Why was the "Linda" alias abandoned for Supergirl

[jimmy]

Just to clear up a point, Lee was her chosen family name. Supergirl used her super-hearing to listen in on many Earth girl names and chose the name "Linda Lee" for herself when she registered at the Midvale Orphanage. This followed the LL naming convention in Superman mythology. When she was adopted by the Danvers, then her full name was Linda Lee Danvers, but she was usually just called Linda Danvers.

Maybe Supergirl was being coy and keeping her house name--El--in her name, in a round about way. And I imagine Otto Binder was thinking of the young singer Brenda Lee who was rising in popularity at the time.

It's probably not right to develop a crush on a paper character in two-dimensions, but I think I had a crush on Linda Danvers when I discovered her at the age of 8, in the back pages of ACTION COMICS. I had blonde hair, but I guess the brown hair and the headband did something for me. She looked just like a lot of older girls that would hang around with my sisters. And I've posted before that she reminded me of Shelley Fabares on THE DONNA REED SHOW.

There was a distinct difference between Linda and Supergirl--so hers seemed an effective disguise.

The interesting thing with the TV Supergirl is that up until recently, Melissa Benoist's hair always looks a bit browner as Kara Danvers than as Supergirl, where her blonde highlights seem more prominent. It could be a trick of the light or I might be seeing something that isn't there.

However, in the last few episodes before the break, Benoist's hair looked much blonder in both identities.

Boy, I remember this page when it first ran!!

Melissa's hair was a bit of "bone of contention" with me, as it was too dark as Supergirl, and was better suited for the Linda (Kara) character. However, Benoist's locks, have been steadily getting lighter, more so, then her earlier incarnation, but could be lighter still!!

I never understood why she wasn't much more blonde to begin with, as a child, in the series she is shown with auburn (reddish-brown) hair which goes completely against type however, I know the current Supergirl show play the "poetic license" card really heavy - Que - Sera, Sera...

[Jim Kelly]

Given all the wigs and dye jobs on the CW, I'm hard-pressed to come up with an explanation for Benoist's hair colour on SUPERGIRL. Maybe originally (over on CBS), they believed that GLEE viewers would be confused if they saw Melissa with a completely different hair colour, so they wanted to ease that transition.

I really don't know. But I think it would be much better if they made a stronger contrast between her Danvers hair and her Supergirl hair. The way that Benoist plays the two, the hair colour difference helps to bring out that contrast in character (reticent, subdued Kara Danvers vs. bold, bright Supergirl).

[marhawkman]

I've always heard Care-uh as the pronunciation for girls named Kara. And that's how I pronounce Kara Zor-El. It annoys me whenever I hear the Car-ah pronunciation on the TV show. However, I don't think you can allege there's a "proper" pronunciation for names. Many if not most names have multiple pronunciations and its purely your own bias which one you prefer.

If TV Supergirl was really clever and she still wants to keep the Kara name, then she would insist on pronouncing her name one way as reporter girl and the other way as alien girl. Didn't Ms. Grant have her own way of saying Kara?

It's like how there's something like 6 ways to spell "Karen". That's the funny thing with proper names. How my name is spelled and pronounced is the right way to pronounce my name. But the fact that people can point out so many actual people with similar names says a lot about why the writers are fine with Supergirl using Kara when pretending to be human.

[Joker Venom]

Also, personally, I prefer her pre-crisis origin of being born after Clark as Argo City survives longer than Krypton and then she’s raised by Fred and Linda. Hope that returns someday.

Agreed. It's not a deal breaker for me, but I just find the notion of her actually being Superman's OLDER cousin to be a bit weird.

[Digifiend]

The only people that have even heard of the name Kara Zor-El are Kryptonians and some of the other Fort Rozz prisoners, and it seemed they all know Kara Zor-El is Supergirl anyway.
Plus a few friends that Supergirl has herself told them her real name is Kara Zor-El.

So of the Earthlings out there who has even heard of Kara Zor-El? Let alone are then going to make the connection that some blonde woman named Kara Danvers has the same first name as Kara Zor-El.

Kara Danvers is brunette, remember - she uses glasses to alter her hair colour.

[Doctor Bifrost]

Agreed. It's not a deal breaker for me, but I just find the notion of her actually being Superman's OLDER cousin to be a bit weird.

Yeah, I'm not quite sure why they decided to commit to this. Maybe they just thought the whole Argo City thing was too weird - but it's no weirder than lots of other things that go on around the DCU.

[Jim Kelly]

Just say that Argo City was an outpost on a moon or planetoid, with an artificial life support system, where Zor-El was stationed at the time of Krypton's destruction. The people in Argo City had to struggle to survive, with damage to their system and cut loose from Krypton's gravity well. Kara Zor-El was born into the harsh conditions and then, as the Argoans died off, she was launched in a life-pod equipped with a homing device to follow the energy signature of Kal-El's rocketship through hyper-space to Earth.

[Carabas]

Just say that Argo City was an outpost on a moon or planetoid, with an artificial life support system, where Zor-El was stationed at the time of Krypton's destruction. The people in Argo City had to struggle to survive, with damage to their system and cut loose from Krypton's gravity well. Kara Zor-El was born into the harsh conditions and then, as the Argoans died off, she was launched in a life-pod equipped with a homing device to follow the energy signature of Kal-El's rocketship through hyper-space to Earth.

You mean have her arrive on Earth as a baby, taking away some of the stuff that makes her different from Superman?

[Doctor Bifrost]

You mean have her arrive on Earth as a baby, taking away some of the stuff that makes her different from Superman?

I don't think that's what he means. It's certainly not what I mean.

