President Barack Obama has more than his share of troubles;
before he was even sworn in, he was being accused of being a Kenyan, a Muslim,
a Communist, the list goes on and on. And when he finally did take the oath of
office the economy was in free fall with the stock market crashing and leaving
everyone to compare that economy to that of The Great Depression. And then the
various tea parties arose, whose sole purpose seemed to be to oppose anything
Obama was in favor of. I’m not going to cover everything that has happened
since Obama took office, but he managed to get reelected in 2012 and this year
seems to be crisis after crisis. Now as we approach his last two years in
office I’m sure he’s concerned about his legacy.
But one thing is clear, while history will be the judge of
his presidency, Obama’s legacy is strong in the world of comic books; he has
appeared in more comics than Ronald Reagan, who was the previous modern
president to appear most in comics, even having his own title, Reagans Rangers!
One of the strangest homages, (even stranger than Super LBJ!) in my opinion, is a particular
character first seen in 2008 in Final Crisis #7, Calvin Ellis, President
Superman of Earth 23, an obvious homage to Obama. This was in 2008 when
optimism for Obama was at its highest point. At the end of that issue he
appeared as a member of an army of alternate universe Supermen.
He reappears in Action Comics #9, published in 2012, where
he has to fight a twisted version of Superman from another reality. The story
seems to be a commentary on the comic book industry, the other worldly Superman
is being used to sell products, sound familiar?
Plus there is much there about the rights of comic book
creators, and how they can lose those rights, like Superman’s creators Siegel
and Shuster did, for instance. And, finally the “controversy” about Obama’s
birthplace is addressed. Great Rao!
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