Even DC Is Throwing Shade at Superboy’s Most Hated Power Feat

Warning: contains spoilers for Outsiders #7!

Superboy has performed some truly astonishing feats of power in his day, but now DC is throwing shade at his most hated. DC’s new Outsiders series is a meta-textual joyride through their universe, peeling back the layers of reality to find what makes it tick. Now, in issue seven, DC slyly calls out Superboy Prime’s controversial Infinite Crisis feat, in which he altered reality by punching it.

Outsiders #7 is written by Jackson Lanzing and Collin Kelly and drawn by Robert Carey. After being ripped from her universe and deposited onto the New 52 Earth, Jakita Wagner is desperate for answers. She cannot make sense of her new surroundings, and panics. She reflects on her first few months there, saying she wanted to “punch at the walls of reality” until something happened.

She admits the idea was “insane” and “embarrassing in retrospect.”

Superboy Prime Helped Shape the DC Universe–Whether He Intended to or Not

Superboy Prime Caused Glitches in the DC Universe

In 2005, DC published Infinite Crisis, a direct sequel to Crisis On Infinite Earths.Infinite Crisis attempted to clean up the messes the first Crisis left, such as Hawkman’s continuity. Furthermore, DC was looking for a way to explain certain resurrections, such as Jason Todd’s return as Red Hood. Enter Superboy Prime, one of the survivors of the Crisis. Living in a pocket dimension, Superboy Prime became envious of the post-Crisis Earth, and began punching the walls of reality in frustration. Every time he did, reality would change ever so slightly.

DC used this device to explain the many continuity glitches since Crisis On Infinite Earths. 2006’s Infinite Crisis: Secret Files and Origins #1 showed the various ways Superboy Prime’s punches changed reality. In addition to the many iterations of Hawkman, Superboy was also responsible for the changes to Donna Troy’s origin, as well as Superman’s. While Superboy Prime’s reality-altering punches were a cool way of explaining these errors, it was not popular with fans, who took to online message boards to criticize it for being silly and over the top.

Will Jakita Wagner Get Her Universe Back?

Now, nearly 20 years later, DC is calling this out. Much like Superboy Prime, Jakita Wagner is the last survivor of her universe. They are both desperate to return to their original universe, but are faced with the prospect that it is now completely gone. Superboy Prime’s frustrations with this prospect led him to punch reality, something Jakita admits wanting to do too. However, she knows it will not bring the Wildstorm Universe back. Jakita demonstrates a sense of awareness he was lacking, leading her to avoid repeating Superboy’s much derided feat of strength.

Outsiders #7 is on sale now from DC Comics!