After years of adapting many elements and components of Superman from its original comics genre to television's Smallville, the magazine has finally taken one of Smallville's own characters to become part of an upcoming issue. Chloe Sullivan, played by Allison Mack on The CW cult series, debuts in Superman issue 674, which hits stands on March 12.



Comic book writer Kurt Busiek told Newsarama recently that he took inspiration from another Superman character, Jimmy Olsen, who also made the leap from one medium to another. According to Busiek, Jimmy was first introduced into Superman lore on the 1940 radio show called The Adventures of Superman. It was only a year later that his character was incorporated into the comic book.

?It made me think, ?Yeah, and the next obvious choice would be bringing in someone like Chloe, but the problem with that would be...' and then bam, a way to do it fell into place that I thought really served the book well, and made her a strong and useful and fun addition to the cast. One that would give us several elements to the cast structure that have been missing for years, but in a new and different way," Busiek revealed.

One sticking point however, in the move to deliver Chloe from Smallville to Superman 674, has to do with rendering her in such a way as to look like Chloe, without appearing too much like actress Allison Mack. This has to do with issues surrounding likeness rights that need to be taken into consideration. Another challenge was to find a niche for the Chloe character, without overlapping with those that are already firmly set in the Superman comic book universe.

?The problem we'd have faced if we brought her in with the same background as the TV show is that she'd fill two basic roles - the Girl from Back Home and the Reporter - and those roles are both pretty solidly filled in the adult Superman cast, by Lana and Lois," Busiek explained. "So she's got to have a different spin, one that lets her occupy a different role from either of them. She's the younger sister of someone Clark went to school with, not a classmate of Clark 's herself. As a result, she's the new intern at the Daily Planet, fresh out of journalism school and itching to make a name for herself. That'll make her clearly different from Lois and Lana, and at the same time more familiar to watchers of the show.?