CEO or Mad Scientist

[Silver Age Fan]

Lex Luthor made his debut in Action Comics #23 (1940). For many years, he was a mad scientist-type character, a criminal who was in and out of jail. He had known Superman since Superman had been Superboy, Clark Kent and Lex Luthor had been childhood friends.

Then, in 1986, DC rebooted it's universe with Crisis on Infinite Earths. Soon after, the Superman mythos was rebooted and, in the new continuity, Lex Luthor was a CEO who was above the law. He got others to do his bidding and Superman couldn't prove that he was behind criminal activities. Also, this Luthor hadn't known Superman since he was young (there was no Superboy in the new continuity) and he and Superman first became acquainted in Metropolis.

So, which version, if any, do you prefer?

I must admit, as resistant as I am to SOME change, I did quite prefer CEO Lex in the post-1986 continuity. I liked the idea of a powerful being like Superman going up against a non-super powered character like Luthor, but without being able to just arrest him. It was a case of mind over matter, Luthor coming up with plans to destroy Superman and Superman foiling those plans, but never being able to prove Luthor was behind them. It was an interesting time for the character.

Slightly off-topic, we've seen a bit of mixture of the different incarnations in live-action. In Superman The Movie, for instance, Lex was a CEO-type, but he was also a criminal who got his just deserts.

[llllllll]

It was only recently that I found out Luthor had been a mad scientist. Up until then I'd only ever known the CEO type, so it's probably no surprise to hear I prefer this version. I guess they both have their merits, but mad scientists are ten a penny in comics, whereas the CEO presents Superman with an entirely different set of problems from the usual superhero badguy.

[MacNimon]

I grew up with Luthor as the mad scientist and loved him in that role. However, even though I've only read a small amount of post-1986 reboot stuff I've found that there's much more depth to the character and it gives much more scope for storylines rather than having Luthor simply escaping from jail again and concocting some mad plan that inevitably got him sent back again. Fun as those days were, the character was simply so one-dimensional that they had no choice...he needed changed, arguably more than Superman himself did.

So another vote for the CEO version...

[Silver Age Fan]

Looks like CEO version is the most popular!

The mad scientist Luthor was good - in his time. It suited the era he was in, an era when there was a high turnover of comics fans, many moving onto other pursuits and who wouldn't notice that he kept escaping from jail and coming up with another plot.

The CEO version had some interesting stories. There was one post-reboot tale where Luthor had done some dastardly things and Superman just couldn't prove it. He also didn't want to destroy Superman. In one 90s issue, he even commented on how mundane a world it would be without a Superman to engage in conflict with.