Superman #162

Superman #162 (1963)
written by Leo Dorfman
pencils by Curt Swan & Kurt Shaffenberger
cover by Kurt Shaffenberger

This might just be the most well-known Imaginary Story of the Silver Age.
Despite the fact that, while a lot of modern readers know about something called “Superman Red and Superman Blue”, they are probably just aware of the name: I don’t think many even know what’s it’s ABOUT.

We begin at the Daily Planet, where we get the closest confirmation ever that only four people work there.
And also that they have TERRIBLE office politics.

That has to be one of the most needlessly cruel ways I’ve ever seen Clark Kent be treated.

This just isn’t his day, because Kandor decides to call him SPECIFICALLY to remind him of every single thing he’s failed at.

All of this is because the Kandorians decided to give Superman a 6 month deadline for fixing ALL his objectives or THEY will take a swing at it.
This raises SO many questions, among which:
1) If this is so urgent for them, why can’t some Kandorians leave the city to work with Superman?
2) Why do they even care about Kryptonite? It’s harmless to them as long as they’re in the city!!!
3) Why do they even care about human crime? If it’s just out of the goodness of their hearts, why is it THAT urgent to fix?

Of note, one of Superman’s goals is “wipe out crime AND EVIL”, which is asking A LOT more than the previous two goals!
Also, what even is the fourth goal? We can only read “against”.

Superman’s solution is to make himself a hundred times smarter with the Brain-Evolution Machine™ which is going to make him smarter.
If he WAS smarter, maybe he would have hesitated to power the machine with stuff that kills him.

If it was just a problem of brain power, he could have simply gone to the future and asked Brainiac 5 to help. I’m sure he would have been glad to.

So Superman subjects himself to the experiment…

The machine DOES make him smarter, but it also splits him into the titular Superman Red and Superman Blue.

First problem to solve: restore Kandor to its proper size.

Just to show off, they do this while simultaneously working on the other task: deal with Kryptonite.
With magnets.

This has the added bonus of basically recreating Krypton (!!!).

But since he did this in Earth’s solar system (SOMEHOW), this means that the Kandorians have powers.

This is good because it allows the complete reconstruction of Krypton…

…but it’s also somehow bad?
Don’t get me wrong, a whole city of Superman-level beings that include all of Kandor’s children is dangerous… but certainly even these two new Supermen could use the help of a few additional powered heroes, right?

No, apparently Kandorians really don’t want to have powers.
Also, as a huge astronomy nerd, my skin crawls at the constant use of words like “solar system”, “galaxy” and “constellation” like they meant the same thing.
I’m not expecting hard science from a Superman story but COME ON, open a dictionary!!!

Since the Supermen have already found a new planet for Kandor, now Atlantis wants the same thing. They were not even on the list!!!

An Imaginary Story is the least place where you’d expect continuity, but Supergirl brings up the memorial world she built in her own series.

Uhm, guys, I think you’re missing the point of the memorial… it wasn’t just to commemorate the loss of Kryton but also THE PEOPLE WHO DIED THERE.
Then again, at the rate this story is going, I wouldn’t put past the Superman to resurrect their parents.

Just how scarily overpowered was Superman in the Silver Age?
Enough to melt ice caps and cause global flooding FROM ANOTHER SOLAR SYSTEM.

Honestly, is there anything that magnets can’t do?

Stardust The Super Wizard would be proud.

Next up in the list: CURING EVIL.

With a ray that I guess also alters your biology pretty drastically, since I don’t think these ants were devouring each other for fun.

This also CURES CRIME, but somehow prisons are still necessary?
What’s even the point of to lock these people up now?

While we’re at it, let’s also end the Cold War.

Doing this also makes Lex Luthor good enough to cure all diseases…

…at the cost of looking absolutely terrible.

Supergirl stayed around just to release the Phantom Zone criminals and redeem them: she’s going back to Kandor’s new planet now.

This leads to an appearance by the Legion of Super-Heroes.
I deliberately left this cameo out of their retrospective because I knew they were going to show up here; unless a very minor appearance pops up, this SHOULD be their last Silver Age cameo.

Missed opportunity not to have Brainiac 5 around.

At this point, after having conquered all crime and all diseases, Superman has only one priority left.

Obviously this has nothing to do with being smarter, but the fact that they STILL can’t decide who they want to marry without resorting to dumb tricks makes me wonder if they sustained brain damage.

Why did they even bother with that stunt if they already decided who they wanted to marry?
THIS IS THE NEXT PANEL!!!

I’m kind of upset that Superman BLUE is the one to propose to the redhead.

Lois and Lana are okay with the sudden possibility of a super-foursome.
Oh come on, I can’t be the only one to think about it.

This results in a TRIPLE wedding, because Jimmy also marries Lucy now.
Honest question, would it have been scandalous in 1963 for Lucy to marry without wearing a white dress?

Superman Red decides he’s going to live on Krypton from now on, bringing Comet the Super-Horse with him just in case.
I guess the list of impossible problems to solve didn’t include turning Comet into his original centaur body?

Hey remember how the story opened with everyone except Clark getting a raise, and Perry not even inviting him to lunch? I wonder how he’s feeling about that now.

Adding all the problems he’s solved with an army of robots, Superman can now retire.

And so we close with the revelation that both Supermen later had twins.
Does that mean that they grow up they’ll be Superboy-Blue, Supergirl-Blue (who’d be the redhead), Superboy-Red and Supergirl-Red (who would not have red hair)?

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Historical significance: 1/10
Superman-Red and Superman-Blue are an easy shorthand for any story to reference the Multiverse.
That’s why they cameo on “The Kingdom #2” in 1999, “Convergence #2” in 2015 and “Batman/Superman: World’s Finest #20” in 2023.

But that wouldn’t be the last time Superman would be split into color-coordinated twins.
In 1998, right in the middle of the period where he exchanged his classic powers for energy ones, he was temporarily split into two separate beings.

In this period Clark had married Lois, who was not a fan of this arrangement.

Silver Age-ness: 200/10
Twice the Supermen, twice the craziness… multiplied by a 100 times, like their minds.

Does it stand the test of time? 0/10
If I have to guess why this story is remembered enough to be referenced by multiple incarnations of Superman, I have two theories. Which don’t necessarily exclude each other.
One is that this is very different from most of the other Imaginary Stories of the time: instead of bending the universe backwards to reinforce the status quo, this one takes delight to break as many Silver Age conventions it can.
The second is that it’s cathartic to imagine a world where every possible thing that can go right DOES go right.
That being said, the story has aged pretty badly. Not because of Superman getting a happy ending, I have no problem with that. My problem is that everything goes too right too quickly!
In fact this is BARELY a story! As soon as Superman gets duplicated and smarter, he doesn’t struggle with anything. Unless you count Superman-Red getting nostalgic for Krypton, which is too little too late.
Still an entertaining story, and Curt Swan is still Curt Swan, but you couldn’t do this today.
Not to mention that ultimately the moral of the story is that Superman can’t solve every single problem in existence… because he just isn’t smart enough!