When “Fallen Angel” first launched from DC Comics, I played fast and loose with the notion that Lee was actually Linda Danvers, a.k.a. Supergirl. A number of hard core Supergirl fans, frustrated that I merely remained coy about it, wandered away from the series because they wanted to know what was up with Linda. When the series moved over to IDW, I revealed the true origin of the Fallen Angel.
Let the word go out, far and wide, in best nudge, nudge, wink wink fashion: Any fans of my run on Supergirl–particularly those who are torqued because Linda Danvers was consigned to oblivion in the DCU–must, must, MUST pick up “Fallen Angel” #14 and #15 when they come out next year.
Trust me.
PAD
• 
You, I’ll trust. When it was in print, Supergirl was the best thing that DC was producing. That was in know small part due to your writing of Linda Danvers. It’s criminal what they’ve done with her since…that being nothing.
Peter, you earned this fan’s trust long ago by consistently delivering ripping good stories. If you say I need to check something out, then I need to check it out.
what’s IDW?
Arrrrgh!
“‘know’ small part” of course should read “no small part.” Now that was a really stupid mistake for which there’s no excuse.
I hope that doesn’t hurt my credibility in praising your writing.
You are trusted, good sir, but you are being very, very cruel.
As long as we’re on the topic, though, you know who I’d like to see in Bete Noire? Blithe or Buzz. I’m fairly sure those are creator-owned characters rather than company-owned, but you’ll have to correct me if I’m wrong.
What’s the protocol for that, anyway? If you come up with a new character in a book starring a company-owned character, would that make the created character company property or creator-owned?
Oh hëll, I almost forgot to put in a request for Twilight. She’d do nicely in Bete Noire.
Ooooh, maybe all three of them could go looking for Linda, assume she’s Lee, and not find her?
THAT would be cool.
I shut up now.
Only if you use the same artists. 🙂 🙂
SO TOTALLY THERE.
Well, I’ve been there for the whole ride.
But still.
SO. TOTALLY. THERE.
Your Supergirl run, imho, is still the BEST comics run ever.
“Yes, I was an angel who fell out of favor with God for getting too involved with my human subjects. But BEFORE that, I was ret-conned out of existence by an alliterative editor-in-chief. Now the hëll away from me, Buzz.”
Heh heh heh heh heh… Awesome. 🙂
Just read # 11 – FA remains one of mine and my wife’s favorite books.
Thank you.
I hope I can get this. My LCS has a devil of a time getting Fallen Angel (no pun intended). Even though it’s on my hold-list, the last issue that I got ended with a knife in Violen’s(sp?) chest. I’m confident that it’s not a problem at the local level. The guy there told me that he’s ordered them, and he’s the type of store manager that I believe. He’s gone out of his way to re-order stuff for me before that I stupidly forgot to put on hold. He’s one to the good ones.
Mr. David, in the past you’ve wanted to know some detail about this sort of thing. If you want, I’ll ask the guy if he minds giving specific details.
Uh oh, I hope this doesn’t change my plan to have her be the female Time Trapper at the end of Zero Hour in 20 years when I finally get my foot in the door at DC .
I don’t know what the overall numbers were during the course of your run on Supergirl. What I do know is that since they’ve reworked the character, I have been totally disinterested. I enjoyed the whole run of Supergirl a great deal and I think DC made a big mistake. You managed to introduce a lot of good concepts and characters during the run. I can’t say I was ever interested in Supergirrl as a character before and I haven’t been since but, it was the whole Linda Danvers aspect which you fleshed out that made the book so dámņ enjoyable (nevermind I always loved Len Kirk and Robin Riggs).
Linda Danvers/Supergirl is my favorite title of all time. ‘Nuff said.
Btw, can someone explain to me why my local comic book shop keeps Fallen Angel under the DC section (I had a !@%^@ of a time finding it there btw), even though it is clearly published by IDW, whereas the Wildstorm titles, which are published by DC, are with the Dark Horse, Image, IDW, etc. comics? Yes, I know Fallen Angel was published by DC once upon a time (and the Wildstorm titles were by Image I believe), but I still find this rather strange.
Also, I hid an epiphany today while reading X-Factor (there’s no spoilers here). PAD, like Jamie Maddrox, has duplicates of himself. First, Jamie gets his own limited-series and is then cast the lead in X-Factor. Then, PAD makes Jamie turn out to NOT be a mutant (which, btw, I’m still scratching my head over how such reknowned geneticts like Moira, Charlie X, Beast, even Mr. Sinister (remember when Jamie had an evil dupe working with him? What do you mean you weren’t around for PAD first X-Factor run? Okay, I’m old, so what!) never figured this out.
Anyway, I’m off topic in my ramblings. Where was I? Oh yes, Jamie is not a mutant. This is because Jamie is a stand-in for the real PAD, who is not a mutant but rather whatever it is that Jamie is. Think about it. Not only would this explain how PAD has such a knack for describing Madrox and his multiple personalities and all the subsequent fallout, but also how he can write as much as he does. Seriously, the guy writes like 10 monthly comic books and still finds enough time to church out 5 novels a year (okay, maybe I exaggerated a little, but still, he does write a lot).
