Mark Waid and Alex Ross' Elseworlds tale might take place in an alternate DC reality, but it still packs a hell of a punch. Taking place in a sort of twilight of the superheroes, America has been abandoned by its greatest champion, Superman's absence being replaced by a new breed of hyper-violent "hero" lead by the murderous Magog. The reason for Supes' desertion? The death of his true love, Lois Lane. This event was actually just one link in a chain of failures on Kal-El's part: the none-more-insane Joker poisoned not just Lois, but the rest of the Daily Planet staff too, apart from the guy with the superpowers. The superpowers he could maybe have used to save them all, to have stopped the poison ever arriving in the office? Sure, along with the powers he could've used to stop anti-hero Magog from murdering The Joker on his way to court, the sea change which causes the Man of Steel to scarper off to Kansas to live in exile. And just think of how many more people died because Superman up and quit...
Tom Baker is the Comics Editor at WhatCulture! He's heard all the Doctor Who jokes, but not many about Randall and Hopkirk. He also blogs at http://communibearsilostate.wordpress.com/
