“Oh, so we’re clapping for data visualization now? Have some self-respect, Peej!”
Power Girl goes All-In this week, picking up a month after last issue’s incident between Omen and the mysterious new celebrity hero Ejecta. Now, with suspicions of this new heroine at a high, Paige, her boyfriend, and her ex-assistant must all help Lilith out of her isolated depression to face the one who sent her into a downward spiral. If they don’t, Streaky might just kill her.
Williams leans on the classic roots of Power Girl while keeping it fresh, which isn’t surprising since she has made it clear from the beginning that Paige Stetler functions as a call back to the Golden Age Clark and Lois, existing as bumbling reporters or freelancers who get by on a poor income. It creates a fascinating take on the character that plays on the initial basis of her classic iteration while trying to move past the rich CEO aspect of her history.
Adding to that, Williams also reintroduces the Daily Star, which was the original concept for the Daily Planet in Shuster and Siegel’s era of Superman. Since then, the concept has been in limbo with small references here and there, but the Daily Star lives on as an Earth-2 concept thanks to Crisis on Infinite Earths, and which separated the Golden and Modern Ages.
DC
All of this hones in on the main point of this new arc as we begin to understand Ejecta as a villain. Williams leans on Power Girl being the last relic of a Golden Age Superman while Ejecta represents the future that Paige’s Superman would’ve stood against with the understanding that Ejecta is a false precog. Ejecta is a conception of A.I, one that is designed to ruin Paige’s life and drag her back down to the past she has been running from since the beginning of this series.
The focus on A.I is a fascinating topic for considering the recent subtext of Absolute Power being the fear of artificial intelligence and how it can/will affect the world both politically and socially. Williams has an advantage due to the fact that Superman’s golden age history revolves around his fear of technology, an example evidenced in his classic first appearance where he destroys a motor vehicle.
All of this has been why Power Girl has existed in a strange place as a character with her previous identity of Karen Starr being a Silicon Valley entrepreneur who makes millions off her tech. Her Earth-0 counterpart, Kara Zor-El works as the scientific counterpart to Superman because unlike Power Girl, Kara wasn’t raised by Superman.
DC
In addition to all that, Williams continues to deliver a fun and engaging script with a large focus on Paige’s roommate and former Titans member Omen as the aftermath of the previous issue. As we’ve expressed before, Williams writes Lilith and Paige with a strong connection, one that is strong enough to even overshadow Paige’s relationship with series love interest Axel Gust, who was recently revealed to be an Asgardian ‘Indiana Jones.’ Axel, unfortunately, still hasn’t improved much as a character since the previous installments of the series.
The script is overall strong but is uplifted by Adriana Melo’s art. Since joining the series, Melo’s art has improved dramatically with each and every issue as she fits the tone and style of the book better than previous series artist Eduardo Pansica, who thrived more on the action sequences when the scripts are more reliant on the slice of life elements of the plot.
Melo’s design work is also just flawless as Melo takes liberties to redesign a recurring villain but also stun as we see more of Ejectra’s colorful and unique character design. Melo is a strong addition to the creative team and we can only hope that she stays along as the series begins to dig deeper and deeper into Power Girl’s life.
You must be logged in to post a comment.