Superman first appeared in _Action Comics_ #1 with a publication date of June 1938, although the issue was almost certainly on newsstands in April 1938 because of prevailing magazine distribution processes. Created by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, the success of Superman created a new genre of comic book feature, the superhero comic, which featured costumed heroes with powers obtained through accident, birth, science, or effort. Superman, then, refers to a specific character but is also used more generally to refer to someone with extraordinary qualities. This latter usage predates the origin of the superhero character with newspapers like the _New York Times_ often labeling a person or character—for example, President Herbert Hoover or Fu Manchu—a superman (May 10, 1931, and November 27, 1932). Two related issues figure in any consideration of Superman: first, the origin of the word and, second, the nature of superheroes who mostly operated outside of legal frameworks. The origins of the use of _superman_ as a common word lay in the loose English translation of Friedrich Nietzsche’s _übermensch_, a word more complex in meaning than simply a superman. Nietzsche’s _übermensch_ and the associated will to power (understood in part as making oneself a superman through...