Writer: Tom King / Penciller: Bilquis Evely / Colour Artist: Matheus Lopes / Letterer: Clayton Cowles / Cover by Evely and Lopes / Edited by Brittany Holzherr and Jamie S. Rich / DC Comics
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16th June 2021
The Pitch: Kara Zor-El has seen some epic adventures over the years, but finds her life without meaning or purpose. Here she is, a young woman who saw her planet destroyed and was sent to Earth to protect a baby cousin who ended up not needing her. What was it all for? Wherever she goes, people only see her through the lens of Superman’s fame. Just when Supergirl thinks she’s had enough, everything changes. An alien girl seeks her out for a vicious mission. Her world has been destroyed, and the bad guys responsible are still out there. She wants revenge, and if Supergirl doesn’t help her, she’ll do it herself, whatever the cost. Now a Kryptonian, a dog, and an angry, heartbroken child head out into space on a journey that will shake them to their very core.
The Super-family has long been a difficult gang to write for. With their power-set and limited weaknesses, after 80 years they beg the question: what do you do with the indestructible family? How are they best wounded? How do you create conflict and therefore drama? It's not a job I'd like to have. I have a theory that the reason we've seen so many Superman origin stories in the last 20 years is that writers found it intimidating to write new ways to render The Man of Steel flesh. For those wishing to take on Kara Zor El, things might seem a little easier. Because Kara is still a young character, there's still a sense of self-discovery to be mined. Even so, we've seen this as recently as Supergirl: Being Super. So what's a creative team to do?
THE STAGE IS SET FOR ‘TRUE GRIT’ IN SPACE, COMPLETE WITH PORTIS’ BIBLICAL, DISTINCTLY AMERICAN LANGUAGE
King and Evely circumvent the issue by making Woman of Tomorrow about someone else. Ruthye, a young woman on a distant planet, whose father has recently been murdered. Seeking retribution, she instead finds Supergirl, de-powered thanks to the red sun of the planet Ruthye lives on. It's here that Woman of Tomorrow changes gears, With Ruthye – like Kara – living in the shadow of a man, she wants an identity of her own. Her way of claiming that identity will be through violence, meted out by others in her name. With Kara forced to join her quest thanks to development in the final pages that I won't reveal here, the stage is set for an intergalactic True Grit, complete with a play on Charles Portis' quasi-biblical, verbose and distinctly American writing style. The western is a mercurial genre. Able to change with the times. Like comics, it is truly American in its roots. Taking it to space opens up its landscapes to a truly epic scale. Monument Valley, made of stars. It raises the level of its heroes beyond the menacing stature of Eastwoods and Waynes, to that of Knights or Samurai – Ronin without masters or equals. Kara in this series looks set to truly become the Woman of Tomorrow. A character in her own right who stands in her power. The quest she's hijacked into could become an adventure worthy of Wonder Woman.
King roots the story once more in trauma, but rather than the sense of powerlessness that pervades his previous work where depression overwhelms his protagonists, we instead get a driven lead who knows what she wants. Instead, it's Kara who is powerless. Dragged into a wrong even she may not be able to right. Evely's art (which I adored on Sugar and Spice) is finely tuned and exotic, using sparse details to create a believable alien environment that is part medieval, part Star Trek. She captures the awe-inspiring scope of worlds where you sense the hands of Gods shaping the universe and her art recalls Kevin O'Neill's style for League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. Lopes' colours give a beautiful glow to otherworldly mornings and nights casting a gorgeous light on Kara and Ruthye. From the opening, Cowles' perfectly captures Ruthye's confident but broken spirit, her words a list of wrongs made against her and her family. Woman of Tomorrow looks set to be the most epic of King's DC books yet.
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