Superman #659
Writer: Kurt Busiek & Fabian Nicieza
Artists: Peter Vale & Jesus Merino
After a few months between apocalyptic Superman stories, Busiek teams up with Fabian Nicieza to bring us a nice single issue story. Here, we find Superman contemplating how he affects the Earth after Arion told him he will help destroy it in the last issue. The issue is a recollection of Superman of his early days in Metropolis about a woman who was inspired by him to clean up her neighborhood. Some of you may not want to get this book reading that it's not continuing the story, but I urge you to keep reading. Superman saves this devout Christian woman from being hit by a car, and she sees him as an angel. A few days later, this woman sees an act of violence and prays for a angel to stop it. Naturally, Superman arrives and stops the violence, and after a few more times, this woman thinks she can "summon" Superman. Supes realizes what she is doing, so to keep her from getting hurt he tunes his ears to her whispering prayers. Which each time Superman shows, the woman gets bolder, enough to actually hunt down and instigate situations in her slum of a neighborhood. Things go bad when Superman can't get there in time. Rather than teaching the old woman a lesson, she teaches Superman a lesson, that his acts of good bring people up and inspire them so do good themselves, that he affects more lives than he thinks he does. It's a touching story, in the same way that Busiek's first story on the book "On Our Special Day" was. It's a good read and worth picking up.
Rather than getting an issue with Carlos Pacheco, he gets an issue to breathe, and we get some great guest pencils from Peter Vale. The first and last pages look like Pacheco drew them, but the flashback is a different art style. If Peter Vale channeled Pacheco for the pages that are happening in the present he did a good job. The imitation adds to the story in that we see Superman currently looking back on his past, so a younger-different looking Superman makes sense. Superman is remembering, and memory is always a little blurry, so it's cool that Supes looks a little different. Vale's biggest strength is his handling of the old woman. She looks very firm in her beliefs, in her faith, and in Superman. Her facial expressions and posture are drawn well enough that we can all recognize someone we know in this woman. Rather than skip this issue because it's a fill-in, pick it up because it's a fill-in. It is a good break from the story we have been reading and will sastisfy your emptiness from Civil War's conclusion. B
