Action #305: Karen Blair's Family Tragedy, Blamed on Supergirl!

As we've learned in this tale from October 1963, Karen Blair hates Supergirl.  Now we learn why, in this flashback.  A few years ago, Karen's astronomer father was giving her brother a tour of the observatory, from which he had recently communicated with space aliens, when a shadow passed by in space that fired some sort of energy beam at the building.  Our story continues ...

As you can see in the third panel, DC hereby established a hard date:  Supergirl's rocket arrived on Earth precisely on May 18, 1959.

Arguing from the typical logical fallacy Post hoc ergo propter hoc, Karen therefore blames Supergirl's rocket for the fire.  In response, Supergirl narrates for her, and us the readers, the story of her origins.

Breathes there a man with soul so dead, that never to himself has said, "I know Supergirl's origin story"?  If so, here's a refresher!

Isn't it handy that the domed Argo City was well-equipped with those handy-dandy Air and Food Machines?

 However, the ground (not anything else, I guess) became deadly Kryptonite due to the explosion.  So wasn't it also handy that Zor-El (brother of Superman's dad Jor-El) happened to have enough rolled-up lead sheet -- just kicking around in his lab -- to cover THE ENTIRE CITY!?@?

Then, after Kara has grown to young womanhood, meteors smash through the sheeting, exposing the inhabitants of Argo City once more to the deadly kryptonite rays.

Doesn't it strike you as odd that no mention is made of the fact that, before puncturing the lead ground covering, these meteors PUNCHED HOLES IN THE DOME?  Well, a later tale sort of addresses this question.  More on this, possibly, anon.

As you can see in this flashback, Supergirl's parents sent her to Earth after discovering that her cousin Superman was there serving as Earth's champion.  We're supposed to believe that this advanced race, home to food machines and air machines and super-telescopes, a people with enough resources to pave a city in lead sheeting -- these guys could only come up with a puny rocket able to carry ONE FREAKIN' PASSENGER to safety?  Ah, the Silver Age!

And as Argo City sinks slowly into the west, we leave this flashback in midflash, to be continued on Friday.  Supergirl's rocket is on its way to Earth, and next she will try to explain to Karen Blair that it couldn't possibly have caused that deadly fire.  After all, Supergirl is one of the GOOD GUYS.

 

Action #305: Karen Blair Tells Her Story of Super-Resentment

Linda Lee (Supergirl) Danvers can't figure out why fellow Midvale teen hates the Girl of Steel so much.  Instead of leaving this state of affairs alone -- depriving us of a story -- she pursues Karen in a ttempt to ghet to the bottom of things.

Unfortunately, Karen almost gets to the bottom of a car crash, but for a puff of super-breath.  Then she lays the whammy on Supergirl, blaming the Kryptonian Kutie for the death of her father and her brother's future life in a wheelchair.

Let the flashbacks begin!

Our remembered tale begins as Dr. Blair is showing Karen's brother Phil around the old place, describing his latest project.  Turns out that Daddy Blair was trying to communicate with space critters.  Does he use light flashes, a kind of space Morse code?  Does he use radio pulses to try and impart universal mathematical concepts that will be recognized by minds across the universe?

No ... he tries a light show.  He turns his observatory into the equivalent of a planetarium laser light show.

There are several unforeseen downsides to this idea. 

1.   The aliens might not have color vision
2.   With distance, there is a pronounced color shift, so the message won't stay "true"
3.   In 1963, Pink Floyd's The Dark Side of the Moon is still a decade away from release!

But miraculously, the aliens of Daxnar III not only receive and decode Blair's message of friendship -- they reply!

But, heck darn it!  Just as Dr. Blair was fixing to reply to the Daxnarians, a strange winged shape flew across the night sky just above the observatory.  Worse, it seemed to have zapped some kind of energy beam into the lab, setting it ablaze!

Soon Supergirl will share her own flashback.  See you on Wednesday!