If one year ago you told me that DC Comics would take Superman back to his roots in the 1930′s and it would turn out to be the most modern and relevant take on the character, I would have called you crazy. But that is exactly what Grant Morrison has done to the character of Superman, and this comic is refreshing, exciting, and meaningful.

Action Comics #2 begins shortly after the end of last issue. The government has captured the being known as Superman, and under a task force led by Lex Luthor, they are experimenting and testing his powers. This is a Superman that can bleed; he is not the all-powerful god that he will become later. Superman breaks free, holds Luthor in a choke hold, and gets to meet Lois Lane for the first time.

Each and every beat of this book has a joy and energy that a Superman story hasn’t had in a long time. The issue ends with the readers discovering the true being that Luthor is working for. (Hint: It’s a classic Superman villain that has teamed with Luthor before.)

Part of the reason that this book works is the pure essence of motion instilled into every panel by Rags Morales. Last issue, his art came off as rushed. Well, Mr. Morales must have had a chance to catch up, because the art on this issue is fantastic. His Superman is always moving, has a smile on his face, and shows power in every shot.

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You will believe that man can fly, no wait, run really fast.

More so than any of the other DC Comics #1′s, including Justice League #1, Action Comics #1 is the flagship book of DC. Superheroes were created in the original Action Comics #1 way back in June of 1939.

The editors of DC Comics must have realized this as well so they gave the job of reinventing their original book and superhero to Grant Morrison, superstar comic writer and creator of one of  the best Superman stories of all time known as All Star Superman. So how is Action Comics #1? Well, it can be summed up in one simple sentence.

Welcome back, Superman.

Action Comics #1 is a refreshing, brand new take on the character of Superman. By going back to the roots of Superman, in his humble beginnings in 1939, Grant Morrison has created a Superman that is more modern and relevant than ever.

The issue begins with a young Superman. He can’t fly, but he can run real fast and leap buildings in a single bound. His costume is nothing but a t-shirt, a cape, and a pair of jeans. Superman grabs a CEO of a company that mistreated his workers, bribed city officials, and used illegal cheap labor.

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This Friday marks a pretty big event for both Warner Bros. and DC Comics as their biggest and longest running TV series, Smallville, comes to an end after 10 solid years.

While we have no idea what to expect from the ending between the suit, flight, Darkseid, the Legion of Doom, Lex Luthor and Lois Lane’s cold feet, it should still be one hell of a finish. To help get you ready for Friday’s finale, Warner Bros. is getting you prepped by giving all 10 season premieres of the show…for FREE! That’s right, free.

Here’s the details:

To celebrate Warner Bros, Digital Distribution is giving fans the chance to get FREE Downloads of all 10 season premieres in HD and discounts on seasons 1-9, now for a limited time on iTunes.

So, if you’ve seen every episode of the series and want a refresher or you want to be in on the story of young Superman, pick up every season premiere in iTunes now. Hurry, though, because it’s only going to be around for a limited time.

Catch the 2-hour Smallville series finale this Friday at 8/7C on the CW.

In case you’ve not been paying attention recently, the ten year run of Smallville is coming to an end next Friday with a two hour blockbuster finale. As much of a bummer as this is for fans of the show, it turns out the cast, led by Tom Welling, is pretty broken up about it too.

Welling, who plays Clark Kent on the show, spoke to Zap2it about the end of Smallville and dropped some clues about what to expect as the series finishes its run.

“I think people will feel fulfilled, but it’s going to be bittersweet,” he said. “If someone has been watching the show for 10 years, it’s coming to an end, and that’s never a fun thing . . .You always want more, but the reality is that it can’t go on forever.”

You do always want more. That’s for sure. Welling went on to explain that they ended up filming the finale in a rather different way than other series.

“We shot the actual finale as our third-to-last episode,” he said. “We shot two more episodes, then shot the first part of the finale last. It gave us the opportunity to take a look at what would be the last image of the show in post-production and make any changes or adaptations to it. It didn’t necessarily take the emotional pressure off us, but the time pressure.”

Speaking about filming the very end, he said, “As we were shooting it, everyone’s senses were heightened. People were flying up from L.A. [to Vancouver, where the show has been made] to supervise and make sure everyone who had to make a decision was there. Everybody was just really excited, and the energy level went up.”

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Welcome to another edition of On the Radar where we delve into all corners of the entertainment, tech and geek Internets for news, views and whatnot that may have escaped our regular coverage during the week. Let is know if we missed something interesting.

Let’s get started!

• Chuck Lorre is developing a Sheen-less reboot of Two and a Half Men for CBS. Would this be considered #cheating?

