Welcome

So a long time ago (the mid-1990s), the greatest writer in comics agreed to take over the writing duties for Image Comics' Supreme. He would radically reshape the character, the book, and due to forces beyond his control, a whole comic book universe. And it led to an award-winning run of comics, three additional titles (among several proposed) and ultimately led to the genesis of Moore's much better known America's Best Comics. And then it all went out of print and was forgotten by way too many.

Having gathered quite a bit of information about Moore's Supreme and Awesome runs, I decided to create a home for the forgotten Awesome. Over the course of a year, I put it all together here.

Each week I did a main "Weekly Reading" post that was a read-through of that issue. I followed that up with a couple of other posts about topics from that Weekly Reading or whatever else I came up with to talk about. You'll find the lost Youngbloods in the Youngblood section and the fan-edit of the last Supreme in After Awesome.

Below is the archive of posts broken up by book. Thanks for checking the site out!

Book 1: Supreme: The Story of the Year

Book 1: Judgment Day

Book 3: Supreme: The Return

Book 4: Youngblood

Book 5: Glory

Book 6: After Awesome

Book 7: 1963

Book 8: Night Raven

Book 9: A Small Killing

Wednesday, October 29, 2025

Reading pre-Moore Supreme - Supreme #33

 


Supreme issue 33 came out in November 1995. Eric Stephenson was the writer. Penciled by Joe Bennett and Karl Alstaetter. Inked by Norm Rapmund and Eric Cannon. Lettered by Kurt Hathaway. 

Oh yay... another company wide event. What's this one called? Oh. Right. Babewatch. 

Hang on a sec, I need to give myself a pep talk. Okay, Mike, you can do this. Yes, this is a stupid comic even in normal circumstances. Yes, it's terribly written, pretty badly illustrated and lacks any redeeming value. And yes, Babewatch is pretty much the bottom of the barrel in terms of immaturity. But you're only about 8 issues away from being done with this and then I never have to pretend there were any comics before Alan Moore's run. Now get out there and recap this issue! 

Okay, sorry about that. We start the issue with Kid Supreme staring at herself in the mirror and then pull out to see Amnesia Supreme shocked by her appearance as well. They get into a bit of a shoving match for the mirror before Amnesia Supreme gets mad and flies up through Kid Supreme's roof. At which point Kid Supreme thinks, "Great. A woman for all of five minutes and he's already got PMS."

 

Hooboy. This issue is a struggle. 

Amnesia Supreme flies off into space to ditch Kid Supreme while Kid Supreme goes off to check on Original Kid Supreme, who has also turned into a woman. Which is when Amnesia Supreme returns and says that the change has cleared her mind and she has figured out that she's not Supreme. 


She then tells about how Star Guard (the Supreme "children" from the future) fought some battle in our recent past and lost. Supreme went searching for an alien device that could defeat their foe. Probe, the telepath, refused to flee without her brother Val-En. She switched souls with his body and when an explosion killed everyone else, only his body remained. 


Probe/Val-En flew to Earth where people were fighting Hell Lord Chapel. Probe/Val-En pitched in, but he was obliterated and his atoms were blown across existence. But don't worry, they reformed over Tokyo back in issue 24.

Hang on. I need another second. This makes absolutely no sense and is such a stupid explanation for how we got Amnesia Supreme. But this nonsense is what passes for plot. Fine. Fine. Fine. Let's just finish this stupid thing.

So Probe/Val-En concludes that she is Probe and intends to stay that way. Thanks Babewatch for such an empowering tale of feminism!

But Kid Supreme wants to know where the real Supreme is and we cut to the alien "Earth" we saw last issue where two guys are talking about the Supreme we see there. Balthazar and Lord Ardath conclude that even though Supreme is sure this isn't Earth, he can't fly on this planet and is powerless to leave. 

Balthazar leaves and Lord Ardath goes and talks to Supreme. Ardath tells Supreme that he abandoned this Earth and much has changed since. But they're going to throw a parade in his honor, which sets Supreme off.

Ahh... there's that senseless rage that was missing from this comic!

As Ardath leaves, he thinks that he also hates Supreme and that one day Supreme will be dead!

Um... ok. So that's where it ends and thank god, we're one step closer to being done with this run.