SUPERGIRL PT 1

[00:00:01] Hello, welcome back to My Happy Place, which is comics, because comics is my happy place.

[00:00:38] It's Colin Hoult, and with me is... It's me, Nick Kirk. Nick Kirk! Nickity Crick? Is Nickity Crick a derogatory term? It's not meant as one. I don't think so. There's not a famous serial killer called Nickity Crick, is there? Not yet. God, get off this topic straight away. Anyway, hello everyone. Thanks for coming back, if you've listened to our previous two episodes. We're trying to base it around, you know, a movie or something that's come out, or a big event.

[00:01:07] And this week, the movie that's coming out pretty soon, it might be out by the time this is in your ears, is... It's Supergirl! It is Supergirl. The movie's coming out soon. I watched the trailer. I thought it was great. Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm very keen. I like... I like that he's gone for... A completely different style of Supergirl to what we've seen before, both in the original 80s film,

[00:01:36] and even in the more recent series. So I like that he's just tried to go for... Not what people would be expecting from a Supergirl film. They've not remotely made her a goody-goody apple pie type. No. All American. No. No, quite the opposite. Not in the slightest. And I do like... What becomes of the broken hearted? I like how they somehow managed to turn almost any song into a sort of exciting superhero trailer song.

[00:02:04] I would have never have thought that would be good. But I like the reason why they've picked that song, which maybe we'll get into when we get into Supergirl. What we're going to do, what we're going to attempt to do right now is talk about Supergirl's history based on five comics I think we picked that kind of, you know, little jumping on points. And then we're going to talk about how we feel about the film. Well, we've already sort of said that. We're excited.

[00:02:32] And we're going to talk also about some Marvel Supergirl's of a sort. I went through the list. There's not many that really fit. I did think Captain Marvel, obviously. She's quite like Supergirl. But we're going to do all the Captain Marvel's one day as a big Captain Marvel off. Yeah, that makes sense. But first, before we get into that, what other comics have we been reading? That's the big question.

[00:02:57] Not only have we spent our time and our lives reading these Supergirl comics, we've read some other comics. What have you been reading recently, Nick? I have been reading recently a big old chunk of Hellblazer comics. I started doing a reread from the start back in the pandemic. And I got up to about issue 120 over a couple of years. And then I've completely forgot and read other stuff and didn't go back to it.

[00:03:26] And so I've picked it back up again. And I've read in the last week or so about another hundred issues. So I've really blitzed through it. I've read the Warren Ellis run, the Brian Azzarello run, and the Mike Carey run. That's a lot of words as well. That's not a very picture-led one, is it? Yeah, it's quite a lot of reading. It's quite a lot of reading. And of the three, my favorite run is the Mike Carey.

[00:03:55] I really like his run of it. And my least favorite, I really didn't enjoy it at the time. I appreciated it more this time. But it's the Brian Azzarello run. I'm not as keen on that one. But I think I know why this time around when I read it. I'm not as keen. It's because his representation of John Constantine is the surface level John Constantine. So in his run, John Constantine is the schemer, the magician who's got the plan and who comes out on top in the end.

[00:04:25] But that's not actually who John Constantine is. That's who he presents himself as to the world. But actually, he's the fuck-up. He's the chancer. He's running every scheme by the seat of his pants and clinging on by his fingernails and getting it wrong and screwing stuff up, but still trying to come out on top in the end. And that's not really what he does in the Brian Azzarello run. Did he make him too cool in a Batman way, do you mean? Yeah, he is the kind of slick, mysterious magician in the background.

[00:04:55] And I would say the kind of magic sorcery elements are more hinted at in his run. It reads more like the kind of crime stuff that he normally writes. Oh, okay. So it feels more like this sort of grim, gritty crime drama with a bit of a supernatural element rather than a supernatural comic. So I think that's why I wasn't keen. And it's not to say it's a bad run. I think he's a good writer.

[00:05:20] And actually, the run, when you read it all together, it ties up quite nicely. There's a story arc there and you can see exactly how it all fits together. But it just doesn't feel very John Constantine. John Constantine, what I think is the real magic, if you will, of John Constantine, one of many great things about him, is it feels grubby. And it feels like, you know when you're like with your mates at sort of school, secondary

[00:05:48] school, I guess, and you either do like a Ouija board or you do like someone's into tarot cards or something and it starts to feel a bit real. And, you know, me and my friends, when I was first at secondary school, we sort of had this like adventure that went over several weeks that I was definitely leading. I look back and I think, God, they must have thought I was insane. But like where we were going into the woods and finding evidence of stuff, do you know what I mean? And it was really spooky.

