Superman: The One Who Fell by Phillip Kennedy Johnson

Superman: The One Who Fell Reviews

• 
  Sam Quixote

  Superman’s son Jon is back from being part of the Legion of Super-Heroes in the future and is by his father’s side as Superboy - but, oh no, Superman can suddenly be hurt somehow (and not Jon)! Jon realises he must soon take his father’s place as the new Superman when his dad becomes… The One Who Fell!
  
  Bendis’ reign of boredom on Superman is thankfully over but because I read so little of it I’m not sure if Superman’s contrived vulnerability was set up during his run or whether it’s a premise new writer Philip Kennedy Johnson has come up with. Either way, this ain’t a very good Superman comic.
  
  Both stories are sooooo uninspired. In story #1, Superman and Jon punch insectoid aliens in space. In story #2, Superman and Jon travel to an alien world to punch other insectoid aliens. Woah… so imaginative… And, as if to emphasise further the book’s forgettable mediocrity, there’s Phil Hester and Scott Godlewski’s wholly unremarkable meh art.
  
  I did like some of the father/son material here - about how Jon realises his dad is not the god he once thought he was, is becoming vulnerable, and isn’t long for the world. It’s poignant, sweet and is going to be relatable to a great many readers. The only thing that undermines this decent writing and fine sentiment is knowing that the father in this instance is SUPERMAN, ie. the dude who’s famously died before and come back, and, despite all this table-setting for the next Death of Superman storyline and Jon becoming the new Superman for a while, it’s all pointless because Superman - the real Superman - will come back and become Superman again, like Superman always Superman. Superman.
  
  So yeah, even though Bendis’ generic, underwhelming run on Superman is over, his replacement - who wrote the most generic fantasy book at DC called The Last God and wrote a generic Aliens book at Marvel - is (unfortunately but not unsurprisingly) writing still more generic, underwhelming Superman comics. Don’t expect much with Superman: The One Who Fell, if you’re gonna read it, because you’re not being offered much.
• 
  Chad

  A filler volume while we wait for PKJ to send Superman into space over in Action Comics while Jon will take over Superman. Two separate stories of Superman and Superboy teaming up to fight aliens. The stories are kind of basic. They are more character studies of the father and son. Anyway, they are fine but completely skippable.
• 
  Subham

  This one was so good omg!
  
  So this one tells the story of Clark and Jon teaming up as they go to the planet "Thakkram" and there they meet Clark's old buddies Faaldr and Qarath-O-Daanim's son "Baakis" and we learn how Clark and Faldr and Daanim defeated these beings called "Shadowbreeds" and learn of the planets culture and the relation between Father and son and well its quite twisted but its fun and then seeing the return of the latter villains and well what has happened here and the possession and all that and seeing how father and son team up to defeat these beings and save the planet!
  
  This is so well written and sure the big threat of the villains is there but I love the way its more like a letter from a father to his son and we learn of how Parents feel when their children grow up and the golden age ends and what-not and how it may impact their children and well them too and through this story PKJ fleshes out both the relationships and I love the way its written, a son who don't think anyone can take his father's legacy and then there is the father who loves his son so much and its just amazing and will make you love both of them and well make you emotional by the end of it, stories like these are why we love Superman and well! <3!
• 
  Chris Lemmerman

  This is mostly a precursor to the Superman: Son of Kal-El series, a bit of a placeholder finale arc of Superman while PKJ's Warworld arc kicks into high gear over in Action Comics.
  
  It's a tale of fathers and sons, both Clark and Jon and the two aliens that they visit to try and save. The themes are well-presented if a little on the nose, and it shows the passing of the baton between Clark and Jon nicely enough. The actual plot isn't entirely compelling, but it works as a vehicle for the character arcs more than anything else.
  
  The artwork begins with Phil Hester, before transitioning to Scott Godlewski. If nothing else has come from Brian Bendis' tenure at DC, it's putting Godlewski in the spotlight - he's a very solid, reliable artist and I'm glad to see him sticking around.
  
