Everyone in the world knows that Superman isn’t a human, but he has taken on the identity of mild-mannered reporter Clark Kent. Now, a new Superman from DC is coming, and to the cheer and joy of Chinese fans, reports say that he will be a teenager from the southern city of Shanghai.

The latest issue of “Superman,” “Superman #51,” shows that the adventures of the superhero the world knows as Kal-El is coming to an end, reports the Shanghaiist. On the bright side, DC is going to have a new cast of superheroes that will defend the earth just like Superman did. One of these heroes will be a young lad named Kenan Kong, a 17-year-old teen who hails from Shanghai.

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Kenan will be part of the cast of “The New Superman,” which is written by Chinese-American writer Gene Luen Yang and artist Victor Bogdanovic. Yang said that DC asked him to write a Chinese Superman, and with it, he hopes to tell a story that is “Superman” in ideals but different in culture, so that people all over the world will get to know what the Man of Steel stands for.

Yang admitted that at first, he was quite apprehensive because he was unable to live in China, and he’d be writing about Chinese life as an outsider. But since the idea of Superman as Chinese came from comic legend Jim Lee, he said yes to the project.

A New Secret Identity

Even the name “Kenan Kong” came about with some challenge, Yang said in a DC comics blog. He said that the new Superman’s secret identity should have a Chinese name that contained the initials K.K., and had to be derived from pinyin. It should sound Chinese and relate to the character’s journey, while being a plausible Chinese name.

After some changes, Yang said he arrived at the name “Kenan Kong” because it represents the original Superman Clark Kent, sounds Chinese, and actually has a meaning to it.

“Ke,” Yang says, means “to overcome.” “Nan,” on the other hand, means south. For Yang, it simply means an overcomer or conqueror coming from the southern city of Shanghai. Yang chose “Kong” simply because “Kang” is already the name of a conqueror in the Marvel Universe.

“The New Superman” will be quite exciting. “New Superman #1” will be released July 13, 2016.

TagsSuperman, New Superman, Kenan Kong, Clark Kent, Kal-El, Gene Luen Yang, Jim Lee