Jor-El and Lara

<span class="SFPTagline"> From SCIFIPEDIA </span>

The Modern Age of Comics Jor-El and (behind him) Lara as conceived by writer/artist John Byrne

Jor-El and Lara are a fictional comic book characters. In the fictional DC Universe, they are the biological parents of Superman. They died with the destruction of his home planet of Krypton.

Jor-El was a scientist who had attempted to convince the authorities on Krypton that the planet was going to destroy itself. He was not taken seriously. He succeeded in sending his infant son Kal-El to Earth, where the child later became Superman. It is for this reason that Superman is sometimes called "the last son of Krypton".

Krypton is a planet with futuristic technology, but is a bit xenphobic, so does not have space travel. The planet's government seems to be run by something called "The Science Council". Jor-El is a scientist with great influence on the council, in some versions he's a member, in others he's the president of the council. Thanks to Jor-El's scientific innovation, the council punishes criminals that might ordinarily be sentenced to death by sentencing them to a place called the Phantom Zone, a dimension where time stands still, and the inhabitants become intangible ghosts that can no longer participate in any real life. This was considered by Jor-El and the council to be more humane than capital punishment.

The Silver Age of Comics version of Jor-El and his wife, Lara, Superman's birth parents.

One of the Phantom Zone criminals, General Zod, particularly hates Jor-El. In a recent retelling, Zod and his cronies, his female lieutenant Ursa and his former mentor, the now lobotomized Non, claim to believe Jor-El's theory that Krypton will be destroyed in the near future. Their attempted overthrow the Kryptonian government is motivated by the need to save Krypton, in defiance of the Science Council, who have made even the discussion of Jor-El's theories illegal. Jor-El refuses to participate in the coup, unwilling to take violent action against the Council. The attempted overthrow kills several council members, but ultimately fails. In this way, Zod blames Jor-El's refusal to act for Krypton's destruction. Jor-El begs for the lives of the three conspirators, and the Council agrees to allow Jor-El to spare their lives by sending them into the Phantom Zone. Zod vows vengence on Jor-El and his son before he, Ursa, and Non, disappear into the Zone. Decades later, when they manage to escape the Zone, they seek revenge on the son of Jor-El, Earth's Superman.

Jor-El loses his standing with the Science Council when he continues to insist that Krypton is doomed to destruction, despite the fact that his theory is condemned as erroneous and dangerous. Unfortunately, Jor-El is proved correct. Krypton is destroyed in some cataclysmic event and pieces of it become radioactive meteoroids; some of which fall to Earth as kryptonite meteors. Of course, Jor-El rockets his infant son to Earth just before Krypton is destroyed.

In an innovation to the story which goes back to the Marlon Brando portrayal of the character in Superman: The Movie (1978), Jor-El is still present in Superman's life in the form of a computer simulation which is programmed to respond to Superman's questions about his native world.

Jor-El and Lara in Superman: The Movie (1978)

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