When a CEO asks Concrete to endorse a voluntary sterilization program for young people, Concrete signs on, intrigued by the idea but convinced by the healthy paycheck. The man of stone makes the rounds of TV shows and talk radio, and is thrown for a loop when he finds that—biologically improbable though it may be—he may be a father himself.

Just like Heroes' Hiro Nakamura and his friends, Ron Lithgow hopes to save the world, but in Concrete, that's not as simple as saving a cheerleader; it requires long years of work, 20 so far since Concrete's debut in 1986. Though it sounds simple-minded to praise the moral authority of a comic-book character, Chadwick has imbued Concrete with such depth that he seems more like a real person—a complex, conflicted man, with real-world opinions—than any caped crusader out there. Heroes may be the more purely entertaining piece of Pop art, but Concrete—like its massive boulder of a hero—will endure.