Happy Birthday, Superman

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Superman turned 70 this month... and wouldn't you know it, he's not aged a day on celluloid - in fact he's gone back in time - at least judging by his latest avatar in Smallville. And it's there, as a young Super-teen that he faces some pretty daunting challenges (there's probably nothing scarier than a US high school!) But the man who epitomised Superman, and who wore the cape best, would have to be the late Christopher Reeve, who then showed some of that formidable iron will after a horse-riding accident left him paralysed... Krypton's ambassador struck the world with his grit, even in his vulnerability. But it's Superman's invulnerability that was his claim to fame -and in post-World War II USA, through the Cold War, that's not half-surprising... The need of the hour was precisely a Man of Steel who knew that Justice and the American Way....