Starkville’s House of El Podcast

Here we are again with a SHoE File of epic proportions. General Zod has been a character in the DC Universe for a very long time dating back to the the early 1960’s. While he wasn’t used very much in the beginning, Zod has become one of Superman’s most formidable adversaries over the years and as of late even an ally in the comics. The character and look of Zod is most defined by Superman I & II. Those movies are really what gave Zod the exposure to make him a mainstream character. His famous line “Kneel before Zod” has definitely become a part of pop culture. Smallville has had a few different incarnations of Zod inorevious seasons, but season 9 has given us the corporeal form of the character on the show.  Let’s get into this character and see what his history is.

Reviewing the history of  Zod in chronological order is going to involve some things that we have talked about before such as the multiverse,  Silver Age, and the Modern age. In the comics Zod has existed in  places called the Pocket Universe, and even some instances of time travel by Superman. These concepts can get somewhat confusing on their own much less when we are talking about all of them.

Dru-Zod was created in the  silver age of comic books, first apprearing in Adventure Comics #283 (April 1961).  Thats right, Zod is actually his Kryptonian last name and it works. I don’t know if I would feel the same way about calling Superman “El”. The foundations of this character have carried on over the years and still hold true to this day. Some of the other characters I have profiled have changed dramatically since their inception, but Zod is still the heartless ruler that he was when he was created by Robert Berstein and George Papp back in ‘61.  For instance, Zod was introduced as a megalomaniacal Kryptonian in charge of the military on Krypton. He had known Jor-El from when he was a aspiring scientist. Once the Kryptonian space fleet was disbanded after the destruction of Krypton’s moon Wethgor by an evil warlord named Jax-Ur, Zod attempted to overthrow the Kryptonian government. He created an army of robotic duplicates of himself that would by today’s standards, resemble Bizarro. His attempt failed and he was sentenced to the Phantom Zone. Superboy would later release him from the Zone when Zod’s sentence was up. As you can imagine Zod immediately tried to rule the earth, which he was stopped from doing by Superboy who placed him back in the Phantom Zone. He would escape from time to time only to be placed back in the Zone. The history of this Zod was erased from comics continuity due to the events of “Crisis in Infinite Earths”

Superman: The Movie gave us a much more iconic and heartless version of Zod.   Zod had been placed in the Phantom Zone by the Kryptonian council shortly before the planet’s destruction. He was acompanied by a female Ursa, and a mute named Non. It was in Superman II that we were able to see the story develop to involve Superman. They were released from the zone due to the work of Superman himself. Superman had sent an elevator car packed with explosives into space before they exploded and the shockwave of the explosion caused the mirror-like Phantom Zone to shatter releasing the three criminals. They make their way to earth and discover that Superman is the son of Jor-El and in their attempt to take over the earth must battle Superman. Ultimately they are defeated.Zod was played by Terrence Stamp who now is the booming voice of Jor-El on Smallville.

The first time we see Zod again in the comics is in the post-Crisis era. A character called The Time Trapper creates a pocket universe where Krypton and Earth are the only planets. Kal-El was sent to earth and becomes Superboy, however there are no other heroes on earth.  When Superboy travels to the 30th century to join the Legion he never returns. In this universe Lex Luthor is a good-guy and is friends with Lana and Pete. After discovering Superboy’s lab, Luthor finds a time viewer and is tricked by Zod into freeing him. Zod and his two followers lay waste to the earth and evaporate virtually all of the atmosphere. Luthor being a genius scientist even in this universe creates a Supergirl. Even she is not able to stop Zod. They find a way to bring the “real Superman from his universe to help them defeat Zod. Ultimately Superman executes Zod with green kryptonite. This was a major move in the comics because here you have a post-crisis Superman (modern) acting as judge, jury, and executioner. This became a plot thread for Superman once returning from the pocket universe reevaluating his morals.

