719 – Super-Sister

In Superboy #78 (Nov 1959), Superboy encounters an alien girl and makes a misogynistic comment about female drivers. For payback, the girl transforms Clark into a girl. He calls himself “Claire Kent” and acts as “Super-Sister”, claiming she is Superboy’s sister. In the end, Clark learns his lesson because he knows what it’s like to […]

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708 – Beppo, the Super-Monkey

Beppo, the Super-Monkey makes his debut in Superboy #76 (August 1959). Unnamed in this first story, the monkey is one of Jor-El’s test animals that snuck aboard Kal-El’s rocket before it left Krypton. Young Clark eventually tricks the monkey to be chased out into space. Beppo will be back, and eventually joins up with other […]

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695 – Mysterio the Robot

In Jimmy Olsen #37 (April 1959), “Superman’s Super Rival” has Jimmy meeting a new boy-sized “hero” covered in lead-lined bandages and sporting superpowers like Superman. Superman is curious as to the identity of the new hero, who calls himself Mysterio, who appears to be trying to steal Jimmy’s loyalty away from Superman. It turns out […]

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687 – Rebello

In Superboy #72 (Feb 1959), Clark creates an extremely life-like robot, one that is nearly indistinguishable from the real Superboy, complete with its own wants and desires. Unfortunately it turns out to have one flaw: the robot is left-handed. So naturally rather than fix that bug, Superboy decides to destroy the robot for fear of […]

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680 – Superboy Meets Oliver Queen

About a half a year after Superboy met Robin, Superboy gets a chance to meet Oliver Queen, the future Green Arrow, in Adventure Comics #258 (January 1959). Superboy tries to invent a machine to look back into the past, but via an “atmospheric disturbance” it lets him see into the future, 1959 to be precise. […]

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674 – Red Kryptonite Effects

Red kryptonite returns in Adventure Comics #255 (October 1958). Maybe the writers forgot or ignored the “red kryptonite is 10 times as powerful as green kryptonite” story from a few months and wanted to tell a different story. This time a “Martian” brings a fragment of red kryptonite to Earth and it splits Superboy into […]

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669 – Robin Meets Superboy

Oh, speaking of which, Adventure Comics #253 (Aug 1958) contains that promised story of when Superboy and Robin meet for the first time. Robin appears from the future to warn Superboy that a clock trophy given to him by a scientist is actually a kryptonite bomb that goes off and fatally wounds Superman years from […]

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668 – Bizarro!

In Superboy #68 (Aug 1958) sees the introduction of one of Superman’s sillier heroes: Bizarro! Accidentally created by Professor Dalton using a “duplicator ray”, the imperfect copy of Superboy innocently wanders around Smallville, much like Frankenstein’s monster. After several acts of Bizarro are mistaken as menacing, Superboy decides the creature is not living (wtf/) and […]

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667 – Klax-ar, the Kryptonian

In Superboy #67 (July 1958), a new Kryptonian makes his appearance in Smallville to taunt Superboy. Klax-ar claims it was he that destroyed Krypton with his “atron rays” for being exiled into space by a jury of scientists led by Jor-El. He agrees not to destroy Earth if Superboy willingly leaves Earth too. But Klax-ar […]

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665 – Red Kryptonite

Superboy encounters his first fragment of red kryptonite in Adventure Comics #252 (July 1958). The meteor is ejected accidentally from a spaceship intent on invading Earth from another dimension and Superboy has to keep vigil until the invasion is attempted. This kryptonite is “ten times the radiation power of ordinary kryptonite!”, so I guess they […]

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