Action Comics #232
☆ Be the first to review + Add to your collection — Join freeAction Comics #232 (September 1957) marks a quiet but consequential turning point in Superman publishing history: it is the first issue of Action Comics to feature a cover penciled by Curt Swan, the artist who would go on to define the visual identity of Superman across three decades. Swan's ascension to the Action Comics masthead with this issue effectively signaled the passing of the torch from Wayne Boring's broader, more angular Superman to Swan's warmer, more expressive Man of Steel — a transition that reshaped the entire feel of the Superman line for the Silver Age. The issue also debuts Superman, Junior (Johnny Kirk), an early experiment with the 'ward of Superman' concept that DC would revisit repeatedly, making this a small but genuine ancestor of later surrogate-son storylines. Its backup story, 'Riddle of the Space Rainbow,' was later reprinted in Legion of Super-Heroes Vol. 1 #1/2 (February 1973), giving the issue an afterlife well into the Bronze Age.
In "The Story of Superman, Junior," a desperate father sends his son Johnny Kirk into space to escape an impending meteor strike, only for Superboy to intercept the threat and send the boy on a journey that changes everything. When Johnny returns years later, he’s a grown man with powers of his own—just as Superman begins to lose his strength, weakened by a mysterious space poison carried aboard the ship. Written by Jerry Coleman and illustrated by Wayne Boring with inks by Stan Kaye, this 1957 tale blends generational heroism and cosmic mystery, with Curt Swan’s iconic cover capturing the moment the past meets the future.
In "The Story of Superman, Junior," young Johnny Kirk is sent into space by his father to escape an impending meteor strike, only to return years later as a grown man with powers of his own—thanks to the journey. When Superboy, now a fully grown Superman, learns of Johnny’s return, he’s already struggling with a mysterious weakening, a side effect of a space poison carried aboard Johnny’s ship.
In the jungles of East Africa, Bill waits on a remote beach in Kampula, where the arrival of a captured criminal, Tom Rader, sets off a tense chain of events. With Janu taken by a ruthless gang, Bill is forced into a desperate gamble—diving into the deep to recover three mysterious boxes from the sea floor.
In "The Riddle of the Space Rainbow," Henry Lord, manager of the Space TV Network, enlists pilots Tommy and Brent for a high-stakes mission: navigating their color-arrayed spacecraft through the cosmos to capture rare footage. With the skies of space holding unseen wonders, the trio ventures into the unknown, where light and mystery collide.
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The issue carries a cover date of September 1957 and an on-sale date of July 28, 1957, placing it squarely in DC's Silver Age anthology format. The lead Superman story, 'The Story of Superman, Junior,' was scripted by Jerry Coleman and drawn by the then-incumbent Superman interior artist Wayne Boring with inks by Stan Kaye — the same Kaye who inked Swan's debut cover. The Tommy Tomorrow backup, 'Riddle of the Space Rainbow,' was written by Otto Binder and fully drawn by Jim Mooney, while a Congo Bill strip by Howard Sherman and a one-page Ollie gag strip by Henry Boltinoff rounded out the 36-page package. Swan had been drawing the daily Superman newspaper strip since June 1956 and had built up substantial familiarity with the character before landing this cover assignment, a transition that Kandor Archives scholar Eddy Zeno has argued places Swan's rise to primary Superman artist status in 1957 rather than the 1962 date commonly cited.
Trivia · 7 facts
- First Curt Swan cover on Action Comics: Swan (pencils) and Stan Kaye (inks) produced the cover, marking the start of Swan's run as the dominant cover artist on the entire Superman family of titles.
- First appearance of Superman, Junior (Johnny/Jimmy Kirk): a boy launched into space by his astronomer father, who believed Earth was doomed; exposure to a space cloud grants him super-powers, and upon returning to Earth he is adopted by Superman.
- First appearance of Dr. Morton Kirk: Johnny's father, an astronomer who, on his deathbed, asks Superboy/Superman to become the boy's legal guardian if he is ever found.
- Lead story — 'The Story of Superman, Junior' (12 pages): script by Jerry Coleman, pencils by Wayne Boring, inks by Stan Kaye; the story includes a Superboy flashback sequence bridging Clark Kent's Smallville years to his adult career as Superman.
- Backup story — 'Riddle of the Space Rainbow' (6 pages): script by Otto Binder, art by Jim Mooney; features Tommy Tomorrow and introduces the Space Fishermen (a race of giants from another dimension) and villain 'Nova' Norton; this story was later reprinted in Legion of Super-Heroes Vol. 1 #1/2 (February 1973).
- The Superman, Junior lead story was reprinted in Superman Annual (DC, 1960 series) #7 (Summer 1963), confirming that editors considered it a notable enough tale to revisit for a mass-audience annual audience.
- Additional contributors to the issue include Congo Bill artist Howard Sherman ('Three Dives to Doom') and cartoonist Henry Boltinoff (one-page Ollie strip), reflecting the era's standard anthology structure.
Full credits
Reprints
↩ Reprints Detective Comics #164 (1950)
Reprinted in Superman Annual #1961-1962 (1961), Superman Annual #7 (1963), MV Comix #10/1969 (1969), Legion of Super-Heroes #1 (1973), The Best of DC #25 (1982), Superman in Action Comics #1 (1993), The Silver Age of Superman The Greatest Covers of Action Comics from the '50s to the '70s #[nn] (1995), Superman in the Fifties #[nn] (2021), Stålmannen #8/1958
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