Should the name be unfamiliar, Ed Pinsent is probably as close to a living legend as you'll find in the world of small press comics, having done much of it first, better, and for longer than most whilst remaining absolutely faithful to a vision entirely his own, stylistically some way outside the mainstream yet neither esoteric nor indulgent and near impossible to mistake for the work of any other artist. His strips tend to combine art and writing in a single visual train of thought, but Silver Age Superman seemed to demand a different approach, not so much an homage or impersonation of Superman as a form more suited to what Ed had written. Enter Mark Robinson who matched Ed's enthusiasm for the undertaking.
As is probably obvious, Silver Age Superman wasn't published by DC but has succeeded - or at least eluded legal scrutiny - by virtue of a format bearing no similarity to anything official, and through terming itself fan art, almost a love letter - certainly unlike the more acerbic reading one might expect from the small press taking on an icon of the mainstream. It's faithful to Superman with none of the gritty revisionism which has become such a cliché, but does more, straying into the introspective realms of the small press; and the magic is that even in doing something different, it remains true to Superman, albeit a Superman of whom we've had only glimpses.
This Clark Kent is an amiable reporter but never quite one of the gang in terms of humanity despite his best intentions. The recurrence of a puzzling memory sends him back through time to the Great Library of Alexandria, the dissolution of the monasteries, and other lost repositories of knowledge in hope of answering an existential question - whether knowledge can be reconciled with understanding or experience. At least that's how it reads to me. It's a weighty subject, but doesn't feel unduly ponderous due to the telling which cannily retains the charm and wonder of the finest Superman strips. I also enjoyed the church and its predecessors acknowledged as central to the development of civilisation, and sponsors of art and science as was historically the case whether we like it or not. Tales of this stripe so often invoke religious institutions mainly for the sake of ill omen, softening us up for the inevitable appearance of Aleister bleeding Crowley; and as if to underscore the refreshing spirit of the enterprise, Pinsent and Robinson have Superman meet John Dee without any of the traditional beastliness.
This one really is a breath of fresh air, a reminder of what we may have lost and of how exciting it once seemed - a breezy philosophical rumination without posturing which, if instilled with a certain melancholy, nevertheless warms the heart and leaves us with smiles on our faces.
Genuinely amazing.
...and you can find it here!
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