Review: Power Girl #16

Review: Power Girl #16
[Editor’s Note: This review may contain spoilers]

Writer: Leah Williams
Art: Adriana Melo
Colors: Romulo Fajardo, Jr.
Letters: Becca Carey

Reviewed by: Matthew B. Lloyd

Summary

Power Girl defeats Ejecta, and there is a surprising revelation about Karen Starr, yes KAREN STARR.

Negatives

We’re going to flip things around and start with the negatives first for Power Girl #16.  As usual, there’s some really bad dialog that Williams thinks is funny but just seems out of place.  She tries to give Ejecta some sexual innuendo in her speech when Power Girl starts fighting her in this issue and it doesn’t land.  In one instance PG takes off her horrendous jacket (which is a good idea) and Ejecta responds, “ooh, kinky.”  This is isn’t funny or clever, but also remember, Ejecta is supposed to be 11 or 12 emotionally.  She aged up, but not because she had any life experiences to age her intellectually or emotionally so it’s kind of creepy when you think about it.  Williams’ scripts to be very juvenile.

At the end of the fight, Power Girl makes a strange decision to let Ejecta go back to Symbio.  She states that Stryker’s (Island Penitentiary) and the Justice League would ask too many questions about Ejecta’s injuries and that Symbio would just break her out anyway.  Just a few pages previous, PG is trying to get Ejecta to let her help her until she learns that even as a kid Abigail had violence problems before Symbio kidnapped her.  That car accident we saw last issue was her parents taking Abigail to get professional help.  So, Power Girl decides that this girl no longer needs professional help and sends her back to the entity that has assisted her in becoming more violent and giving her a homicidal outlet for that violence.  It’s not going to get better, it’s just going to get worse.  Power Girl’s actions here make no sense.  She’s actually making things worse for Abigail/ Ejecta AND allowing a known danger to remain loose who could easily hurt others.  

Negatives Cont’d

Sybio as a Lion Cyborg is loosing any sort of interest.  This is not a character that can sustain interest.  He’s also beginning to look silly.  How he’s morphed into a loving and caring surrogate father for Abigail is strange considering his main goal originally was to kill Power Girl- he can’t control her so he’ll kill her.  This storyline has run its course.

At one point in the fight with Ejecta, Power Girl claims that Symbio wanted Power Girl to be his “perfect murder daughter.”  When did that happen?  The symbio ship wanted to control Power Girl and KEEP her because it was all it knew to do, continue to follow its programming.  Then, it wanted to kill Power Girl which is why it attacked her back in the first arc of this run.  At no point did the Symbio ship ever want to use Power Girl as a “perfect murder daughter.” Williams is just making things up.  It’s also strange that Power Girl struggles to beat Ejecta so much.  This should’ve been a walk in the park for her.  She should’ve dug deep and overcame Ejecta without resorting to alien weapons in the Fortress of Solitude.

By the end of Power Girl #16, PG and Omen are buying the old Daily Star building and they have some plans…one of which is to include even more roommates!!!  Yay?  Williams seems to be emphasizing the importance of friendship for PG.  She’s doing it without any reference or acknowledgement of her past friends and teammates in the JSA.  No mention of Helena Wayne Huntress, Atlee-Terra, or any JSAer- back in the early 2000’s she and Black Canary got along quite well despite PG not liking Oracle.  PG isn’t just a “little girl lost” who needs friends.  She has friends, she has teammates.  She’s an adult, she’s not a twenty-something trying to find herself.  That’s Leah Williams.   Power Girl’s been comfortable in her own skin for a long time.  Just because Leah Williams doesn’t understand those stories, doesn’t mean we should have to suffer.

Positives

Power Girl #16 has some nice art from Adriana Melo.  There are a few close ups of PG in her fight with Ejecta that are particularly well rendered and effective.  Melo is a good artist and it’s a shame she shackled to the atrocious writing in the series.  There are moments in this issue that feel like Williams is trying to pivot with her depiction of Power Girl’s personality.  She tries to make her tough.

At the end of the issue, Williams brings up the Karen Starr name…and while surprising, and a bit exciting, it’s also strange.  When PG tells Omen she’s buying the old Daily Star building, she tells her that while “Paige Stetler” is broke, Karen Starr is a millionaire.  So are we going back to the Karen Starr identity?  Will Leah Williams drag that name through the mud as well?  It’s a strange turn, one that doesn’t seem like it was always part of Williams’ plan.  It’s not really  a step in the right direction unless she fixes the substance of Power Girl’s character as well.

Verdict

Leah Williams does center this series on character.  She doesn’t write the character accurately or consistently even within her own standards, or with good dialogue, but she does try to make character important.  Unfortunately, the direction it takes Power Girl in the series is even further from the core of who Power Girl is…more roommates?  Williams’ reimagining of Power Girl and it’s not landing- how have we gotten 16 issues?  Power Girl #16 is not any better, it just does the same thing with the same problems and suggest “maybe” something better is coming…but, it never does.