Author: Kara Lovett

  • Supergirl Surprise #17: Supergirl (Vol. 5) #15

    Supergirl Surprise #17: Supergirl (Vol. 5) #15

    For those unaware, which might be everyone because I’m not sure I’ve explained it, the way I go about picking the Supergirl Surprise issues each month is by consulting a random number generator and my excel document that lists all my Supergirl comics. The excel document is something I put together soon after I started the blog for the sole purpose of tracking Supergirl Surprise but I’ve since also used it to track just how many comics Supergirl has headlined since I’ve got (pretty much) all of them now. This list currently sits at 412 comics, so each month I’ll pull up a random number generator and key in a request of a random number from 1-412 and consult my list then go to my long boxes and find the respective issue. This is a long winded way of me saying I was gob smacked when I pulled out a Supergirl comic with Power Boy on the cover after just talking about one of Supergirl’s other abusive exes in last month’s Supergirl Surprise #16 (H’El). I really did not want to go through another entry of talking about red flags, but upon re-reading I was quite refreshed at how Supergirl was shown approaching Power Boy and his specific brand of affection.

    “Love the Ones we Hurt” was written by Joe Kelly, with pencils from Ian Churchill, inks from Norm Rapmund, colors from Rod Reis, and lettering by Comic Craft. This issue gives us some backstory on nobody’s favorite character, Power Boy. For those unaware, Power Boy was introduced in the post-Infinite Crisis era and was very briefly a part of the Teen Titans. He went on to have about a dozen appearances and died rather unceremoniously soon after his introduction. About half of his appearances were alongside Supergirl and he was set up as a romantic counterpart to the girl of steel but I imagine it was never meant to last and was more-so a depiction of what a bad boyfriend would look like.

    Captain Boomerang Jr. was another of Supergirl’s supporting cast members in this period of time in her comic and the story opens with him in the hospital for reasons I can’t immediately remember. Supergirl and Power Boy are flying and making out when Supergirl realizes that kid boomerang is awake at the hospital now and tries to break away from Power Boy to go check on him. Power Boy, realizing that he is no longer the center of her attention, yells “Don’t turn you back on me when I’m talking to you.” and then punches her through a hospital. Yikes. He then has the audacity to tell her to calm down. Double yikes. He continues putting the beat down on her, telling her he loves her, and eventually renders her unconscious. You can probably see why I was nervous about covering this one.

    Supergirl awakes on a heart shaped bed with power dampening cuffs on her and then looks up to a wall full of photos of herself that can only be described as stalker-esque. He response is justified when she says “Power Boy is psycho”. Power Boy then opens the conversation with saying that Supergirl was out of line before and proceeds to talk about how his powers work and we find out that he is from Apokolips which is where he first noticed Supergirl. This was when she was brainwashed by Darkseid as part of the Superman/Batman: Apocalypse storyline and she wasn’t at her best. But to Power Boy, this villainous, scantily clad girl of steel is what he thinks is best for her and says “We can be prefect together, if you’ll just let me fix you” while holding up her costume that she was wearing on Apokolips.

    At this point is when I really started getting into how Supergirl approached this situation and why I preferred this issue to the H’El issue from last month. Supergirl, at this point, has had enough. She uses her heat vision to burn her cuffs, the Apokolips costume, and Power Boy’s hands while saying “I think we need to break up”. I love how Kara is shown here having full ownership of herself and her body and knows when to say no to a problematic partner and she knows that what Power Boy is calling love is anything but.

    Also we get like 6 pages of Kara kicking the shit out of Power Boy whilst saying lines like “you said you loved me…and you hit me” and “no one who says he loves you should hit you, ever”. This comic is not the most nuanced take on domestic violence and it’s not particularly subtle, however it is nice to see Supergirl standing up for herself like this and holding her own. I don’t love this period of Supergirl comics, we’re right in the middle of the Zor-El sent Kara to earth to kill Kal arc which is just a bit dumb in my opinion. I was also never really fond on Captain Boomerang Jr. so his inclusion here doesn’t really matter too much to me. Also Felix Faust was here for a page, I guess that was setting up things to come. The issue ends with Power Boy’s Father Box exploding in space and Supergirl looking a bit worse for wear as a cliffhanger.