• As if Lex Luthor didn’t have enough reason to hate him, Superman recently renounced his US citizenship in the comics so that DC can appeal to a more global audience.

• A brand new poster for Green Lantern has hit the web showing off way more Corps members than we can name. Check out the full-res image here.

• Zach Galifiniakis is out, but Jeff Bridges may be picking up the slack to play alongside Ryan Reynolds in the big-screen adaptation of R.I.P.D.

• Those of you hoping for an animated Ant-Man film with Pixar and Marvel Studios are sadly out of luck, as Chief Creative Officer John Lasseter says there are no plans for a team-up.

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This week on The Flickcast Chris and Matt are back to doing what they do best: working alone and without a net. Not only that but, as usual, they discuss and debate all manner of new and returning topics.

This week those include HBO’s Game of Thrones, The Avengers, Smallville and Lex Luthor’s return. In addition, they talked about the Thor movies (yes, both of them), Portal 2, a brand new, exciting product from Apple called the HumancentiPad and pretty much whatever the hell ‘else they want to talk about..

Of course, your hosts also made some picks this week including Matt’s pick of the movie Matinee and Chris’ pick of the returning HBO series Treme.

As always, if you have comments, questions, critiques, offers of sponsorship or whatever, feel free to hit us up in the comments, on Twitter, at Facebook and MySpace or via email.

Those who are fans of The CW’s Smallville already are aware how intense this season has been, leading up to the series finale on Friday, May 13th. This season alone, we’ve had DC Universe characters Ultraman, Deathstroke, Darkseid, Stargirl, Blue Beetle, and Booster Gold make an appearance, just to name a few. Now, it looks like things are only going to get more intense.

This past Friday marked the third to last episode of the series, which was written by DC legend Geoff Johns. We can tell that this season is leading up to an incredible ending in which Tom Welling’s Clark Kent finally dons the blue tights and red cape, but we’re not sure what events in the eleventh hour will lead up to that.

However, a brand new promo that aired with Friday’s episode may just give a clue to those events. Since 2008, original series regular Michael Rosenbaum has been off the show, and his character Lex Luthor has been presumed dead. Now, it looks like we’ll be getting him back for the big 2-hour finale on May 13th.

Take a look at the teaser after the jump, and see what we’re talking about. Smallville airs every Friday on the CW.

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Even though this news came out a couple days ago that doesn’t make it any less awesome. So awesome, in fact, we thought it was worth telling you about it even if though you may already know. What is this amazing news?

Well, get ready to be thrilled, especially if you’re a fan of Smallville. Michael Rosenbaum will be returning to play Lex Luthor for the series finale. That’s right, after months of speculation, the actor just closed a deal to return to the CW series for the finale, reprising his role as Lex.

“It feels like the stars are aligning, literally. We couldn’t be more excited about having Michael back,” Smallville executive producers/showrunners Kelly Souders and Brian Peterson said. “And as far as the way he returns … there’ll be no doubt about how Lex becomes the great rival in Clark Kent’s life. He is the villain of the story.”

Rosenbaum, who left the series after season 7 to pursue his writing, said he was “delighted” to return for the series finale. “I’m simply doing it for all of the fans out there who made Smallville the great success it is,” he said. “I appreciate all of their passion, their relentlessness and even their threats. Ha ha. I can’t wait to hug the old crew back in Vancouver one last time and see all of my old friends once again….. Oh, and for Lex to become the badass he’s destined to be.”

Well, it seems the stars are aligning and the Smallville series finale should end up being one to remember. The series finale of Smallville airs on May 13th on the CW.

After years of waiting (and reporting) DC Universe Online has finally made its way to both the PC and PlayStation 3 console. And we are happy to see it has lived up to the hype. While DCUO isn’t a ground breaking experience that will redefine the MMORPG genre, it does provide an addictive and fun super hero world for people to play in.

Taking a few lessons learned from previous super hero titles like City of Heroes and Champions Online, DCUO allows players to experience an MMO world in an iconic universe with well known locations and super hero and villain compatriots at their side. Unlike SOE’s previous iconic MMO with Star Wars Galaxies, players are actually able to fight alongside their favorite heroes and villains instead of just receiving missions from them. The game also has a fully voiced cast, a much notable difference to players of past titles like classics like Everquest or Galaxies.

Gameplay:

DC Universe Online plays similar in many ways to most other successful MMOs. It is to be expected since those formulas have proven successful for the type of game. Players move using the traditional WASD format combined with their mouse for changing directions and looking around and aiming. Different tap and hold button combinations on the mouse (unlocking more as players increase in level) release different attacks on foes. Additional super powers are unlocked and assigned to the 1 through 8 keys that can be used during combat.

