Look! Up in the sky! It’s a bird! It’s a plane! No, it’s the big blue boy-scout from DC Comics himself: Superman! He is beautiful. He is brave. And he is… boring?

I am a connoisseur of everything mythology and superheroes. Which is completely unironic, because I think of superheroes as modern mythology. Everyone that knows me knows I am a comic book geek, and I have proudly gotten dozens of friends into the wonderful world of comics. But I always encounter the one problem when trying to get them to read more. They demonstrate at best a cavalier disregard for, and at worst a stern dislike of, the Big Blue. “But he’s the archetypical superhero! He’s the OG! The grandpappy of all those do-gooders you know and love,” I cry in protest. “But he’s boring. I don’t really get what he’s about,” they all say to me. And immediately after, they say with much enthusiasm, “How about we start with Batman instead?” After the 27th time this happened, I realized that Supes has some serious PR problems to contend with.

Now, I have nothing against the caped crusader. On the contrary, Batman is one of my favorite characters. But this article isn’t about him. Batman isn’t a hero inspired by mythology. He is the product of more modern sensibilities. His influences are rooted in gothic literature and crime fiction. Batman is dope as hell, but he shouldn’t be your gateway into the annals of mythology.

Superman, on the other hand, is the perfect portal into the world of superheroes. He is the first perfect superhero product. He debuted with it all: a secret identity, a memorable costume, an even more memorable logo on his costume, and an origin story that is simple and easy to remember. Since his first appearance in Action Comics #1 back in 1938, Superman has become one of the most recognizable characters in the history of pop culture. He has dominated the cultural zeitgeist for more than 85 years. So, why such aversion to reading about Superman? Was this just a case where modern readers failed to recognize the value of a great character just because he’s old? Or do they really have a point?

^{︎PHOTO: Fahim Anzoom Rumman © 2024}

So, I conducted some research. By which I mean I read a lot of Superman and pondered on the literary merits of the character. I thought about the sociological impact of the character, about what had made the character persist, and about what now makes the character boring and unrelatable. And finally, I gulped down six shots of espresso, had a seizure, and sat down to write this article. Here is what I think makes Superman “boring”:

Supes has too many powers

This might piss some fans off, but hear me out. Superman is known for his powers. He can fly, has super-strength, is invulnerable to harm, and can shoot laser beams from his eyes. That much I am down for. That is the Superman we all know and love. Those aren’t the powers I am complaining about; it’s all the other stuff.

Superman has telescopic and microscopic vision, which allows him to see things down to the subatomic level. He has super-hearing, which allows him to spy on the KGB while hanging out with Aquaman 10,000 leagues under the sea. He has x-ray vision, which allows him to see through nearly everything (unless they’re made of lead for some reason.) He even has freeze breath which he can use to turn bad guys into human popsicles.

Those are the powers that make Superman unrelatable. I contend that if you have an omnipotent character, they cannot be omniscient, and if you have an omniscient character, they cannot be omnipotent. Otherwise, your character becomes unstoppable. They would surmount any and every challenge, and that is boring.

But how can we just remove powers from a character? Wouldn’t that change them? Good question. Let me answer that by reminding you of the forgotten powers from the comics: he could make miniature clones of himself from his fingertips and could control minds with his telepathic abilities! When Superman first appeared in comics back in the ‘30s, he couldn’t even fly; he merely leapt tall buildings in a single bound. But since then, flight has become the one ability the character is best known for.

Many of these powers have largely been forgotten or ignored because they proved to be incongruous with the character. And that’s perfectly fine. Superman has been around for the better part of a century, and in that time hundreds of writers have taken on the character. Some ideas have greater staying power than others. Some powers are more in sync with the character than others.

And that brings me to the next point:

Evil Superman is more fun

Now this one may seem downright blasphemous, but it is true nonetheless. Evil Superman has garnered mass appeal among modern audiences. Whether it be a tyrannical Superman from the Injustice video games or pastiches like Omni-Man from Invincible and Homelander from The Boys, evil Superman is in vogue.

This is because given Superman’s powers, his tendency to hold back due to his morals, can prove to be frustrating for many readers. It’s fun to see Superman’s full potential be realized. He is a god who can break mountains apart with his bare hands and crush his enemies by breathing on them too hard, but never does so. The Invincible TV show (and comic) is violent and gory and depicts what would happen if Superman ever cut loose. It is inarguably fun to watch, while the villainous Homelander might be one of the best written characters portrayed on screen.

