It’s fun to look at science fiction from decades past that try to predict what the future might be like when we’re past that point and can see how far off those predictions were. Take these stories from the early 1980s that present their imaginings of the year 2020. Remember 2020? Remember how we had flying cities that could travel through space? Remember how in 2020 we had air-cars that attuned to the owner’s bio-rhythms? Remember how in 2020 there were all those Nazis?

Aw, dammit. Why did that have to be the one that was right?

“The Debut of Superman III” and “The Destruction of New Metropolis”

SUMMARY

Issues: Superman #354, December, 1980 and #355, January, 1981

Yes, the year is 2020, and a dual-purpose ceremony is happening that will mark a new period of human history. First, it’s the official opening of New Metropolis, a self-sustaining domed city that can fly and that humanity will use to settle on other planets. Second, it is intended to be the public reveal of Superman III to the world!

Superman III is none other than eager young Kalel Kent, son of Superman II and grandson of the original. To this point his existence had been kept secret, while he was being trained by his predecessors, and naturally he looks exactly like they did, except that he doesn’t yet have the S symbol on his chest.

But while Kal is on his way to the ceremony he encounters a crashing spaceship and he steps in to help, doing so without revealing himself to the ship, because he doesn’t want to spoil the reveal. But what Kal doesn’t know is that his existence is already well-known to a nefarious group called the Purists, who are watching his every move through those magic sci-fi kinds of televisions that can just follow a target everywhere somehow.

The Purists intend to destroy New Metropolis and make humanity hate the Supermen. The Purists lure Kal into a trap, into a cage that is being bombarded with Mega-Energy. What is Mega-Energy? Well, whatever it is it makes the cage so powerful that Kal can’t get out easily. But actually, the Purists want him to escape, because they’ve set a bomb in New Metropolis that will be triggered by his arrival at the ceremony, and with the Supermen as the only survivors, the Purists believe humanity will turn on them.

Naturally, the Purists underestimated their foe. Even trapped in a sound-proof environment, he was able to feel the vibrations on the outside of the cage with his hand and learn of the bomb. He let out a supersonic whistle to get the attention of the Supermen on New Metropolis and then pounded on the cage in Morse code to let them know the baddies’ plan. Three generations of Superman save the day, round up the Purists, and Kal gets to the ceremony where he is given his S.

SUPERMAN VS BIGOTS

The Purists take all sorts of inspiration from Nazis, from their militaristic suits to that swastika-inspired insignia. They even have a hand symbol only one finger away from a Heil. And their rhetoric is all talk about the evils of race-mixing and miscegenation. The Purists hate the idea of humanity spreading to other worlds because it will mean more chances for humanity and aliens to get it on, and that just sickens them. These days it is a pretty common element of Superman stories that someone (usually Lex) will take offence at the alien immigrant coming to Earth and interfering with human affairs, but it was not nearly as common back then. Personally I always like reminders of Clark’s immigrant status, as it is a connection to his creators and it gives him all the more chances to face off against bigots. I mean, Superman doesn’t need personal reasons to face off against bigots, but if he does have such a reason I can hope the message is all the clearer to the children reading.

The aspect of this story that I am not as crazy about is the Superman family bloodline thing. I always lean more to the idea of Superman as an aspirational figure. I like the Superman who carves “Do good unto others and every man can be a Superman” into celestial bodies more than the one who jealously guards his power because not everyone is worthy of it. Superman comics tend to vacillate between those two views (the Silver Age is filled with both), and I just think that the idea of this one genetically superior bloodline that is the House of El, who go on to be the protectors of Earth appeals much less to me than the Superman family that is filled with people like John Henry Irons or Kristen Wells or whomever, united by cause not blood.

Still, if Superman 2020 was going to fight these guys on a regular basis (and he does face them again in a later appearance), I could get behind him for a while at least.

STRAY THOUGHTS

• There’s a bit at the start of the story where Kal fakes his own death to kill his civilian identity. His plan, going into superheroing, is to create multiple new identities that he can use as he pleases. I have to wonder what makes him think juggling more secret identities would improve any Superman’s life.
• For the record, we don’t actually know who Kal’s grandmother is. They do something common in flash-forwards of this era where they don’t reveal who Clark married, so that the stories set in the present don’t have to pretend his marrying Lois is a foregone conclusion. Clark’s wife appears only in one panel here, looking away from us. We do see Superman II’s wife, but of course she is nobody we know.
• It’s interesting to see New Metropolis as a domed city under a bubble. Granted, it’s a full-sized city, but with the Bottle City of Kandor playing a prominent role in the tragic backstory of Krypton, it’s unexpected to see this city under glass as a symbol of the hopeful future of humanity.
• Beneath the flying city, the Eastern Seaboard has merged, Mega City One-style, into an urban sprawl called Megalopolis. Unlike Dredd’s little hometown, Megalopolis still seems to have a decent amount of green space still. It might not even be so bad living there, which is nice.

• But what we see of the Earth outside Megalopolis is bleak. Most of the continent seems to be dominated by “pollution prairies” which certainly suggest that two generations of Supermen didn’t do this planet as much good as you might have hoped.