Lana Lang is a fictional character appearing in American comic books published by DC Comics. She is a Superman supporting character and love interest of the teenage Clark Kent. She was created by writer Bill Finger and artist John Sikela, and first appeared in Superboy #10 (September/October 1950). The character has occasionally gained superhuman powers and assumes the superhero identities of Insect Queen and Superwoman.
Lana has appeared in other-media adaptations of Superman, typically as a teenager. Film portrayals of the character include that by Diane Sherry in Superman: The Movie, Annette O'Toole in its sequel Superman III, and Jadin Gould in Man of Steel. She has been portrayed in television by Stacy Haiduk in Superboy, Emily Procter in Lois & Clark, Kristin Kreuk in Smallville, and Emmanuelle Chriqui in Superman & Lois.
Publication history Created by writer Bill Finger and artist John Sikela, the character first appears in Superboy #10 (September/October 1950). Across decades of Superman comics and adaptations into other media, Lana has most consistently been depicted as Superman's teenage romantic interest growing up in Smallville; as an adult, she is a friend of Superman in his civilian identity as Clark Kent.
Lana is one of many Superman characters with the alliterative initials "LL", the most notable other examples being Superman's primary love interest Lois Lane and archnemesis, Lex Luthor. In the Silver Age, she regularly appeared in comic books depicting the adventures of Superman's teenaged self, Superboy, and also appeared as an adult in numerous Superman titles, vying with Lois Lane for his attention. In modern revisions of DC Comics continuity, she and Clark are shown to have remained friends since their teenage years. The story varies across different revisions of Superman's origin story. For example, in Superman: Secret Origin, Lana becomes privy to Clark's unusual abilities at an early age and becomes his earliest confidant outside of his parents and the futuristic Legion of Super-Heroes.
Fictional character biography Silver Age and Bronze Age Earth-One version
In the original Superboy stories, Lana was the girl who lived next door to the Kent family in Smallville, and was a romantic interest of Superboy. In the Silver Age stories, Lana often behaved like a younger version of Lois Lane, spending much of her time trying to prove that Superboy and Clark Kent were one and the same.
At one point, Lana once rescued an insect-like alien trapped by a fallen tree in Smallville. In gratitude, the alien gave her a "bio-genetic" ring which allowed Lana to gain insect (and insect-like, such as arachnids) characteristics. Lana created a yellow honeybee-like costume and mask, and took the name "Insect Queen", under which identity Lana had several adventures.
Lana also had various adventures with Superboy, and several with the futuristic superhero team the Legion of Super-Heroes. Also appearing in some Silver Age stories was Lana's uncle, Professor Potter, an eccentric inventor.
After Clark and Lana graduated from high school, Lana went to college, and eventually became a television reporter for Metropolis TV station WMET-TV. As an adult, Lana became a rival to Lois Lane for Superman's affection in various 1960s stories, often appearing in the Lois Lane comics series Superman's Girl Friend, Lois Lane.
During the 1970s and early 1980s, Lana became an anchorwoman for WGBS-TV's evening news in Metropolis, as a co-anchor to Clark Kent. Her attraction to Superman during this time had also died off, leaving Superman to Lois Lane. Lana later became romantically linked to the alien super-hero Vartox. Eventually, she and Clark Kent became romantically involved in stories prior to the Crisis on Infinite Earths.
Earth-Two version In the early 1980s, with the use of the multiverse system DC had in place, Lana Lang was also shown in several stories to have had an Earth-Two counterpart (Earth-Two at the time the home of the Justice Society of America and DC's Golden Age versions of its characters, versus its mainstream universe of "Earth-One"). The Earth-Two Lana Lang was introduced in Superman Family #203. In this story, Lana Lang joins the Daily Star as a television critic. On Earth-Two Lana's father left Smallville and moved to Metropolis as a young man, so Clark did not know Lana in his youth.
Later, she became Insect Queen like her Earth-One counterpart; in this case, Lana had received a mystic amulet from her archaeologist father, the amulet having been created to allow a pharaoh to control and divert the locust hordes that threatened ancient Egypt. However, the sound of approaching insect wings was set to energize the charm associated with the amulet; by unfortunate coincidence, the sound of Superman's super-speed flying was similar enough to activate the spell. Lana was thus compelled to create a chitinous golden-brown costume (woven by silkworms under her control) and adopt a villainous alter ego, the Insect Queen. After an initial clash with Superman, the Insect Queen fell under the mental influence of Superman's enemy, the Ultra-Humanite, who kept her under the spell's compulsion and prevented her from reverting to normal. Earth-Two's Superman located an antidote to the spell, which Lois Lane used to remove the compulsion (Superman Family #213), letting Lana break free of Ultra's influence and making her able to use the amulet's power at her own discretion. The Earth-2 Insect Queen would later use her abilities to aid Superman in times of need. This version of Lana Lang was retconned out of existence after the events of Crisis on Infinite Earths.
