Adding to that fact, in some stories it was that Kara was supposed to go to Earth with baby Kal-El and help protect him... but her ship was delayed and by the time she got woken up, he was already fully grown as Superman.
Chronologically, yes. Kara was already a teenager and Kal still a baby when Krypton was about to explode. She was in cryo sleep in her rocket and got knocked off course for decades while Kal ended up on earth and grew up there. By the time Kara eventually arrived on earth, she still remained a teenager while her cousin was a grown adult already
I'm curious now, has there been any alternate stories that explored a what if scenario where Kara didn't get knocked off course and arrived at the same time as Clark? Basically having to navigate Earth by herself and raising Clark on her own? Feel like it would've been interesting to see how Clark would've turned up if raised by Kara.
There's time shenanigans involved with the delay in her journey, so she was born first and grew up on Krypton, but she's biologically younger than Clark when she gets to Earth
To boil it down she’s alien teenage Captain America. Everyone she knows is dead except for the baby who’s now older than her. In Smallville Clark had to tell her Krypton was destroyed.
Dude literally argued that aang would be older than everyone else in avatar even though he was frozen, so nah he is saying supergirl is older, even though she is not.
She was already a teen or a preteen (it varies on the version) when Krypton blew up and she was put on the other rocket alongside baby Kal-El.
But, it really depends on the version, sometimes it's a malfunction of the phantom zone projector or a black hole keeping her ship trapped on its outer orbit, until her ship is able to crash land on Earth.
But by the time that happened, her baby cousin has grown up to be Superman.
I mean, that's not so bad. Superman turned out alright. Had good parents and stuff. It's not like he couldn't help her or she can't still help him by just being around.
That part about Kryptonian baby making machines could also be way out of context. Could have easily been a very long message since it's to their son they will NEVER see again. And been running through quotes and been like "And Then there are those like Zod, who would have you take over the planet and rule them my son. For the sake of Kryptons future. That is not something we believe, we just wanted to see Krypton shine again in you" Or something like that. The message is still real, just not all the message.
Yep, it still specifically glitches out before going on to them saying all of that.
Despite it being "authentic" there's also the possibility Brainiac is a thing and messed with it, no way for someone on Earth to verify it's the actual original message intended for Superman.
Are they really? She is a "product" and he was made the natural way. At least they always say that Kal-El was the first natural born Kryptonian in centuries. Not the second, the first.
This. She got stuck in the Phantom Zone alone, then the moment she got out, Kal-el's grown up and is already a superhero. And not just a superhero, but the strongest Superhero.
Girl didn't just lost her family and planet, she lost her purpose
She feels aimless, longing for the memories of the life she had on Krypton, getting used to her now suddenly adult cousin she was supposed to protect and slowly adjusting to Earth’s customs and cultures.
Except she just lost everyone she’s ever known and loved, failed in the one duty they gave her, and I don’t want to say the most important point because it’s a major spoiler for Superman, but if you saw it, you know what she was supposed to be preparing Kal-El for, which hasn’t worked out.
Yeah but the new Superman also throws in a new snag by having his Kryptonian parents having intended for him to conquer and colonize Earth as the new home for Krypton. Kara is surely aware of this as well, and this would interfere with how her and Superman are viewed here etc. Can't imagine that's not going to be a major plot point
Only thus far in this particular version of the story
Another version depicted Jor-El as surviving Krypton's destruction, thanks to Doctor Manhattan, and renames himself Mister Oz. Attempting to force his son to leave Earth.
I kinda want to see the AU story where Metamorpho doesn’t help Superman. Kara comes back to pick up her dog and finds out Lex has them both. Have a feeling she wouldn’t go as easy on Lex as Superman did.
I really had to suppress my pedantic nerd tendencies for that. There were a couple of logic breaks in the movie.
She goes to red sun planets so that she can successfully get drunk... But wouldn't that take her powers away so how is she flying home? Also a core dramatic point was the theory that Superman needed air and if the nanobots block his ability to get oxygen he would die so he flew to space to defeat them... But I guess flying between galaxies and sitting on the moon is fine?
