Today´s post is a rather quick one. I just wanted to talk about a few things concerning variant covers and spoilers. Normally I stay away from spoilers for my readers but today I´m going to make an exception. So if you don´t know what is happening in CIVIL WAR right now you should not read the rest of this post.
I know I originally started this blog to sing the praises of comic books and how glorious the life of a comic reader can be. But sometimes there are things than make me loose my cool. Like CIVIL WAR - THE RETURN.
Question : When is a variant cover not a variant cover ?
Answer : When the regular cover is no cover at all.
That´s right. The regular cover to CIVIL WAR - THE RETURN is just a blank piece of paper with the title on it and the credits. Wait. I think I see the sailboat now. There is the emblem of the hero who is returning but since it is printed in bright yellow it is virtually invisible. No kidding. You can´t see it in the pic I posted because of the low resolution but it is there in bright, invisible yellow. Wow, an invisible cover.
I understand that Marvel doesn´t want to spoil who exactly is returning but when DC was running THE RETURN OF SUPERMAN they managed to keep the secret without selling blank pages. And won´t all the readers who had to pay 3 bucks but didn´t get the beautiful Ed McGuiness cover be pissed ? I mean you pay full price for a comic and get a blank cover. That´s not right. And it´s not as if people who buy this comic don´t find out who is returning.
I don´t know. Which cover do you like better ?
Speaking about spoilers I want to mention CAPTAIN AMERICA 25. I know that it is a special issue. You probably know already what is going to happen because it has been all over the news. But that´s not my problem. I don´t want to comment on that. I want to ask why Marvel has to make a variant cover by Ed McGuiness and a regular cover ? Just let Ed Mc Guiness do the normal cover.
And I just know that I´m not going to get the Ed McGuiness variant because my comic dealer has the uncanny ability to only get variant covers when it´s not important for me. When I still had RED SONYA on my pull list I only got the covers I wanted once out of five times. The last two issue of ASTONISHING X - MEN I got were variants but I would have prefered to get the regular cover. Just when you think the comic industry has learned from it´s mistakes you have to get worked up because of the same things.
I mean with MANHUNTER 26 they made the Arthur Adams cover as a regular cover. Can´t we all learn from this ?
The last thing that annoyed me was the cover to 52 issue 37. I mean it´s one thing to spoil something but come on. Do you have to spoil the whole story on the cover ? For me that destroyed the whole mystery of the identity of Supernova.
So next time we will return to the greatness that is comics.
New to the blog ? Everything you need to know about TALES FROM THE KRYPTONIAN :
Today I´m going to experiment a little. Normally I´m first writing all the text and add the pictures later on. Which is because I almost never get the post done in one setting. And normally that´s the best because when I go in for the second time I change the text, add some new passages and throw the paragraphs all around. And normally I don´t place all the pictures on the same side. But today I´m going to make it all different. I have seen that in my earlier posts I had much more pictures and on other blogs I have seen in the last few days it´s the same. So today I´m going to put more pictures on the post and I´m going to post as much pics as I can in the next minutes before I have to sign off for today. And I´m going to do the rest tomorrow.
Happy International Women´s Day ! Isn´t it nice to get one day because you´re part of some group just so that the collective conscience can rest easier and the rest of the world can ignore you for 364 days before having to deal with you again ? It makes you just feel so special, doesn´t it ? But all sarcasm aside isn´t it time to salute the women who have not only taken over the world ( here in Germany quite visibly ) but who will make it all better ? Which for me means an excuse to post more drawings of hot babes which is something my blog is seriously lacking.
Today we salute not only all women around the world, no, we also give a shout out to all the women in comics. Now I´m not a big believer in sinchronicity but I doubt that it is pure coincidence that I have been collecting and reviewing pictures for my big post on THE biggest ( and I´m not implying anything here ) superheroine of them all : Power Girl. At least in my opinion.
POWERGIRL 101 - WHAT YOU ALWAYS WANTED TO KNOW ABOUT POWER GIRL BUT WERE AFRAID TO ASK
Since I have quite the backlog on reading material to write about there are also some topics that I wanted to comment on, first and foremost among them how much we all love Power Girl.
