Back Issue Box: Secret Origins #23

 It was the late 80's and mega-crossovers in comics were still in their infancy.

In 1985 DC had given us Crisis on Infinite Earths, redefining the DCU.

In 1986, DC gave us Legends, a wellspring of ideas and excellent new comics and characters.

In 1987, they gave us Millennium. 

The concept seemed sound. The Oans and the Zamarons were going to leave the universe in the hands of New Guardians. Their old foes, the Manhunters, were going to stop them and take over instead. And to go about this task, the Manhunters were going to activate sleeper agents they had sprinkled throughout the universe. Who was actually a Manhunter? It was a mystery.

Unfortunately, the actual event fell flat. How flat? Flat enough that I must have given away Millennium at some point. It is no longer in my collection. (And I still have Countdown!)

But one of the things DC must have realized is that the Manhunters as a group weren't well known. How could they be a universal threat? Who the heck were they?

So to bolster the main event along with the crossovers, Secret Origins #22 would focus on the group giving important background information. 

And this is where I come in because this was the post-Crisis reintroduction of Mark Shaw, ultimately Leviathan. With the Crisis behind us, changes could be made to continuity. Who was Shaw? Did things play out the same?

Let's find out.

Supergirl Sighting Post-Crisis?

 For those of you who aren't listening to the Secret Origins podcast, you should be. Ryan Daly is reviewing the series issue by issue and it is a great listen.

Okay, I may be biased, having been a guest twice.

The truth is I have been loving going back and rereading these issues. For one, the stories are typically very good. It reminds me of the classic origins of these characters.

But most interesting for me is seeing how this book was helping DC smooth out some of the post-Crisis speed bumps which arose. We have seen the Golden Age Fury replace Wonder Woman. We heard how Power Girl is now Atlantean, not Kryptonian. We saw Power Girl replace Supergirl in a Doom Patrol flashback.

And 2 weeks ago in the above issue, we learned that Barbara Gordon was Jim Gordon's niece. Head to the wordpress account to listen to this great episode: https://secretoriginspodcast.wordpress.com/2015/10/19/secret-origins-20-batgirl-and-dr-mid-nite/

For me, as a Supergirl fan, I enjoy going back to this time to see if, when, and how some Supergirl homages were put into comics. Remember, Supergirl was completely expunged from the DCU.

But we saw her in DC Challenge. We saw a statue of her in the Legion memorial hall. We saw a Kara talk to Deadman in a Christmas special.

In the Batgirl origin, we hear Babs talk about how she felt so alone at time growing up that she made imaginary friends.

Okay, I can't prove that the giant blond woman with the Jim Mooney eyes is Supergirl. But it is hard to deny.

Batgirl and Supergirl were friends in the pre-Crisis universe. So having some vestigial memory of that friendship would be wonderful. And the hair and those pale blue eyes with tiny pupils is so evocative of a Silver Age Kara.

I am sticking with that belief.

We flashback to Babs childhood where she and a friend create a number of make-believe woman superheroes. Like Batgirl!

But also like Supergirl!

That is a direct name-check.

But I wonder if DC and Robert Greenberger didn't want to push things too much. While it is Supergirl drawing, she is absolutely raven-haired and not blond. Too bad! How great would a blond Supergirl as a doodle be!

These little name-checks and homages remind me that not everyone at DC was on board with Supergirl's death.

And it isn't the only time I have seen Supergirl sort of discussed in Secret Origins:
http://comicboxcommentary.blogspot.com/2014/05/she-who-shall-not-be-named.html

Will there be more moving forward?

DC Special Series #19: Secret Origins of the Super-Heroes

Never underestimate the power of nostalgia!

As a kid, I absolutely loved DC Digests. They were cheap, had a ton of pages, and were an important part of my childhood. I totally remember having these with me on the beach in summers. The digests also exposed me to a ton of DC characters I didn't know about. It was in digests that I read early JSA adventures, met the Silent Knight and Viking Prince, read the original Fatal Five arc where Ferro Lad died. It was here I also read the excellent Dr. Fate story by Pasko and Simonson.

And I learned the secret origins of heroes.

I had this DC Blue Ribbon Digest, Secret Origins of Super-Heroes. But officially, it is DC Special Series #19. And I remember having this and reading this as a kid. To be honest, this has to be the first place that I read the actual Supergirl origin story from Action Comics #252, reprinted here.

I have a number of reprints of Action Comics #252 but I had to buy this from the bargain box when I saw this in my local comic store. And mostly, because it is so heavy with memories that I felt like a Kid Anj again. Plus it does have a bunch of great stories in it!

It also sports a great cover by Ross Andru and Dick Giordano. Great little Supergirl in her seventies costume in the background.

They also really pack a lot of comic into a very tiny little space.

Here we get the classic Otto Binder/Al Plastino origin story but in this cute little package. I mean, I can easily scan two full pages!

I love this story.

This digest also introduced me to one of the oddball characters that I love from the DCU: the Manhawks!

From The Brave and the Bold #43, we have a Gardner Fox/Joe Kubert story which isn't the origin of Hawkman, but the origin of the Hawk police force on Thanagar. Why do they wear Hawk regalia? Because of this battle with the Manhawks.

Seriously, look at the last panel of Hawkman battling a Manhawk. That is fantastic!

And we even get new material! A new retelling of Wonder Woman's origin is done by writer Cary Burkett and legend Jose Delbo. It is great to see a more classic origin again, the masked Diana fighting in a tournament, and earning her passage to America. Incredible.

But listen to this murderers' row of great stories and creators.