    Nothing super notable in the ad space this time out, but we do have a couple I wanted to show off. There’s an ad page that’s split in half so the top half is advertising the critically acclaimed comic Green Lantern: Rebirth while the bottom is just an absolutely baffling abovetheinfluence ad where one kid is telling the other to play football instead of smoking pot. Most of the other ads here are for 52 and Countdown as it was that time at DC but the inside cover boldly proclaims “Jimmy Olsen Must Die!” which at the very least caught my husband’s attention while I was reading so maybe they’re doing something right in the 2007 DC offices.

  • Supergirl in the Multiverse: Earth-0: Supergirl/Power Girl/Prisoner 8912

    A couple years back, in the most recent iteration of Action Comics Weekly, Supergirl had the starring role in the back-up story which has come to be known as Universe End. I did cover the entirety on this story when the collection came out last year (Supergirl: Universe End) but in short, this story shows Supergirl tasked with escorting a captured prisoner (Prisoner 8912, the embodiment of Fear) to her final prison sentence. The journey is much more exciting than that however, and the final destination is different than what she initially was tasked to do. It’s a very interesting look at how Supergirl approaches obstacles with unfailing hope, help, and compassion for all.

    So what does this story have to do with Supergirl in the Multiverse? In the final act of the story, when Prisoner 8912 is facing off against her brother when, through force of will, she merges her body with that of Supergirl and Power Girl (who joined via Supergirl’s mind) into a really killer amalgamated form. This form appears first (and exclusively) in Action Comics 1080, part 11 of the story. While it doesn’t really count as a separate universe and should instead count towards Supergirl Through the Ages, but her defined costume and S-symbol are some of the main aspects I look for when putting together this series. Also I just really wanted to draw it.

    As with all my Supergirl in the Multiverse posts, this is my own artwork. Supergirl, merged with Power Girl and Prisoner 8912, is stood on a cliff overlooking a swampy environment. A motif of Supergirl’s S Symbol with a 0 on it is in the top right corner.

  • Supergirl in Action Comics (Issues 685 & 686)

    Supergirl in Action Comics (Issues 685 & 686)

    In the wake of Superman’s death, DC comics was suddenly left with 4 monthly ongoing comics without their lead character. While comics like Superman, Adventures of Superman, and Superman: The Man of Steel couldn’t really change their titles, Action Comics could. Action Comics while currently (currently meaning 1992) was using the title “Superman in Action Comics” it was historically an anthology comic and not always solely focused on the man of steel and even just recently before these issues the title changed it’s title to “Action Comics Weekly” so switching to “Supergirl in Action Comics” was a fairly easy change. Supergirl would not however maintain headlining status and would only be the star of the book for issues 685 and 686 (and 706 but we’ll cover that later). Both of these books have the same creative teams of Roger Stern (writer), Butch Guice (penciller), Denis Rodier (inker), Glenn Whitmore (colorist), and Bill Oakley (letterer), most of which we saw last week as well with Supergirl and Team Luthor.

    These Action stories take place in the same post death of Superman time period, although I think I covered these a tad out of order and the Supergirl and Team Luthor story is actually a later story than this. Action Comics #685 has a cover clearly playing homage to the iconic Action Comics #1 with Supergirl instead holding the green car above her head although we do get some text on the cover reading “The All New Metropolis Marvel!”. The story opens with getting the reader up to speed on the fact that Superman just died via a Daily Planet newspaper headline and WLEX news coverage before we get into the meat of the story titled “Re:Actions” where we’ve got Cadmus and the SCU arguing about who get’s the rights to Superman’s and Doomsday’s recently deceased bodies.

    Lex Luthor the Second hears of this nonsense and quickly sicks Supergirl and his Team Luthor goons on the situation and they seem just as cautious about property damage as they were in the Team Luthor special. Supergirl seems particularly upset about the government treating Superman’s body this way and knocks out the whole affair with a rather concussive psycho-kinetic blast. By the time everyone has woken up, Lex has shown up and is announcing that with the approval of Mayor Berkowitz a section of Centennials Park will be set aside as the final resting place for the Man of Steel.