This, really, is a two-fold problem. The first is that Superman is rarely ever pushed to the limit. Even us hardcore fans don’t know exactly how powerful Superman is. His feats include bench-pressing the mass of the Earth, moving unaided through space at the speed of light, and surviving nuclear explosions completely unharmed. These feats, which may seem somewhat extreme if not outright ridiculous, are depicted to have the character seem larger than life. Yet they fail to define the limits of the character. But why do we need to know a character’s limits? Well, because their limits are what make them interesting.

Famous fantasy author Brandon Sanderson has three rules called Sanderson’s Laws of Magic for writing fiction. Pertinently, his Second Law states: “Weaknesses, limits and costs are more interesting than powers.” I am a firm believer of this doctrine. Superman may be the most powerful hero on Earth, but he should still have limits. There should be challenges he cannot surmount even with his great powers; challenges that push him to his limits not just emotionally or mentally, but physically too.

Superman shouldn’t just always hold back until he doesn’t anymore and then win the day; that’s boring. The gimmicky Kryptonite aside, weaknesses like magic and red sun radiation are what make the character interesting. They provide dangerous and diverse (and fun!) challenges for the character, ones he cannot surmount with his impossible strength alone. Superman represents hope, and hope cannot exist in a vacuum; it needs despair to flourish.

The second problem is that people don’t understand Superman’s morality. I’ve heard many people say that Superman’s girlfriend, Lois Lane, is his tether to humanity. They could not be more wrong. His parents are his tether to humanity. His childhood girlfriend, Lana Lang, is his tether to humanity. The entire Podunk town of Smallville, where he was raised, is his tether to humanity. Superman was raised by a kindly couple in the heart of Kansas, Missouri. These were simple, hopeful people who believed in the innate goodness of others. And that was what they passed down to Superman: their idealism, their sense of hope and even their naivety. That is why he holds back, because he believes that people are innately good. He believes that people do bad things when they are misguided or desperate or weak. This is why he chooses not to incinerate the bad guys with his laser eyes and snort their ashes like cocaine.

Superman reminds us that it is our moral responsibility to use our strength to uplift those around us. That self-sacrifice is the truest and most noble of pursuits in life. What makes Superman interesting is that he could choose to rule humanity at any given point, but chooses to serve them instead.

^{︎PHOTO: Fahim Anzoom Rumman © 2023}

Superman is an alien (from space)

The Man of Tomorrow is, of course, not human. And Krypton, the planet of his birth, has become almost as iconic as he. As such, writers have spent decades flushing out the intricacies of the alien planet: its people, its politics, and even its own mythology. There have been entire comic series like the World of Krypton (1979), Krypton Chronicles (1981), and House of El (2021), which delve deeper into the planet’s lore.

Superman is an alien, a demigod from space. In fact, he is practically immortal. This distances him from humanity, and some people even like that about him. But do we really have to dwell on that aspect of the character? Superman was just a baby when he was jettisoned into space. Unable to convince his people to save themselves in time, his father Jor-El decided to save the only thing he could. Superman was born from a desperate act of hope. Hope that manifested not on Krypton, but on Earth. Superman was never a part of Krypton’s mythology; he is part of Earth’s.

He is a refugee; the last son of a dead world. His home is Earth, the world that adopted him and gave him shelter from the cold darkness of space. The world that nurtured him into a god among men. Superman is an orphan who has dedicated his life to the service of the world and the people that saved him. That is something we can all relate to.


Superman was created by the writer/artist duo of Jerry Seigel and Joe Shuster, two Jewish boys from Boston. His origins are inspired by stories of the Abrahamic prophet Moses, whose mother put him in a basket and sent him down the river Nile to keep him from his demise. Some stories have a strange longevity about them, the details may change but they keep finding their way back to us. Superman’s is one such story. He is a character best represented not by his powers or his alien heritage, rather by his limitations and his connection to humanity. He is a hero in spite of his powers, not because of them. Superman isn’t boring or outdated, he is simply misunderstood, at times by the very people who craft his adventures. Maybe someday I will write a Superman story of my own, and try to do him justice. And maybe someday, so will you.

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