  Nothing massively essential, but it's worth a little look. It does more with the Superman/Superboy pairing than Bendis did in his entire run on Superman despite being the one responsible for the age up, so that's definitely a selling point.
• 
  Robert

  Entirely adequate "Father and Son" story featuring Clark and Jon having a run in with some aliens that have a quite different perspective on parenting.
  
  
• 
  James DeSantis

  This felt like a big filler arc.
  
  Well written, focusing on Jon and Clark's relationship. It's not bad at all but feels...like kind of moving in slow motion. This was obviously written to be the buffer between Bendis and Tom Taylor's Superman. It does let Phillip write Clark in a inspirational way, which I loved, and soon Phillip will take over action comics completely and have Clark go into space for awhile. So this is kind of a goodbye in a way for Clark and Jon but mostly in Jon's perspective.
  
  I personally enjoy this arc even if it didn't blow me away. The two different art styles are kind of jarring but they work in their own unique way. Not a bad arc by any means, and helps flush out both characters, but it didn't blow me away.
  
  A 3 out of 5.
• 
  Molly™☺

  55% | C | Good
  
  "How many battles will it take before everyone gets a day like this one"
  
  

  Clark and Jon team up as the ultimate father and son duo to save some species and kick some arse

  
  
  This isn't inherently bad, I just got bored...There is a huge focus on parenthood and the dynamic of father/son which, whilst executed fairly well, don't personally connect with me, at least not yet. There's a short lived section of Clark, Lois and Jon playing golf that serves as a nice break to the non-stop action, but aside from that, you're in for a lot of punching, flying and general Kryptonian shenanigans. Are you missing out on anything if you skip this? No. Is it a waste of time to read this? Also no. It's a strange middle point where it's worth a look, but also not something you'll be rushing to tell your friends about.
• 
  Adam Fisher

  3.5 Stars. Better art would have pushed this to a 4.
  Wrapping up the stories in Superman and Action Comics before the restart, this volume of Superman is all about legacy and passing things onto Jon (which doesn't officially happen here, but I assume at the beginning of the next Volume).
  Highlights:
  - STAR Labs has created a portal in their space research lab (actually in orbit around Earth) that opens to a dimension full of monsters. Clark and Jon are able to fight off the beasts, when they make it through the portal, but Clark is getting very hurt. With Jon getting more and more nervous, his father confronts him and finds out Jon's 31st Century knowledge tells him that today is the day Clark will die. Jon isn't ready to let him go, and ascends to new levels of power and saves Clark. But what does this mean for the future?
  - Clark gets a distress call from Qarath O Daanim of Thakkram, an alien friend he teamed up with to defeat a great beast plaguing their planet. When he and Jon arrive there, they find out that Qarath has been dead for a while. There is a mystery to this, but they ultimately find out that a parasite in controlling the people. Obviously our Supermen save the day.
  
  Overall, I liked this Volume more than I thought I would. With my son being 18 and having to go through these "becoming an adult" changes that are talked about in the Volume, it probably hit more on an emotional level for me.
  Recommend.
  
  Looking forward to seeing Jon embrace his new role!
• 
  Gbolahan

  Meh.
  
  Father son bonding snooze I've seen this before your parents are not perfect yada yada yada.
  
  Art all over the place, insects being punched, more insects just because.
  
  Woulda given it 2 stars, but, hey, it's Clark Kent.
• 
  Robbs

  [3.75/5]
  I get it. I understand how this can feel like a filler arc before Phillip Kennedy Jonson's Action Comics run and Tom Taylor's Son Kal El but that doesn't mean it's bad. Like what a lot of other reviewers have said, it is a character study on Clark and Jon. But I liked it, the whole father/son dynamic and not feeling like you're able to fit into your parent's shoes was good. Overall, this was a very enjoyable story.
• 
  Ming

  Thankfully self-contained arc that's quite lovely
• 
  Joseph Domingo

  [2.75/5]
  
