Supergirl #36 Review and *SPOILERS*

Someone Else’s Story… We’re Just Living In It…

Written By: Marc Andreyko
Art By: Eduardo Pansica, Julio Ferreira, Chris Sotomayor
Letters By: Tom Napolitano
Cover Price: $3.99
Release Date: November 20, 2019

*Non Spoilers and Score At The Bottom*

Supergirl is finally getting to a place where we aren’t leaning on different books or crossover stories to move the story forward. Supergirl has begun to go her own way. Sure, there are still some things about former crossovers that are still affecting the book, but readers of this book are finally getting to focus on their own story for the first time in a long time. She’s dealing with Leviathan still but she’s also got Brainiac-1 to deal with and his invasion of the Fortress of Solitude. There’s a lot to look forward to with this book but and I’m looking forward to continuing on in this book. Let’s just jump into this new issue and see where it takes us.

Our issue begins with Brainiac-1’s robots attacking Supergirl. She is surrounded but fights out of their hold with her eye lasers. However, it is quickly revealed that Supergirl is only fighting in her mind. Brainiac-1 continues to infiltrate the Fortress’ archives as Supergirl fights in her mind with Krypto trying to wake her. He begins barking and Brainiac-1 hides as he allows her to awaken. She is disoriented but then she hears an explosion and leaves Krypto to guard the fortress. She flies off to find Hawkman and Batman engaged in combat. Hawkman mentions something about the Batman Who Laughs before Supergirl intervenes and rescues Batman. The two then race off to find Superman.

When she arrives on the scene, Supergirl finds Superman in combat with Donna Troy and Blue Beetle. Blue Beetle throws a batarang at Superman but Supergirl catches it before it reaches him. However, the batarang actually hurts her before she beats up Donna Troy and Blue Beetle. Soon, she finds that something is wrong and begins coughing up some kind of liquid. Batman pulls Superman away from her as an infection ravages through her body. Brainiac-1 notices the infection as it begins attacking the nanobots in her system. When she awakens, she sees King Shazam standing above her. He asks how she is feeling and she rises to her feet and tells him that she feels super. Her uniform and body have changed slightly as the infection has clearly turned her evil. With her powers at maximum power, she is able to see the nanobots in her system and she leaves for a moment to take care of it.

After remembering how she became infected, Supergirl heads toward the Fortress of Solitude. Brainiac-1 tries to control her with his nanobots but fails and she overcomes his influence and wraps her hand around his neck. She flies him out of the Fortress and uses her heat vision to burn out the nanobots in her system. She then turns her blasts on Brainiac-1 himself and kills him. His lifeless body falls from her grasp as we see she is finally free of the burden of Krypton’s dead on her conscious. She considers returning to the others who have been turned but she decides that she doesn’t need anyone else. Krypto whines as he watches what has become of Supergirl. She flies off to do as she pleases. This is where the issue leaves us.

Remember all the story progression that we had? Remember how we were dealing with Leviathan? Remember how Brainiac-1 was a legitimate threat to the Fortress? Well, throw all of that out of the window as instead, Supergirl is thrown into another storyline that is mainly unfolding in another book entirely. I don’t hate the storyline that we are getting, but it’s not exactly something that we haven’t seen before. The art in this issue is really amazing at least. Perhaps this storyline will end up doing very well but at this point, it’s just another reminder that this book doesn’t have an identity of its own. Instead, it gets dragged into any event or crossover that other books are dealing with.

Bits and Pieces

Supergirl is once again dragged into another crossover event instead of establishing it’s own identity. I am struggling to find reasons why anyone would keep putting their time and money into this series. At this point, it has become a companion series to whatever is happening in the universe. That doesn’t seem to be changing anytime soon. At least we got some fantastic art.

3.5/10