Combat itself is fast paced and fun without much down time between. Unlike many MMORPGs, combat is not item-centric where players must worry about equipping tons of healing items to use after each combat instance. As long as players don’t run through like a lunatic kamikaze, they should be able to take a breather between fights to allow their character to quickly heal up before heading into the next encounter.

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With the last season of Smallville off to a rollicking good start, we snatched up the chance to sit down with Smallville long-time executive producers Kelly Souders and Brian Peterson. While they were a touch shy about spilling the Kryptonite on this season’s surprises, we never-the-less used our super strength to investigate the return of former cast members and historic episode 200 (set to air October 15th).

It seems this season will be strewn with super heroes and villains from across the galaxy.  Giving Kal-El a run for his money, Laura Vandervoort returns in brilliant blue and red style as Supergirl in episode 3, airing October 8th.

The Flickcast: Can you tell us about any plans to bring back favorite cast members from past seasons?

Brian Peterson: Having Annette O’Toole back as Martha Kent and Michael McKean as Perry White- we worked all season to get that to happen. It was fantastic, they were so great, it was such a great episode.

We’d like to, it’s hard because all of these actors, it’s not always up to us, like they have TV shows and careers and theater. You know Glover, we would love to have John Glover back and that man is on Broadway from the beginning of the year until the end of the year.

So, that’s our goal, absolutely, to try to get people like Perry, and Martha Kent, and Lionel Luther back, or at least maybe an appearance.

FC: Last season, Smallville‘s epic episode entitled, “Absolute Justice”, featured the monumental members of the Justice Society. Any talk of a Justice Society spin-off series? Will any members of the Justice Society be making future appearances this season?

BP: I know people are so excited about that and right now, to my knowledge, there are not (spin-off series). I think there’s always opportunities.

But as far as episodes, we’re definitely going to have some of the Justice Leaguers and Justice Society people back in the show for sure (check out episode 2). But as far as a spin-off, I wish that was something I could see into the future and know, but I don’t know.

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At Comic-Con, we had some time to spend talking with the developers and getting some more hands on exposure to DC Universe Online. In addition to talking to Executive Creative Director on the game Jim Lee,  we also got to talk to some of the more hands on members of the team.

Up until this point, the focus of the DC Universe Online message has been your own character’s adventure with interaction with the iconic characters. What they are looking to do now is have a mentor method where to learn from the Iconic characters such as Batman, players must experience what it’s like to be them.

The result is the competitive versus mode that allows for players to take on the role of characters like Batman or the Joker and go up against other players in order to advance as characters. The theory is that by playing as these characters, players will better understand their strengths and weaknesses, their strategies and their tactics. These matches go from 2 vs. 2 to up to 16 vs. 16. The game modes will include territories, capture the flag and sabotage.

It also allows for quick jump in and jump out gameplay for a player who only has a few minutes to play and doesn’t have the time to complete a full thirty or more minute quest in the game. Players gain PvP points that can be spent later on unlocking other characters or their character’s raid suit.

At release, Robin and Harley will be available for players for the heroes and villains sides respectively. Gaining currency, players can then unlock Nightwing, Bane and Huntress, eventually unlocking the Joker at the highest levels. As a bonus to people pre-ordering the game, Batman will be available to them from the start.

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At Comic Con, we got the chance to talk to DC Comics Editor-In-Chief and the Executive Creator Director of DC Universe Online, Jim Lee about the game that everyone around the offices has been clamoring to get a hold of. As you’ll see in the’s interview after the jump, Jim explains what it takes to create such an expansive MMO game. Jim also discusses the newly announced two vs. two simulator mode which allows players the chance to step out of the boots of their own created character and instead play as the iconic heroes of the DC Universe such as Batman or Martian Manhunter.

Lee also discusses the Geoff Johns announcement from the Con for a Suicide Squad video game. Lee describes it was a Dirty Dozen style grittier than your average super hero game. For those who aren’t aware, the Suicide Squad is a team of villains who were put together on a mission where they knew everyone wouldn’t be coming back. It is definitely a darker take on the super hero genre which, if Batman: Arkham Asylum has shown us anything, looks like it is coming out at the right time in this industry.

What you don’t get to see on camera was when Jim mentions to us just how the trailer for the game comes into play. For those who have seen it, the trailer sets up the back-story of why a Luthor from the future comes back and talks to DC’s Trinity pleading for their help. The shockwave he sends on the planet sets forth an explosion of new powers, explaining logically why all these new heroes and villains are created. This ties in directly with the upcoming comics miniseries which will show how these new found powers affect the lives of average citizens who have now been transformed into powered beings.

Check out our interview in its entirety after the jump and stick with us for all things DC Universe Online as the Beta kicks into gear this month.

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