I only kill Superman on Doomsdays that end in "y"

In my humble opinion the biggest comic book event of my lifetime is the Death of Superman saga.

Sure, there are more important storylines that have had greater resounding effects, driving stories published even to this day (Crisis on Infinite Earths comes immediately to mind,) but none have caught the attention of the masses and the media and the fans and the uninitiated alike to the level that the "Death of Superman" did. And all comic book uber-events since have paled in comparison.

Sure, in the end it was nothing more than a huge slugfest, but people actually believed Superman was dead and not coming back! Let's face it, that alone is a huge feat.

In addition, no other comic event has left a larger swath of iconic new characters that people still care about to this day; among them the clone Conner Kent, the genius inventor Steel, and of course, this guy:

This is the JLU Doomsday action figure, based on his appearance in the Justice League Unlimited episode A Better World (and a couple more after that.)

This Doomsday was an exclusive figure only available in a Target six figure set released around 2006. Mattel made sure these spectacular large scale figures were hard to find (as if the rest of their toys weren't hard enough to get a hold of!) and I think Doomsday was the first large scale JLU figure released. Later they repainted him orange and red (to recreate an episode where he fights Superman in a volcano) and they also released Gorilla Grodd in another six figure set (which I sadly never found at retail) and Solomon Grundy was released as a San Diego comic convention exclusive - which means many many fans never saw him at all due to the immediate and sustained high secondary market price.

I guess you could also count Darkseid and Ultra Humanite as "deluxe" because they were also a bit larger and used different bodies than the standard male JLU figures, but at least each of those guys were sold as singles at retail. Of course neither of them were particularly easy to come by either.

But back to Doomsday. A big, grey, ugly killing machine with protruding bones, bad teeth and an insatiable appetite for death. Superman's death, to be exact.

I found this Doomsday at the swap meet, which is why his paint is a little roughed up. I just consider him about 15 minutes into the battle royale. I do have one I picked up at retail way back when, but he's boxed up somewhere and anyways this one was a quarter, so I had to buy it and blog about Doomsday and reminisce about a simpler, more honest time in comics. ;)

There have been quite a few toys made of Doomsday, but this JLU version is perhaps one of the best due to his awesome Bruce Timm design aesthetic. I do wish that someday, somewhere we could get a Doomsday almost completely clad in his green containment suit and hood, with one hand strapped behind his back like he started out in the comics. That'd be keen! But in the meantime we'll have to contend ourselves with this Superman smashing iconic Doomsday.