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Mystery Of Lettering In Last Week's Superman #34 Uncovered

Published Mon, 06 Nov 2017 11:00:22 -0600

A few readers of last week's comic Superman #34 contacted Bleeding Cool with something they saw as rather fishy, with one specific page causing concern.

As they looked at the wall behind Lois Lane's backside and above her heels, they saw something that they didn't expect to be there.

Which appeared to spell out Hebrew letters. And if you went to the Hebrew alphabet…

… some were making the argument that these were the letters Shin, Lamed, Vav and Tav. Which could have been a way to clumsily spell the word "slut" through some poor Google Translate phonetics. Which would have been most unfortunate, and blatantly offensive when placed next to Lois Lane on the page.

Except that wasn't for a start, that wasn't the letter Tav it's the letter Mem. And though the letters have been arranged left-to-right, rather than right-to-left, the spell the word "shalom", Hebrew for "peace". And a favourite in modern Evangelical Christian hymns too.

But how did the letters get there? I spoke to Dinei Ribeiro, the colourist for the issue, who told me that it was a Photoshop-style brush that he had created for "another work, where it contains words of freedom, peace and love, and then I must have triggered this brush". Thankfully that's all it was and he has deleted it from his system just in case, but it is notable that in the light of the Ardian Syaf scandal that it skipped past DC Editorial eyes without anyone asking why there were Hebrew characters etched into a wall on the planet of Apokalips at any point…

SUPERMAN #34
(W) Peter J. Tomasi, Patrick Gleason (A) Ed Benes, Jackson Herbert (CA) Patrick Gleason
"IMPERIUS REX" part two! As the conflict continues, Superman teams with Lex Luthor to bring peace to a leaderless and warring Apokolips as a new warrior enters the battlefield: Lois Lane, female fury. May Granny Goodness have mercy on all their souls…In Shops: Nov 01, 2017
SRP: $2.99

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