This is what the ‘S’ on Superman’s suit stands for… and it’s NOT Superman

THE yellow and red ‘S’ logo on Superman’s tight-blue suit is an iconic symbol to comic book and action movie fans alike… but what does it mean?

You’d be forgiven for thinking that the answer is obvious, and that it merely stands for Superman - but you’d be wrong.

In fact, the logo is not a letter 'S', but a Kryptonian symbol meaning “hope” - as DC Comics writer Mark Waid explained in his 2003 story Superman: Birthright.

The symbol is discovered by the Man of Steel when he uses the data tablet which he travelled with from Krypton to study the history of his homeland.

He learns the 'S' is a sign meaning hope for a better tomorrow and decides to adopt it as his superhero logo.

At that point he wasn’t even called Superman – and Lois Lane gave him the name after seeing the S on his suit.

The story cleared up a slightly different explanation raised in the 1978 classic Superman: The Movie, starring Christopher Reeve.

In that version, the S was used on a seal for his Kryptonian family, the House of El.

Many TV and film adaptations went with this story - until Waid put the record straight once and for all.

Since the Christopher Reeve movies, Superman has been played by Brandon Routh and Henry Cavill on the big screen, and by Dean Cain and Tom Welling on the small screen.

Comic book fans were recently outraged when James Nesbitt named Marvel Comics genius Stan Lee as the creator of the DC Comics superhero.