''The Superman Family'' was an
American comic book series published by
DC Comics
DC Comics, Inc. (doing business as DC) is an American comic book publisher and the flagship unit of DC Entertainment, a subsidiary of Warner Bros. Discovery.
DC Comics is one of the largest and oldest American comic book companies, with thei ...
from 1974 to 1982 featuring
supporting characters in the ''Superman'' comics. The term "Superman Family" is often used to refer to the extended cast of characters of comics books associated with Superman. A similarly titled series, ''Superman Family Adventures'', was published in 2012.
Publication history
''The Superman Family'' was an amalgamation of the titles ''
Superman's Girl Friend, Lois Lane
''Superman's Girl Friend, Lois Lane'' is an American comic book series published monthly by DC Comics. The series focusing on the adventures of Lois Lane began publication with a March/April 1958 cover date and ended its run in September/October 1 ...
'', ''
Superman's Pal Jimmy Olsen
''Superman's Pal Jimmy Olsen'' is an American comic book series published by DC Comics from September–October 1954 until March 1974, spanning a total of 163 issues. Featuring the adventures of Superman supporting character Jimmy Olsen, it co ...
'', and ''
Supergirl
Supergirl is the name of several fictional superheroines appearing in American comic books published by DC Comics. The original, current, and most well known Supergirl is Kara Zor-El, the cousin of superhero Superman. The character made her fir ...
''. The first issue, #164, took its numbering from ''Jimmy Olsen'', which had reached issue #163 and thus had the most issues published.
''Lois Lane'' ended at #137, while the newly launched ''Supergirl'' book had only made it to #9 at the time. A 10th and final issue of ''Supergirl'' was published five months after ''Superman Family's'' launch.
''The Superman Family'' went through two distinct phases. In its inception the three leads
Jimmy Olsen
Jimmy Olsen is a fictional character appearing in American comic books published by DC Comics. Olsen is most often portrayed as a young photojournalist working for the ''Daily Planet''. He is close friends with Lois Lane and Clark Kent, and has ...
,
Lois Lane
Lois Lane is a fictional character appearing in American comic books published by DC Comics. Created by writer Jerry Siegel and artist Joe Shuster, she first appeared in ''Action Comics'' #1 (June 1938). Lois is an award-winning journalist for ...
, and
Supergirl
Supergirl is the name of several fictional superheroines appearing in American comic books published by DC Comics. The original, current, and most well known Supergirl is Kara Zor-El, the cousin of superhero Superman. The character made her fir ...
rotated new stories each issue with reprints for the other characters. The first six issues (#164–169) of the series were in the
100 Page Super Spectacular format and
Nick Cardy
Nicholas Viscardi (October 20, 1920 – November 3, 2013), known professionally as Nick Cardy and Nick Cardi, was an American comics artist best known for his DC Comics work on Aquaman, the Teen Titans and other major characters. Cardy was induct ...
was the cover artist. Changes were made in the setting of Supergirl's adventures during the character's run in the title. She moves to Florida to join the faculty at the New Athens Experimental School in issue #165. In an "imaginary tale" set in a possible future in issue #200, Supergirl, now known as Super''woman'', is depicted as being the
Governor of Florida
A governor is an administrative leader and head of a polity or political region, ranking under the head of state and in some cases, such as governors-general, as the head of state's official representative. Depending on the type of political ...
in her secret identity of Linda Danvers. She leaves Florida and relocates to New York City to become a soap opera actress in issue #208.
After the cancellation of ''
Super-Team Family'', a Supergirl/
Doom Patrol
Doom Patrol is a superhero team from DC Comics. The original Doom Patrol first appeared in ''My Greatest Adventure'' #80 (June 1963), and was created by writers Arnold Drake and Bob Haney, along with artist Bruno Premiani. Doom Patrol has appe ...
team-up originally scheduled to appear in that title was published in ''The Superman Family'' #191–193. Supergirl battled the
Enchantress in issues #204–205 and teamed with the
Legion of Super-Heroes in issue #207.
''The Superman Family'' became the first DC Comics series in the 80-page
Dollar Comic format, consisting of 64 pages of new stories, beginning with issue #182 (March–April 1977). With that issue, the "framing element" was removed from the covers, and the book switched to printing all-new material. It became a monthly series in 1981, starting with issue #207.
Featured series
*''
Lois Lane
Lois Lane is a fictional character appearing in American comic books published by DC Comics. Created by writer Jerry Siegel and artist Joe Shuster, she first appeared in ''Action Comics'' #1 (June 1938). Lois is an award-winning journalist for ...
''—The adventures of Lois Lane, where she regularly battled criminals. (#166, #169, #172, #175, #178, #181–222)
*''
Supergirl
Supergirl is the name of several fictional superheroines appearing in American comic books published by DC Comics. The original, current, and most well known Supergirl is Kara Zor-El, the cousin of superhero Superman. The character made her fir ...
''—The adventures of Supergirl. (#165, #168, #171, #174, #177, #180, #182–222)
*''
Jimmy Olsen
Jimmy Olsen is a fictional character appearing in American comic books published by DC Comics. Olsen is most often portrayed as a young photojournalist working for the ''Daily Planet''. He is close friends with Lois Lane and Clark Kent, and has ...
