Adventure Comics #406
Published and © by DC, May 1971
Title: “Suspicion”
Synopsis: Linda “Supergirl” Danvers moves to San Francisco to start a new job – unfortunately, with Lex Luthor’s niece in tow.
Writer: Mike Sekowsky
Penciler: Sekowsky
Inker: Jack Abel
Review: After years of done-in-one Silver Age adventures, it’s strange picking up a Supergirl comic steeped in issue-to-issue continuity. But this issue requires a full-page text recap to bring new readers up to speed. Stranger still is reading a middle-age man’s take on what it’s like to be a young woman in the early 1970s. From hip fashion to hippie protests, this one is an obvious relic of its time. And despite there being any real sense of danger or drama, give writer/artist Mike Sekowsky credit for at least trying to tap into the era’s youth culture vibe.
Grade: B-
Second opinion: Recommended by The Slings & Arrows Comic Guide (second edition), 2003.
Cool factor: Sekowsky’s work from this era often feels like he’s trying to replicate the Marvel style for the Distinguished Competition.
Character quotable: “Superheroes are just super-fuzz!” – an unnamed protestor, unimpressed
Editor’s note: This review was written Oct. 17, 2021.
