Review: Supergirl Vol. 1- Last Daughter of Krypton

Quick Summary

Pros: The story is different and enjoyable throughout. It also presents a number of mysterious elements to get readers excited for the future.

Cons: Some of the fight scenes are a little generic.

Overall: This is a great start to Supergirl’s New 52 story. It presents two separate but equally interesting stories, one about her protecting Earth and one about her connection with the past. Supergirl is clearly a character with some depth who is more than able to headline what is looking to be a great series.

Story

Supergirl Vol. 1- Last Daughter of Krypton presents a fun, touching, and intriguing plot that exceeds the first volumes of both Superman (Review) and Superboy in terms of overall story quality. It tells the story of Supergirl’s first few moments on Earth and how those few moments will change the rest of her life. She is not just another superhero out to protect as many people as she can, she has her own quest to complete as well. Seeing her start all of this is really fun and does a great job in building up excitement for everything yet to come.

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The start of any new series needs to do two things, the first of which is telling an interesting story. Oddly enough, despite being as enjoyable to read as ever, Supergirl’s origin story may be the least exciting portion of this book. This is not because her origin story is boring, rather it is because everything else is so exciting. The history and lore behind planet Krypton’s demise and Kara’s father’s role are fascinating stories that are hinted at through a combination of Kara’s memories and Reign’s dialogue. Plus the existence of a mad scientist bent on discovering more about this history just adds to things. It may be too early, to tell but the plotlines demonstrated in this book seem to be really enjoyable to read. Hopefully they continue to be this way.

The second thing any new series needs to do is demonstrate that more good stories are coming up. The book presents plenty of interesting questions and potential plotlines dealing with Kara’s past, her life on Krypton, the morality of her father, Mr. Tycho’s plans, the origin of the Worldkillers, and the status of the final Worldkiller. The quantity of potential here is only matched by its quality as each of these stories appear to be very interesting. Honestly, this book even feels almost like the first half of a longer book. All of this together gives a strong indication that Supergirl Vol. 2- Girl in the World will be even better.

This collection tries to get some easy action into the story by having Supergirl go head to head with Superman as soon as she arrives on Earth. Though seeing two Kryptonians fight is usually interesting, this altercation seems petty and forced overall. Fans know that both of these characters will be fine during and after this fight, meaning there are almost no stakes to it at all. Combine this with no motivation for fighting in the first place, and it makes for a rather boring scene.

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Art

For the first few issues the art is pretty generic overall. It is not bad but is also does nothing special or unique. However, almost halfway into the book, the art takes a large jump in quality.

This jump in quality mostly affects the detail in places surrounding the characters. All of a sudden the backgrounds go from being walls of white to being lush landscapes. This does a lot of favors for the book as a whole and helps it to hammer out a little more unique of a style. In particular, shots of the stars in space or the picturesque mountain ranges look particularly good and make the book feel like it is taking place in a larger and more complete world. Overall, the second half of this book looks pretty good and definitely makes the book a lot more attractive overall.

Continuity

Supergirl Vol. 1: Last Daughter of Krypton starts the Supergirl New 52 series. This means that this is the first volume in a brand new continuity, so there are not many references to previous books or specific character histories.

The story started here is continued in Supergirl Vol. 2: Girl in the World (Review). 

This volume also references other comic books, detailed below:

• The beginning of this collection references a “Kansas event”. This is mostly likely a reference to Superman, which can be seen in Action Comics Vol. 1: Superman and the Men of Steel.
• Supergirl starts to hear voices saying things from around the world. A few of these are direct quotes from other series going on at the time.
  • “A church. It had to be a church. Like I’m not already damned as it is.” is from Birds of Prey Vol. 1: Trouble in Mind (Review)
  • “I don’t talk to fish” is from Aquaman Vol. 1: The Trench (Review).
  • “-is the fiercest killer in all of Gotham and he doesn’t even know it” is from Nightwing Vol. 1: Traps and Trapezes (Review).