This review is a modified version of one that I originally posted on the psicofxp forum.
It’s the first review I ever wrote, the year was 2005 I think. I think that the fact of writing this review was influenced by having read a very reflexive comic about Superman, at a moment in which I was extremely reflexive. Except for the line about the approximate date, I wrote everything else in 2005, although I made some modifications to the original text.
The fact is that this simple special of 130something pages impressed me due to its depth and that was something that hadn’t happened to me for a while.
I knew the premise beforehand, that it was a Vertigo special which used Superman, or more precisely, Superman as an Icon, the symbols that it contains, and built a story around that.
This seemed interesting, specially because having the most iconic and archetypal carácter of DC on a Vertigo comic was very rare. None of the big three had ever appeared on Vertigo, and Superman was the first (and still the only one, I believe).
At first I thought that the special was probably going to be one more thing that would end on the box of forgettable comics that Vertigo was publishing at the moment, with some interesting ideas that weren’t explored very well, and clichès that wanted to signify more than they did. I didn’t have much expectations on a story that I ended enjoying and liking a lot.
I’m not saying that it’s amazing and that everyone should read it, because I think that I liked it so much due to the moment in which I read it, and because of who I am. I do think that anyone would appreciate some of its moments. I believe that any Superman fan should read it, even the ones that don’t read Vertigo comics.
The following is part of the original review, I wrote this imitating another forum poster that posted his reviews using this Q&A template.
¿What is this?
Well, this is a Vertigo special called “It’s a Bird”, written by Steven T. Seagle (House of Secrets, Sandman Mystery Theatre), with art by Teddy Kristiansen (House of Secrets, Superman:Metropolis). This special, as I mentioned before, takes the concept of Superman, the archetypal version, not the character inserted in DC’s continuity, examining the symbols (the multiple strenghts behind the icon) that he contains while telling a parallel story with what’s happening in the main character’s life, a comic book writer.
¿And why go to all this trouble?
I read it, I liked it, I started writing. Maybe it’s because a good story deserves to be read.
Ok… ¿And what’s it about?
I mentioned it briefly before, it’s about a comic book writer called Steve, that receives an offer from his editor, to write Superman. This Steve has a very particular personal history, and carries a complex since his childhood with the disease previously known as Huntington’s Chorea, now called Huntington’s disease.
This hereditary neurodegenerative disease causes cognitive, psychic and motor alterations, it has a slow progression (it develops in the course of 15 or 20 years approx) and its most known fact are the exxagerated extremity movements that it causes.
This disease is what kills the boy’s granma, which leaves him with considerable trauma, based on the fear of having the disease passed through to him. Although this usually manifests between 30 and 50, it can happen at any time in life.
This background, in addition to the ideas about Superman that Steve starts getting, while delving into what scares him the most, trying to identify with a carácter completely superpowered, all add to build this good store.
The special shows us the ideas that Steve has about the icon, the mythology, the simbology that Superman, while he walks the path of trying to find a part of himself that he thought buried, something that would never come out, only because he didn’t want to face it.
The story is full of parallels and things that want to signify more than the words that express them, which is something to be expected when examining symbols.
--TO BE CONTINUED, I haven't finished translating--
