Action Comics #600

Thirty years ago, Superman turned 50 and Action Comics reached the #600 milestone.  At the time, this was the highest number a comic series had gone, although now the series just hit 1,000 for Superman's 80th anniversary. 

Superman #17

Somebody is murdering people at used book stores again which means Silver Banshee is back.  After she fails to kill Clark Kent, Superman figures out that for some reason she has to know the identity of the person she's trying to kill or it doesn't work.  Suddenly Batman shows up and almost beats her, but she figures out it's really Superman in disguise.  We finally get a hint of her origin when a mysterious Scottsman interrupts the fight talking about how she had broken a sacred ritual of his clan.  Silver Banshee flees the scene, Superman takes Jimmy Olsen back to his mother who flirts with him, and then Clark Kent goes back to the Daily Planet where he learns he missed a call from Wonder Woman's publicist, Myndi Mayer.

Wonder Woman #16

Wonder Woman fights the new post-Crisis Silver Swan (no relation to Silver Banshee).  After the fight, Wonder Woman reveals to her friend Vanessa that she thinks she may be in love with Superman.  Wonder Woman is called to Myndi Mayer's office where a reporter named Kent manages to get Superman on the phone to arrange a rendezvous.  Myndi wants to capitalize on this story but Clark won't tell her the location where the two heroes are going to meet.  Meanwhile on Mount Olympus, the god Hermes tries to warn Zeus of an invader, but is struck down by a mysterious figure in the shadows.

Adventures of Superman #440

This was actually one of the first Superman comics I ever read.  There's not a villain, instead several plot threads are resolved as Superman goes to his meeting with Wonder Woman.

First, Professor Hamilton is out of jail and is helping Superman test another Superman robot on his force field.  With little explanation, Hamilton transitions from one-time villain to Superman ally.  Lois Lane bumps into Jerry White on her way to visit Jose Delgado at the hospital.  Superman goes to Gotham to pick up the scrap book (remember that?) from Batman, but the only thing the Caped Crusader has been able to deduce from it is that Clark Kent is Superman.  As he leaves, Superman reveals to Batman that he knows he's Bruce Wayne too.  The World's Finest team is starting to become friends again.  Morgan Edge continues his anti-Superman campaign on TV, although now after the last issue he's convinced that Superman really is a robot.  Watching the show, Lex Luthor dismisses that idea.  His secretary brings in the report his team has compiled on Maggie Sawyer and Lex Luthor believes he has some juicy kompromat.  After putting out the fire on a burning fuel truck, Superman takes the scrap book to Ma Kent, who reveals it was hers all along.  Superman still wonders who could have sent it to Clark Kent and if that means Lex Luthor knows his secret identity now.  Finally, he meets Wonder Woman at the rendezvous near a frozen lake and they kiss on the last page.  Continued in Action Comics #600.

Action Comics #600

Wonder Woman wasn't expecting to kiss on the first date so it goes quickly from romantic to awkward.  The two fly off to talk, but Wonder Woman is summoned to Mount Olympus by a distressed Hermes and Superman follows her through the portal.  The two are separated in this Escher-esque magical realm as it is revealed the gods have fallen to a new god, Darkseid.  Darkseid tricks the heroes into fighting each other, but they figure out the deception and find where the lord of Apokalips is hiding.  Wonder Woman explains that he has only been able to conquer Mount Olympus because the gods allowed it, and he leaves angrily.  Back on Earth, Superman and Wonder Woman resolve that they could never be lovers, but perhaps they can be friends.  Superman asks Diana to call him Clark.

Meanwhile, Myndi Mayer publishes her story on "The Super Romance of the Century" and Lois Lane has to take a walk in the park to process it.  She's spent the last several months angry at both Superman and Clark Kent for not disclosing that they knew each other for years.  Lois had decided to kill the exposé she was writing about it when she realized it would have been a death warrant for Kent's parents.  She's contemplating writing Superman out of her life and starting a new chapter when Clark shows up at her door to talk.  Unfortunately, he has to leave abruptly when he hears Jimmy's signal watch, and Lois remains mad at him.

Lex Luthor invites Maggie Sawyer into his office where he reveals he knows she's a lesbian, again without actually saying the L-word.  In an angry fit he slams his hand on the desk, and suddenly experiences excruciating pain.  As his staff rushes him to his doctor, Maggie considers swiping the evidence off his desk, but decides against sinking to his level.  Doctor Kelley discovers that Lex is suffering from Kryptonite poisoning from his Kryptonite ring, and he will probably lose his hand.

Superman finds that Jimmy Olsen has called him to a small town to put out yet another burning fuel truck.  There, Superman collapses as if he's been exposed to Kryptonite.  Jimmy hijacks a fork lift and takes Superman to a cave outside of town, then runs off to get help.  The Man-Bat happens to find his way into the same cave and manages to get Hawkman to come help, but that will have to wait for the next issue of Superman.

I've never been a fan of stories that try to make Superman and Wonder Woman a couple (that was the part of the New 52 I hated the most, actually).  Superman and Wonder Woman weren't originally created as a shared universe, they each have their own supporting casts and love interests and I feel trying to cross-pollinate them diminishes their brand and their myth-potential.  To me, it seems this romance appeals to people who aren't really fans of either character.  But I thoroughly enjoy this issue precisely because of how it subverts this expectation and then leaves the two as just good friends.  The Wonder Woman story has some beautiful art by the impeccable George Perez, who was also doing the post-Crisis Wonder Woman series at this same time.  At the end there's a great pin-up of Superman fighting a re-designed Braniac by Walter Simonson, but unfortunately this version of Braniac never appears in a story.  As a product of a simpler time, this issue features a second interior cover (pictured above), in today's market they would have simply published this as a variant cover.

The World of Smallville #2

Unrelated to Action Comics #600, we continue the story of Martha Kent's first marriage followed by another re-telling of Kal El landing on Earth.  In the present, Lana Lang visits the Kent family at their home, the first time they've seen her since the Millennium crossover.