Come on, you can admit it.
See ? I´m holding my hand up. Which may be in part because it´s too late to deny it. If you have read some of the postings on this blog or if you are one of my three loyal readers you may have already noticed that I get a little excited ( some may even say carried away ) when it comes to Power Girl. Now a lot of comic readers may think that is only because of one reason : her powergirls. Which was the reason that on DAVE´S LONGBOX the big Power Girl post was the climax of BOOB WAR WEEK ( which by the way could use a sequel, how about it Dave ? ) which analyzes the big mystery.
The many costumes of Power Girl
I just realized that in the last paragraph I used both the words climax and anal-yze. But that is the power of Power Girl that everything suddenly has a second meaning or is seen in a new context. You start to second guess what you just said a moment ago out of fear that you might have committed something that may be sexual harassment. In his BOOB WAR WEEK CLIMAX Dave writes about Power Girl´s " Magical Cleavage Window " and it really seems that Power Girl has magic powers ( which may be the reason that in one of her origin stories she was related to Arion ). Most of that powers seem to stem from her costumes of which she had quite a lot. In her first appearance Power Girl had this hole in her costume which later turned into a white body with the mother of all cleavages. Those were the times brother.
This was the costume that is for me the " classic " one because at that time I was reading JUSTICE LEAGUE EUROPE and it´s still one of my favorites. I had just begun to foray into the vast world of american comics when I discovered that there were 2 monthly Justice League books. The first story I read was a two parter story in both books with zombies. The art was done ( in the Justice League Europe issue ) by Bart Sears who at that time was one of the premiere babe artists and defined the look of Power Girl for years to come. He gave her a muscular body with big breasts - and the rest is history. It´s strange to be reminded how much was happening at the time I began to read comics that still play a big role in the comics of today. Anyway, Bart Sears was lightyears away from the kind of artwork that got the new WARLORD series cancelled and he later on changed Power Girl´s costume to a skintight gold and white thing that seemed to be sprayed on.
When is a circle not a circle ? When it´s an oval.
Later on Power Girl had a blue and white costume with a pointy magical window which in most cases was drawn rather tiny. The only comic I know of where that window takes on gigantic proportions that almost make her things pop out is in the last issues of GREEN LANTERN - MOSAIC. And before you ask, no that issues were not drawn by a babe artist . But you can buy the issues nonetheless, in fact buy the whole series. You may be able to find it in the dollarbin and it´s one of the best ( if not THE best ) Green Lantern series there is. Which I can´t say often enough and in fact I already did on several occasions. Here´s a link to an earlier post where I explain what MOSAIC is all about.
Back to the costumes. Here are twolinks that show the many costumes of Power Girl...well, in a superdeformed version.
Later on Power Girl had the white costume without window when she appeared in the pages of Chris Claremont´s SOVEREIGN SEVEN which did not work at all. If that was supposed to save the book from cancellation there was one big flaw : only the magic of the boobie window could have saved the book. So later on the window returned but strangely the circle of the costume turned into an oval that just kept getting bigger and bigger. Which awesome power was responsible for that ? Which unseen force was at work here ? Scientifics all over the world were baffled....well, I have my own theory here.
The gravity of gravity or The difference between flying and defying gravity
It seems that there is a point where all suspension of disbelief fails. There are some things that comic readers can believe but there are others that are just too big. Like a science fiction movie with a woman as president of the United States. Or a version of windows that actually works. Or Power Girl´s breast size.
An alien escapes an exploding planet with a rocket ship and just happens to land on the same planet where her cousin was shot to because her father is also a rocket scientist like Jor - El and has decided to send her to the same planet as Kal - El to grow up together and keep him company ?
Okay. I can believe that.
The alien gains special powers like flight and invulnerability in our atmosphere and decides to use her powers for the betterment of mankind ?
Okay. That also sounds good.
She´s a woman, is humanoid looking in fact she looks identical to earth women and doesn´t even have a different skin color like other alien races in the DC universe ?
Okay. I´m still with you.
And she has really big breasts and a cleavage window.
Say what ? Okay, that´s taking it a little too far. Isn´t that totally unrealistic ?