Maybe instead of having duplicates he just has a twin nobody knows about. Yeah, I could buy that. Unless the twin as evil. Or a Bush-supporter. That would have to be some sort of Anti-PAD, the opposite of PAD in every way. In addition to being a right-winger, he would, for instance, instead of being Jewish, he would bash Jews.
Wait! That would mean that the Anti-PAD could only be…MEL GIBSON? I mean, that would explain why Calhoun was modeled after him.
I think I’m going to stop rambling now.
If I may talk about x-factor. for a second. i’m curious would Nightcrawler also be considered a throwback like Jamie, or does the physical mutation not matter as the fact he wasn’t able to teleport at birth?
Your Supergirl (as well as your Aquaman) was the best. I loved the old Kara Zor-El way back when. But it was a different time and so forth (which someone should tell the current regime at DC since they want to bring the silver age back). It is also nice to know that you haven’t forgotten that past run. And, of course, throwing out what you just did will definitly get me out there to buy the comic. So I know what I have to add to my pull list.
Any further word on collections of the past series?
I’ll be waiting, Peter. Trust is never an issue when it comes to picking up your books every month. (And I got THREE of ’em today! Yay!)
Queen Anthai: As long as we’re on the topic, though, you know who I’d like to see in Bete Noire? Blithe or Buzz. I’m fairly sure those are creator-owned characters rather than company-owned, but you’ll have to correct me if I’m wrong.
Luigi Novi: Since those characters ran in DC books as part of Supergirl’s supporting cast, then they’re most likely not creator-owned, and are owned by DC.
> Uh oh, I hope this doesn’t change my plan to have her be the female Time Trapper at the end of Zero Hour in 20 years when I finally get my foot in the door at DC .
Wasn’t that revealed to be (A) not-the-real-Time Trapper and (B) Lori Morning.
“Mr. David, in the past you’ve wanted to know some detail about this sort of thing. If you want, I’ll ask the guy if he minds giving specific details.”
Yes, I would be interested. “Fallen Angel” faces enough challenges as it is. If fans are actively trying to obtain it and are being denied the ability to do so, I’d like to know about it so I can alert Chris Ryall at IDW. In your case, three issues, including one this week, have come out since the last one you were able to obtain. It’s bad enough that many retailers don’t order any for their shelves, thus thwarting casual buyers; if people now can’t even advance order it, then IDW needs to know about it.
PAD
Dear Mr. David,
Thanks for the heads up. I’ll be there and I’ll definitely spread the word. This is long overdue BTW but yes, thank you also for your Supergirl run. Those last 10 issues in particular were fantastic. Oh, and count me in for Matt D’s Time Trapper story too! Does anyone remember that Spider-Boy-Amalgam Time Trapper/Clone spoof? Probably my favorite part of that whole DC/Marvel Amalgam thing.
Okay, Mr. David. I’ll try to drop by there at lunch today. I’ll ask him if my summary of the situation is accurate and if he minds me giving out details to you.
Okay, Mr. David. I’ll try to drop by there at lunch today. I’ll ask him if my summary of the situation is accurate and if he minds me giving out details to you. Then I’ll forward it to you via the email link on the main page.
I found DC’s current incarnatin of Supergirl to be absolutely unreadable.
Thank goodness my local retailer is a good friend and doesn’t mind that the only hold item I request is Fallen Angel since it’s a special trip for me to go see him.
I am confusued though, I have in my possession up to #10 of FA and the current Diamond shipping schedule for this week said that #11 would be in stores this week. So when is #12 coming out?
Ageed about the current Supergirl. It’s rubbish.
The main reason why I started reading Fallen Angel is because I was reassured that this series has nothing to do with the DC universe, that it is something separate.
I am not interested in the DC universe and although I like some of the Superman movies (although not the Batman ones!) it was never enough to spark enough interest to buy DC.
Should Lee be Linda Danvers a.k.a. Supergirl or be at least somewhat connected, it would damage my interest in the book.
But I guess, I will find out…
Regarding the status of FALLEN ANGEL issues 11 and 12, 11 IS indeed out now–came out yesterday (along with Wonder Man and X-Factor, which made for a nice PAD trifecta). Issue 12 will be in stores on January 24.
I’m not sure why comics shops say they can’t easily get FA. It’s as readily available to Diamond as any issue of Spider-Man or 52. We overprint every issue, so Diamond certainly has enough copies to distribute.
We also sell the issues through our site (http://store.idwpublishing.com/) but don’t usually have the latest issue up there until a week or so after retailers get it (we want them to have first shot at selling it). If anyone is having big problems getting any issues of the book, please drop me a line.
Chris
Editor-in-Chief/Publisher
IDW Publishing
Fallen Angel is at the top of my must-have lists anyway, but I look forward to what I hope to be an appropriate coda to the “Linda Danvers/Fallen Angel” issue.
“Should Lee be Linda Danvers a.k.a. Supergirl or be at least somewhat connected, it would damage my interest in the book.”
