The Many Faces Of… Supergirl

Here’s a little pop quiz for you. Name a superhero who defends Metropolis while wearing red and blue tights, leaps tall buildings in a single bound, outraces trains, planes and bullets, and possesses amazing powers like heat vision, freeze breath and invulnerability. Oh, and did we mention that she’s a girl? If you thought that Superman was the sole survivor of the planet Krypton, you missed a branch on the family tree. He has a cousin, known to the world as Supergirl!

Superman’s Kryptonian cousin, Kara Zor-El, first appeared in Action Comics #252 in May of 1959. She was the daughter of Zor-El (Jor-El’s brother) and Alura. Apparently, a group of Kryptonians had survived the destruction of their planet, and had been floating around through space on a chunk of it known as Argo City. However, a hailstorm of meteors destroyed the lead shielding that was protecting Argo from kryptonite radiation, and, much as Jor-El had sent baby Kal-El to Earth to save his life, Zor-El followed suit and rocketed his teenage daughter off to Earth as well.

Upon arriving on Earth and meeting Superman, Kara’s cousin helped her establish a secret identity. By covering her blonde hair with a brunette wig (hey, it beats a pair of glasses), Kara would become Linda Lee, who took up residence at the Midvale Orphanage. In many of the early stories, Superman encouraged Kara to keep her existence as Supergirl a secret until she learned to use her powers responsibly.

In 1984, Supergirl appeared on the big screen in a live-action movie of her very own. Produced by Alexander and Ilya Salkind, the producers of the Christopher Reeve “Superman” films, “Supergirl” starred newcomer Helen Slater in the title role. The film also starred Faye Dunaway as Selena, a witch with dreams of world domination, Peter Cook as her companion Nigel, and Peter O’Toole as Kara’s Kryptonian mentor, Zaltar. The movie was directed by Jeannot Szwarc, who would go on to direct several episodes of Smallville some 20 years later (most notably the fourth season episode “Spell,” which also dealt with witchcraft)!

Supergirl was intended as a direct tie-in to the Christopher Reeve movies, with hopes that Reeve would make an appearance in the film as Superman. He ultimately chose not to be involved, and Superman appears in the movie only on a dorm room poster. The film does tie into the franchise in other ways, however. Marc McClure reprises his role as Jimmy Olsen, and Lois Lane’s sister Lucy is introduced, who makes numerous references to Lois, Clark Kent, and the Daily Planet. Also noteworthy – the film provided fans with their first view inside The Phantom Zone. In “Superman” and “Superman II,” the Zone had been portrayed simply as a spinning pane of glass…Supergirl revealed the inside of the Zone to be a kind of volatile desert. A similar portrayal was featured in the sixth season of Smallville.

It was hoped that the movie would launch a series of Supergirl films. It didn’t. The movie was met with less than stellar reactions from both fans and critics, mainly due to some campy performances from Faye Dunaway and Peter Cook, and the more fantastical elements of the witchcraft subplot. Slater’s performance as Supergirl, though, was highly praised, having played the character with a sense of innocence and wonder. In fact, Supergirl earned Slater a Saturn Award nomination for Best Actress in 1985.

Since then, Slater has tangled with another caped crusader… she provided the voice of Talia, Ra’s Al Ghul’s daughter, on “Batman The Animated Series.” More recently, she has been seen in episodes of “Crossing Jordan,” “The New Adventures of Old Christine” and “Grey’s Anatomy.” She will soon return to the Superman mythology once again, as she is slated to appear on Smallville as Clark’s birth mother, Lara, in season seven.

The creators of the animated series wanted to keep the emphasis on Superman being the last of his kind. As such, in this version, Supergirl was not actually from Krypton! Instead, Kara In-Ze (not Kara Zor-El) was from Krypton’s “sister planet,” Argo, named after the floating city from the original comics. Though the two were not actually biologically related, while on Earth Kara posed as Clark Kent’s cousin.Supergirl would not return to the screen until 1998, when the character appeared on “Superman: The Animated Series.” Her voice was provided by Nicholle Tom, best known as Maggie Sheffield on “The Nanny” and Ryce Newton in the first two “Beethoven” movies.

