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Mild Mannered Reviews - Supergirl Comics

Supergirl #40

Supergirl #40

Scheduled to arrive in stores: April 22, 2009

Cover date: June 2009

"Who is Superwoman?" - Part 4: "Mistakes"

Writer: Sterling Gates
Penciller: Jamal Igle
Inker: Jon Sibal

Reviewed by: Jeffrey Bridges

Click to enlarge



Kara believes Superwoman is Thara Ak-Var, her father's choice for security chief of New Krypton. Kara also believes Thara is partly responsible for Zor-El's death, and goes in search of her. She finds a decoy and attacks it, only to be attacked in turn by Reactron.

He uses Gold Kryptonite to remove her powers and she falls, but remembering training from Batman uses her cape to glide to a crash landing.

At a party sponsored by the Daily Planet, Lana worries about Kara.

Reactron arrives and says his old powers (mentioned in issue 25) were lies and Kara hits him with some rebar. She then rips the gold K out of his chest, and he dives over a rooftop after it and disappears. Kara's powers return and she notices something on the cape from the decoy she attacked that she'd missed before, and now knows who Superwoman is.

Meanwhile, Lana gets another nosebleed and passes out, and Superwoman attacks Inspector Henderson. Kara arrives and accuses Superwoman of lying and helping to kill Zor-El and then unmasks her, revealing Lucy Lane.

3Story - 3: I'm guessing the reveal of Lucy Lane was supposed to be more of a shock than it was.

To the credit of the writing team I didn't see it coming, but I wasn't terribly shocked or surprised, either. It wasn't a huge, exciting moment the way they've been playing it up as. I never really cared who Superwoman really was, and I don't really care that it's Lucy Lane. I'm hoping something in the future explains that, and I also hope this actually moves into territory of explaining the ramifications of that on Lois, Clark and Kara.

I believe I've mentioned this before, but I'm also still very disappointed at the complete lack of Kal (and to a lesser degree, Lois) in this book. They are Kara's family and in this issue especially it felt like Kal's presence was really missing. Kara is having these really rough times and she has no one to talk to, and I feel like Kal is being... well, I'm not sure what he's being, but how can he not be there for her? At least to talk to? As a friend, as a big brother figure... it's not right that he's just leaving Kara to go through all of this alone, it makes him look bad because that's something he'd never do.

I know he can't be running over every time Kara has a problem, and please don't think that's what I'm suggesting here. But we've still hardly seen the two of them together at all in four years now, and that's gotten REALLY old. This storyline is huge for Kara, in terms of important life events, and if ever he should have been around just to offer her someone to talk to who understands what she's going through, this story is it.

And so the lack of Kal really made this issue feel like it was lacking overall, and I still feel like the overall story we've been getting here is about Superwoman, and it's bits and pieces of plot pushing the story forward. And that story is fine, but it's not KARA'S story and it's been really light on delving into her character and who she is as a person.

This book needs a break from crossovers and tie-ins and ABSOLUTELY needs a break from all the guest stars. Take four issues and reset a base to start from for Kara. Give her a life, a personality and a supporting cast and then forge ahead from there.

I feel bad scoring this a three because it's lightyears ahead of where this book used to be, but this issue shows there's still quite a ways to go to get Kara to where she needs to be.

4Art - 4: There were a few rough spots, but for the most part I absolutely loved it. The splash page of Reactron attacking Kara was exceptionally fantastic. On the whole, very good.

2Cover Art - 2: Kara looks like she's nine years old here, and... wow, that's... uh... a really big shot of Superwoman's ass.


Mild Mannered Reviews

2009

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

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