[00:06:13] We really made us, we saw spooky stuff in the woods, you know, like sort of spirits or whatever. I don't know. And we had all these kind of, what do you call them, where you like encounters or whatever, you know, not episodes. There's a word for it. Experiences, you know, that were quite haunting. I don't now sit here believing in it all, but I kind of still do. Do you know what I mean? And that's what John Constantine always feels like. It feels like, oh, this could be real, but it's not in any way kind of Dr. Fate like.

[00:06:43] It's all very grubby and gross and someone normally gets killed and it's normally someone close to him. Yeah. Or people going mad or. That's what's missing in the Azarello run, which then conversely is absolutely spot on in the Mike Carey run. And also Mike Carey brings in a lot of characters from other people's runs. So lots of characters from throughout the history. Oh, wow. And ties in stuff with them.

[00:07:09] Yeah, I really enjoyed the Mike Carey one because it felt like it was building on what had gone before. Whereas the Brian Azarello run feels completely disconnected from the rest of it. Like a little standalone arc that just sort of happens outside of everything else. Is Brian Azarello did 100 Bullets? Yes. Oh, so he's very much crime type stuff. Yeah. Yeah. And it feels like that. It feels like his crime stuff, which he's great at, to be fair. But I just don't think he's the right fit for Hellblazer.

[00:07:38] Is that the one where he's in prison at one point or something? Yeah, it starts with him in prison. And then ultimately, by the end of the arc, you work out why he was in prison. Right. And he sort of takes his revenge for having been put in there on the person that did it. But it just feels a bit too neat in a way that Hellblazer isn't. Hellblazer should be messy. And although he might win, it should be in a really scrappy way with lots of loose ends. And it didn't really work out properly.

[00:08:06] I've been reading Animal Man, the Jeff Lemire 52 run, which I never read. Yeah. And it's, I mean, it's nothing will be as good as Grant Morrison's, which we've already talked about on here, I think. But it's good fun. And you know what I love? Yeah. As opposed to some of the comics we're going to talk about today. There's very little words. And I don't mean that to sound philistine, but it moves really fast. And there are only words when there need to be.

[00:08:33] And it's, it kind of feels really weird though. Because obviously from Grant Morrison's run, you have Buddy, Animal Man, Buddy Baker, his wife Ellen and the two kids. And it's now like, like what, nearly 40 years later is it that it came out? Or at least 30 years later. But they're still the same. Yeah. To the point where Cliff, his son has still got like the mullet. The 80s kind of mullet thing. It's really bizarre.

[00:08:59] And I think it does a really good job of feeling like it's almost picked up where Grant Morrison stopped. Yes. I read it when it, I read it when it came out. I don't remember liking it. Yeah. And it's, it sort of takes Animal Man down a level where he's not just a man with animal powers. He's part of this thing called the Red, which is, does for flesh what Swamp Thing does for plants. But it's kind of weird because it means they can like make things out of bones and flesh and stuff.

[00:09:27] And like, at one point Maxine is his daughter and she's, it turns out, is the real animal person. And she's the avatar of the red and she can, she like dies. She dies by being killed by dogs, which is particularly horrible. And, but then she's like, don't worry, honey, I'm over here. And you see this like fox, like changing into a little girl slowly in a really grotesque way. And she's like, it's fine. It didn't hurt. It was actually quite fun. You know, it's, it's great.

[00:09:57] And I love that it, the way it balances all the very mundane family life that feels very real still. And the idea that Ellen's just telling him off, not in a hen pecking way, but the kind of, do you have to go out and do this superhero stuff? It's really stressful. I get really stressed every time you do it and all this, you know, we need to make money kind of thing. And it's lovely. And then balances that with like, I guess quite, at least trying to be quite Alan Moore horror.

[00:10:26] It's also quite like his Sweet Tooth, his other work Sweet Tooth. Yes. Yeah. There's an element of that. I was going to say it definitely channels that Swamp Thing, Alan Moore horror vibe that the Grant Morrison one didn't quite as much. There's some horror in the Grant Morrison one, but I think it feels more like the Swamp Thing horror.

[00:10:45] Particularly like you say, now that they're using the concept of avatars so they can sort of travel through the red and regrow themselves in fresh places like Swamp Thing does through the green. Animal Man would be a prime DCU film, I think. Because James Gunn, that's one where there's enough history that is great, but not so much history that you couldn't take it down loads of different avenues and stuff.

[00:11:13] Yeah, and I don't think people would be precious about it. There's something in that, James Gunn, if you're listening. So there we go. Shall we crack on with the main event? Let's do it. We could call this section the main event. So Supergirl is coming out very soon. We had a look through five of the comics. But first, a couple of thoughts about Supergirl. Do you like Supergirl? Supergirl? That's my first question, Nick.

[00:11:42] Where do you stand on Supergirl, if anywhere? I think, given that I've been a sort of lifelong DC reader and I read a ton of Superman comics throughout the years, I've never really had strong feelings on Supergirl one way or another, to be perfectly honest. I think she's fine, but I think all the previous incarnations I've read, the 90s version and the early 2000s version, were okay.

