Reading pre-Moore Supreme - Supreme #11

 

My god. That cover can't be real, can it? Oh, it's real all right. Welcome to the shitshow that is Supreme issue 11.

Supreme issue 11 was published in March 1994. The story is by Rob Liefeld and Eric Stephenson. The script, letters and editing is by Kurt Hathaway. The art is by Pedi. (No, seriously.)

I'm not going to bother to talk about the plot of this issue because it's basically Quantum, the father of Cabbot (of Bloodstrike) and Battlestone (of Brigade) trying to end all of humanity, while Supreme and the other Extreme beings try to stop him. 

Extreme had multiple giant crossovers with all of the other Extreme comics and they're almost all worthless for trying to binge one series. Supreme will appear in it a bit, but it's mostly about way too many other characters and some villain who is always trying to destroy humanity or something in ways that aren't even the littlest bit interesting.

And that's the case here, too. Instead, I want to take a couple of minutes and talk about this art because it is insane.

 

Hair is going every which way. Eyes are making expressions that are independent of the characters or even the plot of this story. And these muscles must be a parody of Image anatomy, right?

 

The only thing I can imagine is that Pedi is a European artist who came over for some easy money and turned in an absolute mockery of Image Comics, and they ran it anyway. 

Because anything else makes absolutely no sense.

Wow. 

Reading pre-Moore Supreme - Supreme #10

  

Supreme issue 10 was published in February 1994. The story is by Rob Liefeld (no longer calling himself Ripley). The script, lettering and editing is done by Kurt Hathaway. Brian Murray does the pencils and the colors. And Joe Rubenstein does the inks. 

Max interviews Supreme on live TV. She recaps what we knew about him being in WWII, including that he dropped bombs on Berlin by himself. 

She then gets into the hard-hitting questions, such as, why did he leave after the war?

 

She accuses Supreme of being allied with Khrome, but he says, nope and that Khrome is dead. So she accuses him of being involved in the innocent deaths at Dulles airport. And he's like, "Innocent people die." Shrug.

She then asks him about his origin story. He says he was human, but now he's a god.

 

As a mortal, he was forced to volunteer for the secret government experiments of Dr. Wells (the same Dr. Wells that Moore brought back later).

 

He was shot full of drugs and exposed to radiation that made his body stronger and his mind smarter. 

 

He soon decided that he had been divinely picked to be a supreme being.

The interview is interrupted to cut to Arizona where a superpowered being named Quantum has escaped and is fighting with Brigade. Supreme then takes off to face Quantum, which is part of the Extreme Prejudice crossover that will take over Supreme issue 11. 

Reading pre-Moore Supreme - Supreme #9

  

Supreme issue 9 was published in January 1994. The story was by Ripley (rumored to be a pseudonym for Rob Liefeld). The story, script, lettering and editing was by Kurt Hathaway. Brian Murray is back doing the pencils. And Chris Ivy is on inks.

The fight between Supreme and Thor continues...

 

Supreme has figured out Thor's confusion... that he thinks it's still WWII and he wants revenge on Hitler... but for reasons that continue to not make any sense, chooses to say nothing. Why? Because we need the fight to rage for three issues. EXTREME!

After several more pages of fighting, Supreme finally fesses up that the war is over. But Thor refuses to believe it. Because if it's true, what kind of idiot would know that and have continued to fight for three issues? Oh, right.

And then, randomly, Supreme decides it's time to knock Thor out and it's nice and easy.

 

Why didn't he do that three issues ago? Ugh.

Supreme decides to keep Thor's hammer and drops Thor off at the top-secret, covert, corporate military group that he just quit. Why not?

 

Remember the serial killer Grizlock? He's working in his lab on a radioactive boulder that is Supreme's weakness. Hey, that sounds familiar! 

 

 

This synthetic radium, "happens to possess the very same properties that Supreme posseses." I guess we know where Supremium came from. Grizlock exhibits a lot of the hallmarks of Dax...

  

 

Apparently, Grizlock has had this program going for the 14 years he's been in prison, just waiting for the return of Supreme.

Supreme flies to the grave of Louise Masters, the Lois Lane type character Grizlock killed. Supreme remembers that he was the world's first superhero. He says that Louise and his friend Billy were killed days after Supreme left for outer space. We see on her gravestone that she died in 1946. So, according to this, Supreme left Earth soon after WWII.

 

Supreme then goes off to visit Charles, better known as Kid Supreme.

 

 

Apparently, Charles could "borrow" a portion of Supreme's powers. 

 

They talk a little and then Supreme hurries off. To go after Grizlock? Heck no! 

To go talk to Max the journalist!

This Supreme guy sure has his priorities straight.