“No idea why I’m doing this”

That’s what I thought to myself when I first decided to pick up this book. And it’s the truth. I mean, sure, I appreciated Power Girl enough in the pages of Justice Society of America, but other than that, nothing seemed to add up. I historically didn’t like the creative team, I didn’t enjoy the previews of the book that had been running through several DC Comics in the past months, and I wasn’t sure that this was the type of book that I’d want to add to my pull list when I already have so much that I’m reading weekly, and so much ‘back material’ that I eventually needed to read.

As you can tell, I bit the bullet. I decided to pull the book based on excitement levels of comic book journalists that I trust (including the iFanboys), as well as seemingly everyone else around me going nuts for it. I was apprehensive, but in the end I thought to myself ‘What can it hurt?’ and the answer was: Nothing.

This was an absolutely stellar book. One of my biggest fears going in was that I didn’t know much about Power Girl, and I wasn’t sure that I cared. I’m always interested, whether I know the character or not, to see how a new creative team will introduce them. I feel like the first few pages of any #01 can be the most important, so it’s often my measuring stick. Power Girl knocked it out of the park. Using the “This is the story you kn…er…no it’s not” angle isn’t exactly original, but it helped get the job of explaining who Power Girl is and why you should care done in a very concise manner.

Those pages I really liked, but I still had the biggest adversary in front of me: the actual story. Often times I’ll be so interested in the idea of a comic after reading the first few pages, or even something as simple as a synopsis, that when I finally do get to sit down and read it I’m disappointed. Such was not the case here. Jimmy Palmiotti and Justin Gray did a fantastic job of showcasing the Superheroics that this book needed, alongside the more personal, meaty story that I was more interested in. I don’t think that any fan of either side of the spectrum can be disappointed here. If you wanted punching, you got punching. If you wanted to know more about what Power Girl does and who she is, you got that as well.

The art isn’t stunning, and as I mentioned before I’m not too big of a fan, but it got the job done, and even worked for me a little bit. Some panels were a little clunky, but for being someone who doesn’t care for the art, I came off fairly impressed by it.

I also enjoyed how the writers poked fun at Power Girl’s cleavage and sexuality. We had a small discussion on the comment section for this book about Power Girl’s costume, where the book would be going, etc. and, although I didn’t appreciate a lot of the comments and the undertones that went with them, they brought up a fair point. Power Girl is a very sexualized character — I mean, she has a 12″ hole in her shirt for the love of God. Who would ever think that would be proper adventuring attire? Not me, that’s who. The book did a very good job of establishing that, yes, the costume is silly, the character is a female and has breasts, and managed to have fun with it, while at the same time being respectful to readers and not giving too much focus to the sexual factor of the book.

All in all, this was a 5-star book that came out of nowhere. I’ll definitely be picking it up monthly from here on out, and I can only hope that the following issues will meet the standard that this one set.