[00:12:08] I didn't really have any particular strong opinion on her either way, I must admit. There's obviously, I feel pretty much the same, but there's obviously a very strong fan base, isn't there, who like really adore her. I think she is quite a queer icon, but not as much as Wonder Woman, who definitely is. Yeah, I've never read more than, seen more in her than just being Superman's niece, really. Is she his niece? Cousin.

[00:12:38] I'm more familiar with the 90s version, who was not related to Superman. Yes. So this, and this is where it gets convoluted, but we'll talk about that in a minute. That's a weird one. Well, two things to mention, or a few things to mention. First of all, there is a movie from the 80s, which is, who plays Supergirl? Helen Slater plays Supergirl. Helen Slater, I think plays it perfectly well. If you haven't seen it, I haven't seen it for donkey's years, but it's absolutely bonkers.

[00:13:07] And Peter Cook's in it, and Peter O'Toole, and Faye Dunaway. It's a bizarre cast. And it's the weirdest, maddest film that makes no sense, but I don't think is it entertaining? I feel like The Old Masters of the Universe was bad, but entertaining. I think the fact that I watched it when I was a kid, and I don't really remember it, and I didn't have a desire to re-watch it a lot, probably says a lot about it, because I would re-watch pretty much any old shit when I was a kid.

[00:13:35] So the fact that I didn't re-watch Supergirl probably says that it wasn't, it both wasn't that great, and also wasn't so awful that it was entertaining. Yeah. Sort of somewhere in the middle. So in the comics, she dies in Crisis on Infinite Earths, that's a big point. Yes. You're probably going to tell us all this in a minute. But the other time I really liked Supergirl is in the Justice League animated cartoon,

[00:13:59] where she has a very cool white outfit, which I think comes into the comics at one point as well. And she's really good in that. It's almost like her story arc, the whole thing. Weirdly with Green Arrow, they're kind of a sort of double act in it. And she's terrific in that. Yeah. I have to go back and re-watch all those. It's been so long since I've watched them. So good. I need to do a re-watch of that. So there we go. So we started with her first appearance, which was in Action Comics in the 50s? Yes.

[00:14:29] It was issue 252. So that's quite a lot of Superman. Yeah. He's been going for nearly 20 years by the time they bring her in. I mean, Captain Marvel had like Mary Marvel almost immediately, I believe. Yeah. I was surprised it was that long before they brought her in. I like the artwork. This first one, is it Kurt Swan doing it? I'm not sure, actually, because I don't think they credited people back in DC stuff back then. So it's hard to know who it was.

[00:14:56] It was Otto Binder and Al Pastino. Al Plastino. But it's only a short story. It's only eight pages, her introduction. It's a really short intro. And yeah, it's quite a sort of tragic story, but it's not really played as if it's that tragic. Yeah. She seems fine with everyone dying, or at least just a bit. Or maybe I think there is one tier, but then it's like, great, you can be a superhero. Yeah.

[00:15:21] But the origin here is basically her entire city, Argo City, was split off from Krypton during the destruction with a little bubble of atmosphere to keep them going. Yeah. They don't really explain it in this first one. It is literally just like a strip of land that somehow is floating in space with everyone living on it. And they discover that there is kryptonite radiation is killing them from the sort of bottom of the asteroid that they're on, effectively. So they decide to sort of cover it in lead.

[00:15:50] Which Zor-El just has in his garage, I think it says. I think it says he has a big sheet of lead in his garage. Yeah. Luckily, Zor-El had a roll of sheet metal in his lab, what, to cover the whole asteroid? In his lab. Not his garage. Yeah. In my mind, it was in his basement or something. Yeah, he's got enough to cover a whole asteroid. It was kept there. So they roll out the lead, but then actually a meteor, well, as they describe it in the issue, a meteor flock. I didn't know meteors came in flocks, but there you go. Sheep and meteors, they're the main flocks.

[00:16:21] Flock of meteors. They punch hole in all the lead and let all the kryptonite through. So yeah, they decide to just send Kara away and not try and save anyone else because they've made a rocket. So they'll just send her away. Do they agree as a society? Because they're kind of almost like a commune at this point, aren't they? I feel like Zor-El has just gone, I'm in charge. I've got all the lead. But we're just, I like the idea that there's a bit where it sort of says they're kind of in paradise. For a while, it was paradise. That may have been in a later issue.

[00:16:51] And I'm like, is it paradise? You're on like a strip of land floating through space. I mean, I guess it's a bit like going to the Silly Owls or something. You know, you've got one shop, one pub. But then you don't have the sea. You just have space. And you can't swim in that, famously. No. No. It's a lot chillier than the sea. Even the seas around here. But it's very detailed. They don't, I feel like they didn't need to do any of that stuff.

