Source: Cerebus #56-57, normalman #1-12 (1983-85), and a few appearances since
Type: Spoof
In the early 80s, Jim Valentino took a crack at self-publishing with a Superman spoof (well, it also spoofed everything else), that actually split Superman in two. The Clark Kent half of him is normalman (come back tomorrow for the other half). Wiki tells the origin story as clearly as I could:
"On the planet Arnold, a junior CPA had come to the conclusion that Arnold would explode in eight hours. In a take on the origin of Superman, the junior CPA built a rocket ship to launch his infant son into deep space. No sooner had he done so, however, that he discovered that Arnold was not going to explode after all, leading his enraged wife to murder him. Twenty years later, the rocket carrying the now-grown baby ended up crashing into an Earth-like planet called Levram ('Marvel' spelled backwards), populated entirely by super powered people. Because he had no superpowers of any kind, the locals dubbed him 'normalman'."
nomalman's father has been known as Joe-L and Jerk-L, depending on the issue (I tend to think the second is just his nickname... oh and check out that Golden Age surname). His own true name is Norm-L (feels like something out of Paranoia).
You can get the Complete normalman in trade from Image Comics, which I have yet to do. It came out in 2007 (in black & white, unlike most of the originals) and collects all of normalman's appearances - Cerebus #56 and #57, A-V in 3-D #1, Journey #13, normalman #1–12, normalman3-D Annual #1, normalman - The Novel, Epic Lite #1, normalman Megatron Special #1 and normalman 20th Anniversary Special #1 - and includes work by many big names, like William Messner-Loebs, Donald Simpson, Larry Marder, Dave Sim, Murphy Anderson, and George Perez.
Type: Spoof
In the early 80s, Jim Valentino took a crack at self-publishing with a Superman spoof (well, it also spoofed everything else), that actually split Superman in two. The Clark Kent half of him is normalman (come back tomorrow for the other half). Wiki tells the origin story as clearly as I could:"On the planet Arnold, a junior CPA had come to the conclusion that Arnold would explode in eight hours. In a take on the origin of Superman, the junior CPA built a rocket ship to launch his infant son into deep space. No sooner had he done so, however, that he discovered that Arnold was not going to explode after all, leading his enraged wife to murder him. Twenty years later, the rocket carrying the now-grown baby ended up crashing into an Earth-like planet called Levram ('Marvel' spelled backwards), populated entirely by super powered people. Because he had no superpowers of any kind, the locals dubbed him 'normalman'."
nomalman's father has been known as Joe-L and Jerk-L, depending on the issue (I tend to think the second is just his nickname... oh and check out that Golden Age surname). His own true name is Norm-L (feels like something out of Paranoia).You can get the Complete normalman in trade from Image Comics, which I have yet to do. It came out in 2007 (in black & white, unlike most of the originals) and collects all of normalman's appearances - Cerebus #56 and #57, A-V in 3-D #1, Journey #13, normalman #1–12, normalman3-D Annual #1, normalman - The Novel, Epic Lite #1, normalman Megatron Special #1 and normalman 20th Anniversary Special #1 - and includes work by many big names, like William Messner-Loebs, Donald Simpson, Larry Marder, Dave Sim, Murphy Anderson, and George Perez.
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