Showcase Presents: Supergirl, Vol. 1 by Jerry Siegel

My rating: 2 of 5 stars


This book collects the first two and a half years of the print career of Kara Zor-el, the first and best known Supergirl starting in 1959 with Action Comics #252 where she quickly got her own back-up feature.

In the book, Superman discovers, after more than two decades in comics thinking he was the last survivor of Krypton (at least who wasn't shrunk by Brainiac), that another member of his species survived-his cousin Kara Zor-El, and he responded how any caring big-hearted hero would by thrusting his cousin into an orphanage where she would hide her powers and ensure that she lived a life of loneliness and isolation for fear that she might be adopted. And she must remain in this state so that Superman can use her as his secret weapon.

Oftentimes, in order to enjoy older comics, you have to take off modern blinders and enjoy the books for what they are and I've been able to do that with multiple books but not this one. Because Superman's treatment of Supergirl at this point in her career is the most unSupermanlike thing he does in the Silver Age. Stories often end with Supergirl sad or upset and almost always it's directly or indirectly caused by Superman making her hide in silence.

And because of being unable to reveal herself, Supergirl gets to do very little actual crimefighting, mostly swooping in to stop a natural disaster secretly or travelling somewhere where she can actually be seen (either in time or on another planet.) I think that probably the editors got feedback from kids wondering why Superman was being so mean to Supergirl because there was actually an issue that showed Superman was rooting for her and planned to give her her own fleet of Super robots. You would have never known Superman was rooting for her reading the book before that point as he came off as very mean. We're also treated to a few stories that seek to redo Superboy/Superman stories with Supergirl including her getting a merman boyfriend and other such rip offs.

That's not to say every story is bad. The book not only features Supergirl in Action comics but also some of her guest appearances and the ones in Superman's Pal Jimmy Olsen were actually fairly good. We also do get to meet Streaky Supercat. Supergirl's Cat who sometimes has superpowers and then loses them until they randomly return. Also, in the initial book, in her orphan identity as Linda Lee, Supergirl wore pigtails but by the end of the book, had a new hairdo that was actually voted on by fans and you can actually see the original ad.

The book does have one really good storyline that a five part story over sixty pages which was very unusual for 1961, and for the Supergirl strip. In it, Superman has finally decided to reveal her to the world, but then she loses her superpowers because of an evil scheme of a female Kryptonian scientist who figures out how to escape from the bottled city of Kandor. She manages to replace Supergirl and pretend to be repowered and hatches an evil scheme to use Luthor to kill Superman and then kill Luthor in order to avoid detection. It's an amazingly good plot for 1961 DC Comics.

It also managed to change the status quo for Supergirl as she finally can stop avoiding adoption. The whole plot does get resolved with a bit of a deus ex machina by a well known Superman guest star popping out of nowhere, still it's a very good story. You just have to go through a lot of so so material to get to it at the back of the book.



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