Sandsmark begin their relationship.

now - Connor & the Teen Titans fight Hank Henshaw, who kills him before he is stopped. His remains are sealed in a tomb on Mars. He later returns, having been rejuvenated in the future and sent back by Brainiac 5, now able to age. He recovers his own body and entombs it within the Phantom Zone.

2995 - Connor Kent's body is recovered from the Phantom Zone by Querl Dox. He is revived, and re-engineered to allow him to age. After some time with the Legion of Super-Heroes, Querl manages to align his temporal technology to send him back.

There is a lot to unpack with Superboy, both because of the massive influence the original incarnation of Superboy exerts on the history of Superman's history specifically and DC in general, but also because the modern character's depiction over the course of his existence is such a perfect microcosm of the evolution of the company over that period. He was introduced in a burst of creative nonsense during the nineties, and then grew into a far more nuanced character into the early aughts before he became a casualty of a company-wide crossover, doing irreparable damage to his regular series. There have been several attempts to recapture his appeal in the comics, but currently the best depiction of the character is in a wildly popular animated series that was canceled over poor toy sales, only to be brought back thanks to massive fan demand, but only viewable on DC's standalone streaming service. If that isn't a perfect encapsulation of the state of DC's characters, I don't know what it is.

(Fun fact; apparently, Geoff Johns pitched the idea that Superboy's human parent was Lex Luthor back when he was Richard Donner's assistant and was laughed down... which is funny because he went on to have so much editorial power in DC he could make Lex Luthor EVERYONE'S father and no one can stop him.)

Superboy's Comic History

The original character that went by the name Superboy first debuted in 1944, a deliberate attempt to expand the brand of the then 5-year-old character Superman to appeal to young readers after the concept of child superheros had proven successful thanks to the introduction of Robin. He first appeared in More Fun Comics # 101 before becoming a feature in Adventure Comics with issue #103, and then went on to headline the anthology book for over 200 issues. He was then given his own series in 1949 (only the sixth character in DC's history to get one), and was the very first new superhero comic to succeed after World War II. Superboy would go on to achieve massive success until the even more successful Legion of Superheroes took over the book in 1977.

It's easy to forget how substantial a chunk of time that is. For more than 25 years, the Superman brand was essentially an even split between Kal-el's adult and childhood adventures. A huge amount of what we now consider Superman canon was actually established in the world of Smallville.

Superman's entire mythology was started over from scratch by John Byrne in 1986 after the Crisis of Infinite Earths. In the new story, Clark never had any superheroic adventures until adulthood, meaning the entire concept of a "superboy" was now non-canon. It was during the events of the Death of Superman arc when we were introduced to four new characters all with a claim to Superman's Legacy, that we met the character that would eventually be called Superboy in The Adventures of Superman #500, created by Karl Kesel.

The real innovation in this version of Superboy was to make him SUCH a product of the times. He was 90s-era youthful and edgy to the point of self-parody, but somehow there was enough self-awareness that, when he earned his own series in 1994, it's infusion of fun and humor allowed the character to carve his own place into the Superman mythology. He became a founding member of Young Justice, where he was integral to the whimsy that became that series trademark. The relationships forged in that series delivered more mature and exciting stories when the majority of those characters went on to become the new Teen Titans in Geoff Johns series. Over these years the clone Superboy developed a strained but fascinating relationship with Clark, moving to Smallville to live with Ma & Pa Kent, earning both a Kryptonian name (Kon-El) and a human name (Connor Kent). He evolved from a brash hothead to a character upon which huge story arcs could be carried.

Eventually, Connor was killed in the pages of Teen Titans during the Infinite Crisis. Rumors at the time suggested that he was actually a replacement for Dick Grayson, who was slated to be killed before a last-minute editorial pivot. It's actually pretty common for popular members of the Teen Titans to suffer because of editorial decree in a way that legitimately seems poisonous to the brand, something that continues to this day. In any case, the death of Connor reverberated through the Teen Titans series and in many ways the book never really recovered. He eventually returned, but by that point the series was steeped in deaths and lineup redesigns.

Connor was redesigned during the new 52, but that take on the Titans was fairly quickly retconned out of existence. He's apparently about to return to his classic 90's era appearance in the pages of the new Brian Michael Bendis Young Justice series, even though the incredibly popular animated Young Justice series put so much of it's narrative weight on the shoulder of the classic Teen Titans concept for the character. Connor remains one of the best examples of an incredibly popular character that, for whatever reason, DC just struggles to depict successfully in it's own comics.

