Comic Book / The Einstein Connection

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The Einstein Connection!/The Ghost of Superman Future! was a two-parter Superman story published in Superman (1939) #416 (February, 1986), written by Elliot S! Maggin and pencilled by Curt Swan. One of the last stories of the Pre-Crisis Superman, it serves as a coda to Maggin's interpretation of Luthor as a tragic villain who might be redeemed under the right circumstances.

The story is divided into two parts. The first part reveals that every single year, Lex Luthor breaks out of jail on March 14, and pulls some weird stunt off: sneaking into New Jersey by motorboat to have an ice cream, posing as a desk clerk in a Swiss patent office, causing a ruckus in order to sneak into one Princeton University's building...year after year, Superman grows puzzled by Lex's bizarre stunts until realizes they have a common connection.

The second part, The Ghost of Superman Future, is set one-hundred years later. Superman has grown older -but not weaker-, and he has been travelling across the galaxy after leaving Earth many years ago. When he is found by a group of Earth reporters, Superman agrees to give a final interview in exchange for using their holocaster to send a holographic message to his younger self.

Tropes:

• Astral Finale: The first part has Superman chasing Luthor through the coast of New Jersey, and the second half takes place in outer space.
• Batman Gambit: Clark Kent tries to convince Perry White to let him fly to Switzerland, where his tipper assures that Luthor is hiding. White isn't feeling inclined to let him go until Clark suggests the Eagle newspaper might have the story first; whereupon White tells him to catch one plane tomorrow morning.
• Cardboard Prison: Every year Luthor breaks out of jail on March 14. Even though everybody has noticed this, nobody is able to stop Luthor from escaping whenever he wants.
• Cassette Futurism: In the year 2086, videotapes are the storing system used by the most cutting-edge systems.
• Cool, but Inefficient: While Luthor is working in a patent office, a man comes up with a device to swabbing a submarine's deck...while it's underwater.
• Cover-Blowing Superpower: As hearing a report on Luthor escaping again, Clark Kent accidentally crushes his phone, and has to fix the receiver with a bit of super-strong hand pressure and heat vision before someone sees him.
• Distant Finale: The epilogue takes place one hundred after the main story, showing an elderly, retired Superman wandering freely around the galaxy.
• Even Evil Has Loved Ones: One of the few people whom Luthor unabashedly considers a personal hero is Albert Einstein, to the point he knows his favorite flavor of ice cream.
• Even Evil Has Standards: During his yearly escape from prison to celebrate Einstein's birthday, Luthor is running from Superman when he sees a child drowning. Though initially reluctant, Luthor leaps into the water and saves the kid, even though it costs him his escape, because try as he might, he just can't bring himself to be heartless on a day dedicated to his personal hero.
• Fatal Flaw: As usual, Luthor's worst enemy isn't Superman but his own pride, which makes him unable to accept that Superman is just as smart as him. Hence, Superman keeps outsmarting him.
• Go-Karting with Bowser: Superman has Lex Luthor always escaping on a certain date each year; eventually Superman figures out he's trying to celebrate the birthday of Albert Einstein, one of his heroes. Superman arranges for himself and Luthor to have a private tour of the Einstein section of the Smithsonian. Luthor actually tears up as he sees the statue. As Luthor is taken back to jail he tells Superman, "Thanks for everything!"
• Heel–Face Turn: Lex Luthor saves a kid from drowning, despite knowing he is losing his chance to escape from Superman. As a reward for his rare selfless act, Superman takes him to the Smithsonian to see the statue of Einstein, Luthor's personal hero. Likewise, the kid whom Lex saved grows up into a respected psychiatrist who several years later will help Luthor turn over a new leaf.
• Hero-Worshipper: Lex also idolizes and views Albert Einstein as his personal hero, to the point where the famous scientist's birthday is one of the very few occasions where Lex will stop being a villain for once and instead spends twenty-four hours gushing about how awesome of a guy Einstein was.
• Hidden Depths: Luthor admires Albert Einstein to the point where he stops being a villain on March 14; Einstein's birth date.
• Historical Domain Character: Albert Einstein is Luthor's personal idol, and every year Luthor reenacts one episode of Einstein's life on his birthday.
• Inconsistent Coloring: In all panels of the second page, the fists of Superman are colored dark-blue, like if he was wearing gloves.
• Invisibility Cloak: Luthor builds a machine which turns him invisible for a short while.
• Kansas City Shuffle: When Superman confronts Lex in an ice parlor, Lex's left hand immediately goes for his pocket, drawing Superman's attention, who is caught off guard when Lex's right hand fires a concussion blast. As fleeing, Lex mocks Superman for falling for a stage magician trick.
• Legend Fades to Myth: Superman leaves Earth around the turn of the millennium, and his life's history gradually devolves into distorted tales throughout the decades. In the year 2086, an old Superman gives a group of journalists his final interview and flies off for parts unknown, once again. And it's told that Superman would "pass from legend to myth before the nations of Earth saw their Man of Tomorrow again..."
• Media Scrum: In the year 2086, Superman is semi-retired and wandering around the galaxy. He is not in mood for interviews, but when a throng of Earth reports manage to find him, Superman decides to give an interview out of professional courtesy.
• Never the Selves Shall Meet: The Superman of 2086 needs to talk to his present-day self, but he cannot time-travel to the past because the same person cannot exist twice at the same time, so that he sends a holographic message one hundred years back to the past.
• Not Me This Time: Superman is about to set out to capture an escapee Luthor when a giant holographic bearded Superman shows up and tells him to not recapture Luthor immediately. Superman assumes that it is another Luthor's trick, but when he confronts Luthor about his message, his nemesis asks what he is talking about, and Superman can say tell he is really surprised.
• Old Superhero: In the year 2086, Superman is around one-hundred-thirty-year-old, but even though his face is wrinkled and his beard long and white, his power hasn't been diminished at all.
• Older Than They Look: Future Superman is an over one-hundred-thirty-year-old man who looks like a remarkably healthy elderly senior in his seventies.
• Shout-Out: The second story is called "The Ghost of Superman Future".
• Shrouded in Myth: Superman leaves Earth around the turn of the millennium, and the details of his life begin getting muddled. By the year 2086, Superman meets a group of reporters who inform that it is speculated that Lex Luthor was his secret identity (or political activist Ralph Nader). Superman guffaws loudly in response.
• Villains Out Shopping: Superman wonders what crimes will try to pull Luthor off after making it to New Jersey—but instead, Luthor goes to an ice parlor to have a tutti-frutti cone with jimmies.
• Villain Teleportation: Subverted. Luthor declares that Superman cannot trap him because he has just invented a teleporter, and vanishes. However, Superman only needs to take a look on the device to realize that it is an invisibility machine and Luthor tried to send him in a wild goose chase.
• Walking the Earth: When he begins growing old, Superman leaves Earth together sets out to wander around the cosmos in the company of a reformed Lex Luthor.
• We Used to Be Friends: Inverted. Superman and Lex Luthor, who used to be friends before the fire lab accident which Luthor blamed on Superboy in How Luthor Met Superboy, reconciled each other after criminal psychiatrist Calvin Anderson cured Lex. They even travelled together around the universe for a while until Lex died of old age.
• You Could Have Used Your Powers for Good!: During one of their bouts, Superman examines Luthor's latest gadget (an invisibility machine) and regrets how Luthor is wasting his considerable genius utterly.
  Superman: "This machinery...A technology far beyond conventional Earthborn science. Luthor is undeniably a genius— as well as an awful, awful waste!"