Superman #410 – “Clark Kent—Fired!” – Cary Bates/Curt Swan/Al Williamson
This one starts with Superman taking care of a satellite that’s fallen from orbit. The satellite breaks in half and he buries one piece (containing a nuclear-fueled engine) deep underground, flying to Hawaii just in time to kick the other piece into a volcano, which gives the crowds in Honolulu a thrill. Back in Metropolis, Superman changes to Clark Kent and writes up the satellite story for the Daily Planet, pretending (as always) that he scored an exclusive interview with Superman. The story makes the front page, but later that day things take a bizarre turn when Morgan Edge gets a call about the story. Edge gives Perry White hell and tells him to deal with things. Turns out, there was no falling satellite
(NASA says it’s still in orbit) and no heroic measures by Superman (nobody in Honolulu remembers Superman kicking the satellite machinery into the volcano). It looks like Clark just made the whole story up, which screws up the credibility of the Daily Planet (and Galaxy Communications). Superman checks and finds the satellite is still in orbit and it doesn’t even have his fingerprints on it. Since nobody remembers him dealing with the satellite, he figures it wasn’t replaced with an exact duplicate, so the only explanation is that he hallucinated the whole thing. Superman wonders if he might be a danger to the world if he’s losing touch with reality. He stops by Morgan Edge’s place 
and Edge asks him if he gave the satellite story to Clark Kent. Superman contemplates telling Edge the truth, but figures the public might freak out if they knew Superman was seeing things, so he throws his alter ego under the bus, telling Edge he has no idea where Clark got the story. When Edge and Perry call Clark in to explain himself, he has no defense so Edge fires him. Lois wonders if Clark and Superman are working on some plan together and this is all part of it, but Clark won’t tell her anything to ease her mind. He packs his stuff and leaves WGBS, telling Lana he needs a few days to process things. After avoiding some other reporters at his apartment, Clark changes to Superman and heads to his Fortress of Solitude to give himself a thorough medical exam. Everything checks out fine, so Superman figures whoever screwed
with his mind must be a genius who can cover his tracks perfectly. Turns out Superman is right … we see Lex Luthor on his island gloating over how he implanted the false memories of stopping the satellite in Superman’s mind. Lex knew Superman would give the story to one of his friends (either Clark or Lois) and then be forced to deny the story, getting that friend in trouble. (Naturally, Lex doesn’t know Superman actually is Clark Kent.) When Lex hears that Clark has been fired, he’s happy but says his plan isn’t over yet. Meanwhile, Superman is feeling guilty for ruining the Kent name and hopes his parents would understand if they were still alive.
Action #570 – “The Mystery of Jimmy Olsen’s Alter Ego” – Paul Kupperberg/Kurt Schaffenberger/Dave Hunt
This one starts with Superman dropping Jimmy Olsen at the Galaxy Building after giving him an exclusive on a story. Jimmy is his usual arrogant self, thinking he’s a brilliant reporter and everyone should be grateful just to be near him. Perry White cuts him down to size, telling him he’d better get to the observatory to interview Dr. Morton. At the observatory, Morton tells Jimmy about X-cosmic rays, energy supposedly left over from the Big Bang that could represent a new energy source. Jimmy gets zapped by some of the rays while looking through the telescope and sees a dark version of himself standing nearby. Morton assures him it was
an after-image, but when Jimmy is leaving we see the Dark Jimmy watching him. (Just from the title of the story, you can pretty much figure out what’s going to happen.) Later, Superman is taking some thieves to jail when Dark Jimmy (calling himself Alter Ego) shows up to grab the loot the thieves stole. Alter Ego tells Superman he’s so powerful he can pretty much do anything he wants. He demonstrates by slapping Superman around before taking off with the money. But Superman’s x-ray vision revealed who was under the hood, so he calls Inspector Henderson and they go to the Daily Planet. Jimmy (who’s acting much more humble than usual) says he’s been there all day and Lois and Perry corroborate that (as does Superman’s super-hearing when 
listening to Jimmy’s heartbeat). But Superman knows Alter Ego was Jimmy (he says even the fingerprints match), so he’s not sure what’s going on. Superman finds Alter Ego robbing a bank and gets pounded again, but figures Alter Ego will go after Jimmy next. Sure enough, Alter Ego shows up in Jimmy’s office, telling him he’s Jimmy’s ego, which is why he’s so sure he can do anything. Superman shows up an challenges Alter Ego, taking him out with a full-power punch. Superman knew Alter Ego wouldn’t be able to stand up to him, and also knew he’d never admit it. Alter Ego disappears back into Jimmy’s psyche, and Jimmy immediately becomes full of himself again.