    From here we cycle through some of the supporting cast, we get Lois at the Daily Planet where Perry White sends Lois home along with Superman’s cape that she hasn’t let go of. Then we cut to Lana calling the Kents hoping that what she heard of Superman’s passing wasn’t true. Then a brief montage of people around the world reacting to the news of Superman’s passing. Then we hop over to see Lex II obliterating a chair over the corpse of Doomsday while thinking “Superman was mine to kill”. Then we have Lois back at home and giving us the dialogue revealing that it’s the same day still of Superman’s death with her mentioning she just had breakfast with Clark this morning. A brief look at the maximum security wing where Parasite laments never being able to siphon the powers of the Man of Steel ever again.

    We are now back to the star of the show, the Maid of Might! A handful of goons thinking the city is easy pickings without it’s resident hero thinks to rob a jewelry store and on their way out nearly run over a cop. The felons are briefly scared by the S-Shield before they realize it’s just “that Supergirl bimbo” and think they can easily get away. Supergirl doesn’t let them off easy, tossing their car (more Action #1 homage) and flinging their bullets back at them and turning them over to the police. The issue ends with a scene of Bibbo crying and praying in a rather touching scene.

    We then move on to Action Comics 686 and the story “Who’s Buried in Superman’s Tomb” which opens with the Guardian chasing down aa van full of gunmen and we get a rather Jack Kirby looking shot of the gold-clad vigilante. This Guardian prologue serves to show that Metropolis still has heroes even without Superman flying about and we soon shift toward a limousine driving by with none other than Lex Luthor II inside.

    Here we get some backstory revealing that Lex II is actual just Lex I’s brain in a younger sexier body. Guardian is seen getting called back to Cadmus rather suddenly and Lex, Supergirl, and the Metropolis SCU join up together in Centennial park to take a look at Superman’s empty tomb. The SCU pesters Lex because there are a series of tunnels under and around Superman’s tomb that they blame for Superman’s disappearance. Lex writes this off as what could easily be the truth but is likely a cleverly delivered lie but regardless Lex didn’t take the body as Supergirl and inspector Henderson reveal the tomb was broken into not out of.

    The SCU begin to journey into the tunnels to see if they can discover anything while the reader gets to take a peek back at Cadmus where we – and Guardian – find out that Superman’s body was taken by Cadmus. Guardian is thoroughly pissed off but is calmed down slightly by the former Newsboys revealing that they plan to clone Superman just as Guardian had been cloned before. Supergirl, Lex, and the SCU encounter some rubble that the maid of might has to strong arm her way through when suddenly a left over bomb goes off. Supergirl only just saves everyone by extending her protective aura but they all have to work together to get back to the surface once the tunnels start flooding after the explosion.

    After they are all safely topside, they bear witness to a religious cult that seems to worship Superman, Turpin and Sawyer discus their thinking that Cadmus is likely the culprit behind Superman’s death while Lex and Sydney Happersen come to a similar conclusion. The book then ends with a scene at the airport with Lois sending off the Kents and Lana. Lois and Lana have a nice exchange where they each let the other know they’ll always be there for one another.

    Something I’ve come across in these 2 issues, and to some extent the Supergirl and Team Luthor special, is that when only reading a single issue at a time or even 2 issues, there’s a lot of story you miss out on. Just in issue 686 I counted no less than 7 editor notes referencing previous issues of story telling and there’s obviously a gap in the story just between issues 685 and 686 of Action Comics. There is a lot of love for this “Triangle Era” of Superman comics and when reading through all the titles it really does give way to some fantastic story telling. Unfortunately it makes just looking at 2 isolated issues a bit trickier and a lot of page real estate is dedicated to following up on ongoing minor stories and not so much on the main hero (Supergirl this time). Supergirl really only has a couple scenes across these 2 issues where she was headlining, a major psi-blast at the start of 685 against the Cadmus Lab boys, then not again until the end with the car chase/Action 1 homage scene. And then in 686 we only see her exploring the tunnels below Superman’s tomb and Guardian is much more the focal character this time. In the 44 pages I looked at for this week’s entry, Supergirl was only in 16 (about 1/3rd) which was a bit disappointing to me because I had been really hyping up these stories to myself leading up to this and was a bit let down.

    I did take a quick peek at the letters page to see if the editors had anything to say about Supergirl stepping into the spotlight and only saw a couple mentions in Action 685. In response to a letter from Ed (and Cassie) Catto, we get a promise of “a lot of Supergirl in the upcoming issues” and a tag at the end of the page a mention of Supergirl having a lot to live up to with Superman gone. Also a shoutout to Jackson Guice paying homage to Shuster’s Action Comics #1 with the cover. I didn’t see any other mention of Supergirl in either letters page so possibly Supergirl was initially supposed to be a more prominent presence and was shifted aside when the 4 replacement Supermen entered the scene. I have quite a few more Matrix stories coming up to cover including the 1994 mini-series as well as Panic in the Sky and the Showcase issues with Supergirl starring.

