Some thoughts about Superman #44

Can the Bizarroverse be saved?

Superman and Superboy have arrived to Bizarro's planet to help him fight the Legion of Fun but all of their attempts might be in vain.

I expected this story to be quite funny but it also turned out to be bizarrely sad.

Peter Tomasi and Patrick Gleason conclude this story by delivering a surprising twist. The issue opens in a pretty exciting manner with the fight between Superman and Bizarro starting to reveal the latter's thoughts and while they can be pretty confusing at times, they also make sense in their own way. The plot also offered quite entertaining scenes like the already mentioned Legion of Fun which is clearly based on the Superfriends' incarnation of the group and even includes characters like Toyman and the Wonder Twins in Bizarro form, hell, it even includes a version of the Joker called the Jo-Cryer who is constantly weeping and looks like a normal human being which contrasts perfectly with his other counterpart.

But as I said, this chapter presents a twist in which makes the story end in a pretty dramatic and kinda depressing fashion, one that depicts Bizarro in a quite negative, yet strangely understandable way based on his struggles but at the end there's also a bit of hope for some of the characters at least.

Doug Manhke handles the art and is really solid thanks to his detailed style that depicts action scenes perfectly.

Good stuff, probably one of the best arcs in a while.