See what I mean ?
And that seems to be the big question. Scientifically speaking you can define the power of flight as the ability of one person / individual to defy gravity. You can further argue that if that person / individual can defy gravity than logically the whole body can do it. This also must include every part of the body. The head can do it, the leg can do it, the hand can do it.....even the nose can do it. Now since Power Girl´s breasts are INDEED a part of her body ( and a rather big part ) the only logic conclusion is that her breasts also defy gravity. In every way possible. At least according to science.
So the real question is not why Power Girl´s powergirls defy gravity...the real question is why her boobs defy gravity in this particular way and why the boobs of other superheroines who can fly don´t. Now that I think of it we really don´t know if Wonder Woman´s boobs do it because they are always pushed into that corsage. Or it could be because Wonder Woman was made out of clay. She doesn´t have clay feet but maybe.......Hmm. And what about Starfire. She definitely defies gravity. Maybe there is more to this idea than I thought.
How big is too big ?
What is the reason that Power Girl´s powergirls lead to such big debates ?It´s not like there are no women with big boobs out there. We know that they are. Some got them the natural way, some had a little help from medicine and science but we have seen them. Even if it´s only on the big screen, on tv or on the internet. I have seen them, I´ve taped them and I have studied them for endless hours as part of extensive scientific research. You really can see them everywhere : on the streets, at work, in the gym, on television....it´s not like you are constantly surrounded by big chested women. ( And if you are send me your address....or at least some photos. ) But it´s also not the case that there are no women with a big " personality " excisting in our universe.
And I´m going to post some pictures of really big breasted women to prove it when I make the extra post of " WHO COULD PLAY POWER GIRL ? " which will probably get me into some trouble. Like maybe some of the pictures I put on this post. But I just didn´t want to post the same pictures that everyone posts. And to tell you the truth for the most part I have no idea where I got them from anyway. Which is one of the reasons I mainly stick to covers from solicitations or pages from previews. But there are just too many awesome graphics depicting Power Girl out there not to post them especially with only three people reading this besides me.
The history of Power Girl
Power Girl first appearance was in All Star Comics 58 a comic starring the JSA of Earth 2 and here Power Girl was the cousin of Superman like Supergirl was on Earth 1. Unlike the much tamer version of Supergirl Power Girl was much more aggressive, much more outspoken and also...more grown up. Her fighting style was more agressive and she was constantly fighting with Wildcat who kept making sexual remarks about her....which at that time was the norm. But even if she was more of an original concept than Supergirl who was really just Superman with a skirt she didn´t connect really with the readers. Which may prove that female versions of known superheroes get a bigger response because of the franchise they belong to than new characters.
The real problems began after CRISIS ON INFINITE WORLDS. When DC merged all the universes together they did not only keep Supergirl but also Power Girl who should have merged with her Earth 1 counterpart. Now they could have gone and invented a new origin story for her like they did for the Huntress but instead they invented at least a dozen different new origins. It seems that DC was more interested in keeping the character than in doing a quick briefing to define her new origin. Instead whenever a writer worked on Power Girl he just invented a new origin, or if they wanted to write a story they always said " Hey, I got an idea. How about a new origin for Power Girl ? " or just wrote a new one if they couldn´t remember the old one. Which lead to one of the most convoluted comic histories besides Hawkman.
As a result of that her powers kept on changing depending on which writer did the story or what was called for in the story. Always a character out of place she was on different teams. On Earth 2 she was a member of the JSA and later of INFINITY Inc and after the crisis she was with the Justice League Europe and later the newly formed JSA after a short stint with the BIRDS OF PREY.
With INFINITE CRISIS her origin is finally cleared, she´s not from the Legion of Superheroes, she´s not related to the atlantean sorcerer Arion, she´s not whatever.....she´s the Earth 2 version of Supergirl. Big surprise. I really expected a little more especially in the JSA CLASSIFIED story about her.