  • Supergirl in the Multiverse: Earth-183

    The home of Super-Savage would first show up in the pages of Superboy, issue 183 specifically. The story for the most part mirrors the classical Edgar Rice Burroughs Tarzan. Kal-El, surviving the explosion of Krypton, lands not in Smallville but in the jungles of Africa. Here he is raised among the native gorillas and he would over time develop powers. Later into his young adult life, a group of hunters came into the jungle and began caging and stealing the jungle animals to take back. Kal, by now using the name Karkan the Mighty and having refashioned blankets from his rocket into a super suit, helps save these animals from their cruel captors. However, during this encounter Karkan is shunned by the gorillas that raised him and he returns to the city with Toni who had shown kindness to Karkan when the other humans didn’t. Karkan would later (in Superboy 188) have a brief adventure with Toni in the big city, but has since been an un-explored universe aside from a couple brief cameos.

    For Supergirl’s addition to this universe, I tried to think of how Superman landing in Africa would affect Supergirl, and for the most part I don’t think it would change. Supergirl, particularly in the silver age, has a fairly normal Kryptonian upbringing on Argo city until her teenage years when the saved city begins to fall apart. At this moment, Zor-El and Allura search the cosmos to find a suitable planet to send their daughter to when they land on Earth where Kara’s cousin Kal-El has become Superman. With this universe instead having Super-Savage, the Zor-El family has instead fashioned their daughter after Super-Savage and into the new hero; Savage-Lass.

    As with all my Supergirl in the Multiverse posts, this is my own artwork. Allura and Kara Zor-El are standing next to a Super Telescope. Kara is wearing a super-dress fashioned after Super-Savage. The pair are discussing sending Kara to earth. A display from the Super Telescope shows Super-Savage. Savage-Lass’s s symbol is in the top right with a 183 on top of it.

  • Supergirl and Team Luthor: A Super and a Luthor Working Together?

    In the wake of Superman’s perish during the Doomsday storyline a handful of one-shots featuring other Metropolis characters or the city in general reacting to a world without Superman. These specials included such titles as Superman Legacy, Newstime: The Life and Death of Superman, and the subject of today’s blog post; Supergirl and Team Luthor. For those that aren’t quite as familiar with the early 90s Superman universe you may be surprised to find out that the Supergirl and Lex Luthor in this comic aren’t the 2 that you would generally associate with those monikers. The DC Universe page from this issue actually explains them significantly better and more concisely than I could. “He’s Lex Luthor the Second, a young, attractive billionaire who heads the largest multinational conglomerate in the United States of America. She’s Supergirl, a gelatinous blob of protoplasm who can change the course of mighty rivers-as well as her own appearance.” The only major part left out here is that Lex Luthor II is actually just the real Lex in a cloned body acting as his own Australian son. For more info on Supergirl’s origin, take a look back at my last post about The Supergirl Saga.

    The book features 2 stories, a 38 page lead story and an 11 page backup, and 4 pin-up images. The lead story, “…The Future of Metropolis” is credited to Roger Stern writer, June Brigman layouts, Guice and Janke finishes, Albert de Guzman letterer and Glenn Whitmore colorist. The opening sequence is framed as a promotional video that Lex II is showing to the City Council to hopefully get the city’s support as Metropolis’s new protectors now that Superman was gone. I really like this sequence and think it helps catch readers up to speed on who Supergirl is and what she can do and the opening page mimicking the 50s Adventures of Superman opening. We’ve also got Supergirl saving a cat which I always like to see. When I was reading through this I was really hoping the whole comic would be framed like a video but where the story goes works pretty well and the 5 1/2 pages of faux promo video work great.

    The story then shifts to Lex pleading the council that his Team Luthor and Supergirl should get the same special police powers that Superman once had. He brings up the extra-normal threats that Superman previously faced off against that his team could once again help the Metropolis SCU were unable to face on their own. The council still seems skeptical but coincidentally there is a break-in at STAR Labs which gives Lex the perfect opportunity to put his team, Supergirl, and himself into action.

