Superman's Pal, Jimmy Olsen #138
☆ Be the first to review + Add to your collection — Join freeSuperman's Pal, Jimmy Olsen #138 (cover date June 1971) is the thunderous closing chapter of Jack Kirby's inaugural six-issue story arc on the title — the run that served as the on-ramp for his entire Fourth World saga. Issues #133 through #138 form one continuous narrative that introduced Darkseid, Intergang, the new Newsboy Legion, the DNAliens, the Evil Factory, and The Project to the DC Universe, making this concluding installment the payoff for one of the most concentrated bursts of world-building in Bronze Age comics. The issue's near-real-time, 15-minute countdown structure — with Superman racing to prevent a nuclear catastrophe caused by Apokolips-engineered creatures — demonstrated that a superhero comic could sustain cinematic tension across every single page, a storytelling ambition that influenced how ongoing serialized arcs were constructed for decades. Morgan Edge's chilling cameo here, in which he abandons his own staff to Intergang on orders from his criminal masters, also deepened Kirby's recurring meditation on organized crime's infiltration of corporate media power.
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We Buy Collections ▸History
When Kirby arrived at DC in 1970, he was handed Superman's Pal, Jimmy Olsen as a proving ground precisely because it was considered a lesser Superman-family title — one where his experimental Fourth World concepts could be tested without disrupting the flagship books. For issue #138, Kirby had originally plotted a two-part conclusion spanning #138 and #139, but associate editor E. Nelson Bridwell contacted him mid-production to flag cross-continuity conflicts with plans being made in DC's other Superman titles; Kirby scrapped several already-drawn pages and compressed the resolution into a single issue. Mark Evanier later revealed this behind-the-scenes upheaval in his introduction to the Jimmy Olsen Adventures by Jack Kirby Vol. 1 collection, and he eventually recycled Kirby's unused plot notes as the basis for the Superman/Jimmy Olsen story he wrote with artist Steve Rude for Legends of the DC Universe #14. As was standard practice for the entire run, DC had Murphy Anderson redraw Superman and Perry White faces throughout the interior pages, while Vince Colletta inked the 23-page story and Neal Adams inked Kirby's photo-collage cover — an editorial intervention that remained controversial among Kirby scholars.
Trivia · 8 facts
- The issue carries a June 1971 cover date and went on sale April 13, 1971; it was written, penciled, and edited by Jack Kirby, with Vince Colletta inking the 23-page interior story.
- The cover features one of Kirby's signature photo collages, inked by Neal Adams — the same Adams-over-Kirby cover arrangement used on the immediately preceding issue #137.
- Murphy Anderson inked the Superman and Perry White faces throughout the interior, a DC editorial policy applied across Kirby's entire run to keep the Superman-family characters 'on model.'
- The story, titled 'The Big Boom!!', concludes the six-issue Wild Area/Project arc (JO #133–138) — the foundational story arc of Kirby's Fourth World that introduced Darkseid, Intergang, the new Newsboy Legion, and the DNAliens.
- Kirby originally intended the conclusion to span two issues (#138–139), but cross-continuity conflicts with other Superman-family books — communicated by E. Nelson Bridwell — forced him to scrap partially finished pages and compress the ending into one issue.
- Mark Evanier later used Kirby's discarded plot notes from this aborted two-parter as the basis for 'The American Evolution,' a Superman/Jimmy Olsen story he wrote with artist Steve Rude, published in Legends of the DC Universe #14.
- The issue features a ticking-clock narrative structure — a 15-minute countdown to a nuclear explosion at The Project's atomic power plant — as Simyan and Mokkari deploy a horde of Four-Armed Terrors via Matter-Transmitter to overwhelm Superman and the Guardian.
- The story was reprinted in Jimmy Olsen Adventures by Jack Kirby Vol. 1, the DC trade paperback collection that preserved this foundational Fourth World material for later generations of readers.
Cast · 19 characters
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Reprints
Reprinted in Supercomic #66 (1972), Jimmy Olsen: Adventures by Jack Kirby #1 (2003), Jack Kirby's Fourth World Omnibus #1 (2007), Jack Kirby's Fourth World Omnibus #1 (2011), The Fourth World Omnibus by Jack Kirby #[nn] (2018), Superman's Pal, Jimmy Olsen by Jack Kirby #[nn] (2019), Spécial Strange #2 (2022)
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