Since Power Girl was mostly seen by her male teammates as a blank canvas to project their sexual fantasies on she never had many romantic relationships. The only thing resembling some kind of interaction was Flash constantly trying to hit on her. And of course her interaction with Guy Gardner ( who should really co star in her ongoing series ). In the pages of JUSTICE LEAGUE EUROPE there was a storyline about Power Girl being pregnant where she said that she wasn´t sure who was the Father : Hal Jordan or Aquaman. You heard right. Aquaman. It seems that the guy who is mostly known for being the least interesting Justice Leaguer scored where most other failed. This really gives a different meaning to the words : to boldly go where no man has gone before.
I mean Hal Jordan really is not so surprising. Not only do the heroes with the color green in their name get more chicks than the other heroes ( just think about Green Arrow´s track record ) but if Hal is known for one thing than that his " little black book " has the size of the New York phone book. And since Power Girl seems to have a certain attraction to older men it´s not too surprising that something happened between them.
But Aquaman really came out of left field. Maybe it´s got something to do with being a king and ruler of a sunken underwater kingdom. I mean he scored with a hot redhead like Mera so maybe he has unknown superior pick up powers. Or maybe his telepathy not only works on fish. And who knows how much the fact that it probably took place underwater played a role. Maybe there is some super scoring secret that is only shared by male leaguers of the old guard. But the really shocking fact was that Power Girl mentioned that they BOTH could be the father which means that for that possibility she must have done it with both at the same time period. Whoa. That´s what I call action.
Power Girl in her own books
Now if what is always said about comics is true it is really surprising that Power Girl has no ongoing series that is number one in the sales charts. I mean, all comics are read by drooling fanboys who are only looking for big breasted girls in skintight costumes with lots of exposure and wardrobe malfunctions. She´s in the top five asked about comissions with female characters and judging by the extensive drawings of Adam Hughes and other artists she seems to be quite popular with the creators.
Well, IF size really matters Power Girl has that in spades. She can mix it up with the biggest of the comic hotties and besides Big Barda and Starfire she´s right in the top spot where cup sizes are concerned. So what´s the missing ingredient ? I think it is because in most comics with Power Girl in risque situations like in JUSTICE LEAGUE EUROPE when she wore a bathing suit ( not a bikini, that would have been too much for the impressionable minds of male comic readers ) or when she was stranded on an island and had to wear a makeshift string bikini made of coconuts that didn´t really cover too much of her buxom beauty....whenever she´s in a situation where her physical attributes take center stage the comic is drawn by someone who draws really ugly women. It seems that is just part of the big conspiracy in comics to prevent babe artists and comics with hot chicks to inhabitate the same universe. At the moment DC comics is trying to bend universal law by having Terry Dodson on WONDER WOMAN and Adam Hughes working on ALL STAR WONDER WOMAN which hopefully ends successful and means that there is a Power Girl series by Arthur Adams or Ivan Reis on the horizon.
Well, it´s time to wrap up this post since I´ve written longer on this post than any other. There are still a lot of things left to say like who could play Power Girl in a movie but that will be in one of the next posts. This time I tried something different with posting the pictures first but for the next post I´m going to return to my usual method. Like life blogging is a experience in progress and I guess it will take a while till I have figured out the perfect method.
It´s always difficult to make this posts short especially when three of my favorite topics are concerned : comics, hot chicks and superheroes. Check out the links I posted for more information and if you think I´m totally off base or you agree or just are miffed write me a comment on the comment section of this blog. It would be nice to get some comments besides the usual spam.
The videos of today are something of a premiere because not only are they comic related but they actually have something to do with the topic of my post. Normally I just post some clips that I think my readers have not seen or might find interesting. This time though, since I´m trying to make my ultimate Power Girl post, I just have to post these two fanfilms.
The first one called POWER GIRL - THE CLASSIFIEDS. For a fanfilm it is pretty good and the actress portraying Power Girl brings the right qualities.
The second one is called I´M POWER GIRL, DAMMIT ! and shows Kara taking a phone call while battling BIZARRO.
New to the blog ? Everything you need to know about TALES FROM THE KRYPTONIAN :
Today´s post is a rather quick one. I just wanted to talk about a few things concerning variant covers and spoilers. Normally I stay away from spoilers for my readers but today I´m going to make an exception. So if you don´t know what is happening in CIVIL WAR right now you should not read the rest of this post.
