Power Girl pits her new psychic powers against the menace known as Johnny Sorrow, but is it too late to save her family and friends? Your Major Spoilers review of Power Girl Special #1 from DC Comics awaits!

POWER GIRL SPECIAL #1

Writer: Leah Williams/Joanne Starer
Artist: Marguerite Sauvage/Natacha Bustos
Colorist: Marguerite Sauvage and Marissa Louise/Tamra Bonvillain
Letterer: Becca Carey
Editor: Brittany Holzherr
Publisher: DC Comics
Cover Price: $5.99
Release Date: May 30, 2023

Previously in Power Girl: With new powers and a new mission, Power Girl faces a challenge unlike any she’s experienced before: she now strives to battle the demons (literal and figurative) lurking within the minds of some of the greatest superheroes of the DCU. But the nefarious Johnny Sorrow has been searching for a connection to Earth-0, and the superheroines’ work may unwittingly give him the means to make their world his personal stage! Can Power Girl and her estranged Super-Family bring down the curtain on Sorrow’s evil plans? And at what cost?

TRAPPED IN HER OWN MINDSCAPE

Our festivities begin with a perfume commercial, oddly enough, advertising Sorrow, a new fragrance from Johnny Sorrow. Power Girl and Omen walk down the street, having an ice cream and enjoying the day, when PG realizes that something’s not quite right. Before Omen can respond, her friend hits her with a flying side kick, knocking her out of her reverie and into the real world. The duo finds that Johnny Sorrow has summoned his Four Horsemen (The Pit, The Pendulum, The Poet, and The Piper) and that much of the world, including the Superman family, is under his control. Using Omen’s experience with psychic phenomena and Power Girl’s new “Astral Punching” power, they meet Sorrow head-to-head, but quickly find that the most dangerous things are already inside Power Girl’s head.

THEY CALL HER PAIGE NOW?

There are a few confusing moments in this story if you haven’t been following events in the Superman titles. We start with Power Girl and Omen already in jeopardy, with Omen calling her “Paige,” something that’s never really touched upon or explained in the issue. Even a simple caption that mentions events in the Superman titles would help, but once the Johnny Sorrow story gets cooking, it never really feels like he’s that much of a threat. He wants to take Paige back to Earth-2 and repopulate the world, but for an omnipotent mind virus, he is easily punched out of existence, and the story just sort of ends there. Power Girl’s new psionic powers may or may not be gone, too.

The second feature is a story of Fire and Ice, dealing mostly with their struggles to come to terms with Ice’s situationship with Guy Gardner. It features a well-done Superman cameo and some very cute, expressive art. Both stories also feature impressive, vivid coloring from Carey and Bonvillain, which is almost a character in itself.

BOTTOM LINE: I WISH I HAD MORE CONTEXT, BUT I LIKED IT

Unexpectedly, Power Girl Special #1 wasn’t tied into JSA continuity as I thought, but instead Superman continuity, and while that does affect the context of the story, it’s more than the sum of its parts with vivid coloring and attractive art getting past the parts of the narrative that don’t quite land, earning 3.5 out of 5 stars overall. I will say this, the new jacket look is a nice change to her classic look.

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