    All the while this is happening, the book splices in scenes of Supergirl helping the emergency services clean up after the destruction of Doomsday. We’ve also got a brief scene between Supergirl and Lois Lane where Supergirl complains about missing Superman and then after dropping Lois off at the Daily Planet realizes she was being rather insensitive seeing that Lois was much closer to the man of steel than she ever was.

    Lex and Supergirl show up at STAR Labs and make quick work of the fiends (The DMT specifically) that are looking to steal back their armor from the Lab. This encounter is not without fault though, extensive damage has be wrought to the facility and Lex Luthor has suffered a serious leg break. This leg break along with the public’s general disapproval of the destructive nature of their attempted heroic act has put Lex in a rather sour mood. He lashed out at both Dr. Kelley and Happerstein before settling into his office where he is met with his live-in superhero/girlfriend.

    Supergirl notices her partner is in a bad mood and uses her shape-changing ability to transform into what I can only assume is 3 pop culture icons but I only recognize Princess Leia (feel free to let me know who else is here). However none of these famous babes get Lex out of his funk but a quick change to Gretchen Kelley and a bit of motherly inspiration get’s Lex back to sorts. We also get to see Supergirl (still in Kelley form) go off on a couple of Lex Corp employees making blonde jokes and Lex proving to the reader that Lex II is just as cruel to his upper staff members as his father was.

    Lex meets with Dr. Packard of Cadmus Labs, gets an idea to clone his girlfriend, and then Supergirl saves one of the Team Luthor goons from an excessively dangerous training exercise before we land into the final scene of this first story. Here we see the home of George Markham, who had previously been the ire of Lex Luthor in a board meeting, and surprise guest Hellgrammite. Markham, terrified, lets spill that he hired the monster to kill Lex Luthor the Second. Upon this proclamation, Lex and his Team Luthor crew step out from the shadows with cameras catching him in the act like it’s an episode of To Catch Predator.

    We then cut to outside where Lex starts talking to Hellgrammite who is revealed to be Supergirl in disguise. That’s right reader, not only has Lex used inhumane means to put one of his staffers behind bars, he has also used the girl he proclaims to love to do so in a way that is obviously very painful for her. The Lex/Supergirl romantic coupling is clearly set up to be a bad encounter for Supergirl, but it’s handled quite well in this era and Lex really does cover his tracks rather well so it could be seen as a perfectly honest relationship from Supergirl’s perspective. I still don’t think she should be with him, although that is kinda the point.

    The backup story really leans into Lex acting like a proper gentlemen where we open to Supergirl thanking him for building a new homeless shelter down by the river. “Shelter” is written by Louise Simonson, with art by Denis Rodier, colors by Glenn Whitmore, and Albert De Guzman lettering. We find a crew of Underworlders (they’re like the sewer mutants from Futurama) trying to check into the newly constructed shelter. Shenanigans ensue, the Underworlders accidentally start a fire because one of them has weird hands and the other makes sparks when he gets agitated, the non-mutants start shooting the mutants, and Supergirl enters the scene.

    Once Supergirl shows up, she cools everyone off and stops the fire. Supergirl finds out that while the Underworlders did start the fire, it was only because everyone else in the shelter was accusing them of starting a flood that they had nothing to do with. Supergirl reports back to Lex that everything is all good now (aside from the gaping hole in the side of the building) but she still feels bad about the Underworlders and wishes to help them if she can. Lex on the other hand thinks of them too, but in a much more exploitative way. This story does feel a bit like a Very Special Episode, but it feels like we’re really getting to see that good ol’ Kent good heartedness that we love to see from people who wear the S shield.

    We close out the book with 4 pinups by John Byrne, Art Thibert, Kerry Gammill & Bob Wiacek, and Doug Hazelwood & Tom Grummett. the Hazelwood/Grummett piece almost looks like an homage to the cover to the 1988 cover to Power Girl #1. This pinup might be my favorite of the bunch but all 4 are rather good.

    I do want to make a mention about the art that is good all around but the coloring specifically (by Glenn Whitmore) was particularly striking and would often feature panels with spectacular lighting and monotone compositions that really pop. As I mentioned last week, I’ll be going through some more Matrix Supergirl stories in the coming weeks to shine some light on an odd period of Supergirl’s storied history.