Warning: Contains spoilers for Action Comics Presents: Doomsday Special #1
Though Supergirl. As another champion of Krypton and Earth, Kara Zor-El has shown time and time again that she's just as equal to any task as her cousin. In fact, another Justice League icon actually thinks there's one incredibly deadly villain that Supergirl is more ready to face than Kal-El.
In the Action Comics Presents: Doomsday Special #1 story "Doomsday in Hell"– by Dan Watters, Eddy Barrows, Eber Ferreira and Adriano Lucas – Supergirl awakes from a horrific dream, featuring the monstrous Kryptonian monster Doomsday in a realm of fire and death.
Soon after, Kara is stopped by Martian Manhunter, who tells his friend that it was he who sent her – and not Superman – the dream, hoping she could decode the Kryptonian message he'd received.
Martian Manhunter Trusts Supergirl, Not Superman, to Fight Doomsday
In "Doomsday in Hell", Martian Manhunter sends Supergirl a message he has received in Kryptonian, transporting it to his fellow superhero in the form of a dream, so that she may decode what he cannot. Supergirl is able to confirm J'onn J'onzz's worst suspicion: the message was sent by Doomsday. After Doomsday's most recent defeat during the events of Dark Crisis, the pair suspect that the monstrous creature was sent to Hell or, at least, some form of it. Martian Manhunter himself received the message, he suspects, due to a lingering psychic connection he shares with the beast, following his fight with a version of Doomsday during the Lazarus Planet event series.
Doomsday Is Krypton's Devil
Suspecting that the message was an attempt by Doomsday to reconstitute himself in the real world, J'onn sends the dream to Kara, and not Clark, to avoid making his friend relive the pain of Superman's death. When she dreams of Doomsday, Supergirl calls the creature Krypton's greatest monster, saying that "Krypton had no Heaven. It had no Hell. And yet, we still had a devil." Later in Doomsday Special #1, When Kara shares her dream with her cousin, Superman responds by telling her, "there have been few darker moments" than his fight against Doomsday, knowing that the Kryptonian creature would eventually kill him.
It makes sense that Martian Manhunter would want to spare his Justice League teammate, and friend, from being cannot die the same way twice, the fires of Hell allowed him to grow stronger and stronger, until he nearly has the power to escape through pure malice and terror.
Doomsday Special #1 depicts Supergirl, clad in Hell armor, barely holding the villain at bay, succeeding only through the assistance of the damned Doomsday tortured. The souls of Hell fight Doomsday to simply shield others from the monster's pain, by keeping him at bay with their own. As Kara puts it, "It's the best we can ever hope for, keeping our Doomsdays at bay." A fight like this, a battle against his greatest trauma, in a setting where they can be no saviors and there is no hope, is not a fight Superman would fare well in. Instead, Supergirl and Martian Manhunter do only what they can, saving the Justice League for a more hopeful mission.
Action Comics Presents: Doomsday Special #1 is available from DC Comics now.