[00:17:17] They could have just said, oh yeah, my parents sent me as well in a rocket ship when Superman finds him. But it's not. It's that, yeah, all the sort of meteors hitting and the lead. So much lead in this story. Oh, and they've spied on, they've spied on Earth and they see Superman lifting up heavy weights. So, oh, and they hear that he's from Krypton. So they decide that that means Kara will have superpowers if they send her there. So they make her a costume like Superman's and shoot her off in the rocket.

[00:17:47] And then by coincidence, when she turns up, Superman says, oh, I was shot into space by my father, Jor-El. And she's like, Jor-El? My father's Zor-El. Ah, we're cousins. Yeah. What are the chances, eh? It's a bit too convenient, isn't it? But also, she's a baby that's been born there. So they're carrying on making babies on this just strip of Earth floating through space. They're just either very positive or just a bit stupid, aren't they? Well, I don't know. What do you do? What do you do? They didn't choose to be blown off into space, so to speak.

[00:18:17] They've got a large bubble of air in a food machine, so they're sorted. They have got a food machine. It just makes food. What's everyone complaining about? Superman immediately gives her a name. Or does she choose the name? Which is Linda Lee, which I remembered is in a Velvet Underground song. Ah. We're looking for Miss Linda Lee. She's got the power to love me by the hour. But give me W-L-O-V-E. Which maybe is about Supergirl, then.

[00:18:45] It probably is, because this was 59, so they would have been well after that. All over the name. But yeah, she chooses the name. And then Superman thinks to himself, hmm, Lana Lang was my girlfriend, and Lois Lane became her replacement. By sheer coincidence, she picked the same initials, LL. Yeah, you're just hiding your laziness by having one of the characters say. Oh, yeah, the initials thing. Also, his mermaid girlfriend, Laurie Lamaris. Yeah, and Lex Luthor, his arch nemesis. And Lex Luthor.

[00:19:14] I like that as a weird, unnecessary tradition in Superman comics, that for some reason all his companions are pretty much called LL. Well, I also like that his immediate reaction to the fact that he's got a cousin and he needs to look after her is to put her in an orphanage. I've written that down. That's so funny. He's just like, well, there's only one place for you. Like, he doesn't even think for a second. He's Superman. He can essentially do anything.

[00:19:40] Even if he didn't adopt her in his secret identity, he could just go and live in the Fortress Solitude for a bit or something. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Don't put her in an orphanage. I mean, I think orphanages maybe were seen as nicer in those days, although you'd had like Wizard of Oz and stuff. Maybe. Does that have an orphanage? Oh, no, that's Return to Oz, which is an absolute fucking nightmare, as we all agree. Yeah, shove her in the orphanage. Yeah, she'll be good. She seems quite happy about that.

[00:20:07] But so Supergirl at this point, I guess very goody two shoes. Yeah. Not necessarily, but just kind of very cutesy. And she looks like she's from a long time ago. Like I say, almost like a Victorian design or something. So then to jump ahead. So Supergirl sticks around for a while. The next one we read was Daring Adventures of Supergirl, a comic book of her own. Yes. And at that point, is she working for a TV company? Have I got that wrong? She's going to college, I think. No, she's going to college.

[00:20:37] That's right. It starts where she's on a train and there's so much stuff about trains. It's like the opposite of what I said about the animal man thing, where it's like a lovely blend of words and pictures. This is just like a picture of a train and then like an essay about trains and about how they're different to flying. Yeah. It's like he puts in so, is Paul Kupferberg, who I don't really know. At first I found it really annoying. Then after a while I found it really charming.

[00:21:04] But he puts in so much detailed information about every place she goes to and people who live there, like the town of Chicago. The reason why it's called the Windy City, all this stuff. Which at first I found a bit annoying. I was like, actually, this is quite fun. So it's her on a train, right? Just traveling to university, I think, start college. Yeah. And he does this thing, which is so weird, where he puts memory. Keep saying memory. Memory. You're on Krypton.

[00:21:33] Your family are with you. Memory. Your city is blown away. Memory. It's like, why did people write like this? It's so weird. It's that Chris Claremont thing, isn't it? Where it's like, do you remember where it's got Cyclops? It's like, do you feel guilty, Cyclops? Do you? Do you? Yeah. But why is it? But the memory thing isn't like once. It's about eight pages of it. Memory.

[00:22:01] You're a little girl with your parents. Memory. Stop that. Sometimes I just want to go to them. Just read out what you've written and see how it sounds. Like, read it into the room and just let me know if you still want to keep that in it. Memory. You had fish fingers for dinner. Memory. Memory. Memory. You haven't changed your energy provider. You should do that. Oh, my God.

