ROZ-EM

Real Name: Roz-Em

Class: Extraterrestrial (Kryptonian)

Occupation: Professional criminal

Group Affiliation: None

Known Relatives: None

Aliases: None

Base of Operations: Phantom Zone, formerly Krypton, Smallville

First Appearance: Adventure Comics I #304 (January, 1963)

Powers: Roz-Em, like all Kryptonians, gained superhuman powers while under a yellow sun. He had incalculable levels of superhuman strength and invulnerability. He possessed the powers of superspeed, heat-vision, telescopic vision, super-hearing and flight.  He was vulnerable to both kryptonite and magic.

History: (Adventure Comics I #304) - Kryptonian criminal Roz-Em paid a crooked facial surgeon to make him look like Nim-El, who guarded the Armory of Forbidden Weapons, hoping to loot it. His plot was uncovered by  Nim-El and his brother Jor-El, and he was put into suspended animation inside a space capsule until it drifted near a yellow sun, giving him superpowers. He’d seen Krypton explode and Jor-El’s baby son Kal-El rocketed to Earth, before the planet's destruction so he was determined to avenge himself for his imprisonment by destroying the boy. Kal-El was adopted by the Kents, and as a youth became Superboy. Superboy volunteered to help the army test a new type of artillery by offering himself as a living target. After the test Roz-Em, dressed as Superboy, flew down from the sky. He claimed that the artillery had cracked open a nearby mountainside, exposing red kryptonite, and it’s effect was to create an adult duplicate of Superboy, a Superman. Superboy introduced the Kents to Superman, and they were thrilled to now have two children. For the Kents’ wedding anniversary Superboy crafted a new line of Superman robots, and Superman concocted a potion that gave the Kents temporary superpowers. Superman told Superboy that his super-intellect had figured out that the two of them coexisting would cause spacetime disruptions that would destroy the solar system unless one of them left Earth in the next 48 hours. They were going to flip a coin to decide who staid, but as it was coming down Superman melted it with his heat vision, claiming it was an accident. They agreed to have the Kents decide, but Superboy used a dream projector on his sleeping parents, saw them dreaming about being superheroes once Superman made the effects of his potion permanent, so the next morning Superboy announced that he’d leave Earth after one last stroll around Smallville. Clark and Superman, posing as his uncle “Charles,” visited Lana Lang who wanted to show off her violin-playing skills, telling them she had an upcoming recital. Her high pitched playing caused the glass around her to break, but she thought her playing was pretty good. Krypto returned from one of his space jaunts in time to say goodbye to Superboy before Superman had him enter a space capsule and hurled him beyond the atmosphere towards a planet with a red sun. The Kents realized Superman was an imposter when the civilian glasses he used as Charles proved to be cracked from Lana’s music, which could never happen to Superboy’s glasses, which were made from unbreakable Kryptonian plastoid from the window of the ship that brought him to Earth. “Superman” revealed that he was actually  Roz-Em, And had fabricated fake red-K and concocted his spacetime in danger story to get rid of Superboy. Pa Kent had gotten Krypto to fly into space to warn Superboy that they were in danger, and Superboy returned to Earth and used the Phantom Zone Projector to exile Roz-Em.

Comments: Created by Jerry Siegel & George Papp.