Late Monday night I received the following email from Booster booster Rob Snow:

Booster sighting! Kinda! We see the back of his head in one panel of the latest World's Finest

Sadly, I have not yet managed to make it to my Local Comic Shop to pick up a copy, but I imagine the panel looks something like this:

The only way to know for sure is to go buy Batman/Superman: World's Finest #23 and make Skeets happy.

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Booster boosters know that much of Booster's origin was based on elements of Superman's Silver Age continuity (as covered on several pages of this site, including the Boosterrific! Blog post from December 4, 2015. But just because Booster became a successful hero in his own right didn't mean he was done "borrowing" from costumes and powers from Superman 's history.

Yes, I'm talking about Supernova.

Introduced in 52 Week 8 (2006), mysterious Metropolis hero Supernova's secret identity stumped even veteran reporter Clark Kent. Few at the time guessed that underneath his mask, Supernova was really the disgraced hero Booster Gold using the powers of flight and teleportation.

How did he do it? His teleportation was a clever manipulation of the Kryptonian Phantom Zone projector technology invented by Jor-El, Superman's father (first seen in Adventure Comics #283, 1961). And he flew by way of Booster's own 30th-century Legion Flight Ring, which in pre-Crisis on Infinite Earths continuity had originally been Superboy's (first seen in Adventure Comics #329, 1965).

The best part is even the concept of Supernova as one-hero-disguised-as-another was a nod to something Superman once did.

cover art by Neal Adams

First seen in World's Finest Comics #178, 1968, the "Nova" persona was adopted by Superman as a way to continue fighting crime following an unfortunate encounter with an alien invader that left him powerless.

Nova used Batman's utility belt as his inspiration to create a costume with its own powers. Amusingly enough, this included a cape created by Leonardo da Vinci that Superman had picked up during an earlier time-traveling adventure. (In fact, Superman and Leonardo da Vinci had worked together as recently as the previous issue!)

The Nova personality was used only for a few misadventures, including a villainous turn against Batman and the triumphant defeat of a criminal mastermind. The costume was eventually shelved as Superman returned to his former costumed identity.

World's Finest Comics #180, by Cary Bates, Ross Andru, Mike Esposito, Ben Oda

Every Nova adventure took place in one of DC's infamous "imaginary" stories, but that doesn't make them any less influential. Booster Gold may be a thief, but at least he steals from the World's Finest!

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We opened the week discussing Booster Gold visiting the stories of yesteryear. It now appears we should have been discussing his return to the stories of yesteryear, as it seems that he had already beaten us to it.

In 1963's World's Finest Comics #135, Batman stumbles across a mysterious blue and yellow-clad figure who has apparently traveled from the Gotham City of the future via Time Sphere. Turns out that both the Time Sphere and the mysterious fellow's future-tech was stolen, a fact discovered when Superman travels to the future and meets with the thief's twin sibling. All of this sounds pretty familiar, no?

The story, "Menace of the Future Man" was written by Bill Finger, who perhaps owes more to the creation of Booster Gold than one may have thought. A pretty complete issue review can be found at Silver Age Comics. The story was also recently reprinted in Showcase Presents World's Finest Volume 2.

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