Our Superboy Story

We should first establish that we are skipping over the original concept for Superboy. Despite the pre-crisis history of the idea; it makes so much more sense for Clark to have started his career in Metropolis rather than to have ever worn his costume as a teenager.

The concept of the clone Superboy might have been a part of a pretty wild 90s era plot explosion, but his existence actually resolves and expands so many concepts in Superman's mythology. The first almost seems incidental, but he's the ultimate payoff of the well-trod story that Lex Luthor is trying to clone Superman. Bizarro is such a well-established villain that he absolutely has to be included, so the reveal of a human-hybrid clone using part of Lex's DNA feels like that same story coming full circle.

Second, the existence of the clone Superboy allows us to actually fulfill a very fraught issue when you're building a timeline; we get to actually have Connor join the Legion of Superheroes in the 30th century. We work REALLY hard not to use time travel or to bring characters back from the dead, but the idea of there being a Superboy on the Legion is such a fundamental part of the bedrock of DC's mythology, it was worth the effort to make it happen here.

Connor's actual story is actually a weirdly short one, because he truthfully only came into existence a scant five years ago. Like the other Titans of his era, we have to pack a lot of content into a relatively short time, but in his case it's a little easier because his history is delineated so thoroughly by the different eras of his publication.

His story begins with the death and return of Superman, when his original characterization is so prominent, followed by his time living in Hawaii. This is quickly followed by his time with Young Justice, and then with the Titans, each era giving us a new and more evolved version of the character. This eventually leads to his time living in Smallville with the Kents, (our timeline allows him to briefly live there with Kara before she leaves for college, giving him a temporary big sister, which is awesome). It's during this era when Connor is killed, allowing for our Legion of Superheroes arc. Rather than have him die during another Crisis, we imagined that Hank Henshaw would make an excellent threat for him to battle, given how tied the two characters are.

Cassie & Connor

One of the things that makes us so hesitant to have character die and come back with the same frequency that they do in the comics (other than the fact that that's just poor writing), is the damage it can do to the larger narrative. Connor's death did irreparable damage to the Teen Titans book, but perhaps ever worse, it left his girlfriend Cassie almost unrecognizable and very hard to read.

The relationship between these two characters was absolutely delightful to watch evolve. They started out as young teens with crushes in 1998, and both grew in leaps and bounds as people and young heroes together. By the time they spend their first night together in Teen Titans Annual #1 in 2006 they felt like young adults who had EARNED their relationship. When Connor died in what amounted to the very next month, Cassie's entire characterization essentially devolved.

If we're going to include this in our story, it becomes vital that both Connor and Cassie are allowed to continue to grow together through his absence and return. This should be something that strengthens them both as individuals AND as a couple, just like all the other challenges they've faced together.

Superboy's Costume

I'm just going to go on record and say that I absolutely love Connor's 90s era costume. I even love the way it evolved in the pages of Young Justice, adding what you might call a Deep Space Nine Jacket. I think this should absolutely be canon.

But of course, it's really hard to argue with the decision to depict Connor's personal growth by eventually having him lose that look in favor of one of the most delightfully understated costume redesigns ever, putting him in just a simple black t-shirt and jeans with the Superman symbol. Who knows where this idea came from (my guess is Titans penciler Mike McKone), but it's utterly brilliant and I'm sure played a huge role in the evolution of the character. I'm a fan of the way the animated Young Justice series finds ways to subtly evolve the look over time, adding gloves or a jacket, and I think that it's a great way to show him continuing to grow. The future of the character may require him to adapt some sort of more deliberate costume (like maybe this cool online fanart?) , but at this point in his history this is absolutely who he is.

Superboy's Future

When we leave off our timeline, Connor has recently returned from his adventure in the 30th century, and has now developed the ability to age properly. This is obviously going to be a huge new era for the character as for the first time we may start to see him looking more to his own future. Superman, of course, is currently off planet, but very shortly he will return and be dedicating himself to raising his son, which means that Supergirl will be stepping up to fill his shoes, but this also means that Connor may have a stronger sense that some time in the future, he might just need to step into the shoes of his mentor.

Of course, his time with the Titans will end soon as well, when a new group of kids will step up, and Connor and his friends will return to the name Young Justice. I don't necessarily think that Connor is going to trade in his jeans for a pair of tights right away, but I do think that at this point, it's only a matter of time before he decides to stop going by the name Superboy and perhaps finally embrace his legacy. Clark's son will, at some point in the future, want to use the name Superboy, and when that happens it may just be time for someone else to become Superman.

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