Writer

Judd Winick

Penciller

Aaron Lopresti

Inker

Matt Ryan

Colourist

Hi-Fi

Letterer

John J. Hill

Editor

Rex Ogle and Brian Cunningham

Cover Colourist

Hi-Fi

Cover Artist

Aaron Lopresti

Variant Cover Colourist

Hi-Fi

Variant Cover Artist

Kevin Maguire

Maxwell Lord: Eventually, the badguys always go down. Time… the universe… our reality… always seems to keep score, and no matter how long a run the black hats might have the good guys will eventually knock them right down the mat. But, that’s the thing, Jaime… You keep thinking that I’m the bad guy.

Booster Gold: Welcome to the party. You want to help?
Power Girl: Yeah. Sign me up.

Previously: Maxwell Lord’s plan – whatever it may be – is accelerating. He set the Creature Commandos on the JLI as a distraction whilst he kidnapped the Blue Beetle. He arranged for Checkmate to be stood down by the United Nations so that it could be succeeded (in some as yet unknown way) by his New Checkmate. The rest of the JLI followed Max’s teleport trace to Tokyo, but they were blind-sided by Power Girl who attacked Captain Atom. She had come close to uncovering Max’s plans, but his mind control had clouded her mind.

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Writer

Judd Winick

Penciller

Joe Bennett

Inker

Jack Jadson and Ruy Jose

Colourist

Hi-Fi

Letterer

Sal Cipriano

Editor

Rex Ogle and Brian Cunningham

Cover Colourist

Hi-Fi

Cover Artist

Aaron Lopresti

Variant Cover Colourist

Hi-Fi

Variant Cover Artist

Kevin Maguire

Blue Beetle: Yep. A whole new wide world of suckage.

Previously: The Justice League International’s headquarters have come under-attack from Maxwell Lord’s new Creature Commandos. The JLI had been separated with Fire and Ice in the sick bay and the others outside. Booster had decided to withdraw and ordered the Blue Beetle (Jaime Reyes) to find Fire and Ice. However,  Jaime was singled out for attack by the Commandos and was kidnapped by Maxwell Lord while the other heroes were incapacitated.

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Credits: Written by Judd Winick; art by Sami Basri; coloured by Sunny Gho and Jessica Kholinne; lettered by John J. Hill;  edited by Rachel  Gluckstern (associate) and Mike Carlin; cover by Basri and Gho.

Synopsis “Beasts of Burden”: Power Girl has followed the trail of Divine (her raven-haired clone) to a cloaked facility in Vietnam. Professor Anthony Ivo introduces himself and tells PG that she has found the location of the new Cadmus Project. He then sets his menagerie of genetically engineered monsters on her (including a four-armed albino King Kong called “Caspian”) with the expectation that they would stop her getting inside. However, PG just brushes them aside and flies straight through all of Ivo’s safeguards. She plugs s USB transmitter into a computer console allowing Nicco to download their database while she continues to explore. Nicco decides that he has to do something with the mountain on unencrypted intel so he forwards it to the Batcave for archiving. PG discovers that Ivo has even cloned Krypto (Superman’s dog), but the Krypto clone recognises her as a kryptonian and starts helping her. They have the upper hand until Maxwell Lord arrives and shuts down Power Girl’s opposition with his mind control. He then makes her believe that Captain Atom was responsible for Magog’s murder and that it’s her duty to take down the JLI.

Continuity: The Batman that Nicco calls is Bruce Wayne (raised bat-emblem with the yellow oval). Whether this is deliberate or whether it’s an art mistake will have to wait for a following issue. The end of this issue takes place simultaneously with Justice League: Generation Lost #17 and continues in Justice League: Generation Lost #18.

Opinion: Another great issue from Winick and Basri. The emotional turmoil that PG faced last issue is pushed to one side as she does some monster punching. Why do I get the feeling that Anthony Ivo has had way too much fun working for Max. That old scientist must be a real movie buff considering the monsters and Creature Commandos that he’s been manufacturing (either that or he’s a pokemon fan). “Clambake”, the big clone of Krypto, was also fun and I hope they’ll keep him around. This issue finally leads directly into Generation Lost and there is some relief that we’re moving beyond the investigation phase of PG character arc.

