Liberty Bell March, Day 17: And Now for Something Completely Elseworlds

Superman: True Brit is a 2004 DC original graphic novel that poses the puzzling question: What if Baby Kal-El had landed in England instead of Kansas?


from Superman: True Brit graphic novel (DC, December 2004), script by Kim "Howard" Johnson "with some help by" John Cleese, pencils by John Byrne, inks by Mark Farmer, colors by Alex Bleyaert, letters by Bill Oakley and Jack Morelli
There's a lot of talent attached here: It's based on ideas by Python John Cleese, John Byrne's on art, and long-time Monty Python historian and biographer Kim "Howard" Johnson wrote the script. And with a pedigree like that you probably know right away that this is not going to be a staunch, serious Elseworlds like USSR Superman (plus Batman and his furry hat). No, it is...rather silly. Which is fun! We don't get enough of that silliness in a Superman story much anymore.

The book includes several verbal and visual nods to the Pythons, their sketches and movies, and their various side projects. I won't include videos for them, but I bet you can identify most of the references! Have fun, and remember: "The Universe consists of a billion, billion galaxies...77,000,000,000 miles across, and every galaxy is made up of a billion, zillion stars and around these stars circle a billion planets, and of all of these planets the greenest and the pleasantest is the planet Earth, in the system of Sol, in the Galaxy known as the Milky Way."










And that's just the ones I found on my recent re-read. I am pretty sure that in keeping with the theme of this month, this comic has the most Monty Python references ever in a single comic book. Including some copies of Monty Python's Two-in-One.