[00:22:28] I like the bit where she's on the train and she's like whipping out to save people randomly. She's just like sat on the train with this weird dude. And then she just like jumps out of the window and flies off and stops some people who are going to die the worst death ever. Where like, it's like a load of molten liquid going to fall on them. But they're in this factory. But they're drawn like they're just lying down on the floor asleep. And they're like, oh, my God. It's a bit lost in powers. Everyone's just screaming. The molten lava is going to fall on them.

[00:22:56] Also reminded me that awful bit in Transformers the movie, which was very stressful. The original cartoon where they're being dropped into the acid. Do you remember that? Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Spike's dad's about to be dropped. Spike, the acid. Dad. Shoot the acid cover, son. But how? Use your exosuit. What? And it takes so long. And they're seconds away from dropping. And you see them like burning alive.

[00:23:27] Melting. It's so disturbing. There's a line where he just goes, hurry! And it's so like a man who's a... They should win Oscars for that performance. Because that is the sound of a man who thinks he's falling into acid any second now. Hurry! It's so stressful. But the reason you think he might actually die at that point is because at the beginning of that film,

[00:23:55] you've watched all of your favourite characters get slaughtered. Yeah. So by this point in the film, you're like, yeah, anyone could die. And you've seen some Autobots fall into acid already. Yeah. They haven't gone as far as melting a human's flesh. But... No. Wouldn't have been surprised if they did. Yeah. Like you say. Wouldn't have put it past them. Anyway, we're getting off it a little bit. Also, at one point, this is just something I noted. They mention Cabrini Green again. Cabrini Green's in a lot of things.

[00:24:24] So that's from Candyman. That's the estate in Candyman. And have you ever read the old Suicide Squads with Amanda Waller? With her sort of origin? Some of them, yeah. Oh my God. It's, again, incredibly dark. And she is basically just from this council estate. She's not, like, in any way qualified to run a spy agency. But then because all... I think, like, all her children and husband are killed in horrible events.

[00:24:53] It makes her decide to go and run a spy, learn how. Like, go back to college. And then quite quickly, he's the head of the CIA or whatever. But it has the Candyman in her origin. And it's from before the film Candyman. Ah. Ah. Yeah. And he says sweets for the sweet. So I don't know whether they got it from that or whether it must be an actual ancient... Not ancient. You know, traditional urban myth. Urban myth. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it must be. There you go.

[00:25:23] Just a little thing to point out there. But it's in this as well. So not a lot happens in this. But I enjoyed it a lot. I like she's become... It reminded me a lot of Spiderwoman. She's now become an independent woman. Yes. She's not in Superman's shadow so much. She even meets a girl at college who's the kooky best friend that you always have. Yeah. Like Spiderwoman always has. And she's got... Yeah, she's got that otherworldly austere, you know, I don't really understand the world. Yes.

[00:25:53] But I'm also strong. I don't take any shit. And here's my kooky friend with her boy trouble. Do you know what I mean? It's literally exactly like Spiderwoman. It's even got like magic baddies and stuff. Yeah, but you're right. I think it's like Spiderwoman in that they're just treating her as her own character rather than being associated with Superman. That's what I quite liked about this one. It is just about her on her own outliving her life, setting up in a new city. It feels kind of nice.

[00:26:23] I like it the way it's done. And good marks on the test. What is it called? The Bechdel test. Bechdel. Bechdel test. There's loads of pages where there's no men at all. Yeah, yeah, yeah. There's a whole sequence where Supergirl is chatting to her friend and the landlady for about three pages. And it's actually quite nice dialogue. Yeah. But it's kind of weird, isn't it? I thought that all these men back in the day, all these middle-aged men writing sort of 20-year-old girls, but quite well.

[00:26:54] I mean, I'm not a 20-year-old girl, as anyone will tell you, but I feel like this feels good. Well done, Paul Kupferberg. You got into the mind of a 20-year-old girl and her old landlady. The only thing I really know Paul Kupferberg from is the run he did on Doom Patrol immediately before Grant Morrison took over. Oh, that was him. Yeah. He killed them all. Yeah, which was not necessarily him.

[00:27:22] It was more of a mandate from editorial as part of a crossover event, as always. We need to kill someone. What about the Doom Patrol? No one knows who they are. Yeah, that'll do. The villain in it is very Ozymandias-like in... Watchmen. Watchmen. He's got loads of screens, I think, and he's kind of planning. He's a rich bastard. And the villain, the woman who's called Gail, sort of seems to be wearing a kind of chastity belt situation. I'm not quite sure what's going on in the chastity.

[00:27:50] But it did make the movie make more sense. Because in this story, all that stuff feels kind of normal. But in the movie, it would look... A bit nuts. Really fucking weird, wouldn't it? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So what happens after that, Nick? Am I missing much here? No, we're pretty much after this sort of incarnation of... After this version of Supergirl, we get into a crisis on infinite Earths,

[00:28:17] which, for those of you who don't know, was DC's attempt to clear up the many decades of continuity up to the mid-80s that weren't making a lot of sense, which they tried to do by basically rebooting everything apart from some of the bits they didn't, which then became confusing further down the line and led to them about every five years or so doing another crisis event and tweaking and rebooting bits of continuity. So this now becomes a pattern.