  This books was fine. Nothing really special about it but nothing ultra bad about it either.
• 
  CzasoStrefa

  Clark Kent i jego pierworodny wyruszają w kosmos, by wspomóc mieszkańców odległej planety. W tym celu muszą stawić czoło pasożytniczej istocie mającej wpływ na umysły swoich ofiar. Czy ojciec i syn stworzą zgraną drużynę?
  Scenariusz napisał nominowany do Nagrody Eisnera Phillip Kennedy Johnson. Rysunki stworzyli zaś Scott Godlewski i Phil Hester. Album zawiera materiały opublikowane w amerykańskich zeszytach Superman #29–32 oraz Action Comic #1029.
  
  Okładka prezentuje się dość urokliwie.
  
  Scenariuszowo komiks aspiruje do bycia czymś więcej niż pospolitą historyjką o superbohaterach. Te są też zazwyczaj przeładowane akcją. Tutaj, choć fabuła zahacza o starcie z najeźdźcą i szeroko pojęte ratowanie świata, to cała historia jest w gruncie rzeczy kameralna i skupia się raczej na relacji ojca z jego jedynym dzieckiem. Akcja nie gra tu więc pierwszych skrzypiec, aczkolwiek misja, której podejmują się protagoniści, pozwala im się do siebie zbliżyć i spojrzeć na pewne rzeczy z innej perspektywy.
  
  Superman, żywa legenda, jest świadkiem dojrzewania Jona, swojego potomka, który podobnie jak ojciec, chce zostać superbohaterem i ratować ludzi przed niebezpieczeństwem. Świadomość upływającego czasu, obserwowanie, w jakim tempie twoja pociecha się zmienia i przestaje wymagać opieki, zwykle prowadzi do zaznania strachu większego niż kiedykolwiek wcześniej. Jeszcze większą obawą napełnia Cię widok dziecka, które zmaga się samo ze sobą. Co ciekawe, Clark faktycznie odczuwa pewien lęk, a różne wspomnienia budzą w nim melancholię. Mężczyzna jednak od początku akceptuje stan rzeczy i angażuje syna do różnych zadań. Jednocześnie pokłada w nim niezłomną wiarę, nawet jeśli chłopak sam w siebie nie wierzy.
  
  
  Jon natomiast otrzymuje szansę, aby rozwinąć skrzydła, co udaje mu się częściowo dzięki predyspozycjom, jakie posiada. Prawda jest jednak taka, że te być może nigdy nie zdołałyby osiągnąć pełnego potencjału, gdyby nie wsparcie, jakie otrzymał od rodzica, którego od małego tak bardzo podziwiał. To dzięki tacie może pokonać swój strach, odeprzeć atak i wreszcie poznać własną wartość. Idolem Jona jest tata, idolem jego taty jest zaś Jon. Ich relacja to kwintesencja tej historii. Przypomina nam, jak ważne jest wsparcie ze strony ojca.
  
  Cała recenzja na CzasoStrefa pl
• 
  Clay Bartel

  As a general rule I always perfer Action Comics over Superman.
  
  AC generally tells the bigger ongoing story for Superman and the Superman title tells smaller more episodic one off stories.
  
  In this trade we get to stories. The Golden Age (4 stars), the better of the two stories and The One Who Fell (2 stars) the much weaker of the two stories.
  
  Both stories involve the alien race and the second a symbiotic black goo parasite that controls said race.
  
  The art over all is bit simplistic for about half the stories. And the story itself is hard to care about because the alien race, the Thakkramites is a race of aliens we just don't care about.
  
  Honestly maybe I had to high expectations for Philip Kenndy Johnson because he's received a lot of praise for his Action Comics work as of late.
  
  Ultimately The One Who Fell is just to generic and short sited for me to care about and nothing new is brought into the Superman world.
  
