Apologies for extreme lateness...The Three Lives Of Jimmy Olsen

I'm sorry guys this isn't movie night. I've been sick lately and my enthusiasm for that has kind of waned. Instead... Jimmy Olsen!


Superman like many rappers felt the need to help his friends break into his business despite them more often than not having little talent.  Like Superman's stalker Lois Lane Daily Planet cub reporter  Jimmy Olsen was given his own solo title. 

Jimmy is the photographer/print boy/everyone's bitch for the Daily Planet. He's one of that strange breed of comic orphans who seem to be have never had parents, or many parents who died in mutually incompatible ways. A similar case is Spider-Man, who usually would lead a reader to believe he was just kind of  spontaneously generated to be his aunt and uncle's nephew. Or maybe his parents were spies or robots I don't know. If I had to estimate his actual age I'd say early twenties, despite looking and acting like a thirteen year old. And not a bright thirteen year old. 


Now when I said solo title earlier there should be an asterisk next to it.  You see Jimmy's  kind of a spazz, so much so that Superman gave him a watch that emits a irritating shriek that only he can  suffer. A noble sacrifice because the simplest of tasks were beyond the boy. One time Superman let him get milk out of the fridge on his own and life still can't exist in that apartment building. So basically the comic Superman's Pal Jimmy Olsen consisted of him getting himself into trouble and using his Superman dog whistle to summon his terrible Kryptonian wrath. 

Not the most interesting premise really so why are we here? Because the trouble Jimmy Olsen got into was fucking insane. Even by the standards of an era where Superman gained the power to shoot a tiny version of himself out of his hand! Let that sink in for a moment. . 

Jimmy spent most of his time being twisted in ways that would be quite horrific if it wasn't so hilarious to behold. In his "career" he had to lose so many superpowers that in early copies of the X-men titles after House Of M there were mistaken references  to a "Jimmy Olsen Day". 

Enough talk, into the void my friends!

"Superman have you considered how our relationship will be affected by this life changing-stop snickering!"

I don't get why Superman looks so surprised by this, by that point it was pretty hard to run into Jimmy on a day when he wasn't some kind of super-being.  

See when I read He-Man, I don't think strong, I think homoerotic cartoon characters from the 1980's. This bloke is slightly more naked though. Didn't think that was possible.

 I finally get a Charles Atlas ad, and it's not one of those revenge fantasy strips, figures. This guy reminds of human version of a tyrannosaurus Rex, which is weird because when I actually look at him I think palm tree. Very thin trunk, expansive top. 

"I don't approve of the faith this temple honours, suppress it!" 

So in all of Jimmy's past lives superhumanly strong men have had adventures for him? And about Samson, I don't think he needed some freak in a Cleopatra wig telling him to destroy heathen temples. That was God's job. Or is Jimmy Olsen actually Jehovah? That explains a terrifying amount of what happens to him come to think of it.


Why is the Daily Planet distributing radium for the Radium Institute? Surely a newspaper reporter and whatever Jimmy is aren't the first choices for transporting radioactive material?  Personally I think it's a symptom of how much the Planet seems to have supplanted every important service normally supplied by the government or other private industry. Their fundraisers provide money for practically everything in the city, they make sure children in the care of the state have Christmas presents, I think I've seen them perform arrests.  Poor Lois has probably had to put out factory fires. Probably spending cuts. 

And I assume the radium is for X-ray machines, since I'm not sure when this comic came out and if radiotherapy was a thing at the time. Or maybe they were going to expose patients to it and see if whatever superpowers they gained cured them.

Who believes in reincarnation? Oh just Hindus, Buddhists Sikhs, and some Native American nations to name a few you fucking idiot." 

Oh it's not even just delivery, Clark has to determine who receives the radium. Poor guy's got his work cut out for him. Seriously this is so disorganized. Did the Radium Institute just need to get rid of some radium really quickly? Is there a big radium tax?

Never mind that because a stereotypical Egyptian man who inexplicably knows Jimmy's name offers to test a machine on him. After claiming Jimmy's knows him from when he was a Pharaoh...  Instead of running away from the stalker nut Jimmy makes a racist comment and agrees. 

And so Swami Rama (either he's actually Indian or his parents loved Arthur C. Clark) tries to bring forth memories of past lives by blasting Jimmy's brain with gamma radiation. Are we sure he's not trying to kill him because he's crazy or that insensitive remark Jimmy made earlier? Jimmy does look like he's getting a bit of brain damage. But maybe Incredible Hulks have good memories. 