Credits: Written by Judd Winick; art by Sami Basri; coloured by Sunny Gho and Jessica Kholinne; lettered by John J. Hill;  edited by Rachel  Gluckstern (associate) and Mike Carlin; cover by Basri and Gho.

Synopsis “One Step Forward — Two Steps Back”: Power Girl remembers telling Maxwell Lord about the time that Blue Beetle (Ted Kord), Booster Gold, Fire, Ice, and herself fought the Royal Flush Gang in the Florida swamps. However, nobody else remembers Max due to a telepathic command that PG has only recently broken (issue #18). She presents the facts about Lord to her team-mates in the JLA All-Stars and Batman (Dick Grayson), but as the pieces start falling into place they all pause and involuntarily forget everything about him. Batman notes that PG is crying even through she can’t remember why. Later she has a nightmare of Divine and Max showing up at her Starrware offices, but even when she wakes up she can’t remember that Max was in the dream. She doesn’t have time to ponder its meaning as Nicco informs her that he’s traced Divine and Crash to Vietnam via a lost ear-ring communicator. PG investigates and discovers a cloaked facility. Professor Ivo appears beside her and tells her that she’s been a large part of his work recently (the implication is that he’s responsible for Divine). He then reveals that the cloaked facility is the new Cadmus Project and shows her the monster’s he’s been building.

Continuity: Max owns wetlands in Chokoloskee, Florida. A lot of what is shown/referenced in this issue took place in Justice League: Generation Lost. Magog is referenced as being dead so this takes place after Generation Lost #13, Professor Ivo was shown working for Max in his Chinese robotics facility in Generation Lost #11. The implication is that Ivo is responsible for Divine’s creation. The Cadmus Project – show here – is referenced as being responsible for the creation of the Creature Commandos shown in Generation Lost #15.

Opinion: It’s not very often that Power Girl is made to look vulnerable, but she has really been put through the ringer by Maxwell Lord. The strain that he’s putting her under really comes across on the page – not just in the writing, but also in the subtly of her expressions and body language. It really shows that all the creators are pulling together to tell a nicely balanced story. The repeated forgetting of PG and Batman isn’t over stated. It happened once in Generation Lost and has now happened once here. It isn’t laboured, but repeats just enough of the beat to keep readers who just follow one book up to speed. The seriousness of the central part of the box is nicely balanced by the opening JLI flashback and the reveal of Cadmus’s daffy menagerie. While I like Generation Lost a lot, but I think the clear and consistent art lifts Power Girl above it as a series.

Credits: Written by Judd Winick; art by Sami Basri; coloured by Sunny Gho and Jessica Kholinne; lettered by John J. Hill;  edited by Rachel  Gluckstern (associate) and Mike Carlin; cover by Basri and Gho.

Synopsis “I don’t know your name (but you look really familiar)”: Power Girl has traced the mysterious mastermind who has stolen her company’s assets to a hidden base in Antarctica. She was attacked by a raven-haired female kryptonian as she approached the base. The woman (we later find out she is named Divine) admits that she’s a near-clone of Power Girl (“I think my boss wanted to put his own spin on it.”) However, that’s all she is willing to admit before she attacks Power Girl. The two women brawl across the ice as Power Girl tries to get the upperhand. The fight crashes through the roof of the buried base revealing tank after tank of earlier failed clones. Their brawl is brought to a sudden halt when Maxwell Lord disables them both with red-sun radiation. He then has CRASH help Divine up and they escape before PG recovers. As she lies on the ground she sees the Kord Industries logo and her memories of the Blue Beetle and Maxwell Lord come flooding back. An explosion incinerates the lab, the tanks, and any evidence, but it isn’t strong enough to hurt the recovering Power Girl. She pulls herself out of the crater and tells Nicco that she finally knows/remembers that Max is behind everything.

