Books : Showcase Presents: Superman Family, Vol. 1

In association with Amazon.com

Rating:

- Excellent collection at a good price
Normally, I prefer the color Archive editions of old DC comics, but I can see the sense in issuing these particular stories stories in black and white. Jimmy Olsen is fun to read but I would not want to be paying $50 for a hardcover collection of a few issues. So in this case it does make sense. And the reading lasts a long time. I have the Green Arrow Showcase and I read a story or two a day and it still takes weeks.

I would like to make a note about the previous review which said that there should be more characters in this collection, other than Jimmy Olsen. There WILL be a lot more Lois Lane in the next one because what DC is doing in the Superman Family Showcase is collecting the comics of Jimmy Olsen and Lois Lane in chronological order. The Jimmy Olsen comic book series predated the Lois Lane comic books by a few years. They start with Jimmy Olsen #1 and work their way up issue by issue, month by month. So, that's why, near the end of the volume, when they reach the latter part of 1957, her individual comic issues began to appear, and that is where they start including her titles. The second volume of this should be about half Lois and half Jimmy stories but it will be determined by the dates the original comic books came out.

Rating:

- Jimmy Olsen tales with a little Lois Lane thrown in
The title "Superman Family" might lead one to expect this book to have stories divided evenly among the Silver Age Superman's supporting cast. This is not so. The book is 95% Jimmy Olsen stories, with but 1 Lois Lane-centered book reprinted, plus a 1944 Lois solo story. Don't get me wrong, it's still great fun Silver Age cheese, but people looking for more than Jimmy Olsen tales will be disappointed.

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