Brace yourself for dumb shit in 3, 2, one!

And Samson shook the Lego temple apart!

There is so much concentrated wrong here I feel almost obligated to mention something that almost nearly makes sense if you're squinting while blind. Weekly Hieroglyphic makes more sense than Daily Planet since I imagine compiling news, putting it into prose, chiselling it into lots of slabs by hand and then distributing it on a daily basis would be fucking hard indeed. And because I really don't want anyone thinking anything in this scene is even slightly correct, hieroglyphics were not the only Egyptian writing system, the Weekly Hieroglyphic should be the Weekly Papyrus Scroll Written On In Demotic Or Hieratic Script. Doesn't roll of the tongue I admit but it'd be easier to get it out. 

Recent archaeological evidence shows that Jhimmie died hideously young of sunburn, due to being the whitest Egyptian of all time. Also what the Hell is Samson during here, going by the Bible he lived in Israel not Egypt. Can't imagine him being keen on paling around with Egyptians either. 

I like how they feel the need to give Jimmy's past life such an obvious name despite telling us  this was Jimmy's past life. 

Calling it, Swami's the baddie.

 Must suck when the writers who supply your own existence are too lazy to write your endings. I'm noticing a trend here, all through out history junior reporters are the only thing standing between us and violent criminals or being consumed by animals. Jhimmie is sent to basically capture an apparently dangerous thief and now Jymus (it hurts) has to catch a fucking lion! Considering as we've seen the modern Daily Planet has a habit of doing everyone's job for them this is probably a common job for our Jimmy:

Perry White: Jimmy, the Hot Wire Rapist has been tracked to a slaughterhouse outside of town, chainsaws have been heard revving, and children have been going missing from a nearby elementary school! Go get em', here's a steak knife. Don't bother with the signal watch Jimmy, Superman's in the future. Now go away, I've got a bottle of proof I need to pour on the side walk for the last cub reporter!    

 Also Poor Perry is apparently tied to Jimmy's soul, forever.  Doomed to always have a shitty name trying to be reminiscent of one a man in mid 60's North America no matter where and when he finds himself in. Maybe he sends the reiterations of Jimmy into these horrible situations so he can quit his newspaper equivalent and live his own life. 

"I'm a baker, why am I carrying a spear?"

When he's Greek he's Heracles not Hercules dammit! And why does my spell check not recognize Heracles? Anyway why risk ending up in a bottomless pit instead of going back the way you came? Or did you two come this way but didn't take note of which path? Either way, idiots. And once again this story terminates before reaching its resolution. Instead Vikings with helmets they never actually wore! We don't even get to see the Norse version of White, presumably because he's hung himself from the repetition and this Jimmy was willed the map. And really, saga writing? You know Jimmy there are better ways of writing fiction than going on horribly boring quests. You could also sit down and make shit up!  Also did the Norse really pay for sagas? Or did they share them over a fire while desperately trying to remember who's who through the boozy haze? 

Actually Jimmy you could probably make some money of that treasure, more than whatever you're being paid for your "saga".  Any way who the Hell helps him here? 

Quick, while Marvel isn't looking!

Are all of Jimmy's friends meant to be reincarnations of Superman? Do souls migrate across planets? I suppose it's not silly, many religions which put faith in reincarnation believe that human souls can become animals, why not Kryptonians? Although this is kind of complicated by the fact that Thor is a god (and Heracles is half god come to think of it) and immortal. Has he died in the intervening centuries? Did Ragnarök  happen? 

"One day I'll tell Jimmy how many babies I had to let suffocate to get him out of this..."

Which seems more profitable, patenting and replicating your dream machine and sell custom fantasises to rich bastards, or trick news boys into stealing radium? And the thing about Jimmy Olsen comics is Jimmy has so little actual involvement with his own plots. It's just Superman swooping in and exposit the problems away, maybe Jimmy gets to close a box full of green kryptonite, maybe. 

Why is he wearing the glasses in his own home?

Why the Hell is Swami green? Don't these people realise if I'm reading this I'm clearly an idiot who thinks that's Braniac now? Hmm even if Braniac Connors' machine isn't real with that level of skill in hypnosis he could still make a killing as a kind of low tech virtual reality supplier. And Clark it isn't so much lived a long time ago so much as lived on Earth in a completely different life. Also you can time travel you posing as mythical strong men isn't out of the question. 

We're not done here yet. But before we break I've got to say this, still better than that one Lois and Clark episode with H.G Wells' soul tracker.