The next incarnation of Zod is the most different version from the original yet. Two cosmonauts are bombarded with radiation during a meteor storm while in space. This radiation changes  the two cosmonauts and their unborn child. The mother dies during childbirth and the father dies shortly thereafter. The child known as Zed is taken by the Soviet government and raised in a laboratory. It is discovered that this child is incredibly weak under a yellow sun, and extremely powerful with all the powers of Superman under a red sun.  He blames Superman for his parents death and is fitted with a red armor that filters yellow sunlight and produces red sunlight radiation to give Zed his powers. Zed is spoken to from a spirit of the pocket universe Zod, who fuels his hate for Superman and he takes the name Zod. He faces Superman on several occasions with neither really getting the better of the other. It is revealed that Zod is planning on turning the Earth’s yellow sun to a red sun, so that he may take Superman’s place and rule the Earth. Sound familiar? Lex Luthor helps the depowered superman regain his powers and restore the sun back to yellow. When this happens, Zod is attempting to attack superman and now that he is depowered he dies attacking Superman.

June of 2004 brought forth a new and different version of Zod. Brian Azzarello wrote a story that appeared in Superman comics #204-215. This story explored the idea of  pocket universes and alternate realities. Zod in this version resents Superman for placing him in the phantom zone and continuously tampering with it. According to this Zod, he is from the same planet of Krypton. He was placed in the zone by Jor-El..blah…blah…blah I think we all know how this story goes. Anyways, this Zod is much older than any incarnation we have sen before. He mostly looks like an older version of Zod in the Superman movies. We find out later that this character is not Zod at all, and his existence is super-ceded by the fact that since this version of the character is considered “pre-crisis” he is not Zod.

The final comic interpretation of Zod is the one that is considered to be the actual Zod. Not being from an alternate reality or a pocket universe, this Zod finds a way to escape the Phantom Zone along with his two most trusted allies Ursa and Non. This is the first time that Ursa and Non appeared in comics based on the Richard Donner Superman movies. Go pick up a current Superman comic and this is the Zod you will see. This story is told in the Superman: Last Son storyline.  He is a character who wishes to rule the earth with the help of Ursa, Non, and the rest of his supporters who escape the phantom zone. In the begininning of the story a child arrives in metropolis in a escape pod. Superman discovers the child to be Kryptonian and after the government seizes the boy and transports him behind Superman’s back to an undisclosed location, Superman breaks him out and takes him to Smallville to live with Ma & Pa Kent. They name him Chris Kent and Clark and Lois discuss adopting the boy. Meanwhile Zod and his army arrive on Earth and begin to make their presence felt. The Kryptonians are shown wearing yellow goggles because the yellow sun is too intense for their eyes. It turns out that Chris Kent is actually Lor-Zod, the son of Ursa and Zod who was born in the phantom zone. Superman teams up with Lex, Metallo, and Parasite to defeat Zod and send him back to the Phantom Zone. However Chris had to return to the Phantom Zone to seal it up so that Zod and his minons could not escape again. Fellow  SHoE contributor, William Goodman,  has recapped the current storyline involving Zod and the World of New Krypton. Click here to check William’s review concerning the current storyline involving Zod.

Probably the best characterization of Zod in my opinion has been the Kevin J Anderson novel called “Last Days on Krypton”.  In this story we really get to see what makes Zod tick and how evil of a character he really is. I recommend this book to anyone who is a Superman fan.

Smallville has given us a few different looks for Zod. First was the Phantom Zone wraith who tried to use Clark as his vessel. but Clark was able to close the portal before this happened. Then we saw Lex being possessed by Zod on Dark thursday. These events brought forth the best head to head battle between Zod and Clark, even though it was Lex possessed by Zod. Then in season 8 Faora (Ursa) tells Davis Bloom that he is a creation of Zod’s DNA manipulated into a Doomsday creature destined to destroy all life on Earth and carry on the bloodline of Zod. Now we have Calum Blue playing a much younger Zod than has ever been seen before. This Zod is a clone whose only memories are from the war on Krypton against the Black Zero group. I love this portrayal of the character and I am anxious to see what happens from here. We have seen glimpses of a future that has played out in the comics before, but I don’t think we will ever see those events transpire to their fullest extent on the show.  Only time will tell.

Make sure to visit our forums, there is a lot to discuss during the hiatus and that is just the place to share your thoughts on Smallville.

A very special thanks to Graham Tracey for designing the banner at the top of this article.

Thanks for reading!

This entry was posted on Friday, December 4th, 2009 at 3:32 pm and is filed under Character History. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.