  Honestly Bendis has many volumes far superior to this and I'm not even a big Bendis fan.
• 
  Michael

  This one's a bit flat. Obviously, with both Clark and Jon operating as Superman, we need a story where Jon gets to step out of Clark's shadow a bit. Johnson's narration captures that - both Jon realizing his father is vulnerable, and Clark realizing that his son is his own person - although a bit heavy-handed and the outer space action vs the breach felt tedious and repetitive.
  
  I admit I found the primary plot tepid as well. Clark succumbs, but winds up escaping on his own ("Kryptonians are hardy"?). They need Jon's heat vision for the win, although the previous weapon was modeled after Clark's, so I guess we're supposed to assume that Clark told a white lie and encouraged Jon to find his own limits? The book had its heart in the right place, but came off a bit rote.
  
  The art's largely good though. Hester's always been a dynamic artist.
• 
  Jeremy Bautista

  Now, fully into the aged-up Jonathan Kent Superman era, this story focuses less on Kal-El Superman as Jon's father, but more on the passing of the torch on from father to son. There is a 2-issue story about a breach, aliens, Amanda Waller... and none of it matters. Then there's a 4-issue story about a call for help, a seeming betrayal, alien parasites... and none of that matters either. Neither of those story arcs is well defined nor are given much importance. They are only a backdrop to the growing realization that Clark has for Jon's maturity as a person and growth as a full-fledged hero. These are forgettable stories. However, it sets the stage for Jon to take on his own as a bearer of the sigil of the House of El.
• 
  Rick Ray

  Reads entirely like a filler story with empty platitudes to set up the next Superman run. Superman and his son, Jon, work together as it seems clear that one day Jon will have to take up the mantle. This collection is a smattering of uninspired space faring adventures that mostly revolve around Jon developing more confidence in himself as it becomes more apparent that he will one day have to fill the void left by Kal-El. While the father/son dynamic is pretty nice here, the uninspired missions they go on really drag this book down. I felt like I needed to read this to proceed onto PKJ's Action Comics run, but after getting through this I realize how little information was actually conveyed here so anyone is free to skip this and move onto the actual run.
• 
  Memphis Evans

  Whew! Hang on, let me just dry my eyes for a second. Well, I found this volume to be a very moving meditation on parents and children.
  
  I know technically it’s a superhero comic with aliens battling a mind controlling goo from space. Fine, yes. I’ll read that any day. However, the creative team also explores the different phases of being a parent and watching one’s child grow up. That’s what elevated this volume and it really got to me.
  
  Art, dialogue, colors, etc. are also all terrific and worthy of the big theme. Six stars out of five.
• 
  Shannon Appelcline

  I really enjoyed Johnson's first Warworld volume, so I backtracked to read this one ... and I don't understand how it could be so vastly mediocre.
  
  Problem number one is extensive captioning. Adding nothing to the story and detracting from it, really.
  
  Problem number two is entirely abstract menaces. Rifts and shadow things.
  
  Problem number three is that the rifts are entirely a MacGuffin to put Clark in danger of death for the next arc.
  
  There's a bit of redeeming interaction between Clark and Jon, and that's it.
• 
  Kris Ritchie

  The story, in which Superman writes a rather lengthy framing letter to his son about what is means to be Superman, was neat but it just seemed like something I would see in an annual? Like it was not enough material for an arc.
  
  And the art...IDK at times it was approaching cool designs but the ugly linework makes me think of Miller in a bad way.
• 
  Andrew Shaffer

  Superdad just doesn’t do it for me. Neither does his generic Superson. Always a pleasure to see Phil Hester on art chores!
• 
  dima

  mid
• 
  Matt

  Collects Action Comics #1029 and Superman issues #29-32
  
  I like the story-telling style here at the start of this new run, and I also really appreciate the father/son dynamics of the story.
• 
  Jesse A

  A whole lot of nothing much
• 
  Zoidberg

  Pure exposition, good character moments for Superman as a dad. Feels like a silver age dc story, which imho is when dc was at its best!
• 
  Alek Hill

  Eh.
• 
  Lucas

  What in the world is this story? I asked the internet for the current Superman storyline, and I get this jumbled mess.