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Mild Mannered Reviews - Supergirl Comics

Supergirl #9

Supergirl #9

Scheduled to arrive in stores: August 23, 2006

Cover date: October 2006

Writer: Joe Kelly
Penciller: Ian Churchill
Inker: Norm Rapmund

"Big Girl, Small World"

Reviewed by: Jeffrey Bridges

Click to enlarge



Much like the rest of us, it seems as if Kara's finally trying to find out who she is.

After the events in Kandor last issue, Supergirl and Power Girl were immediately transported back to earth at full size and with all their powers restored. They have a conversation atop the Statue of Liberty where Power Girl chews Kara out for giving up the fight for the Kandorian's freedom in exchange for a cold trail to Argo City, the information that Saturn Queen apparently gave her. Kara insists that the fight for the Kandorian's freedom wasn't something they ever should have gotten involved in, and Power Girl doesn't much like that response.

Kara heads out over the ocean and shares a nice scene with Wonder Girl, reminiscing about their time training together on Themyscira and together they mourn the loss of the Amazons and Paradise Island.

Then Kara pays a visit to the Kents and spends a little time in Connor's old room. She brings up the very good question of why Clark never asked his parents if Kara could stay with them for a while. Eventually she leaves, taking Connor's old black t-shirt (with the red "S" on it) with her.

She has a quick flashback to Krypton, where she's crouched, terrified, holding a dagger in her hand. Her father is attacking a woman and is pleading with Kara to kill her.

She then drops by the Batcave and "sells" a device from her ship to Batman in exchange for a million dollars, or at least enough money so that she doesn't have to worry about paying for rent or clothing again. Bruce agrees to see that she's taken care of, and gets a kiss on the cheek for his efforts.

Kara then seeks out Boomer (who I've never heard of and can't find any information about, even in the DC Encyclopedia... though he apparently knows Nightwing) and spends the night wearing Connor's old shirt and talking, dancing, and playing pool with Boomer. She does all of this while trying to figure out who she is, culminating in her saving a little girl from getting run over by a truck.

Editor's Note: I'm not sure if this is intentionally left unclear or not, but I think "Boomer" is supposed to be the new Captain Boomerang (son of the deceased villain who died in "Identity Crisis").

She winds up back at her apartment where Cassie (Wonder Girl) arrives to talk, after having another fight with her mother. Kara tells her she's always welcome, and then gives her Connor's old shirt.

5Story - 5: There is one inconsistency here that bugs me, which is Kara feeling at the beginning of the book that the fight for the Kandorian's freedom wasn't something she should get involved in. And then at the end of the book, Kara saves the little girl from getting run over by the truck.

I know they're not quite the same thing, but it seemed to me as if at the beginning Kara was questioning the whole "being a hero" thing, and at the end Boomer says that he thought she "quit the hero thing" and her response is, "Never. I'm just... doing it my way."

So her way doesn't involve freeing oppressed and subjugated innocents? I don't know, I could get that she maybe thought it was a political thing she didn't want to get involved in, the way that Superman doesn't interfere in wars. But it wasn't presented as such. And if she had a big "change of heart" then I missed it, because I couldn't find it anywhere.

Still, perhaps it will be touched upon later. And even if not, the rest of this issue was too good for that to bring the rating down any, which is saying something.

THIS is what I've been waiting for since issue 1.

This should have been issue 1.

One year and nine issues later and we're finally getting to where we should have been all that time ago. The book even acknowledges that at the very end, where it says, "A beginning."

A beginning! At long last! Huzzah!

Too bad it's coming in the middle, as they usually work best when they come first.

Still though, at least we finally got it. Character depth, internal conflict, continuity, interpersonal conflict, and a confused young girl searching to find out who she is.

This is what I've been waiting a year for. Rucka started on it in issue 6, but never got to finish it and the rest of that arc was okay, but not all it could have been. And that's to be expected when writers change in the middle.

This book, however, is totally Kelly's vision and I have to say, right now I'm excited to see where he's going. I'm really excited about seeing the next issue, and I can't remember feeling that way for most of the run of this book so far.

Here's hoping he does for Kara what he did for Kal with Action Comics #750.

4Art - 4: Average Churchill, although the "Kara stopping the truck" panel was quite spectacular, as was the two-page splash of Kara remembering Themyscira. And hey, the Statue of Liberty had her correct face, which isn't the standard "this is a woman drawn by Churchill" face. Fantastic!

So why didn't Power Girl or, for that matter, Martha Kent have different faces? Martha just looked like an old Supergirl! Gah!

4Cover Art - 4: An interesting (and credited) homage to Frank Quietly and his cover to All-Star Superman #1. I like the title under "Supergirl" and there are no other words to distract from the image, which is silently powerful enough on its own and captures the emotional essence of the book, if not a direct event from it.

I still don't much care for Churchill's art (gee, can you tell?), but credit where it's due. This is a very good cover.


Mild Mannered Reviews

2006

Note: Month dates are from the issue covers, not the actual date when the comic went on sale.

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