[00:28:43] If you don't know much about DC Comics, there's a weird amount of meta stuff where there are big epic stories based around editorial decisions to merge comics or wipe them out. But they're almost written as if the editors are part of the story. It's very weird. Do you know what I mean? In a cosmic way, isn't it? Sort of. Kind of like as if the forces of... Yeah. Creation. Capitalism?

[00:29:13] As part of Crisis on Infinite Earths, Supergirl sacrifices herself to save the world. But also as a result of the crisis, history is rewritten and nobody remembers her anymore. So Kara Zor-El doesn't exist in the newly rebooted continuity at this point as we go into the mid-80s. Wow. This is like a 1984 style execution. Not only are we going to kill you, we're going to change history so you never existed. And the party was always right.

[00:29:43] And that's what they did to Supergirl. Was it a bit of early fridging? That phrase which means where you kill someone's girlfriend or in this case cousin to just give the hero something to care about. It's a very famous image of Superman holding her dead in his arms, which has been reused in many, many images since. I think it was more the fact that they wanted to pretty much completely do away with the whole extended super family. So him as Superboy, Supergirl.

[00:30:13] You had various Superpets as well as Crypto the Superdog. Streaky the Supercat. Streaky the Supercat. Comet the Superhorse. Oh, we haven't mentioned the horse. Do you know the weird... I heard this on another comics podcast, but the weird truth about the horse? Turns out it's actually a man who's a centaur. Did you tell me this? No, but it is in one of the other ones we read, which we'll talk about in a bit. It's in... Oh, is it? Yeah. I don't know if I saw that. It's in Woman of Tomorrow. Oh.

[00:30:41] And the idea is it's a man centaur that's in love with her. So it becomes a horse. So she'll ride him. All very wholesome. All very wholesome. She's not really seen as a sex symbol, I don't think, is she? No. She's very sort of straight-laced and your cousin. No. But there is a sex symbol version of Supergirl in the DC Universe. And that is, of course, Power Girl. Oh, of course. Yes. With the gigantic boobs.

[00:31:10] I'm not trying to be reductive there. No, that is how she's drawn. But she is... She has a boob window. Yes. In her costume. She has a boob window. Famously so. Darling, do we have a boob window coming up at any point this year? I'll check the calendar. Yes. I'll just see if there's a boob window next week. Yeah, she has a boob window. It is literally... I'm not... It's literally called a boob window, isn't it? No, that is the terminology for it. One of those things have gone full circle where she's now like a kind of...

[00:31:39] She's now kind of feminist and strong. Yeah. Like I choose to have a boob window. But it's also kind of quite self-referential and post-modern, I guess. But there's no excuse for it, really. Whatever dirty man created that. Also, Power Girl is very convoluted in terms of the whole crisis thing. Because she is a version of Supergirl from Earth 2. Earth 2 was wiped out in the crisis, but they kept Power Girl.

[00:32:04] So for a while, she was an Atlantean instead. So she was originally from Atlantis, like Aquaman, with powers from there. Stupid. It's a bloody stupid idea, Nick. I'm furious about this. It didn't last because ultimately they started to bring back the parallel Earths. And they decided that she was from Earth 2 again. And she was a version of Supergirl. Again, in the Justice League Unlimited cartoon, they do a good job of her. Where she is... I can't remember if she has a boob window or not.

[00:32:34] I don't think so. Considering it's a kid's cartoon, probably not. But she does... She is a clone of Supergirl. Yeah. Which is a very... An evil clone. Which is a very simple, simple version. Works. I like it. I like it. So there we go. So Supergirl's dead. Erased from all history. But almost immediately, a Supergirl comes back. Is that right? The next version of Supergirl that pops up is commonly referred to as Matrix.

[00:33:01] And this version of Supergirl is a genetically engineered, shape-shifting ball of protoplasm created by an alternate pocket universe, heroic Lex Luthor. So John Byrne did this in... So he restarted Superman? Yes. But I think he'd left by the time they created the new Supergirl. Oh, okay. So I think he'd already finished his run by this point. So yeah, so she stays around in this universe.

[00:33:29] And she starts a relationship with Lex Luthor II. Now, at this point, Lex Luthor II is a cloned body containing the brain of the original Lex Luthor, who was killed by kryptonite poisoning. So it is Lex Luthor? It's basically Lex Luthor, but he's posing as his own son. Oh, ooh, creepy. He's posing as his younger son with a full mane of ginger hair. I think I remember this. Does he have a beard as well? He does have a beard as well, yeah. But it's really red. It's like bright red.

