Even with their religion and government keeping them from being the most expansive species and why it wasn't fleets of people who left, they do have extremely advanced technology and a few who have predicted the planet's destruction like Jor-El in the first place for the origin to work.

Plus there is just the intrigue Kara Zor-El, Dru-Zod. Zor-El, the lost city of Kandor, and many others have developed over the decades as characters in the lore of Superman. Way too many to be wasted in just removing them to make Clark's world far smaller just so he feels like the last which really doesn't add to his grief any more than him not having that many even now in the lore filled with survivors.

Also @AABoG Isn't Miss Martian not technically a Green Martian? J'onn meeting the criteria of the last son of Mars is more a detail to keep to for someone like Ma'alefa'ak.

No, he shouldn't be. We already saw how bland this would make Superman's world into if it's enforced (post-crisis superman by john byrne). And even when they did impose this rule they still wanted to use characters like Supergirl and zod but couldn't so they changed their stories to better fit this interpretation, and that resulted in some of the worst superman stories ever. Not to mention, the mess of a continuity it resulted in for power girl, Supergirl and the legion.

Usually in convoluted manners. Like, it's not like characters such as Matrix couldn't be interesting on their own, but it would be interesting as unique incarnations in their own right. Like, a very different kind of Supergirl alongside Kara.

He’s called the last son of krypton because he was the last baby born on krypton. So he’s legitimately its last son

Yeah, even if there are other survivors, the title hardly becomes null.

That poll is so confusing that I think I voted for the wrong option.

Anyway, my answer is a resounding: No, he should not be the sole survivor. Kara Zor-El/Zor-L, Kandor, the Phantom Zoners, Argo City, the Thought-Beasts... bring about plenty storytelling possibilities, as proved by the many good, great, or at least entertaining Superman stories featuring them. The character, his universe and his lore would be -and, IMO, have been- poorer and more boring without them.

The OP is right to tell that the HMS Sole Survivor ship sailed long ago. On July, 1950, to be precise, since that month came out one comic wherein Superman bumped into Kryptonian rogues for the first time. People who want Kal-El to be the only survivor are longing for a status quo which has not existed for seventy-two years.

I keep hearing Superman is a less dramatic figure without the tragedy, the weight, the "gravitas" of being the last of his kind, since his unique status informs every aspect of his life...but the same people who makes such a claim usually also are those who think Krypton should be downplayed as much as possible. Moreover, whenever he has been the sole survivor, Kryton was "What is a Krypton?" (1938-1949) or "meaningless trivia" (1986-2000) to him. I would understand better the "being the last of his kind is dramatic" argument if it was, in fact, dramatic.

Some fans also claim he was always meant to be the sole survivor, since that is his appeal. I have not heard of Siegel or Shuster even hinting Superman's appeal comes from being the sole survivor, or he was meant to being the last Kryptonian. Definitely it was not a factor in their stories (and Siegel has written plenty stories where he was not. Given his Supergirl stories, I am pretty sure he was fond of Kara). I consider likelier that they thought his appeal is being an escapist power fantasy for two men who had lived through the Great Depression. Unlike them, Superman could punch and humilliate all kind of bullies and crooks without negative consequences.

I mean, if you tell me that his main appeal for you, okay. But if you say he was always meant to be the sole survivor, I will request citations of Siegel, Shuster and their editor stating that was his creators' intent, and what they considered to be his main appeal.

I think Kurt Busiek once said that the "Last Son of Krypton" moniker is way newer that people think, and it was probably introduced by the 1978 movie. I cannot tell whether this is true, but I would not be surprised.

And, anyway... Why do some people take that nickname so seriously, to the point they think it should describe a literal fact? Must Superman be made from literal steel, Batman knighted by the English Crown, Green Lantern fight gladiatorial games and Flash be crowned sultan? Must the Maid of Might be a domestic employee and the Dominoed Daredoll a toy?

Regardless, the existence of other Kryptonians does not diminish his Last Son status: The Phantom Zoners, the Kandorians and the Argonian survivors are older than him, and Kara is one woman (and, depending on the continuity, older than him). So Superman is the still the last male Kryptonian born before the end.

Personally, I think the biggest evidence that Superman should not be the only survivor is that DC tried to erase the Kryptonian characters because they were supposedly irrelevant baggage of a sillier and more childish age...and then they spent around fifteen years struggling to replace them with non-Kryptonian similarly-named substitutes who never became so iconic or enduring. The Superman -and Legion- books went through three Zods, six Supergirls, one Earthborn dog called "Krypto", one alien ghetto called "Kandor", one floating alien city coincidentally named after the original Argo... until DC gave up, admitted those "irrelevant" characters filled a niche and could not be easily eliminated, and restored them. And hardly someone remembers, let alone cares for, the Pokolistan Zod, the Odilinian Kara, or Conner's unwanted pet (unwanted by him, I mean).

Reinforcing Superman's sole survivor status did not improve the books. It messed up the lore and broke the fanbase.

@Xandermcc Where did I say she was a green martian?

In saying having her around suddenly stops J'onn from being the Last Son of Mars when she wouldn't.

Superman shouldn't be the last son of Krypton because then we can't have Supergirl as his cousin. I hate how the "Last Son of Krypton" mandate changed Kara's last name from Zor-El to In-Ze in the DCAU and her race changed from Kryptonian to "Argoan" while still keeping her powers the same as Superman and keeping her weakness to Kryptonite. It's confusing because that makes viewers watching Justice League Unlimited believe she's the same Kryptonian Kara Zor-El from the comics but no, her origin story in Superman TAS showed her as Clark's adopted "cousin" Kara In-Ze from Argo. And not Argo City, but Planet Argo. It's clear that the showrunners really wanted to use the Kryptonian Supergirl but John Byrnes' mandate that Superman should be the last survivor of Krypton forced them to change Kara's origin in the cartoon. Kind of weird how they still used Jax-Ur and changed the Amazon Mala to a Kryptonian.

And in the comics, it's better to keep Kryptonians as a minority instead of keeping Kal-El the last Kryptonian in the galaxy. We've seen how that mandate messed up the backstories of former Kryptonians. Power Girl's backstory was a mess when she was Atlantean and was weak to rocks and wood.

Yeah, Zod was weirdly kept in major gaps of media as well as Kara. Though mostly Kara because double standard, but still.