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As people in battlesuits watch within a beleaguered high-tech fortress on a devastated world, Superman finds himself being followed, but can't seem to find the person following him until he picks up the heartbeat, indicating a female. Superman catches the person from behind, and he is surprised to f

The Supergirl Saga is John Byrne's final Superman arc of his run on the character after the Crisis on Infinite Earths. It introduces Matrix, a new, non-Kryptonian Supergirl.

Synopsis

As people in battlesuits watch within a beleaguered high-tech fortress on a devastated world, Superman finds himself being followed, but can't seem to find the person following him until he picks up the heartbeat, indicating a female. Superman catches the person from behind, and he is surprised to find a young blond-haired woman wearing a female version of a Superman costume.

The woman identifies herself as Supergirl, and surprises Superman again by transforming herself into the red-haired likeness of his Smallville sweetheart Lana Lang, saying she got her powers from Lex Luthor. This leads to a confusing situation between the two where Supergirl blasts Superman away with a telekinetic blast, and then makes her invisible before attacking Superman again, this time knocking him into the ground. Superman then burrows his way to his house in Smallville, where he finds his parents and Lana Lang all tied up in the cellar by a woman matching Supergirl's description. Superman realizes something about this Supergirl claiming to be Lana Lang and so gets her to meet the Lex Luthor he knows, who upon seeing her thinks she's Superman's sister.

Supergirl doesn't recognize him, though, which leads Superman to believe that she came from the same Pocket Universe dimension that he visited earlier, the one that Superboy from the Legion of Superheroes came from. As he tells her this, a teleportation field surrounds them both. Supergirl tells Superman not to worry, that he's simply being transported from his world into the Pocket Universe. It is there that Superman meets its Lex Luthor (the red-haired man in the battlesuit that was seen earlier in the story), who greets him by saying welcome to the end of the world.

Superman mourns at the loss of Superboy's adoptive parents and learns about the sad state the Pocket Universe Earth is in following Superboy's disappearance from its reality. As told by its Lex Luthor, he was trying to find out where Superboy had disappeared to by using his equipment in Superboy's secret lab when he accidentally stumbled upon the three Phantom Zone criminals -- General Zod, Zaora, and Quex-Ul -- who claimed to be innocent survivors of the destruction of Krypton and let them loose from their prison.

Destroying both the lab and the Phantom Zone projector, the Phantom Zone criminals went on a destructive rampage against the whole world, claiming to be its rulers and killing anyone that got in their way. Lex Luthor formed a resistance group and even gave Lana Lang powers similar to Superman, but it only resulted in the Phantom Zone criminals going so far as to destroy the Earth by burning away its atmosphere, killing everyone except those in Luthor's Smallville citadel. Learning the existence of the main New Earth universe, Luthor sent Supergirl across the dimensional barrier, blanking her memory but planting in her mind a compulsion to go to Metropolis in order to contact Superman. Superman at this point vows to join the resistance force to put an end to the Phantom Zone criminals' reign of terror on this world.

Superman along with Supergirl, Lex Luthor, and his resistance team confront the three Phantom Zone criminals as they engage in a battle that results in great disaster: the Smallville citadel is destroyed, all of Luthor's team members are killed, and Supergirl is surprisingly melted. Lex Luthor secretly tells Superman to head towards Superboy's underground lab while he tends to distracting the Phantom Zone criminals.

As the Man of Steel heads there, Quex-Ul goes after him and pummels him into the ground, his strength obviously greater than Superman's. Upon reaching the underground lab where there is still air to breathe, Superman finds a hidden lead canister that contains the Gold Kryptonite and exposes Quex-Ul to it.

Turning the underground lab into a prison and hiding the Gold Kryptonite sample in his cape, Superman also depowers General Zod and Zaora and captures them, letting them languish while he goes to find Lex Luthor, who is now mortally injured.

Before passing away, Luthor reveals to Superman two things: (1) that Supergirl was really a protoplasmic matrix that he brought to life, given powers and the memories of Lana Lang who was killed, and (2) he failed to use the Gold Kryptonite due to the same kind of pride issue that his New Earth universe counterpart has with Superman: he wanted the destruction of the Phantom Zone criminals to be by his own hand. Luthor makes Superman swear that he will not let the same disaster that befell his world take place on his own, and so faced with a difficult decision of what to do with three depowered evil Kryptonians who committed genocide on a global scale, he chooses to execute them by fatal exposure to Green Kryptonite, watching sadly as all three of them fall.

After burying their bodies, Superman brings the melted Supergirl back to his own universe to be put in the care of his adoptive parents while he goes off to contemplate over what he has done.

Issues


Trivia

  • The original Supergirl was killed in the "Crisis on Infinite Earths" event. In order to replace her, John Byrne came up with a non-Kryptonian Supergirl and introduced her in this storyline. Matrix would later merge with a girl called Linda Danvers, and eventually a new Kryptonian Supergirl was introduced.
  • The Lex Luthor of the Pocket Universe reality was seemingly identical to that of the pre-Crisis Earth-One reality up until the point where Superboy disappeared prior to ever first meeting him, thus this Luthor was spared the fate of becoming a villain.

Recommended Reading

Links and References


Supergirl v.5 38
Supergirl Storyline
DC Rebirth Logo

This event or storyline is specifically related to the character of Supergirl and/or her supporting cast. This template will automatically categorize articles that include it into the Supergirl Storylines category.

Superman Our Worlds at War Vol 1 TP
Superman Family Storyline
DC Rebirth Logo

This event or storyline is specifically related to Superman, or to members of the Superman Family. This template will automatically categorize articles that include it into the Superman Storylines category.

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