Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow

 
Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow
by Tom King

art by Bilquis Evely
DC Comics

2022

 

 

Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow is an 8 issue standalone miniseries set in a far distant corner of the DC universe. Like Far Sector, which I read last year, it uses its remote location to tell a story that isn't particularly connected to or concerned with the rest of DC's continuity. While Far Sector drew on the scifi conventions of space opera, Woman of Tomorrow draws far more on the tropes and imagery of sword & planet fiction.

 
The tale is narrated in retrospect by Ruthye, a simple farm girl, who wants revenge on Kern of the Yellow Hills, who murdered her father. Ruthye tries to hire a bounty hunter to use Kern's own sword to kill him, when she runs into Supergirl, who's visiting this planet beneath a red sun so that she can get drunk for her 21st birthday. We learn on the second page that Supergirl will kill Kern, and only at the end do we see exactly how long after the fact the story is being recounted from.

 
This is a young Supergirl. She swears, says 'like' a lot, and is only a few subjective years removed from the destruction of Krypton, which she witnessed firsthand as a teenager. She initially counsels Ruthye to forgo revenge, but then Kern shoots her with several arrows, poisons and nearly kills her dog Krypto, and steals her spaceship. So Supergirl and Ruthye set off together to find Kern and get the antidote for the poison.

 
The pair take the spaceship equivalent of a Greyhound bus to reach the planet the stolen ship went to. They find evidence of a recent ethnic cleansing, and learn that space brigands visited the world, and that Kern has joined them. They follow a trail of planets that experienced recent genocides at the hands of Kern and the brigands. What they see upsets them, greatly.

 
The first time they catch up with the brigands, Kern uses magic to teleport the women to a planet full of dinosaurs and an articial Kryptonite sun. They confront Kern again with the help of Supergirl's horse Comet, and capture him. The brigands come to rescue Kern, and at great cost, Supergirl defeats them. Then, while Ruthye learns that her travels have caused her to want justice instead of revenge, Supergirl decides to end things by killing Kern.

 
In an epilogue, an older Supergirl returns to visit Ruthye after she published her account of their adventures together. We also learn that one key incident recounted earlier was a lie.

 
I liked Woman of Tomorrow a lot. Ruthye is proud, speaks formally, and often complements an action scene with thoughtful commentary on Supergirl's nature. I like her as a narrator. 

 

We also see Supergirl herself greatly tested. She suffers pain, watches the injury and death of her pets, and sees over and over the results of genocidal violence that she was too late to stop. She is almost infinitely patient, shows almost infinite restraint. She tries to help who she can, and to do the right thing. But against foes like the brigands and Kern, we also see her pushed to her limits, and placed in a position where executing her prisoner rather than showing him mercy might, arguably, be the more just decision (and certainly a tempting decision, even if you think it is wrong.)

 
Bilquis Evely's art is beautiful and baroque, and Matheus Lopes's colors are a perfect complement, all pastels and jewel tones and rich shades. I would happily read almost anything Evely illustrated and Lopes colored. Together the communicate the strangeness and alienness of the setting, giving it a fantastical, storybook feeling that's a good match for the tone of the text.