I mean going back to the original: Argo City somehow survives the destruction of Krypton. Kara is born there (years after Krypton explodes, and therefore years after Kal-El is born). She grows up there until she's about 16. Then Argo City is about to be destroyed, and her parents send her in a rocket ship to Earth. She's about 16 when she arrives, and Clark/Kal-El is (to approximate) somewhere in his mid-to-late 20's, already active as Superman for a number of years.

I think it's an important aspect of Supergirl that she grew up (at least until her teens) in a Kryptonian culture, whereas Superman grew up on Earth from babyhood. (Although some Silver Age stories seem to make him a little older, like 4 or 5.)

One thing that gets lost lately is that Krypton, as originally envisioned (and for many years after) had no space travel. (Because they never developed it; or, in later stories, when that made them seem a little backwards, because they had prohibited it due to a catastrophe associated with it.) So Jor-El creating a spaceship for little Kal was an enormous achievement, as well as a last-ditch effort that came so late that no one else could be saved. (There were some stories in which the ship was large enough for Kal and Lara, but she refused to go with her infant son, deciding instead to stay behind and die with her husband. That strikes me as a... well, let's just say, suboptimal choice.) Nowadays, especially on the Supergirl TV show, Krypton seemed to have extensive space travel capabilities, but the destruction of the world happened so fast that almost no one could be saved. I find less pathos in that version, though - it's less like they were desperate and helpless, and more like they were careless.

But that's just me.

[marhawkman]

In the Timm-verse, Argo city wasn't on Krypton at all. It's always been true that Kryptonians had spaceflight tech and it was on Krypton's equivalent of Mars. With Kryptonian tech it was a few hours to travel between them.

[KurtW95]

Agreed. It's not a deal breaker for me, but I just find the notion of her actually being Superman's OLDER cousin to be a bit weird.

Yeah, I'm not quite sure why they decided to commit to this. Maybe they just thought the whole Argo City thing was too weird - but it's no weirder than lots of other things that go on around the DCU.

Certainly no weirder than her dad being Cyborg Superman. (which should immediately be retconned)

In the Timm-verse, Argo city wasn't on Krypton at all. It's always been true that Kryptonians had spaceflight tech and it was on Krypton's equivalent of Mars. With Kryptonian tech it was a few hours to travel between them.

She wasn’t even related to Clark there, which was odd.

[Midnighter]

Just want to chime in and say I LOVE Pre-Crisis Argo. I think it's one of the most fascinating parts of the mythology. I hope it returns someday.

I mean hey, if Streaky can return anything's possible.

[Jim Kelly]

Just want to chime in and say I LOVE Pre-Crisis Argo. I think it's one of the most fascinating parts of the mythology. I hope it returns someday.

I mean hey, if Streaky can return anything's possible.

I read something recently where the guy was saying it seems like every red-head from the comics has dark hair when they go to live action. It's gotten so bad for gingers that even Streaky is portrayed by a black cat. I thought that was funny.

I don't think that's what he means. It's certainly not what I mean.

I mean going back to the original: Argo City somehow survives the destruction of Krypton. Kara is born there (years after Krypton explodes, and therefore years after Kal-El is born). She grows up there until she's about 16. Then Argo City is about to be destroyed, and her parents send her in a rocket ship to Earth. She's about 16 when she arrives, and Clark/Kal-El is (to approximate) somewhere in his mid-to-late 20's, already active as Superman for a number of years.

I think it's an important aspect of Supergirl that she grew up (at least until her teens) in a Kryptonian culture, whereas Superman grew up on Earth from babyhood. (Although some Silver Age stories seem to make him a little older, like 4 or 5.)

What he said.

I just meant that, if it makes things simpler, Argo City should be an outpost satellite of Krypton--rather than a city on the planet's surface that miraculously survives the destruction. But other things about the Zor-El family would remain the same. And Kara would grow up until she was perhaps a young teen and then be sent to Earth.

You could say that the outpost was set up as an early warning post, in case of invasion--after the attack from Brainiac. The survival of Argo City, after the loss of the mother planet, would make an interesting science fiction story. They could survive for a short period of time, maybe twenty years, but at some point the outpost could no longer sustain itself and the people would die off.

Even with our rocketships, if something happened to Earth without much warning, would anyone be able to escape the planet and survive? At best a few people could go to the space station or the moon. But then what? How long would those people be able survive before the situation became impossible? It would take decades to get beyond our solar system and thousands of years to reach a planet in another star system that could support life. You would need a giant space ark for that and that would require several years to build--not something you can whip together in a day or two.

Had Kal-El's little ship been a propulsion rocket, then the little baby would have died, as well, before he could reach a yellow sun. Jor-El must have figured out a way to jump into hyper-space so the rocket could get to our solar system. Either that or little Kal-El was put in suspended animation and his rocket drifted for thousands of years through normal space before it found a yellow sun that could power him up.

[marhawkman]

She wasn’t even related to Clark there, which was odd.

IIRC he once called Kara In-Ze a distant cousin, but... very distant. Or maybe he was talking about the people of Argo being cousins of the Kryptonians?

You could say that the outpost was set up as an early warning post, in case of invasion--after the attack from Brainiac. The survival of Argo City, after the loss of the mother planet, would make an interesting science fiction story. They could survive for a short period of time, maybe twenty years, but at some point the outpost could no longer sustain itself and the people would die off.

Or do what Timm did and say they lived there because they could. I mean, if it only took a few hours to fly to Mars, a LOT of people would move there. Even if they had to live in habitat domes.

[Last Son]

Certainly no weirder than her dad being Cyborg Superman. (which should immediately be retconned)



She wasn’t even related to Clark there, which was odd.

Yeah, they went a step too far with that. Considering Argo was still a Kryptonian colony and right next to Krypton, some of the El family could have lived there.