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Legion of Super-Heroes v4 #100 (story #1)
The Adventures of Superman #598
The Adventures of Superman #598
| Cover | Coloring error: Ferro’s eyes should be blue; compare to 13:4. Also, Ferro doesn’t adopt this mask and costume until after this story, in The Final Night #<3>. |
| General | This story occurs during The Final Night, when the alien Sun-Eater had surrounded Earth’s sun and was devouring it, which cut off heat and light to Earth, making the planet freeze. Only pages 1-4, 9, and 11-22 are dealt with here. |
| Some segments of fandom expressed concern about the introduction of Ferro in the 20th century, while the preboot version of the character had come from the 30th century, seeming to make this a major divergence from previous continuity, beyond that which should be explainable by Zero Hour. However, note that relatively little is known about the preboot Ferro Lad and his family from before he joined the Legion, except that his mother was an actress. One possibility is that the preboot Nolan family somehow time travelled between the 20th and 30th centuries, such that Ferro Lad was actually from the 20th century without that fact ever having been revealed. Another is that the facial deformities and iron-transformation power is hereditary in the Nolan line, and there was a similar 20th century character who was simply never shown in the preboot continuity. | |
| 1:1 | This is apparently the Metropolis theatre district; note that the street sign say “Broadw[ay]”. “Cats”, written by Andrew Lloyd Webber and based on the poems of T.S. Eliot, is the longest running musical in Broadway history. “Guys and Dolls”, by Frank Loesser, Jo Swerling, and Abe Burrows is another well known Broadway show. (The restrooms in the Broadway corner of the New York New York casino in Las Vegas are labelled “Guys” and “Dolls”.) None of the other signs seen here seem to be related to real world shows. |
| 1:3 | The logos on Jerry’ uniform are very close to that of the United States Postal Service. |
| 2:1 | Troy McClure was a character on The Simpsons, an actor. McClure was voiced by Phil Hartman; the character was retired with Hartman’s death. |
| 3:1 | Jerry is presumably referring to John Barrymore (d. 1942), although he could be referring to Lionel, Ethel, or others in the family. Who knows, maybe Drew Barrymore “Scream”ed her last at this theatre in the DC Universe. |
| While Nancy Nolan claims to not be superstitious, I’ll bet she wouldn’t push things by jumping up on stage and saying the name of That Scottish Play. (You know, the cursed one. MacBe...) | |
| 3:2 | “The Phantom of the Opera,” by Andrew Lloyd Webber based on the novel by Gaston Leroux, is another of Webber’s monster Broadway hits. It is notable in part for the giant chandelier as part of the set. |
| The Reeves theatre is named for actor George Reeves, who starred as Superman on television. | |
| 4 | The lettering on the Cain Theater marquees is very poorly done, especially the front marquee. |
| 9:1 | “The Queen of Monte Cristo” would be a reference to “The Count of Monte Cristo,” a movie based on the book by Alexandre Dumas père. |
| 9:5 | This is Ferro, of course, and his face is shadowed because of his severe facial deformities (although he is presumably wearing his full-face hood/mask like usual). |
| 12:1 | The knight’s helmet is apparently one of the props from Nancy Nolan’s career, perhaps from “The Queen of Monte Cristo,” like the speech being recited. Ferro chose to wear this rather than his burlap mask in order to be less likely to scare the audience. |
| 13:1 | This is The Tonight Show featuring Johnny Carson and Ed McMahon. |
| 13:2 | Observe that if the twins were indeed born nine months after the appearance on The Tonight Show, then the original rumor Nolan was debunking was indeed false (since she would have already had to have been 4-6 weeks along in the pregnancy at that point). Unless, of course, it was an exceptionally long pregnancy, perhaps related to Andrew and Douglas being mutants. |
| 13:3 | Based on heights, the twins are perhaps four years old. Whether this was when the twins were remanded over to the custody of Dr. 30 is unknown, but that probably occurred a few years later. |
| 13:5 | The marquee lettering is somewhat better here, but it is still rather warped on the front of the marquee. |
| Chad alluded to the roof possibly collapsing due to the weight of the snow. Why they chose to break the foreshadowing and go with a lightning strike is unclear. | |
| Dialogue is from Lori Lemaris. | |
| 14:3 | Skyscraper windows typically do not open at all, much less swinging out like this; they slide up, or have a portion that levers out. |
| 15:4 | Ferro has apparently changed into his iron form. |
| 16:1 | And now he has changed back, based on skin color. |
| 16:3 | Superman’s comment about giving him “a start” indicates that he probably used his x-ray vision through Ferro’s helmet and saw what he really looks like. |
| 17 | Pink dialog captions are from Nancy Nolan; the yellow one is from Superman. |
| 17:3-5 | If the coloring is to be trusted here, Ferro is only transforming to iron when he has to, staying in his human form through most of the rescue. He is too shy to use his powers continuously, especially in front of Superman. |
| 18:4 | Nancy Nolan is apparently in denial. |
| 21 | Dialogue captions are from Superman. |