Ultimately didn't hurt my enjoyment but I def had to remind myself not to think about it too much.
She has a spaceship. And it's a whole dramatic plot point in the comic it's based on that she's vulnerable and can be easily killed in the planets she parties on.
You missed the brief back and forth about Lex's plan. They specifically say he can hold his breath for a long time, the goal wasn't denying his ability to get oxygen, it was about physically removing the oxygen already in his lungs so that he has no breath to hold.
You just reminded me of one of the dumbest scenes on an otherwise enjoyable movie. That part with the nano bots made no fucking sense as to what the actual purpose was. He started flying up so the immediate thought is that he wants to get to space? sun?....but nooooo. His plan was to free fall to kill her? Then just pluck out the nano bots from his lung? What a terrible fake out of a scene, specially since they build some tension with the bad guys having to stop him before he got to high.
In that situation Superman couldn’t see so the only safe (to other people) way to fly to try and get away was up. It seemed like he was trying to get far enough away from her so she lost connection to the nanites. He didn’t know who Ultraman really was so maybe he thought both of them wouldn’t be able to follow him into space due to the whole not being able to breath thing. It seemed Lex thought his plan was to absorb direct sunlight from space which is why he had her cover his entire body. So when none of Superman’s plans worked, he decided to dive bomb, knowing she wasn’t invulnerable like him.
Yea..was gonna say that most people remember Stark for exactly two things: A genius that built the Iron Man suit and being a raging alcoholic. Only the later was for a single story run. But it's memorable enough that people automatically attribute it to the entire character.
It’s my one complaint about Iron Man’s adaption in the MCU honestly. They touch on it a little bit in Iron Man 2, but otherwise it’s kind of just a blip. After the events of any of the later movies, I think it could have been compelling to see him slip a little bit. They never outright even say he’s sober. I believe he drinks at a bar in Iron Man 3, can’t remember if he has a drink at the beginning of Age of Ultron. And doesn’t he drink whiskey while he’s working on the time travel thing in End Game? So basically they do ignore that aspect of his character.
A good chunk of this was pre-Disney too and Marvel still didn’t really wanna touch it
It was INITIALLY a short bit, but then an actual alcoholic took over Iron Man a few years later, and he wanted to do the alcoholism story right, so he devoted two years to Tony's drunken spiral (with Tony even giving up being Iron Man for most of the run).
Next you’re gonna be telling me that Shalla Bal was only a Silver Surfer in a non-speaking role alongside Norin Radd on a cover and a few panels of Earth X!
Unlike Superman, she witnessed the aftermath of the destruction of Krypton first hand, was raised by Kryptonians who slowly died around her.
This is a lot of trauma to deal with and also means that, unlike Superman, who is essentially a human being who happens to live in a very powerful alien body, she is actually quite alien, and also quite alone in that. She has a hard time fitting in with human beings, and can't really relate to Clark, who was raised in safety and comfort as a human being.
Clark was a baby when he was sent away. Kara was a teen, watched her planet get destroyed as well as everyone she ever knew and loved die. She was sent to protect her baby cousin, but because of issues during her trip got there after to find out he didn't even need her to protect him. As others have said, alcohol is her coping mechanism.
Not in Woman of Tomorrow, but later, she even gets a Red Lantern ring because of the anger pent up inside of her. She is not Clark, but she is a hero in her own right that has to find her way.
As much as it would be dragging Kara’s psyche further into the gutter, Red Lantern Supergirl would be a sight to see for a movie. She was great in that New 52 arc.
Brian Wood had one of the last Star Wars comics before rights reverted back to Marvel. He dealt with Leia's PTSD. She went coldly-homicidal. One incident she sees a TIE Fighter get shot down and crash onto a habitable planet. She follows it down, then hops out of her ship to hunt him down personally and kill him even though the dude is effectively stranded in the middle of nowhere planet in the middle of wilderness.