“The Superman Who Came to Dinner” – Craig Boldman/Howard Bender/Pablo Marcos
This is a goofy story about Superman saving a guy (Martin Weems), who invites him home for dinner as a reward. Superman accepts and then acts like a complete dick, taking over Martin’s house and refusing to leave,
driving Martin and his wife crazy. Martin finally freaks out, telling Superman to get lost and Supes reveals that he accidentally exposed Martin to some alien germs he’d been studying (when they shook hands after Superman saved Martin) and the cure for the germs was anger, so that’s why Superman was being so obnoxious and keeping Martin away from everyone else. (The germs only affect males, so Martin’s wife was never in danger.) The whole thing is kind of a take on the old play The Man Who Came to Dinner (hence the title), but it’s weird to see Superman playing the Monty Woolley role; I think it might’ve worked better for someone like Plastic Man.
DC Comics Presents #84 – “Give Me Power … Give Me Your World” – Bob Rozakis/Jack Kirby, Alex Toth/Greg Theakston
This one starts with the Challengers of the Unknown showing up at the Daily planet, trying to get in touch with Superman. The receptionist doesn’t recognize them, but Clark Kent does and asks why they need the Man of Steel. The Challs tell Clark about a strange adventure they had recently in St. Louis. A guy named Jenkins was on the ledge of a bank building threatening to jump, so the Challs tried to rescue him. Jenkins was freaked out, refusing to go back inside the building and the Challs could tell he was terrified of something inside. After an elaborate rescue, Jenkins was taken back inside where a cop asked him about a strange card on his desk.
That freaked Jenkins out all over again and he jumped out the window, almost taking Red Ryan with him. The card had a strange symbol on it that turned out to be Kryptonian, so they need Superman to figure out what it means. Clark tells the Challs he’ll try to contact Superman and takes off, heading to the Fortress of Solitude. The symbol on the card seems vaguely familiar, but Superman needs to use his memory machine to recall the details. Turns out the symbol was invented by a criminal named Zo-Mar and he could enslave anyone’s mind just by showing it to them. He was defeated by Dru-Zod (which earned Zod his promotion to General) and imprisoned on a satellite orbiting Krypton. Superman zooms back to Metropolis to get the 
Challengers and they take him to where they got the card. If that sounds fishy, it is: turns out Zo-Mar has enslaved the Challs, using them to lure Superman to his hideout. The Man of Steel quickly succumbs to the hypnotic card’s power and Zo-Mar interrogates him about his fantastic powers. When Superman tells Zo-Mar his powers come from Earth’s yellow sun, Zo-Mar thinks he’s lying, since Zo-Mar is Kryptonian and doesn’t have super-powers on Earth. He orders Superman to go out and destroy the town and Supes is forced to obey. But Superman’s mind is still his own and he manages to use super-ventriloquism to duplicate Zo-Mar’s voice, ordering the enthralled Challengers to attack Zo-Mar and retrieve the card. They do and Superman ends his destructive rampage. When Superman tries to take Zo-Mar in, the Kryptonian suddenly does have super-powers. Superman figures out that
the card is a sort of mutated Kryptonite which canceled Zo-Mar’s powers while he had it. Prof suggests giving him the card back to negate his powers, but that would enable him to enslave them again. Suprman uses his super-breath to blow the card toward Zo-Mar (since Superman can’t touch it without losing his own powers) and just as Zo-Mar grabs the card, Superman punches him out. Superman takes off with the unconscious Zo-Mar, projecting him into the Phantom Zone before he wakes up (where he’s reunited with Zod). Later, the Challs drop by the Daily Planet again looking for Superman because they want to know how Supes beat Zo-Mar and where he took him. But Clark tells them some questions just have to stay unanswered.
