Review: Superman/Supergirl:Maelstrom #1

This is a long post, so bear with me.

I wrote just yesterday about my optimism for the Palmiotti/Gray/Noto Superman/Supergirl:Maelstrom miniseries. It was optimism knowing that there is always a chance that optimism can melt away to disappointment.

This is the first issue of a 5 issue mini, so I have only read a small portion of the whole story. Still, I have to say I was pretty disappointed here.


The story opens on Apokolips where we meet Maelstrom. Maelstrom is not a Female Fury in training. She is not a warrior or even in the military. No, she is down among the laborers but she has aspirations far away from that lowly status. She wants to be Darkseid's bride. She does not just serve Darkseid, she loves him and she is willing to do anything to get his notice. That includes stealing contraband Boom Tube technology and heading to Earth. Maybe if she brings Superman's head on a platter, Darkseid will love her back.

Now there is some good plot possibilities here. Just how often do people dream on Apokolips? How does one advance their status there? Are you born in a caste that you die in ... or can you move forward? We know Apokolips is a bleak place where people are in the elite or a slave. But I can't recall reading a story from the point of view of a slave who wants more on Apokolips rather than freedom. So this was a good start, an original character with an interesting point of view.

Maelstrom arrives in Metropolis during a week when Superman is away on a mission in space. He put Supergirl in charge and she initially complains of a slow week of action until something gets her attention.

Yep, nothing like a bunch of cars being thrown into the air to get a super-hero's attention. Perhaps best done in the classic Miracleman #15, but more recently seen in Supreme Power, it is an effective method of bringing the heroes to you or delaying them as you escape.

Unfortunately for Supergirl fans, what we then get is a 7 straight pages of Kara being tossed around like a rag doll and beaten like a heavy bag. First the dreaded 'swing you around by your hair into a bunch of stuff' technique. Then Supergirl gets punted into a skyscraper.

She recovers just in time to see Maelstrom upend a whole hospital building ... the whole hospital!!!! That is some prestigious strength there. Supergirl can only watch as the building crumbles scattering people everywhere .... injuring most, killing some.

Flying to the rescue and to confront Maelstrom, Supergirl is quickly dispatched. Maelstrom grabs her by the face and buries her into the pavement. Maelstrom calls Supergirl 'weak and useless' and is about to kill her when Superman shows up to save the day.

3 pages later, Maelstrom is soundly defeated and sent back to where she came from.

Supergirl is able to barely rouse herself and thankfully her first thoughts are for the injured people. Superman casually tells her he has already saved the survivors. She then passes out again.

Okay, I have to admit I cringed a lot here ... but let me finish the issue and then I'll get into my review.

Cut to 3 days later with Kara sulking on the moon. Superman gives her another pep talk, one we have seen him give this Kara a handful of times already.

"You're not the first to fail," he says ... sort of like the 'it's okay to be scared' line from Action Comics or the 'you can't save everyone' lines from Puckett's 'Saving Thomas' story.

Supergirl begins crying, telling him this was more than failure, it was catastrophe. She even confides about her 'self-doubt'.

Superman tells Supergirl that he feels he is to blame because he threw her into a life of hero-ing without overseeing her training himself. He should have taught her how to use her powers himself. And he plans on doing it. They are going away from Earth for a week to train.

He tells Kara that he asked Power Girl to watch over Metropolis while they are gone. That's a real nice way to help her self-doubt. If I was Supergirl this is how I would have heard that: "Hey Kara, you failed keeping my city safe ... so while we are gone I put someone in charge I can trust, your better trained and more discipined clone from another Earth. I always liked her better."

Despondent, Supergirl tells Superman to leave her alone. Put he puts down his foot saying whether she likes it or not, he is taking her with him.

The issue ends with Maelstrom being re-educated by Granny Goodness. I guess we are supposed to look at Supergirl and Maelstrom as two sides of the same coin. Both are young and want to improve their standing in life; both are in the shadow of someone bigger than life. And both are going to need to train/survive to reach their goals.

Whew ....

First off let me say that I absolutely loved the art work on the issue.

Now, the first thing I tried to do after reading this issue was figure out where I was going to put it in continuity. It can't be now because I don't think the 'current' Kara would act this way. Supergirl seems like such a newcomer here that it would need to be early on. The fact that Superman is talking about her training puts it very early.

So for me, I am going to wedge this after issue #5 but before the Candor arc. This storyline seems to best fit in the year we missed when we move 'One Year Later'.

If we are talking about that Kara maybe I can understand some of her reactions a little better. She just dealt with the evil persona manifesting itself. She was recently under Darkseid's thrall. And she was new to Earth and heroing as a whole. So maybe ... maybe ... I can understand her emotions here. And I certainly liked the fact that when she awoke her first thoughts were to save the people, not rage over the defeat or sadness about the failure. But to see her crying, to hear her lamenting her abilities, to see her sulking on the moon ... that seems too extreme for this character.

And I also find it very unsettling that she was defeated so soundly by Maelstrom. Kara was trained by the Amazons in the ways of combat and did have some adventures prior to this. And around that time we were seeing a Kara who was giving the Trinity a run for the money. To see her trounced by a character who's only experience is the hard life on Apokolips also seems a bit out of touch here. Maelstrom is no Female Fury but she gives Kara a beating. This is only made worse by the fact that Superman basically defeats her by putting her in a bear hug.

I have said it before, writing Supergirl is a tricky business. I do not envy the writers. It is hard to please Supergirl's fans. We want her to be strong both physically and emotionally ... but we want a hint of vulnerability. We don't want her to be infallible; we want to see her succeed and fail, learn and grow. But we don't want her to constantly fail or seem weak.

Superman can be a great catalyst in Supergirl stories but he can make things trickier. Supergirl fans want Superman to be in her life, and we don't mind him being a role model. But I don't think we want him to be a over-protective father figure nor do we want him to always outclass her. At least not all the time.

So to see Kara beaten, defeated, saved by Superman, crying in self-pity, and being pulled from the doldrums by Superman ... it was a bit too much of the things I don't necessarily like to see.

I am going to call this an early adventure of Supergirl. There is great potential in this story. I realize that this is just the beginning of this arc and maybe we see a stronger Kara the next 4 issues. I certainly hope so. Because I don't think she was treated well in this issue.

Overall grade: C-