[00:33:58] And he's supposedly Australian. So he says a lot of like struth and mate and things like that. This is peak 90s comics, I would say. But the creepy thing here being, but she's been created by a version of Lex Luthor and then she starts a relationship with him. It's very, it's very creepy. I mean, the relationship doesn't last because he attempts to clone an army of her and she finds out about it. So she finishes with him by beating him up. Does she like date him? Yeah. No, they're a couple for a while.

[00:34:28] He kind of looks like a caveman as well, if I remember right. A little bit. He's like really muscly, but with a red beard. Yeah. Or like one of the new gods or something. Yes. Yeah. Kind of a bit like one of the new gods. But yeah, with long sort of reddish gingery hair and a beard. Is he like the main Lex Luthor for a while then? Yeah, quite a while. Good few years until ultimately his clone body deteriorates and then he ends up sort of trapped

[00:34:51] in this withered husk of a body until he makes an arrangement with the demon Neeron to get restored to a new body again. Oh, and then he's just back to Baldy. Yeah. Classic. And then he also, he does that classic thing of claiming that the withered clone was an imposter and he's been kept hostage for somewhere for a long while. So that wasn't him anyway. And he never really died and all that kind of stuff. Like the Magneto Joseph stuff. Yeah.

[00:35:19] But as in to get Lex Corp and get his power back, he claims all of that Lex Luthor, the two stuff was nothing to do with him. Oh, so it did happen, but he's like... It did happen, but he just says, no, that was nothing to do with me. I'm the real Lex Luthor. Which I do like that you can do that with Luthor. I like you can do that with Luthor because he will just lie. Yeah. In a Trumpian way, he will just go, no, I didn't. Very Trumpian. None of that happened. I never said that. I'm excited for the next Lex Luthor Superman movie. Yes.

[00:35:47] After the first one, which was ace. He's great. I saw Peacemaker as well to the end. Little spoiler, but Lex Luthor pops up at the end. He does. And it made me go, oh God, he's so good at him. He's really good. I like his Lex Luthor. Nicholas Holt is really smashing it out of the park there, as they say. To use a sporting metaphor, I did not earn. So I don't know if you earn metaphors. Do you? Does one earn metaphors? Yeah. Let's say, yeah. Asking all the big questions here. We must move on. We've got so much more to talk about.

[00:36:18] Is there anything else you had to say about this? Oh yeah, Matrix. Yes. But it wasn't Peter David who created it then, because Peter David is one of our favourites, as you know. And I thought, why have you come up with this stupid idea, Peter? Yeah. So he doesn't create her. So we then read the first issue of the Peter David Supergirl series, in which the Matrix Supergirl combines with a human called Linda Danvers, which actually, I know we said at

[00:36:46] the start that Linda Lee is the identity that she adopts, but she gets adopted by the Danvers family and becomes Linda Danvers. So this was Supergirl's alter ego. But in this new rebooted continuity, there's an actual person called Linda Danvers and Matrix combines with her to create this new entity. Right. So the old Linda... Right. Oh, I don't care about... That's annoying. It's all annoying. Just so they can...

[00:37:15] That only happens so she can be called Linda Danvers? I feel like that's why they've done it. Again, a lot of magic satanic stuff as well. For some reason they liked, which I feel like is a bit subliminally creepy that they like to kind of pair her off with devil stuff. It's all a bit... Yeah. Demon-y, isn't it? I read a couple more issues of this run. And in the next issue, they sort of imply that Linda Danvers is willingly a part of this demon cult and has killed people. So it's a little bit... Wow.

[00:37:45] I'm not quite sure where they're going with it. It feels like it's edging into that sort of grim for the sake of being grim that you sort of got a lot in the mid-90s. Yeah. It feels very son of Stan... Son of Stan? Son of Sam. Son of Stan Lee. Yeah. Son of Sam sort of satanic panic type feels weird, doesn't it? But I did enjoy it. And it's Gary Frank who I always enjoy doing the arts. I feel like this one, and actually the previous one, the Paul Kupferberg, is quite sort of

[00:38:14] in a good-ish way, is quite sort of anti-men. Yeah. Maybe not exactly anti-men, but it definitely is a world as opposed to the original ones where it's just kind of like, you're a good girl, super girl. You go and live in the orphanage. You'll be fine. Yeah. Whereas now it's like, generally the world she inhabits is unsafe because of men, violent, aggressive men. And that's just like her dad as well. Yeah.

[00:38:42] He's not sleazy, but he's like violent at one point. And like, obviously the villain. And it just feels like the whole world is unsafe, which is sadly truthful. But I thought that was an interesting take. I don't know. So the interest, there's no female writer. I mean, the last one we read was a female writer, the most recent one. Yes. Unfortunately, I didn't think it was, I thought it was quite pointless and boring, if I'm honest. Quite quite.