All-Star Squadron #48 – “Camelot 1942” – Roy Thomas/Mike Harris/Vince Colletta
This one starts with Shining Knight going to a ruined castle in southern England where he meets another knight, one who seems to be from Arthurian times just as Shining Knight himself is. The knight attacks and after subduing him, Shining Knight is thrilled to find out it’s his old master, King Arthur. Shining Knight’s joy doesn’t last long, as Arthur knocks him out with a sucker-punch. The next day, a contingent of All-Stars (Dr. Fate, Firebrand, Robotman, and Hourman) arrive in England in response to an urgent summons by Churchill (which we saw last issue). Their transport plane runs right into a night attack by the Luftwaffe and Firebrand, Dr. Fate, and Robotman head out to help. They’re
aided by the timely arrival of the Blackhawks, who send the Germans running back to the mainland. After landing at a nearby aerodrome, the heroes are greeted by Churchill who takes them (and Blackhawk, whose teammates head back to their secret island base) to his nearby base of operations to explain why he needs them. He sent Shining Knight to investigate a strange area around the site of Camelot that seems to be surrounded by a mystical force field, but Shining Knight disappeared. Churchill needs someone well-versed in magic (like Dr. Fate) to check it out. The All-Stars head out toward Camelot (with Blackhawk taking Hourman in his plane) and get a shock when they approach the site: instead of ruins, there’s a medieval castle there, complete 
with knights and a wizard. The wizard is apparently Merlin and he blasts the All-Stars, causing Blackhawk’s plane to crash and knocking the others out … except for Dr. Fate. he’s able to fight off Merlin’s blast and gets close enough to deck the wizard. “Merlin” turns out to be some kind of robot and it explodes when Fate knocks its head off, bringing Fate in for a rough landing. Fate wonders what the hell’s going on and “King Arthur” reveals himself as Fate’s old foe, Wotan. Wotan wants revenge on Fate for past defeats and he brings out his secret weapon … Shining Knight, who’s under Wotan’s mental control. Wotan orders the enthralled Shining Knight to kill Fate and the other All-Stars.
Infinity Inc. #17 – “Home Sweet Helix” – Roy Thomas/Todd McFarlane/Tony DeZuniga
Last issue, Lyta (Fury) Trevor was kidnapped by Mr. Bones, who left a note for Lyta’s fiancé, Hector (Silver Scarab) Hall saying he’d be contacted about the ransom and if he told anyone, Fury would be killed. Obsidian actually found the note, but Silver Scarab talks him into keeping his mouth shut while thy work on fashioning a new Silver Scarab costume (since Bones trashed the original one during the kidnapping). Fury wakes up in a crappy house surrounded by weirdos, who Mr. Bones introduces as his teammates (Helix). Besides Bones and his poisonous touch there’s Penny Dreadful (who manipulates energy), Arak the Wind Walker (who harnesses natural forces), Tao Jones (who can apparently turn any attack against her back on its source), Baby Boom
(explosive powers), and Kritter (who looks like a dog but is apparently a mutated human and quite the computer genius). Helix sends Hector the ransom demand and repeats that he’d better not tell anyone. Hector decks Obsidian to keep him from following and goes out to meet Helix. Obsidian wakes up (groggy because he hit his head when Hector decked him) and takes Hector’s car to his sister Jade’s place, where he has a hallucination of Rose Canton as Thorn before he passes out. (Of course, we know Rose really is Thorn, but none of the Infinitors know that yet.) After reviving, Obsidian tells Jade about Fury’s kidnapping and she calls the rest of the team. Silver Scarab goes out to a 
ghost town in the desert near Bakersfield to meet Helix. Baby Boom screws with him, blowing up several buildings she claims Fury is in. When Scarab attacks her, Kritter jumps him and the rest of Helix come out of hiding with Fury. Silver Scarab tosses Kritter away and goes after Helix, managing to grab Fury and fly away. But “Fury” turns out to be a dummy, which Baby Boom blows up in Silver Scarab’s face. Mr. Bones tells his teammates it’s time to stop screwing around and take what they want … starting in L.A.