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[encyclopædia] [all entries] A B C D F J K L M P PROFESSOR R S SUPER T U V W |
Krypton's most famous emotion-movie actress and most glamorous beauty,
a hauntingly beautiful and breathtakingly lovely girl with whom
Superman shares a passionate, poignant romance after having journeyed
through the time-space barrier to the planet Krypton at a time
preceeding its destruction. Stranded for a time on his doomed native
planet, Superman manages ultimately to escape the death of Krypton
through a bizarre quirk of fate, while Lyla Lerrol - like Jor-El and Lara and all
the other doomed millions of Krypton - remains helplessly behind
to perish in the impending cataclysm.
It is while he is thus stranded on Krypton - a period, apparently, of several weeks - that Superman is introduced to the blond Lyla Lerrol by his parents, and, almost against his will, surrenders to the greatest romance he has ever known.
Two pairs of lips meet, and two hearts thrill as one... as deep
within the heart of Krypton, fiery forces clash and twist and churn,
foreshadowing dreaded things to come... but the flames within the
planet are like cold glaciers, compared to the mighty love blazing
between Superman of Earth of Lyla Lerrol of Krypton...
"The universe would have been created without meaning for me if I had never met you, my darling..." replies Superman. "Lois loved me because I was Superman," muses the Man of Steel at one point, "but Lyla loves me for myself! On this world I'm just an ordinary mortal!" When it becomes apparent to Jor-El that Krypton is going to be blown apart by internal stresses, Superman joins forces with the great scientist in a valiant - but hopeless - attempt to oversee the construction of a gigantic space-ark to transport Krypton's millions of inhabitants to a safe haven on Earth. But Krypton and its people are doomed to destruction. When efforts to complete the space-ark fail, Superman reconciles himself to spending his remaining days on the doomed planet with his parents and Lyla Lerrol, the Kryptonian girl he loves. Bravely, they plan to face the oncoming doom together. And so, soon afterwards, the couple announce their intention to marry as soon as Lyla has completed work on her forthcoming emotion-movie. "The happiness we'll share as husband and wife," promises Superman, "will more than compensate for whatever happens later!" "A love like ours," muses Lyla silently, "can't be measured in mere days or years! Even one enchanted moment is worth a dozen ordinary lifetimes!" But just as history has decreed that Krypton and its millions will perish, so has it decreed that Superman will survive the death of Krypton and escape to Earth. As the filming of Lyla's emotion-movie nears the completion of its final sequences, an extraordinary mishap - an event the odds against which could only be called astronomical - results in Superman's being catapulted violently into outer-space inside a mock-up rocket ship being used in the filming. "Lyla!" cries Superman as he stares helplessly out the porthole. And then he thinks, "I've lost her! Just when I'd resigned myself to perishing on Krypton with Lyla and my parents... this had to happen, due to a strange twist of fate!" And so, soon afterward, far out in space, far from the gravitational pull of Krypton, Superman regains his super-powers and crashes through the hull of his mock-up spacecraft to freedom. "If I return to Krypton," muses Superman, "I will lose my super-powers again! Fate can't be changed! It's impossible for me to save Lyla or my parents! Earth needs me!"
And so, flashing across the universe at incredible super-speed,
Superman returns to his adopted planet Earth. Already, the
passionate, wonderful, bitter-sweet romance with Lyla Lerrol on
Krypton is receding in his mind's eye "like a strange, incredible
dream!"
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Text on this page taken from The Great Superman Book © 1978
by Michael L. Fleisher.
Superman TM & © DC Comics