[00:39:10] But it's interesting that all these are written by men and they're all like, they always go down a quite lurid, dark path, don't they? Yeah, yeah, yeah. But at the same time, I think the way Peter David, yeah, I think it's almost like that brilliant film, Scarlett Johansson, Under the Skin, Under the Skin. Oh yeah, I've never watched that, Under the Skin. Oh, it's great. But it's basically an alien comes to earth and wears the body of a woman and is going

[00:39:39] around turning men into food or something like that. But as it goes on, you sort of realise it's about a woman's, you know, she discovers what it is to be a woman in, you know, patriarchal world and all that and how gradually just things get more and more awful for her. Yeah. It's got a bit of that feel to it. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So how does Matrix end? Do you know, the whole Matrix, she's, it's weird she's a pink shape-shifting blob as well. Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

[00:40:07] I can never quite get to grips with that idea. Well, ultimately they end up splitting up Danvers and Matrix. They get split back out again and they both give up being Supergirl. Then another one of these crisis events happens, in this case Infinite Crisis, and that completely wipes out Matrix Supergirl. So now she never happened. Oh. So there never was a Matrix Supergirl. And does she never come back? After, after this Infinite Crisis, they, they reintroduce Kara Zor-El, who arrives in a rocket,

[00:40:37] having been launched from Krypton at the same time. So I think in this version, she didn't, she didn't leave Argo City. She left Krypton, but was in suspended animation and her rocket went a long route to Earth. So she's 16 when she leaves Krypton, so older than Superman. But when she arrives on Earth, she's still 16 when Superman's an adult. So even though she was technically older than him, she's now younger by the time she arrives on Earth. And he's like her baby cousin who she already knows. Yes. So she remembers him.

[00:41:06] She remembers him being her baby cousin. Yes. She remembers him as a baby, but then he's now a grown man by the time she arrives on Earth. I think that's a pretty good fix. Yeah. So they did reintroduce her and then... So they don't have floating around on what is basically like a big car park. Well... In the sky. They don't do that element with the lead. That is now all back again. Oh, great. So the most recent one that we read, I read some more of that.

[00:41:33] And that has reintroduced pretty much all of those old elements back. So she did get adopted by the Danvers family. All of that is there. She's got Streaky, the super cat. All of these kind of things they've put back in now. So ultimately, her pre-crisis origin has pretty much now been restored. As a long-winded way of saying, yeah, ultimately that all came back again.

[00:41:59] But via them having a couple of different versions of Supergirl along the way. It's weird the stuff they want to bring back, isn't it? It's like even on a bigger level, even like Hal Jordan. Like we've talked about this before, but we read it when it was Kyle Rayner as Green Lantern. And there's just no need to bring back Hal Jordan because he doesn't really bring anything. I think he's not an interesting character. He's not really any different.

[00:42:24] Interestingly, I was watching a video about former DC head Dan Didio, who for various reasons apparently is not the greatest of guys. And I'm saying apparently because I don't know that myself. But this video is claiming that one of the reasons why Barry Allen came back and Hal Jordan came back is because he apparently despised all of those next generation ones. So he hated all of the kind of Teen Titans ones that were growing up and taking over. He didn't want them around at all.

[00:42:54] He hated Nightwing. He hated Wally West. He hated Kyle Rayner. The legacy characters. Yeah. And he just wanted them done away with. Despite the fact they were popular, he didn't like them. So that's why you get storylines like Nightwing getting shot in the head and becoming Rick Grayson. Yeah. So it's funny though. But I mean, Hal Jordan and that is one thing. But then literally elements like just, oh no, we have to put the lead shielding back in. That's an integral part.

[00:43:23] I just feel like it's so, they're such nerds like we are. And in true comic book fashion, we're going to leave you with a cliffhanger there, dear listener. Yes, this ends part one of our look at Supergirl. Come back next week for part two, when we'll be taking a look at the comic that inspired the film, Women of Tomorrow, and taking a look at some potential Marvel-style Supergirls.

[00:43:52] See you next week. Comics are my happy place. Thank you for listening to Comics Are My Happy Place. If you have enjoyed this podcast, there are many ways you can support us. You can follow us on Instagram at comicsaremyhappyplace. You can drop us an email at comicsaremyhappyplace at gmail.com. And if you've got anything funny or interesting to say, we'll read it out on the podcast.

[00:44:19] But the best way to support us is to go to our Patreon, patreon.com slash comicsaremyhappyplace, where, for a small fee, you can subscribe to get yourself early access to extended versions of these episodes. Yes, that's right. A day before the episode drops on all your regular podcast platforms, you'll get a longer version on the Patreon if you sign up and subscribe. So please do consider supporting us. Once again, thanks for listening.

[00:44:49] We'll catch you next time.

[00:45:22] This podcast is part of Podomity, the UK's podcast comedy network. Why not laugh at what else we've got? Visit podomity.com.