Modern Age After the 1985-1986 miniseries Crisis on Infinite Earths was written, various aspects of Lana's history were retconned, starting with comics writer John Byrne's miniseries The Man of Steel, which was designed to rewrite Superman's origin from scratch. In the post-Crisis version of events, Lana was a childhood friend of Clark, with a certain degree of romantic tension in the air as Lana had long pined after Clark, who had loved her only platonically in return.
After they graduated from high school Clark took Lana on a private walk, saying that he had to tell her something important, which Lana honestly expected to be a marriage proposal. He then divulged to her that he had superpowers, displayed by flying her around the world, before explaining that he felt he had to leave Smallville to help humanity as a whole. Kissing her goodbye "like a brother", Lana was left in considerable shock, not only over the revelation of Clark's superpowers, but also over the final realization that he held no reciprocal romantic feelings towards her, leaving Lana heartbroken and alone. When Lana finally aired her grievance with him years later (The Man of Steel #6), Clark felt very badly over how he had hurt her.
When Clark appeared in public as Superman some years later, the lonely and depressed Lana deduced his true identity and became something of a stalker, to the extent that Lex Luthor noticed the frequency with which she appeared in the vicinity of the hero and actually had her tortured in an attempt to gain whatever inside knowledge of Superman she might have.Superman (vol. 2) #2 (February 1987) Lana bravely kept Clark's identity a secret and upon his rescuing her their relationship became more healthy once again, albeit still at a distance. A long-term conspiracy of the Oan-created androids, the Manhunters, from whose control Lana and the rest of Smallville's children born around the same time as her were eventually freed, proved to be the cause of this stalking. Unlike the pre-Crisis Earth-One continuity, Lana did not go on to have a journalistic career or compete with Lois for Superman's affections, nor play a significant role in Clark's life in Metropolis.
Lana's relationship with Clark is again altered in 2003's Superman: Birthright limited series by Mark Waid, which again revises Superman's origins. This storyline, which takes some inspiration from the TV show Smallville (such as the appearance of Jonathan and Martha Kent), also shows Clark and Lana to have had a mutual romantic relationship during their youth. At the start of the storyline, Lana has already left Smallville prior to Clark's return from his world journey. Upon his arrival home, Clark is told that Lana left some time prior and no one has heard from her since. Following this storyline, there is never again any mention of her history regarding Clark or Superman.
Lana's "Birthright" history was revised following the events of Infinite Crisis, which returned Clark's pre-Crisis Superboy alter-ego to continuity. In this new history, Lana's two brothers, whom she lacked in previous versions, often interrupted her romantic relationship with Clark. The full extent of her history and her connection to Superboy/Clark has not been fully disclosed. Again, her previous history has not been mentioned since this revision.
Years later, the post-Crisis Lana eventually married Pete Ross. The two settled into a quiet life in Smallville, where they had a son they named after their mutual friend, Clark. They picked this name for their son after Lana asked Clark to save his life when a car accident caused him to be born eight weeks premature. Although the attack of the Brainiac-controlled Doomsday interrupted Clark's efforts to take the baby to receive care, Brainiac's subsequent attempts to use the baby's DNA to create a new body for himself brought the baby to full term. Pete began a career in politics that got him elected to the Senate. In 2000, Senator Ross became Lex Luthor's vice presidential running mate in Luthor's bid to become President, and after the two won, Lana moved to Washington, D.C. Eventually, Luthor was forced from his office, and Pete Ross became President (and Lana the First Lady). As she and Pete began to drift apart, Lana began to subtly attempt to regain Clark's affections, much to the anger of his (now) wife Lois Lane. Pete and Lana briefly reunited after Superman saved them from a murder attempt by the villainous Ruin.
In Superman #654, Perry White reported that Lana had become CEO of Lexcorp following the ousting of founder Lex Luthor. In Superman/Batman #49, it is revealed that she sold Kryptonite to the government to prevent Lexcorp from going under and had caches of Kryptonite placed all over the planet, as a last-ditch defense if Superman should ever go rogue. When Superman and Batman come to remove the Kryptonite, Lana refuses to hand it over and pushes a button which turns the caches into "dirty bombs" which spread Kryptonite molecules through the entire planet, forcing all Kryptonians to vacate. However, Toyman uses special nanobots to remove all of the Kryptonite molecules, undoing the damage. Superman meets with Lana again, with Lana telling him she was left with no choice. Superman responds by telling her that, while he does sometimes wonder what things would have been like if he had married her rather than Lois, there is a reason he is with Lois instead of her: Lois would never have pushed the button. After Superman flies off, someone is shown watching Lana crying on a screen, saying to her "you did perfect". In Superman/Batman #63 suggests that this was Gorilla Grodd, when Batman mentions that "Grodd finally finished what he started when he controlled Lana all those years ago". However, this scenario is later revealed to be a simulation created in the Batcomputer.