The love between Lois Lane and Superman has spanned across 80 years of DC comics — so,
naturally, things have gotten a little weird every now and again.
From messed-up marriages to role-play gone wrong,
here are some of the strangest things about Lois Lane and Superman's relationship.
Smallville takes the unconventional route to romance when Lois Lane appears in the show's
fourth season. Let's just say that meeting your amnesiac future lover while they're
standing naked in a burning field isn't exactly the meet-cute dreams are made of. Unless you're
into that kind of thing, which, as it turns out, Clark Kent and Lois Lane definitely are.
It all goes down in the first episode of season four, when Lois shows up to
investigate the death of her cousin. During her road trip, she winds up in
a cornfield — where she discovers Clark in the nude, lying in a burned patch of corn.
When Supes gets up on his feet, he insists that he's fine — to which Lois quite rightly answers:
"You've just been hit by lightning, you're stark naked, and
you don't even remember your own name. You have a fairly loose definition of 'fine.'"
Lois and Clark's will they/won't they flirtations last for five
whole seasons on the show, and even after they start dating,
there's something awkward about all their banter and palpable sexual tension. But it
never gets quite as weird as that day they ran into each other in that half-scorched cornfield.
Having a kid and saving the world at the same time is no easy feat.
Finding out that your children multiplied while you were out saving the world is even
harder — but that's exactly what went down with the Arrowverse version of Superman.
This version of Lois Lane makes her first appearance in the Arrowverse crossover
episode "Elseworlds," in which Lois and Clark reveal that they're expecting a baby. Cut to
"Crisis on Infinite Earths" a year later, where the couple have one child together,
called Jonathan. Unfortunately, the notorious villain known as the Anti-Monitor
is busy destroying multiple Earths in the multiverse. When everything's said and done,
the gang can only save one Earth — and reality as they know it is altered forever.
At the end of the story, the superhero J'onn J'onzz restores the pre-Crisis memories of his
allies — but things are kinda different in this strange new version of Earth, especially for those
who remember how things used to be. Take Superman, for example. Clark, who began the day with one
child, is kinda surprised during a phone call with Lois when she mentions their "sons," plural.
"Clark, I need you to get to Metropolis now. It's the boys."
"The boys?"
"Yeah, honey, your sons."
Congrats, Clark — again.
Everyone always looks forward to the supercharged romantic climax of a love
story, when the couple finally kisses. At first glance, it seems that Superman II
provides that moment with gusto… until you realize what's actually going on, that is.
First introduced in Action Comics #306, Superman has occasionally demonstrated his ability to
mind-wipe people with a kiss. The concept of messing with someone's memory is shady
even with random bystanders, but doing it to someone you supposedly love and trust is much
worse. Instead of kissing Lois for the right reasons in the 1980 film, Superman uses his
amnesia trick as a power move to alter Lois' memory when she figures out his secret identity.
Given that knowing Superman's secret doesn't seem to change how Lois feels about him,
his actions come off that much crueler. Even worse, if Superman intends to remain close
with Lois in both his forms, she'll likely just discover the truth all over again; after all,
this is super sleuth Lois Lane we're talking about here. And if she does figure it out again,
chances are she'll put together the fact that Superman messed with her mind — something that
won't exactly go over well. Superman's gonna have a lot of explaining to do after that little stunt.
When you're as coveted a hero as Superman, sometimes one of you just isn't enough to
go around. Luckily, within the panels of the comic book world,
anything is possible — even splitting yourself in two. And in Superman #162,
Supes does the unthinkable. He separates into a red and blue version of himself.
Naturally, this has consequences when it comes to Clark's love life, with both Lois and Lana,
another of Superman's major love interests, marrying their own version of the Man of Steel.
Lois settles down with the red version of Superman on a newly restored Krypton, while Lana weds blue
Supes, ultimately chilling out on Earth. It's not exactly the most conventional arrangement,
but since when has Superman settled for anything less than five shades past extra? And sure,
polygamy may not be everyone's cup of tea, but hey — if it works, it works.
Any fan of Smallville will have felt the pain of watching Michael
Rosenbaum's Lex Luthor try and fail to be the best version of himself.
But what if Lex really could really turn good? That's gotta be impossible, right?
"Wrong!"
In Superman's Girl Friend Lois Lane #34, Lex kidnaps Lois — as most supervillains
tend to do on any given weekday. However, as Lex makes his usual threats against her,
the aliens on the planet Omark set the supervillain on the straight and narrow,
curing him of all evildoing. He and Lois then strike up an unlikely friendship,
and the reformed villain even asks her to marry him. Lois initially declines, but when
Lex turns up to save her from trouble instead of Superman, she begins to rethink her decision.
Eventually, Lois falls for her old captor, and she finally accepts his proposal.
Of course, Superman, being the charmer that he is,
is more than happy to move onto his second choice: poor old Lana Lang.
Everyone knows there's nothing like a good fairy tale — but you can always trust a comic
book to make things weird. Take Action Comics #243, for example,
in which Superman and Lois act out their own version of Beauty and the Beast.
