nypress.com When Joe Shuster and Jerry Siegel created Superman during the fledgling world of newsstand comic books, it was heavily criticized for corrupting the minds of young people with its images of mayhem, murder, torture and abduction. Never fully recovering from losing the rights to their character in the 1950s, Shuster began illustrating a sex serial called “Nights of Horror,” which is the subject of Craig Yoe’s new book, “Secret Identity: The Fetish Art of Joe Shuster.”
After two New York youths—Jack Kaslow and Melvin Mittman—began emulating “Nights of Horror” with a group of murderous neo-Nazis called The Brooklyn Thrill Killers, the books became the center of a Supreme Court trial on indecency. Shuster’s images of sado-masochism, BDSM fetishization and Satanism inspired the boys to horse whip women and set the homeless ablaze. According to Yoe, all the players were leading double lives; Shuster, Kaslow and Mittman—even Clark, Lois and Lex—who appeared in the lurid tales as darker, sexually obscene versions of themselves.
The book collects images from all 12 of the “Nights of Horror” stories, complete with narratives: "Ann, her dress still up, faced the unexpected intruder." and "’Harder’, she murmured, shivering with excitement." Images of almost-bare buttocks, light bondage scenarios and voyeuristic peepholers seem relatively charming when compared to his more famous fetish illustrator contemporaries (Tom of Finland, Eric Stanton and Alberto Vargas). Overall, there's not enough whip-wielding negroes and ass-obsessed matrons to classify Shuster as a full fledged fetishist, but rather an artist trying to make a little extra dough during lean times, but it’s still an entertaining read.
The two highlights of the book are the recounting of Shuster and Siegel’s follow-up to Superman, a ridiculous superhero clown named “Funnyman” and a single story featuring a surefire hit character, Annette, Secret Agent Z-4, whose fuck-me boots and ample cleavage prove essential on a rescue mission in Red China.