Last week I reviewed Action Comics #303, a Silver Age classic with a healthy dose of Red Kryptonite fun. I got a lot of great feedback for that review and I feel that I have been so busy with current reviews that the Silver Age stuff has been missing a bit from here. I also try to have my back issue reviews somehow relate to current storylines and with Superman dealing with a Red K injection in Joshua Williamson's Superman book, I thought I would look back again to one of the wackier Supergirl/Red K stories from 1961. (For transparency, these scans are from my Supergirl Archives Vol 2 book.)
'The Six Red K Perils of Supergirl' was the back up story in Action Comics #283. Written by Jerry Siegel with art by Jim Mooney, we get to see Supergirl dealing with a new period in her life and struggling with a major Red K exposure.
I really feel like this period of Supergirl's stories are a major turning point for the character and worth a look at. There is a long, multi-issue story where we meet one of Supergirl's arch-enemies, Lesla Lar. She loses her powers. She regains her powers from an odd source. And then it all culminates two issues from this story in Action Comics #285 in which Superman reveals Supergirl's existence to the world. That issue is one of the most key issues in Supergirl's history.
But we are here, now, in Action Comics #283 so settle in for Silver Age goodness. From character progression to zany Red K transformations to detailed super-brief side plots, this issue is a hearty meal. And guess what? It is only part one.
We start with a spectacular splash page with some great teases.
First off, that picture of Supergirl, in some eerie cavern, battling a horde of multi-eyed monsters, is just gorgeous. Great action. Weird setting. Beautiful.
And the words just add to the mystery making you want to read on. Supergirl saying she never dreamed she would be in this place! The narrator talking about the strange adventures ahead. It all makes me want to turn the page.
Before we get to that scene though, we need to establish the current state of the Supergirl state.
Supergirl has been in a sort of 'back and forth' battle with her foe Lesla Lar. Lesla is a Kandorian rogue scientist who just happens to be a dead ringer for Kara. How close do they look like each other? Enough that Superman couldn't tell the difference (although giving how aloof Superman can be in the Silver Age, maybe I shouldn't be surprised).
Lesla was trying to replace Supergirl on Earth, brainwashing Supergirl into think she was Lesla in Kandor. Part of that plan included hitting Supergirl with a permanent depowering ray. But before the ultimate switch can happen, the Kandorian police arrest Lesla.
Meanwhile, on Earth, a depowered Linda Danvers realizes she has to live her life as a 'normal human'. Unknown to her, Mr. Mxyzptlk randomly picks Linda to give super-powers to. But the imp adds an interesting wrinkle. He will give this 'random girl' super-powers WITHOUT a weakness to Kryptonite. His hope is to irritate Superman by making a simple girl more powerful. And think about it, right now in this book, Supergirl is the most powerful being in the DCU - everything a Kryptonian has without the Kryptonite!
Okay ... that was a lot. Lookalike villains! Depowered heroes! A lucky, 5th-dimensional deus ex machina! Whew! Welcome to the Silver Age!
Reveling in her new powers, Linda imagines a better life moving forward. She wants to reveal her secret identity to her foster parents. She wants to date Dick Malverne who has become a nice young man.
But first, with Superman off world, Supergirl decides to take advantage of her new true invulnerablity. She rounds up six different Red K meteors before they can get to Earth and smashes them to powder.
Great art by Mooney. Love that top panel. And love that her first thoughts are for helping Superman and Krypto!
Unfortunately, when on a date with Dick at a local carnival, she feels the tingle she feels before a Red K transformation happens. She runs away from Dick.
We flash back to Mxy granting her the magical powers but since he was only thinking of Green K, the Red K vulnerability remains in play. Now I could pick this to pieces. He didn't make her Kryptonian. He gave her Kryptonian powers. It shouldn't effect her.
The first transportation is for Linda to become enormous and rotund.
She enacts a humorous plan. She pretends to be a giant balloon float at the carnival, kicking up some dust with her super-breath to mask her appearance a little.
The Red K effect wears off pretty quickly and Linda is back to normal. But now she knows, she has 5 more transformations to get through.
This whole subplot, transformation one, is done so quickly! You have to love the brevity in story-telling.
Von Holtz basically tells Tremaine that the writer is a has-been. The distraught writer slinks away.
How crazy that a famous director/writer combo are close enough to Midvale to take in a quick flick together.
This also seems a bit detailed for such a tiny subplot. I wonder if there was some 'real life' Hollywood drama this was riffing on.
In the lobby, she transforms into a wolf-girl.
Realizing she can't continue the date, she calls in her Linda Danvers robot to take her place.
It is interesting to see Linda spying on Dick having a grand time with the robot and feeling jealous.
Outside, she realizes that Tremaine is so depressed about his current work situation that he is going to pitch himself into the sea and kill himself.
Linda shows up as a wolf-girl and startles him, making him pause.
Thinking he perhaps imagined the whole thing, he pitches a new script idea to Von Holtz who loves it.
A depressed Hollywood writer is stopped from committing suicide by the sight of a lycanthropic Linda Danvers. That is a crazy plot and rather intricate for just a couple of pages in this back-up. But it gets even nuttier.
Well, his father has succumbed to a rare sleeping sickness and might be doomed. Only a new miracle serum called Sparacolicin can save him.
The timing is crazy, of course.
What is crazier is the next Red K transformation, shrinking Supergirl to the size of a microbe, a perfect transformation to deal with this problem!
The 'cavern' is Mr. Malverne's blood stream. And the monsters are bacteria!
I love Silver Age comics. This is probably where many a kid learned the terms 'erythrocyte' and 'leukocyte' explaining the blood cells.
I don't think bacteria look like that. But what fun!
I unabashedly love this scene and these panels! Mooney's art is wonderful here.
After eradicating the bacteria, Mr. Malverne improves and will live.
But will people think it was the miracle serum Sparacolicin? Doesn't matter. They used their one dose and the formula was lost in a fire. Way to tie off that plot thread!
Of all the things that happened in this story, that one plot detail - that a medical group used the one dose of their miracle drug on Mr. Malverne and then lost the formula in a fire - might be the craziest.
So rotund Kara, wolf Kara, tiny Kara ... what could happen next?
Love this story and hope you did too!
Overall grade: A
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