Continuity: Maxwell Lord created Divine by bargaining for Captain Marvel’s arch-foe Dr Sivana’s help. His speech implies he’s after the energy processing abilities of Kryptonian cells and that Divine is just a side-product. In the normal DC Universe Power Girl is a parallel universe version of Supergirl. However, in the DC Animated Universe of Justice League Unlimited a version of Power Girl called Galatea is a clone of Supergirl created by an evil version of the Cadmus Project. Divine parallels that clone origin. PG got her first look at Max in Power Girl #15, but she didn’t recognise him. She told Batman (Dick) about that in Justice League: Generation Lost #10 and they came within a whisker of remembering Max before his post-hypnotic blocks made them forget again.

Opinion: “As much as I like a good cat fight” says Max and this is quite a good cat fight. That’s what I like about PG -  the fights aren’t watered down just because she’s a superheroine (her battles are probably rougher than most male superheroes battles). Basri’s art is great as never really descends into a the T&A route that artists of the Ed Benes school would have taken. As always I think  Sunny Glo and Jessica Kholinne’s delicate and muted colouring is a large part of the success of this book. It just doesn’t look like most of the other books out there. It has a definite tone, look, and feel that is brilliantly its own. Divine has the potential to be a very interesting character (every superhero needs their own evil clone).

Credits: Written by Judd Winick; art by Sami Basri; coloured by Sunny Gho and Jessica Kholinne; lettered by John J. Hill;  edited by Rachel  Gluckstern (associate) and Mike Carlin; cover by Basri and Gho.

Synopsis “Snow Job Part Two”: Batman (Dick Grayson) continues to aid Power Girl in her search for the mastermind who stole money from her company and created the C.R.A.S.H. android. They raid the arms dealer who was trying to sell C.R.A.S.H. when it went live (back in PG #14) and he tells them that it was briefly stored in Antarctica. They knew this was connected with the purchase of massive thermal generators (implying somewhere cold), but they needed to narrow the search area down. Power Girl’s superspeed/x-ray search of the ice cap finds a man-made structure hidden beneath the ice. However, she’s ambushed by a super strong masked combatant as she approaches the base. Nicco’s remote sensors can’t get a lock on his physiology, but whoever it is they’re as strong as Power Girl. She finally manages to pull her attacker’s mask off to reveal that “he” is actually a dark-haired female just as Nicco radios her that the woman is a kryptonian.

Continuity: C.R.A.S.H. stands for “Cybernetic Re-Adaptive Simulant Humanoid”.

Opinion: Well I didn’t see that one coming – another excellent twist by Judd Winick. I’m writing this review after I’ve read the next issue so I (and possible you dear reader) know who the raven-haired kryptonian is. However at the time my mind was racing with who she could be – a survivor from Kandor, one of Zod’s crew escaped from the Phantom Zone, another Mutliverse refugee. The fight with Divine (she get’s named next issue) was the opening sequence for last issue so it’s almost two issues of re-sequenced drama before we’re back in sync. This works really well and gives a boost to what could have been a very procedural/non-action investigation. It seems that Dick Grayson gets his best solo outings as Batman in Justice League titles. Both James Robinson and Judd Winick manage to retain that sense of joy and flair he had as Nightwing whereas most of the Bat-titles tend to over do the Bruce Wayne Batman impersonation.

Credits: Written by Judd Winick; art by Sami Basri; coloured by Sunny Gho and Jessica Kholinne; lettered by John J. Hill;  edited by Rachel  Gluckstern (associate) and Mike Carlin; cover by Basri and Gho.

Synopsis “Snow Job Part One”: Power Girl faces the fallout for forcing Karen Starr’s employee, Nicholas “Nicco” Cho, to help her during Crash’s rampage. It wasn’t hard for Nicco to figure out that Starr and Power Girl were the same person and he confronts her about it. Nicco is angry that his boss appears to be “fraud” who disappears when her company was in dire straights. On this issue, Power Girl approaches the Batman (Dick Grayson) about tracing Donna Anderson – the accountant who disappeared with the contents of her company’s bank accounts. He traces Donna to Thailand, but by the time PG arrives Donna is dead from an apparent heroin overdose. She doesn’t believe that Donna would have stolen the money or killed herself and suspects that somebody is still playing with her. At Donna’s funeral Karen approaches Nicco and recruits him to a secret computer lab built by the Batman. He will be her secret weapon in tracking down the villain responsible for targeting her and her company. Batman’s own investigation had found that Karen’s money had been filtered through a series of shell companies before getting lost overseas. The only concrete lead was that part of the money had been used to purchase thermal generators for use in the Arctic. It is that route which leads Power Girl to a fight in the snow against a masked opponent.

