Luthor Knew

A plot point going back to Jeph Loeb's first issue of Superman picks up again, as Lex Luthor holds Lois Lane to her agreement to kill any one story of his choice.  Fans used to be rewarded with payoffs like this after years of waiting, back when writers stayed on books for longer runs and before story arcs were written for trades. 

Superman #182

Lois Lane's investigation into what President Luthor knew about the Imperix invasion before the war leads her dangerously close to finding out that General Rock is still alive, which leads Amanda Waller to send the new Suicide Squad to intimidate her.  Superman rescues her, although she realizes the Squad wasn't trying to kill her.  Lois finally gets concrete evidence when Luthor's bodyguard Hope agrees to meet her in an empty parking garage like Bob Woodward meeting "Deep Throat."  Lois now has corroborating evidence that Lex Luthor was allied with Brainiac 13 and knew what was going to happen in the future.  Unfortunately, when Lois returns home she finds the President in her apartment, and Luthor demands that she holds up her end of the bargain that they made back in Superman #151.  Lois is forced to kill the story at his request, but she's now free to talk about this agreement with Clark.  Clark agrees she should do what she agreed, but since Clark made no such agreement he has the story published under his byline instead. 

While this story had been in development for years, it had real world parallels as the nation was starting to question what then-President George W. Bush knew about the September 11th attacks before they happened.

Adventures of Superman #603

Mirror, Mirror part 2 of 3

Inside the Fortress of Solitude, Superman fights his evil, anti-matter counterpart Ultraman to keep him away from the superpowered newborn baby he brought there.  Superwoman and Owlman of the Injustice Gang also followed Ultraman into Superman's universe, where the tesseract Fortress allows them to interact in the same space without displacing them into each other's respective universes.  Superman now assumes the baby is the product of Owlman and Superwoman's affair, until it starts to speak with Brainiac's voice.

Carlos Meglia is assisted by some other artists for this issue, but the results are still mixed and incoherent.  It doesn't help that Ultraman and Superman are nearly identical characters, but in some panels without a clear glimpse of their differing crests it's difficult to determine which one is performing an action or even speaking.  Carlos Pacheco drew the cover for this issue and the next one, and he would return as a regular artist on this series a few years later.

Superman: The Man of Steel #126

The Pantheon part 1 of 2

A giant named Midas attacks Metropolis, with the predictable ability to turn people and objects into gold.  Superman is assisted by some super-powered out-of-towners who reveal they represent the gods and call themselves the Interfaith Diety Council of Active Polytheists (IDCAP).  Meanwhile, Lois Lane gives an interview to a Metropolis University journalism student, who asks her difficult questions about her father's death.  Then the student asks Lois a random question: if she could be a goddess, what would she be the goddess of?  The student keeps pressing her until Lois settles on the answer: integrity.  Lois is suddenly transformed into the Goddess of Integrity, and appears before Superman to reveal the members of IDCAP are really evil gods.  Of the eight remaining issues, this would be the last multi-part story arc in this series before it ended.

Action Comics #791

Clark is invited to his high school reunion and has a painful memory from a school dance.  A schoolmate named Marge is bullied for her weight, and a young Clark Kent feels sorry for her and decides to invite her to the dance.  Feeling pitied, Marge declines Clark's offer and tells him she'll be gone before the dance anyway.  Clark assumes she's planning to commit suicide, and when he sees her on a bridge she falls in the water when he tries to save her.  But it turns out she wasn't planning to go to the dance because she got an early admission to college and was looking forward to getting out of Smallville.  Marge agrees to go the dance with Clark, where Lana Lang declares them the homecoming king and queen even though their names aren't on the winning envelope.  Tragically, the jealous couple who would have won drives home drunk and they fatally hit Marge as she walks home. 

Smallville was a hit series on the WB channel (now the CW) at this time, so there would be another flashback story like this one in a few issues to capitalize on the show's popularity.  Ben Raab and Derec Aucoin fill in as guest writer and artist, the only issue for both of them on this series, although Derec Aucoin would be seen again soon in Adventures of Superman. 

This same month was the final, 100th issue of Superboy's long-running series.  Within a year, Peter David's Supergirl series would also end, as well as Superman: The Man of Steel.  Jeph Loeb would be leaving next month, and the next year would seem like a low point.