2 Years Later, DC's Big Reboot May Have Its Most Tragic Villain Ever

There's little to be said that's not already been put out about DC's Absolute Universe lineup. It's stunning, bold, occasionally abrasive, yet holds a remarkable capacity for tender, emotional, or dark moments ranging from happy memories to harrowing tragedy. Such is par for the course with DC Comics across over eight decades of stories, but in the case of to his cause. But in a bid to draw out Luthor's animus, Brainiac committed a brutal massacre of Luthor's family, forcing him to watch, before ultimately leaving his prospective recruit, victimized, horrified, and broken, with the ominous promise that they'd meet again. Should Luthor be brought into the fold in any capacity, his would be the most devastating top-tier supervillain origin to date in the Absolute Universe.

DC's Absolute Universe Utterly Broke One Man To Create A Supervillain

Tragic origins are a dime a dozen across superheroes and villains, and certainly venture into the territory of hamfisted tropes more often than not. So when Jason Aaron's Absolute Superman completed the handoff of Lex Luthor's introduction in , it was an intriguing introduction which, in the way most Absolute Universe stories proceed, went south extremely quickly. Brainiac's uncannily grinning facial mimicry of Prime Earth's Luthor was not persuasive enough to pull this universe's counterpart out of his quiet, happy life as a local gas station owner into a vague "project" targeting Superman, so he opted instead for his usual drastic measures.

Luthor's demeanor, after all, is a surprise even to Brainiac. He's the same man who's consistently known to have challenged the prominence of Superman on Earth and even donned wildly powerful interstellar villain mantles in the past. But whether it's because he's without the ambition, or perhaps the driving insecurity that otherwise motivates his innate brilliance, Luthor felt no reason to do more than build a family and small local business in Missouri. Brainiac's attempts to bypass that are naturally beyond the pale, which seems to be the Absolute Brainiac benchmark, creating an inciting incident as an alien butcher murdering Luthor's family in Absolute Superman #17.

Good Guy Lex Luthor Has Had His "One Bad Day"

Famously and Absolute Evil, with Luthor this time being from a humble upbringing, and Joker being a serial killer from a billionaire dynasty.

Where Luthor goes from here is intriguing. His trauma could overtake him and push him in chaotic directions, or, it could plant seeds of hatred, pushing him on a similarly xenophobic warpath toward Superman. Just how this balances out Joker is yet to be seen, but Luthor is, for all intents and purposes, all too human compared to the utterly inhuman Absolute Batman villain. His mind may yet be unclouded by insecurities from past iterations, making a vengeance story arc likely starting in some part with Brainiac to create a twisted iteration of the iconic Earthbound nemesis everybody knows and loves to hate. The pieces are all there, and with multiple different comics highlighting Luthor, it's rather apparent his story is not over yet in Absolute Superman.

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