Continuity: The Bat Bunker scene between Power Girl and Batman takes place nearly simultaneously with a scene in Justice League: Generation Lost #10. The Gen Lost scene involves PGs arrival and their discussion about Maxwell Lord. Max’s post-hypnotic suggestion means that they lose their train of thought and drift on to the discussion about Donna shown in this issue.

Opinion: Four issues in and Winick and Basi’s run on Power Girl continues to keep a high-standard. Judd Winick continues to surprise me with his use of pacing. Sometimes he’ll spend pages and pages on the most inane fights and then at other times the scripts will thunder through various jumps and revelations in the matter of a few pages. I can’t quite work out if I like it or not.  The disappearance of Donna and – the dramatic cover image – is wrapped up very quickly, but the two-page sequence from the PG discovering the body to her standing at Donna’s funeral is beautifully drawn and coloured.  The tie-ins with Generation Lost remain interesting and you have to wonder if the Artic facility is one of those unearthed by Skeets.

Credits: Written by Judd Winick; art and cover by Sami Basri; lettered by John J. Hill; coloured by Sunny Gho; edited by Rachel  Gluckstern (associate) and Mike Carlin.

Synopsis: Power Girl (Karen Starr) is still having a very bad day. She thought she’d defeated the synthetic purple-android with the stolen memories of the arms dealer Randall Mikavic, but she’d only been keeping it busy whilst its programming rebooted. That completed, the android grows in size and announces – chatty as every – that its primary objective is the destruction of New York City. Power Girl calls Nicholas Cho – an employee of Karen Starr’s R&D company – and blackmails him into digging up whatever secret information about the android is available (Cho had been a hacker who was caught by the FBI and then spent his conviction by working for them). Cho discovers that it the android is called “C.R.A.S.H.” and is a weapon designed to be dropped into a city where it goes on a four-hour rampage before shutting down. Power Girl simply keeps it occupied for another hour and then lets it power down naturally. However, she suddenly weakens and collapses from exposure to kryptonite radiation as a teleportation portal opens. A man steps out and leads Crash away. The last thing Power Girl sees as the portal closes is the stranger introducing himself to Crash as “Max.” Back at the office, Cho tells Karen Starr that he knows that she’s secretly Power Girl.

Continuity: Max is of course Maxwell Lord which ties these events with Justice League: Generation Lost. It had already been established in Power Girl #13 and Justice League: Generation Lost #4 that Power Girl’s company worked on the same type of technology that Max was interested in.

Opinion: As a character Crash is less that interesting. The opening monologue of Randall Mikavic had potential, but as the protagonist for a two-issue brawl he’s over played. That said, I find the concept of a weaponized-monster interesting. He’s effectively Godzilla or Mothra turned into a weapon of mass destruction – drop the monster into a city, let it rampage for a couple of hours, and then send in your conventional forces to mop up any remaining resistance. No radiation, no chemicals, just a very large rebuilding bill. Nice idea, but I’d have preferred Godzilla. The running exchange between Power Girl and Cho was fun – I particularly liked the bit about throwing the evidence into Starr’s office. Something I just realised – this issue is using sound effects (“Ka-Boom”, etc). They work really well as part of the art.

(Crash is a skinny purple thing, that swells is size, gives Power Girl a pounding for four hours before collapsing, flaccid and spent. Best not to comment on that I think. )

Credits: Written by Judd Winick; art and cover by Sami Basri; lettered by John J. Hill; coloured by Sunny Gho; edited by Rachel  Gluckstern (associate) and Mike Carlin.