No, Lee is not Linda. ALthough I stand by my assertion that fans of my “Supergirl” work will want to check out issues 14 and 15, I will assure you right now that Lee herself is not, in any way, shape or form, Linda Danvers. Nor is any knowledge of the DCU in general or Supergirl in specific required to read the issues.
PAD
I dropped out of reading comics before the end of PAD’s Supergirl run, so I never saw how it ended. Recently, I’ve gotten back in… and I saw that there’s a new Supergirl, who’s simply Superman’s cousin from Krypton (leaving out spoilers from the ‘Power’ TPB).
Can anyone tell me if that Supergirl is related to PAD’s? Or if not, how they’re explaining the existence of two Supergirls? Or if DC is simply trying to tell everyone that PAD’s Supergirl run never happened?
1
>>Can anyone tell me if that Supergirl is related to PAD’s? Or if not, how they’re explaining the existence of two Supergirls? Or if DC is simply trying to tell everyone that PAD’s Supergirl run never happened?
–there is *zero* relationship between the current Supergirl and PAD’s version. Following the events of Infinite Crisis, the revisions to DC’s continuity have retroactively wiped out Linda Danvers/Supergirl.
Best guess is that in this continuity, the Protomatter Clone of Lana (aka Supergirl) died in the Pocket Universe during the battle with the Phantom Zone criminals.
Tony
THIS IS why you are my favorite writer!!!!
If Madrox isn’t a mutant how did he get the Legacy virus?
Okay, I missed the end of the Supergirl run, and I hated that TPTB just decided to, from my perspective, completely ignore everything PAD did with Supergirl when Loeb brought in the “new” Supergirl in Batman/Superman. Not even a whisper of a mention of Linda by either Bats or Clark. The not mention by Clark being almost criminal, considering he and Linda became friendly. I always wondered what the “official” DC take on Linda was. And to hear that IC just wiped her out of existance…that just blows.
Tony, where has it been specifically shown and/or stated that Linda/Matrix/Supergirl was completely wiped out by the events of “Infinite Crisis”?
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>>Tony, where has it been specifically shown and/or stated that Linda/Matrix/Supergirl was completely wiped out by the events of “Infinite Crisis”?
–Paul, it was stated by Dan Didio during one of his interviews by Newsarama. Over the course of the 7 months Infinite Crisis was published, Dan was interviewed after each issue came out. He also fielded questions from readers. When the Earths collapsed together at the end of Infinite Crisis #6, one reader asked him the status of Linda Danvers/Supergirl. He responded that she was wiped from continuity. This of course resulted in many people (myself included) being up in arms about it. It’s not as if the character needed to be wiped out. No one was likely to touch her (since it seemed PAD was the only writer to use her) since there was a new Supergirl running around. And given Dan’s status at DC, I’d expect that to hold for quite a while. This being comics, it’s possible at some point in the future someone will come along and reverse that decision, but I’m not holding my breath. Nor would I want Linda back unless PAD (or someone as good as him) were to write her.
Tony
(Dan Didio’s long held a sort of dislike for the concept of the Earthbound Angel version of Supergirl. IIRC it started when he went to an amusement park (likely Six Flags) and went on the Superman ride (if you’ve not been, there are signs along the path to the ride itself featuring many of Superman’s allies, enemies and supporting cast). Supergirl’s origin was too complicated in his eyes (and in his opinion, in the eyes of any potential readers out there))
Well, I absolutely loved your Supergirl run and agree that it was one of the best comic runs ever. In particular, I thought 1-50 was spectacular and wich it could be put into trade forms just so my issues don’t get more dog-eared.
I’ve been reading FA since it’s inception and love it as well, feeling (despite the Liandre origin) that it is in essence Linda v2.0. So this little tease certainly has my attention.
Thanks for not forgetting the Linda fans out there.
I never really considered Lee to be Linda from the DCU. I’ve always suspected that some of the themes that Mr. David would have liked to explore with her may have found their way into Fallen Angel, but the character herself…no.
Paul, it was stated by Dan Didio during one of his interviews by Newsarama.
You can’t count editorial interviews as canon even from the EIC. Especially the same EIC who said Nightwing was going to die and that no hero name should have two people using the name at the same time– yet in the past two months alone we’ve seen two Flashes, two Hourmans, two Wonder Womans and a zillion Green Lanterns. If it didn’t happen directly on page– it didn’t happen.
The current Supergirl COULD be a coherent book if they could get a creative team to stick around for more than handful issues. Twevle issues so far with FOUR writers. (Counting an out of sequece fill in story.)
Peter’s Supergirl is by far the best run on the title. Though I did like previous Kara Zor’el stories the one with Ambush Bug or ‘The Secret Weakness of Brainiac Five’. Which was technically a Legion story in which Brainy makes a talking blow-up doll. No– really.
Lee herself is not, in any way, shape or form, Linda Danvers. Nor is any knowledge of the DCU in general or Supergirl in specific required to read the issues.
*raises hand*
Ooh! Ooh! Does Lee run into an Earth-born angel? Or Wally?