Robin, from Batman #213, by  E. Nelson Bridwell and Ross Andru.
The Legion's Ranzz family, from Superboy #172, by E. Nelson Bridwell and George Tuska.
Aquaman, from Adventure Comics #260, by Robert Bernstein and Ramona Fradon.
The Elongated Man, from Flash #12, by John Broome and Carmine Infantino.
And one of the many Superman/Batman World's Finest team origin, from World's Finest #94 by Ed Hamilton and Dick Sprang.

I always look for these digests. There is a Supergirl solo digest which I don't have!!

Secret Origins Podcast #11: Power Girl

I was honored to be asked by Count Drunkula to be a co-host on the Secret Origins podcast, a show looking at the Secret Origins book from the post-Crisis 1980's.

I was asked to co-host the show for Secret Origins #11 looking at Power Girl's origin. In this time, Supergirl was simply gone, erased from continuity by the rejiggering of the post-Crisis timeline. Somehow Power Girl survived the new history. But with one universe and one Kryptonian in the new DCU, who is Power Girl? What is her origin? Head over to the site to hear me talk about Kara and Karen.

I am a Power Girl fan but I don't feel like I have as much of a grasp on all her history like I do Supergirl. But if I was going to be a co-host an early issue, this would be the one. In many ways, Power Girl was shoe-horned into Supergirl's history, taking her place in some old adventures.

Hopefully I don't embarrass myself! Be kind in your comments.

For those who aren't listening or want to follow along, here is a bullet review.

Ancient Histories was written by Paul Kupperberg with art by Mary Wilshire. It is very good creative team. Kupperberg had shepherded Supergirl through the early 80s and so was a natural choice to be the primary creator for Power Girl moving forward. And while I haven't seen much of Wilshire, her fine pencil art works well with the material here.

The story starts out with a great action pose of Power Girl leaving the scene of a bank robbery after foiling the crooks. The perspective here is great as we look down on the scene from an extreme angle as Karen streaks practically straight up.

But she has a stern look on her face and seems almost emotionally lost. She gets the accolades when she saves the day but feels that people want her to leave immediately and forget her. It resonates nicely with her new reality, lost in a world she doesn't know.

We briefly get a rundown of her presumed history. And what I find interesting here is that her origin mirrors the origins of the last two incarnations of Supergirl very closely. Kara was born on Krypton before Kal. She is slightly older. And when Jor-El was making his rocket for Kal, Zor-El was making his rocket for Kara.

This idea of Kara being technically older than her super-cousin was a big plot point in both the Loeb/Turner Supergirl and the New 52 version as well.

As far as I know, this is the only visualized appearance of the Earth 2 Zor-El and Allura.

Unfortunately Zor-El's flight path is a bit off. It takes Kara's ship 60 years to get to Earth (hence Superman being about 60 on Earth 2 when she lands). But the 'symbio-ship' ages her more slowly. She arrives at around age 20. And the ship has fed her knowledge during the trip, raising her in a sort of virtual reality.

I think this is a weird sort of image. Seeing Kara now grown, stretching out and filling her baby onesie in this cradle of a ship is a little weird for me.

However, in the post-Crisis world she is lost. She has lost all her friends and family. People don't know where she came from. Only the heroes at the end of time even remember the Crisis. This is a emotionally gut-wrenching to Karen Starr. She is depressed ... angry ... all those early stages of grief.

Lashing out at the symbioship seems to activate some sort of magical AI as a vision of Arion appears.

He calls Karen his granddaughter and tells her a story of the end of days in Atlantis when magic was dying.

Now Arion was a title Kupperberg created and wrote. We get a lot of Arion history and story here, almost as if Kupperberg wanted one last chance to write these characters. Arion is older and sorcery is nearly extinguished.

To try to make his progeny more powerful, and since magic is waning, we learn that Arion has been conducting 'genetic manipulations' on Kara. He hopes these will make her stronger and more durable.

Unfortunately, her heritage and these experiments have made her a decent conduit for Garn Daanuth, the big bad in the Arion universe to seemingly possess her. Daanuth had been banished to the 'dark' by Arion earlier (in my mind a sort of magical limbo). But Kara has given him a toehold into reality. And he is going to use her like a portal to bring all the evil from the dark back to Earth.

I don't know if it sounds very grandfatherly to be experimenting on your granddaughters DNA.

Arion has little choice but to try to sever the tie between Kara and Daanuth and to get her away from any chance of him returning. He asks that a paper weight from his desk be brought to the fight.

It turns out the paperweight is actually the crystallized soul of Calculha, the most powerful of Atlantean gods. Flinging the crystal cuts the ties between Daanuth and Kara. It magically sends Arion away to supposedly fight Daanuth. And the crystal encases Karen and takes her to the 20th century where temporally she should be safe. The crystal is the symbioship.

So, in a place where magic is dying, Arion kept the most powerful magical relic as a paperweight on his desk?

Beautiful art here.

And then, to ease the transition to this new time, Arion embeds false memories into his now grown granddaughter. But recognizing her need for the truth, this vestige of him unlocks these memories.

So let me see if I get this straight.
Genetic manipulation.
Advanced aging, robbing Kara of her childhood.
Fake memories.

It doesn't sound too loving to me. I suppose her powers are a mix of genetic experiments and magic.

But Power Girl takes it all in stride. Know that she knows the truth, that she has a real family (even if in the way way way distant past), she can move on in life. Her belt buckle becomes the amalgam of triangles that Arion is known for.

In the post-Crisis world, I guess creators needed to think outside the box to tie up loose continuity ends like this. But this seems like an odd stretch. I suppose this is a way for Kupperberg to link a lot of his personal loves. (He ends up having Power Girl interact with his Doom Patrol as well.) This also reads much more like an Arion story than a Power Girl story, although she is the key character for the plot to revolve around, even as a baby.

Hope you enjoy the show and this mini-review!