Synopsis: Against the very load protestations of its owner (Karen Starr alias Power Girl) Starrware Labs has been put into administration by the Loan Officers of First Federal and Savings Bank. Her finance officer Donna has disappeared with the contents of Starrware’s bank accounts and has fraudulently sold off the company’s patent portfolio. However, Karen’s attention is diverted from her company’s urgent problems when she is called away as Power Girl to answer Booster Gold’s questions about Maxwell Lord and then to investigate a problem at the docks. A clandestine meeting between competing arms dealers Randall Mikavic and Benjamin Vitale has gone wrong. The stolen pod they were bargaining over has opened and something seized Mikavic.It copied his mind into a synthetic android that is now destroying everything in sight. Power Girl challenges the surprisingly chatty android and it reveals that its programming is still booting. She thinks she has it subdued until the boot up finishes and it declares its intention to destroy New York City.

Continuity/Commentary

• The scene between Power Girl and Booster Gold would match a montage in Justice League: Generation Lost #2 in which the members of the JLI try to establish who remembers Maxwell Lord. However, in Generation Lost the person who talks to PG isn’t identified beyond her saying “Did Booster put you up to this?” (or words to that effect), i.e., it’s not Booster speaking to her.
• The Mikavic/Android says it has three objectives, one of which is Power Girl, and then says its primary objective is the destruction of New York City. Its origin is unidentified in this issue, but the pod has something like “crash” written on its lid.

Opinion: Judd Winick’s second issue seems to do a lot less than his first. The bank subplot is used, but isn’t advanced. Ditto with the Maxwell Lord angle. However, both of those sequences are still interesting. The exchange between the arms dealers is fun, but I found the resulting big-purple-meanie (BPM) to be be decidedly less interesting. Winick has been really good in Generation Lost and here with Power Girl herself in hitting a character’s “voice”, but the BPM just comes across as uninteresting and two-dimensional. However, this is only the first part of a story so we’ll have to see where it goes. The art by Sami Basri and colouring by Sunny Gho is brilliant and works really well.

Credits: Written by Judd Winick, art by Sami Basri, coloured by Sunny Gho, lettered by John J. Hill. The associate editor was Rachel Gluckstern and the editor was Mike Carlin.

Synopsis: Power Girl, in her civilian identity as Karen Starr owner and CEO of Starrware Industries, has had her hands full with corporate matters. One of her scientists, Nicholas, who is trying to get her to approve an increase in lab space for his Nanobyte processing units, gives her a pair of ear rings that include a miniaturised cell phone. Her Head of Finance has vanished and the bank is sending in four executive finance officers to investigate. However, before she can act on that Superman announces that Maxwell Lord, the JLI’s rogue ex-director, is still alive. Power Girl’s plan to ambush a group of mercenaries at the JLI’s Moscow Embassy is scuppered when Booster Gold suddenly appears and starts a fire fight with them. The exasperated Power Girl then follows up a second lead on her own. She encounters a warehouse of OMACs in Northern China, but they break off from the fight when Maxwell Lord makes a global telepathic broadcast and erases everybody’s, including Power Girl’s. knowledge of his existence. She returns to New York, but in her absence the banks’ officers have revealed that Starrware’s accounts have been cleaned-out by her missing Head of Finance.

Continuity: This issue takes place concurrently with Justice League: Generation Lost #1.

Opinion: This is Judd Winick and Sam Basri’s first issue and so far they’re doing a pretty good job. There is definitely a more serious tone to the issue than during Jimmy Palmiotti, Justin Gray and Amanda Conner’s amazing run, but the jump isn’t so great that you feel like you are reading another book entirely. The strength of the old art team was Amanda Conner’s excellent linework. While Basri’s linework isn’t as good as Conner’s linework, it combines with Sunny Gho’s colours to create a visual style that is just as strong. I love the old-school concentric circles mind-control motif that is used when Max actually makes his broadcast. The integration with Justice League: Generation Lost, which Winick also writes, is very tight. So tight in fact that you suspect that Maxwell Lord is behind Starrware’s money troubles (especially as the next part is trailed as “The Lord Hath Taken Away”). He did the same thing to Kord Industries, but the subsequent investigation cost Ted Kord (alias the Blue Beetle) his life . The subplot of the Nanobytes is interesting because in Generation Lost #4 Max talks to a scientist about Nanobyte genetics research. It may just be one of Judd Winick’s favourite buzz words, but the connection could play out.