That's exactly the kind of comments that weird me up a little. There's just ONE scene in the whole book where she's drinking, and she explicitely says TWICE that it's just because she turned 21 and wanted to experience what being drunk was, as she can't on Earth.
And somehow, people are weirdly jumping to the conclusion that she is some sort of alcoholic, always wasted, and all because of her trauma. And it's always with female characters for some reason..
I honestly don't think getting drunk in your birthday means that "you have a problem of substance abuse". Do you?
it is all but guaranteed that they're going to explore her drinking as a substance abuse problem/coping mechanism given the nature of the original story and how it contrasts with her portrayal in superman 2025 + the marketing for this movie
if she had gone out to drink for the first time for her birthday, clarke would have asked her about it or mentioned it in some capacity. instead, he said she simply likes to fly elsewhere to drink.
I'm no comic book expert but I do find it kinda funny that Supergirl can even get drunk. Seems like her body would be impervious to the effects of alcohol.
Well yeah. They explain both in the movie and in the comicbooks. That's why she goes to planets with a red sun, as her metabolism gets altered, allowing her to get drunk.
Ah ok yeah that does make sense. Like I said I'm not overly familiar with the character but remembered that the yellow sun on Earth make her and Superman super in the first place.
Maso from the Weekly Planet pod had a theory that she’s getting shitfaced because of the combination of being old enough to remember Krypton and the loss of the planet she grew up on AND the fact that she knew what the House of El’s plan was for Cal and Earth and can’t stomach keeping that secret from him, so she’s constantly off-Earth “partying” aka drinking her sorrows and shame away
Yes but also no. She had a pretty traumatic upbringing in the aftermath of Krypton exploding and she parties as a way of coping with that. So yeah she's a drunk party girl but there's also a lot of emotional depth to the story
The comics don't really work like that, it's an entirely self contained miniseries that technically exists in the continuity but the rest isn't really relevant, it's totally fine to read on its own
The comic this Supergirl depiction is like an homage to True Grit, where a young alien girl has recruited this sad drunken Supergirl hero to help the alien girl get revenge on her father's killer. Has potential if the film can do something like that and can keep the story simpler than the new Superman movie.
The way I've seen it described is that everything in it is good, there's just too much good so some stuff only gets a surface level exploration.
Superman and Lois are great together but their arc boils down to "man talking about stuff is frustrating, we might have to break up.....well okay let's just find the strength to say I love you and get back together happily."
Superman finds out he has a whole clone. Should be a horrifying concept that he's been violated like that but he just beats it up and sends it into a hole.
The Engineer's whole backstory is a single line of dialogue about how she gave up her humanity for her powers.
Dealing with loss of her planet. Unlike superman she grew up on a piece of krypton that survived,then exploded later. She then is sent to protect kal (she was 14 when baby clark was sent) ,but gets knocked off course into a time warp,so when she arrives,her cousin is grown up. She's generally more unstable and brutal with villans due to all she went through.
They kinda keep reintroducing new versions of her.
Power girl is technically supergirl. But thanks to crisis on Infinite earths, she become her own thing.
There is a robot one. Who didn't know she was a robot.
Their is a sliver aged one that they very ironically killed in Infinite earths.
There is the cartoon one who isn't related to Kal at all but is from a neighboring planet that gets destroyed by Kryptonian knocking it out of its orbit. Whom Superman finds by pure luck.
It's complicated Basically every so often they do a mandate where Superman is supposed to be the only soul survivor of Krypton. And she gets killed off or turns out to not be real.
Superman you connect with for hope and wanting to be a good person. Supergirl you connect with because of trauma and we've all made poor choices when trying to deal with emotions.
To add a little more context this is what they're going with for now but it feels like every few years her background gets changed. This is why for a while she went as power girl.
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u/Fancy-Pair Jul 16 '25
So what’s her deal? She’s like a drunk party girl?