Tag: Supergirl in the Multiverse

Much like last week’s Earth-34 being an homage to Astro City, Earth-35 is an homage to the short lived universe that appeared in Awesome Comics. Awesome Comics was created by Rob Liefeld after his (forced) departure from Image Comics and featured such titles as; Youngblood, The Coven, and the most relevant to today’s post Supreme. Supreme was created by Rob Liefeld in 1992 but would be drastically retooled by Alan Moore in 1991. Supreme, as written by Moore, is a pretty clear pastiche of Silver Age Superman but instead of Supreme getting his powers from being an alien, Supreme was exposed to a meteorite (Supremium) at a young age that gave him super powers.

Sally Crane was the adopted sister of Ethan (Supreme) Crane who lived most her childhood as a normal school girl. One day however when her brother returned home on an adventure Sally was exposed to Supremium just as Ethan was many years before. While she initially though it only turned her hair silver, she would soon gain powers supreme and start her heroic super career as Suprema.

As with all my Supergirl in the Multiverse posts, this is my own artwork. Suprema and Radar (the Dog Supreme) are shown on a grassy ridge. Suprema has her hands on her hips, each has a cape billowing to the right. A cloudy orange sky sets the background and the Citadel Supreme can be seen peeking out from behind the clouds. A motif of Suprema’s chest symbol is in the top right with a 35 in it.

Earth-34 as it appears in DC continuity is relatively unexplored, however, it is very clearly supposed to be Kurt Busiek’s Astro City and I’ll be treating it like I did earths 7 and 8 (1610 and 616 Marvel universes) and base my drawing on the original universe not the DC version of it. Astro City is a comic series that has been through a few different publishers – including DC for a bit – but it seems to be currently under Image. The series doesn’t follow a single character or even a single team and instead follows the city itself. Stories focus on a single hero for a few issues or they will focus on average citizens as they interact with the super heroic world around them. Because of the nature of the storytelling we mostly see the heroes grow and evolve in the background. It is hard to adequately explain the brilliant storytelling in such a brief post, but it is truly a great series that has a sort of optimistic silver age futurism vibe told in a more modern era and is absolutely worth a read.

For this series, when a universe doesn’t immediately have a Supergirl counterpart my first instinct is to figure out the Superman of the universe and Astro City’s Superman is very clearly the Samaritan. Unfortunately the Samaritan doesn’t have any partners or female counterparts with similar power sets so I was back to square one. I considered Starwoman as well because of her alien heritage but she didn’t really fit otherwise. It was when I read issues 2 and 3 of Astro City Vol. 2 and was introduced to Astra Furst. The First family is very obviously an homage to the Fantastic Four but something about Astra’s fun-loving personality and the fact that she is a young blonde girl who is part of a legacy of heroes that really sold her to me as a good Supergirl for the universe. Astra, as I mentioned, is part of the First Family who are public heroes in Astro City and have been active since the 1950s. Astra is part of the 3rd generation of the family and has energy based powers which allow her to fly, blast energy bolts, and maintain a nearly invulnerable energy form.

As with all my Supergirl in the Multiverse posts, this is my own artwork. Astra Furst of the First Family is floating in the foreground casually lounging after flying up from Astro City pictured behind. Astro City can be seen stretching out around the bay and Mount Kirby. A motif is in the top right of the First Family logo with a 34 on top of it.

This week we’re looking at the “real world” universe of DC Comics. DC has portrayed the world that we live in a number of times. It was called Earth-Prime in the Pre-Crisis era and we saw real world DC staffers show up in comics like Julius Schwartz and this universe would also birth Superboy-Prime. Earth-33 specifically refers the universe as it appears in Multiversity by Grant Morrison, and has a hero called Ultra. However, the real world universe I’m using as reference comes from Superman: Secret Identity by Kurt Busiek and Stuart Immonen. In this story we’re introduced to a kid named after the famous comic character Clark Kent. Clark is a kid from Picketsville, Kansas who is just a normal kid that gets too many Superman toys and gets teased relentlessly for his name. That is until one day he starts flying. The story goes on to show us how someone from the real world might react to suddenly having the powers of Superman.

This week we’ve got 2 Supergirls as opposed to 1 but they really do come as a matched set so it felt rude to leave either out. Jane and Carol Kent are the twin daughters of Clark Kent and while they appeared as babies in issue 3 of Secret Identity, it was in issue 4 where they really came into prominence. Jane and Carol, much like their father, mysteriously acquired super powers when they were teens. And, much like their father, would secretly use these powers to help people.

As with all my Supergirl in the Multiverse posts, this is my own artwork. The Supergirls from Superman: Secret Identity are shown saving a cat from a tree. Jane is floating up and carefully removing a very upset cat from a high branch while Carol stands in the foreground posing for a picture.

The amalgamated home of the Justice Titans, Earth-32, features heroes that are combinations of 2 heroes from Earth-0. The concept was first explored in Batman: In Darkest Knight which showed Bruce Wayne was selected to join the Green Lantern Corps. Other heroes from the universe include Black Arrow (Green Arrow & Black Canary), Aquaflash (Aquaman & Flash), and Super-Martian (Superman and Martian Manhunter) among others.

In this universe some members of the Martian race lived alongside Kryptonians and had their cultures intertwined. Such is the history of Kal, the Super-Martian who we learn more about in Lex Luthor: Year of the Villain #1. This issue also reveals he is in a romantic partnership with this universe’s Lex Luthor who has also taken up the mantle of Batman. Ms. Super-Martian appears briefly in Dial H for Hero #10 but her origin isn’t explained. Because of her costume similarities to Earth-0 Kon-El Superboy, it’s possible this young member of Young Justice International is a clone of Lex and Kal much like Kon-El. While her name isn’t revealed in the story, I think based on other characters from the universe her name would most likely be M’gann.

As with all my Supergirl in the Multiverse posts, this is my own artwork. A digital drawing that depicts Ms. Super-Martian jumping down towards the viewer with her arms and legs outstretched. A night sky is obstructed in the background by various skyscrapers. A bright yellow light is backlighting Ms. Super-Martian. The top right corner has a motif of Ms. Super-Martian’s S symbol with a 32 on top of it.

Earth-31, formerly known as Earth-494, first showed up in Detective Comics Annual #7 from 1994. The DC Comics annuals from that year were all Elseworlds stories and this story is no different. The story tells a tale of a different sort of Batman, a Captain Leatherwing pirate captain of the Flying Fox. Neither the classic, nor current iterations of this universe have very many appearances but the theme is pretty easy to follow. This is of course the pirate universe.

Mary El is the rebellious niece of Admiral Gar-El who has escaped her cozy rich lifestyle to live the thrills of the pirate life as captain of the ship, Comet. Captain Steel-Skin, so called for her invincible skin, leads her crew of pirates pillaging the 7 seas. While Admiral Gar-El has shown up a couple times since showing up in The Multiversity Guidebook, mostly it is as a cameo. As such, Captain Steel-Skin unfortunately doesn’t actually exist in canon but I feel the idea of a pirate universe consisting of pirate versions of all our favorite DC characters has room to tell lots of stories.

As with all my Supergirl in the Multiverse posts, this is my own artwork. Captain Steel-Skin is shown flying above cresting waves pulling her ship Comet behind her. The ship has its sails aloft and a flag at the top showing the crest of the house of El. Captain Steel-Skin has her sword drawn pointing forward as she leads her ship. The top right features a motive of the El Crest with a number 31 on top of it.