Superman gets cursed by a sorceress named Circe, who slips a potion into his drink in an attempt
to extort him into marrying her. He refuses her, of course, convinced that his Kryptonian
makeup is impervious to her sorcery, only to find himself swiftly turned into a super lion.
Lois then proves that her love for Superman is thicker than fur,
kissing him during a fairly awkward date night. And, because subtlety isn't really
a thing in comic books, the actual Beauty and the Beast plays out on-stage at the same time.
Sadly, unlike the fairy tale couple, this kiss doesn't magically solve Superman's bestial woes.
He forlornly accepts his fate and resolves himself to hanging out at the zoo — until he realizes that
Circe laced her elixir with kryptonite. As a result, he's able to figure out the cure… but
still lets Lois have her moment by thinking it was her kiss that did the trick. What a cutie.
When you're doing the ol' will they/won't they dance with an award-winning journalist,
chances are good they're going to ask questions,
no matter how well you hide yourself behind a pair of glasses.
However, despite both Clark and Superman spending plenty of time with Lois,
he still tends to punish her whenever she gets close to uncovering his secret
identity — and sometimes things can get a little out of hand.
The debut issue of Superman's Girl Friend, Lois Lane starts off on a fairly cringey note that
sets the tone for the whole series. This issue follows Lois as she dons her own disguise as a
successful actress to dupe Supes into agreeing to an interview. Superman, the king of disguise,
is somehow offended by Lois' own use of deception. So, to teach her a lesson, the caped
hero dons his Clark Kent disguise and pretends to jump off of a building right in front of the
terrified reporter. Of course, Superman assures a traumatized Lois that he saved Clark just in time.
Obviously, Supes could only have been crueller to Lois here if he had pushed her off that ledge.
And things don't get much better from there, either — throughout the series,
Superman strives to find new and twisted ways to torture Lois for getting too close to the truth.
In Superman's Girl Friend, Lois Lane #48, Lois has the opportunity to uncover Superman's identity,
as the Man of Steel recorded his secret on a tape he gave Perry White — which is only
to be played in the event of his death. Tempted to listen prematurely, Lois eventually decides
to do the right thing, and Superman overhears. So he "rewards" Lois by offering her a chance
to guess his fabricated secret identity in three time periods of his choosing.
As a result, the Kryptonian transforms her into Helen of Troy, Florence Nightingale,
and Cinderella — and it's with that last one that Superman really crosses the line.
What seems like an amusing game turns sour when Superman disguises himself as
Cinderella's evil stepmother. He subsequently begins abusing her,
forcing her to clean, mocking her appearance, and generally treating her like a slave.
Think about it: Superman had countless potential characters to role-play, but he chooses the
abusive option just to throw Lois off the scent. Given that the game was his idea to begin with,
it's fair to say that no one forced him to go to such extremes to hide his identity. He could've
picked any time, place, and character to emulate, but he went with the option to belittle and harm
Lois. Role-play is all well and good if everyone's having fun, but this is practically unhinged.
Superman takes the whole "'til death do us part" vow a little too
literally when he marries Lois' dead body in Superman's Girl Friend Lois Lane #103.
The tale begins in the previous issue after Lois meets a shifty man during an exotic animal parade.
After drinking the stranger's magical elixir, Lois spouts horns, a tail,
and hooves. Needless to say, Clark Kent isn't happy about this, but Lois ends up
in the crossfire when Superman confronts the mysterious figure masquerading as the devil.
During their fight, a wayward laser blasts off of Superman's chest, apparently killing Lois.
Of course, Superman blames himself. In a fit of despair, the Kryptonian finally admits his
love for Lois and cries out wedding vows over her assumedly dead body — which,
let's face it, probably isn't the romantic wedding Lois envisioned for herself.
Luckily, as it turns out, Lois was never dead after all. The devious devil turns out to be
an alien, who takes her to his homeworld in the hopes of convincing her to marry him.
She then sees the ring Superman put on her finger and demands to go home.
Who would've thought that Clark's post-mortem wedding vows would save the day after all?
Following Lois' ongoing trend of tricking Superman into marrying her, the pair
enter into a whole new realm of weirdness during Superman's Girl Friend Lois Lane #42.
After Lois snaps a picture of Superman mid-change, a car crash alters her personality,
and as a result, she gives Superman a choice — marry her the next day,
or she'll develop the film. Obviously, every great romance starts out with a blackmail scheme,
and things go predictably well here, too. While attempting to stall the reporter,
Superman flies her to the Fortress of Solitude, but when she arrives,
she spritzs herself with a dose of "rejuvenation spray" and begins to rapidly de-age.
The age difference prevents the pair from acquiring a marriage license,
but that doesn't stop Lois. She sprays Superman with the serum,
and they both continue to de-age in quick bursts. Eventually, they get
the go-ahead to proceed with the marriage — despite basically looking like toddlers.
Then, by the time the wedding rolls around, both parties are literally babies. Still, everyone is
chill with moving ahead for some reason... until it turns out that Lois and Superman are unable
to say "I do" to each other, since they can only speak in baby babble. Look, it was the '60s, okay?
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