In a special feature on the Superman: The Animated Series Volume 3 DVD set, series writer/producer Bruce Timm revealed that it was planned to have Kara eventually develop some powers that were different from Superman’s, since they were from different planets. This never happened, simply because they never got around to it. Though Superman was more powerful than Supergirl, the two had all the same powers.

This version of Supergirl traded in her traditional costume for some different threads, though… the animated Supergirl sported a white baby tee with the “S” logo on it and a short blue skirt. This look was eventually adopted by the comics as well, temporarily.

In 2004, Cartoon Network launched “Justice League Unlimited,” a new incarnation of its previous “Justice League” series. This time, more than 60 heroes had joined up with the League, and Supergirl was among them. Appearing in the series’ first episode, “Initiation,” Nicholle Tom reprised the role of the Girl of Steel.

Supergirl would become a prominent character in the “JLU” series. In one story arc, a shadowy government organization known as Cadmus attempts to take down the League. One aspect of their plot involves cloning an adult version of Supergirl. The clone, calling herself Galatea, leads an invasion of the League’s Watchtower. Galatea is also voiced by Nicholle Tom.

In one of the later episodes, Supergirl finally updates her threads… in the episode “Chaos at the Earth’s Core,” she dons a new costume that is more reminiscent of the traditional Supergirl outfit (it is also similar to the current version of the costume in the comics, designed by artist Michael Turner).

Smallville gave fans a tease of Supergirl at the end of its third season, with the episode “Covenant.” In that episode, a mysterious blonde girl named Kara arrives in Smallville, with powers similar to Clark’s. She claims to be from Krypton, and tells him that it is his destiny to return to Jor-El through the caves beneath the town. There is no mention of the two being cousins here… in fact, Kara implies that she and Clark are meant to procreate to carry on the Kryptonian legacy.

In the end, “Kara” is revealed to be a girl named Lindsey Harrison who was caught in the Smallville meteor shower, and is under Jor-El’s control. At the episode’s end, she is apparently killed. Kara/Lindsey is played here by Adrianne Palicki.

With the debut of the seventh season of “Smallville,” the series promises to finally deliver their version of Supergirl. Actress Laura Vandervoort will play the role of Clark Kent’s Kryptonian cousin. Sent to Earth at the same time as baby Kal-El, Kara has been in a state of suspended animation ever since her arrival, and awakens to find that her “little” cousin is now older than she is. Now, Clark finds himself in the position of mentor to his cousin, trying to help her adapt to life on Earth and her newfound abilities! Laura Vandervoort’s previous acting credits include “CSI”, “Falcon Beach” and “Instant Star.” She also appeared in an early episode of the series “Mutant X,” which starred “Lois and Clark”‘s Lex Luthor, John Shea.

Though Superman has always been surrounded by close friends like Lois Lane and Jimmy Olsen, he has also always been something of an outsider. An orphan from a dead world, he would never know Krypton or his birth parents. With the arrival of his cousin, Kara, that changed. Now, Superman had a living connection to his family and his home planet, and someone who could truly relate to him. It also cast him in a new role – that of a “big brother” figure. He had several advantages that Kara did not have… growing up on Earth all his life, he was able to adapt to his powers gradually as they emerged. He also had the benefit of being raised by Jonathan and Martha Kent, who taught him much about life. Kara, on the other hand, landed on Earth as a teenager, and was thrust into a new world with amazing new abilities that she was not used to. From Clark, she would learn patience, understanding and control. From Kara, Clark would learn a new definition of family, as he got to pass on the wisdom and love that Jonathan and Martha had shown to him.

Note: The views of Russ Dimino don’t necessarily represent the thoughts and feelings of everyone at KryptonSite.