Superman/Batman: Apocalypse

Superman/Batman: Apocalypse is an animated film released by Warner Home Video in 2010. The movie stars Tim Daly as Superman, Kevin Conroy as Batman, Andre Braugher as Darkseid, and Summer Glau as Supergirl. The film is a sequel to Superman/Batman: Public enemies and both of these movies are fairly accurately depictions of the comic series Superman/Batman from 2003. Apocalypse adapts issues 8-13 of the series a story arc sometimes called The Supergirl from Krypton and sometimes just called Supergirl. The story acts as a new introduction of Kara Zor-El.

I’ll only touch on the plot briefly because I encourage readers to check out this story either in its comic or movie form. Kara Zor-El’s ship crashes in Gotham harbor and is found by Batman. After a few scenes of Kara experiencing her new powers, Batman is able to track her down and use Kryptonite to bring her back to the Batcave. From here she meets Superman and finds out that they’re cousins to one another. The next chunk of the story shows Kara acclimating to life on earth, she learns English, she learns to shop, and then with the help of Wonder Woman and the Amazons she learns to fight. While on Themyscira, the island is attacked and Kara is kidnapped and taken to Apokolips. Darkseid, ruler of Apokolips, brainwashes Kara to be one of the Female Furies and it takes the combined efforts of Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, and Big Barda to get her back to earth safely. Back on earth she and Clark go to Smallville where Clark has set up for her to meet his parents Jonathan and Martha. However, as soon as they get there they are attacked by Darkseid. A fight breaks out and results in Darkseid getting sent through a boom tube and ending up either in the depths of space or the source wall, depending on if you watched the movie or read the comic. With the threat passed, Kara is now revealed to the world as the hero Supergirl.

In the comics Kara Zor-El had been absent since her death in Crisis on Infinite Earths but Supergirl had shown up in a couple different ways. First as the Matrix, who was a protoplasmic clone of Lana Lang from an alternate dimension who later merged with a human girl named Linda Danvers and became an Earth Born Angel. The second attempt at a post crisis Supergirl was a character named Cir-El, the daughter of Superman and Lois Lane from the future that was actually just a creation of the Futuresmiths and was removed from continuity soon after her debut. While both of these versions of Supergirl have their fans and are interesting takes on the character, there’s something about the simplicity of a Supergirl from Krypton that, for me personally, works really well.

This Kara Zor-El isn’t quite the same as her Pre-Crisis counterpart and her origin has quite a few differences (read about the Pre-Crisis debut of Supergirl Here). One of the major changes was the idea of Kara being older than Kal and being a teenager when Krypton was destroyed and being trapped in suspended animation for years as Kal grew up and became Superman. This suspended animation factor to her origin has similarities to the Supergirl from Superman the Animated Series and Power Girl’s origins. This idea of Kara being older than Kal has now become the norm and has been adapted into nearly everything including Smallville and the Supergirl series from 2015. Personally I think the suspended animation angle to her origin is quite good and Kara being alive on Krypton and remembering it before its destruction creates a nice distinction between her and Superman and leads to some interesting stories.

Another major change to this new version of Supergirl is how immediately she was integrated into the wider DC Universe. This Supergirl didn’t live her first few years in an orphanage in Midvale as a secret weapon for Superman. She was trained by Wonder Woman and her origin is closely tied to Batman which leads to both these characters becoming mentor figures for her along with her cousin Superman. This is expanded upon bit more thoroughly in the comic, during the scene when she is revealed as Supergirl on Themyscira many of the major heroes of the DC universe are present including the Justice League, the Teen Titans, the JSA, and the Outsiders.

In this movie Batman is very standoffish towards Supergirl and doesn’t trust her and has trouble believing that she is who she says she is. The main question that keeps coming up in the story is Batman asking Kara what the name of her mother is. Kara remembers Kal’s parents, Lara and Jor-El, and her own father Zor-El but doesn’t remember her mother’s name. Batman’s mindset is that all the information Kara has presented about her life on Krypton immediately after coming out of the rocket is that all the information is widely known or information that Superman had told her. It is near the end of the movie when Kara approaches Batman and says “Alura”. I think while the answer to Batman’s question was part of why he started trusting Kara, her evolution as a hero throughout the story also plays a major part in him trusting her.

There are 2 scenes from the movie that are some of my favorites that aren’t present in the comic or are much less prominent. The first is near the beginning of the movie when we see a montage of Clark taking Kara through Metropolis and she’s trying on clothes and shopping and really exploring her new life as a human girl. There’s something very fun and lighthearted about this scene. The scene is present in the comic but it isn’t as long and is mostly restricted to the hot dog scene and a panel of Clark mentioning that Kara had certainly gotten the shopping part of being a teenage girl down. The second scene that I want to talk about happens near the end in the climactic battle against Darkseid. In the comic Supergirl is taken out of the fight pretty early as she fakes her death to throw darkseid off his game leaving Superman to continue the battle by himself. The movie has Supergirl playing a much more active role and she spends a lot of time actively fighting Darkseid. She is also responsible for activating the boom tube that sends Darkseid into the depths of space. I really enjoy this more active role she plays here and feels like a much better start to her heroic career as opposed to her hiding away for most of the fight.

There’s a few parts of this movie that I’m not particularly fond of. Kara starts her life on earth and comes out of the rocket naked and she stays this way for quite a while, this coupled with the constant over sexualization of the character never sits right with me especially considering Kara is supposedly 16 during this story. A good chunk of this story has Kara in an antagonistic role, first when Batman is untrusting of her after she arrives on earth, and then when she is under Darkseid’s control on Apokolips. These two factors are both very prominent in the Apokolips portion of the story in the middle when Superman is faced with having to fight supergirl and the outfit Kara is wearing doesn’t leave much to imagine.

While this isn’t my favorite Supergirl origin story, it is a really easy and fun way for new fans of the character to get to know the Girl of Steel. Also looking at the story without solely focusing on Supergirl, there’s some pretty great scenes and a lot of cool action sequences. This storyline would also lead to an ongoing Supergirl title that started in 2005 which is full of really interesting storylines that further develop Kara and her history with Krypton and her future as a hero. Thanks so much for reading! If you liked my blog post about this movie or just want to hear more about it, fellow comics fan Mike Bailey did a podcast episode about it in his Moving Kryptonian Images maxi series that you can find Here. For any thoughts, questions, corrections, or suggestions feel free to leave a comment or email me at blogofsupergirl@gmail.com.