''—The adventures of Jimmy Olsen. (#164, #167, #170, #173, #176, #179, #182–222)
*''
Superboy
Superboy is the name of several fictional superheroes appearing in American comicbooks published by DC Comics. These characters have been featured in several eponymous comic series, in addition to ''Adventure Comics'' and other series featuring ...
''—The adventures of the
Earth-One
Earth-One (also Earth-1) is a name given to two fictional universes (The Pre-Crisis and Post-Crisis versions of the same universe) that have appeared in American comic book stories published by DC Comics. The first Earth-One was given its name in ...
Superman as a teenage superhero. This series continued from ''
Adventure Comics'' #458 and led to the feature leaving the title for its own in 1980, ''
The New Adventures of Superboy''. (#182, #191–198)
*''The Private Life of Clark Kent''—The adventures of
Clark Kent in which he used his powers and skills without becoming Superman. This feature had moved over from ''
Superman'' after issue #328 of that series.
(#182, #191–197, #199-215) After the cancellation of ''The Superman Family'', it returned to ''Superman'' for two more appearances in issues #371 and 373.
*''Mr. and Mrs. Superman''—The adventures of the
Earth-Two Superman and his wife, Lois Lane Kent. This feature was moved from the comic book ''Superman'' after issue #329.
(#195–196, #198–199, #201–222)
*''
Krypto
Krypto, also known as Krypto the Superdog, is a fictional superhero dog appearing in American comic books published by DC Comics, commonly in association with the character Superman. In most continuities, Krypto is Superman's pet dog, usually dep ...
''—the adventures of Superman's dog with the aid of detective Ed Lacy. (#182–192)
*''
Nightwing and
Flamebird''—the adventures of the second Nightwing and Flamebird team of heroes (Van-Zee and Ak-Var) in the bottle city of Kandor. (#183–194)
DC published several other ''... Family'' titles concurrently with ''The Superman Family''. These included ''
Batman Family'' (1975–78), ''Super-Team Family'' (1975–78) and ''
Tarzan Family'' (1975–76). As a rule, DC's other ''... Family'' titles contained mostly reprints and featured a higher page count and higher price than DC's other titles.
With issue #222 (September 1982), ''The Superman Family'' was canceled and replaced with ''The Daring New Adventures of Supergirl'', which briefly featured a "Lois Lane" backup series.
''Superman Family Adventures''
In 2012, DC launched a new series titled ''Superman Family Adventures''
written by
Art Baltazar
Arthee "Art" Baltazar (born 1968) is an American comics artist and writer who currently works for DC Comics.
Career
Art Baltazar started making comic books with his self-published comic book, ''The Cray-Baby Adventures''. Since then he has crea ...
and
Franco Aureliani
Franco Aureliani is an American comic book writer/artist, best known for writing the DC Comics series '' Tiny Titans'', for which he won two Eisner Awards in 2009 and 2011. ''Tiny Titans'' also won a Harvey award in 2011. He was also nominated for ...
and drawn by Baltazar. Baltazar and Aureliani are the winners of the 2011
Eisner Award in the category "Best Publication for Kids" for their work on the ''
Tiny Titans'' title for DC.
Fuzzy the Krypto Mouse, a character who appeared in a single story in ''
Superboy
Superboy is the name of several fictional superheroes appearing in American comicbooks published by DC Comics. These characters have been featured in several eponymous comic series, in addition to ''Adventure Comics'' and other series featuring ...
'' #65 (June 1958), inspired a similar character created by Baltazar for ''Superman Family Adventures''. ''Superman Family Adventures'' ended with issue #12.
Collected editions
*''
Showcase Presents
''Showcase Presents'' was a line of black-and-white paperback books published by DC Comics (from 2005 - 2016) at an average rate of two per month. Much like Marvel Comics' ''Essential Marvel'' volumes, each book usually included over 500 pages of r ...
: Batgirl Vol. 1'' includes the Supergirl story from ''The Superman Family'' #171, 520 pages, July 2007,
*''Superman: The Amazing Transformations of Jimmy Olsen'' includes the Jimmy Olsen story from ''The Superman Family'' #173, 192 pages, July 2007,
* ''Superman: The Adventures of Nightwing and Flamebird'' collects the Jimmy Olsen story from ''The Superman Family'' #173 and the Nightwing and Flamebird stories from ''The Superman Family'' #183–194, 144 pages, October 2009,
* ''Superman: The World of Krypton'' includes the ''World of Krypton'' story from ''The Superman Family'' #182, 240 pages, March 2008,
* ''Deadman Book Three'' includes the Lois Lane story from ''The Superman Family'' #183, 176 pages, December 2012,
* ''Superman: Bottle City of Kandor'' includes the Nightwing and Flamebird story from ''The Superman Family'' #194, 200 pages, October 2007,
References
External links
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Superman Family
1974 comics debuts
1982 comics endings
2012 comics debuts
2013 comics endings
Comics anthologies
Comics by Gerry Conway
Comics by Marv Wolfman
Comics by Paul Kupperberg
Comics by Paul Levitz
Comics by Roy Thomas
Defunct American comics
Superhero comics
Superman titles
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