Wait, clone Superboy, where have I heard that before?
In a little discussion on s_d: What was so bad with Superboy being partially cloned from Luthor anyway?
thefinalwraith suggested this:
"There's an obvious solution, there were two Superboys, the original made from Westfield etc., who was kidnapped or something, and the one made from Lex Luthor who died. That explains how Lex was able to install some brainwashing triggers into Superboy while he was unaware of his creation, and why he's bald in the flashback (additionally this explains why in the Teen Titans series Superboy looks nothing like he did in his own title and Young Justice, I mean he has a completely different build.)"
Heh. That's pretty good, actually. So, why didn't the other YJ kids notice?
This reminds me: The fan "solution" in my brain for some time has been as follows. Kon-El went to hang out with Valor & the Legion of Super-Heroes in the future. But no one knows he's there, or even which LSH he's with, because he could have landed at any point in time, & there are more than three versions of the LSH in the multiverse. He, of course, doesn't know that Kara went to hang out with another LSH, & that members of yet another LSH are running around in his home time period being "the LSH."
His disappearance created an opportunity for someone to drop a duplicate Kon into the middle of things. This clone has an imperfect knowledge of Kon's past, but is programmed to think he's Kon. And along the way, Lex Luthor told this Kon that, "Luke... I am your father," (which is a total lie, but how would Kon know if Lex falsified DNA results?) which implies that Lex is the one who put false!Kon in place.
OK, you say, so where does Lex get a pseudo-Kon? Well, there already was one running around: Match!
But, wait, you say, Match was in Teen Titans, looking all Bizarro-like.
Exactly!
See, Lex doesn't have a Cadmus-style setup to engineer a viable duplicate Superman for himself, & if he tried a dual clone of himself & Kal-El, it probably would just die anyway. But he did have that imperfect duplicator with which he made the first Bizarro back in Byrne's The Man of Steel.
So, reprogram poor Match to think he's Superboy(getting the Joker-ized face off if necessary)--& yeah, how he does this I really don't know; that's a big hole in my plan. The code words could be implanted at this point, too. So most if not all of the Johns Kon is actually Match!Kon.
Then make a Bizarro-duplicate of Match to pass off as Match, say he's "falling apart."
So Match, who looks just like Kon & now believes he is, goes on to die in Infinite Stupid Crossover, & Lex can't believe his luck that the real S-boy has never shown up & exposed the whole scam.
The great thing is, this retcon can be reintroduced at any point; Kon is traveling back from alternate-LSH-world, undershoots his destination, & finds out what's going on. He's really puzzled that Cassie thinks she's his girlfriend, & that apparently he's dead.
Eventually, we get to hear Cassie's reaction: "...I slept with Match?"
thefinalwraith suggested this:
"There's an obvious solution, there were two Superboys, the original made from Westfield etc., who was kidnapped or something, and the one made from Lex Luthor who died. That explains how Lex was able to install some brainwashing triggers into Superboy while he was unaware of his creation, and why he's bald in the flashback (additionally this explains why in the Teen Titans series Superboy looks nothing like he did in his own title and Young Justice, I mean he has a completely different build.)"
Heh. That's pretty good, actually. So, why didn't the other YJ kids notice?
This reminds me: The fan "solution" in my brain for some time has been as follows. Kon-El went to hang out with Valor & the Legion of Super-Heroes in the future. But no one knows he's there, or even which LSH he's with, because he could have landed at any point in time, & there are more than three versions of the LSH in the multiverse. He, of course, doesn't know that Kara went to hang out with another LSH, & that members of yet another LSH are running around in his home time period being "the LSH."
His disappearance created an opportunity for someone to drop a duplicate Kon into the middle of things. This clone has an imperfect knowledge of Kon's past, but is programmed to think he's Kon. And along the way, Lex Luthor told this Kon that, "Luke... I am your father," (which is a total lie, but how would Kon know if Lex falsified DNA results?) which implies that Lex is the one who put false!Kon in place.
OK, you say, so where does Lex get a pseudo-Kon? Well, there already was one running around: Match!
But, wait, you say, Match was in Teen Titans, looking all Bizarro-like.
Exactly!
See, Lex doesn't have a Cadmus-style setup to engineer a viable duplicate Superman for himself, & if he tried a dual clone of himself & Kal-El, it probably would just die anyway. But he did have that imperfect duplicator with which he made the first Bizarro back in Byrne's The Man of Steel.
So, reprogram poor Match to think he's Superboy(getting the Joker-ized face off if necessary)--& yeah, how he does this I really don't know; that's a big hole in my plan. The code words could be implanted at this point, too. So most if not all of the Johns Kon is actually Match!Kon.
Then make a Bizarro-duplicate of Match to pass off as Match, say he's "falling apart."
So Match, who looks just like Kon & now believes he is, goes on to die in Infinite Stupid Crossover, & Lex can't believe his luck that the real S-boy has never shown up & exposed the whole scam.
The great thing is, this retcon can be reintroduced at any point; Kon is traveling back from alternate-LSH-world, undershoots his destination, & finds out what's going on. He's really puzzled that Cassie thinks she's his girlfriend, & that apparently he's dead.
Eventually, we get to hear Cassie's reaction: "...I slept with Match?"