DC Super Hero Girls: Finals Crisis is the first graphic novel based on the first generation of the DC Super Hero Girls franchise, and it is the first graphic novel in the entirety of the franchise. It is written by Shea Fontana and illustrated by Yancey Labat. It was released on July 5th, 2016. The first two chapters of the book were released for Free Comic Book Day on May 7th, 2016.[1]
Official Description[]
Preparing for high school exams is hard enough, but at DC Super Hero High, even the tests are super-tough!
In the first-ever DC Super Hero Girls original graphic novel, Supergirl, Bumblebee, Wonder Woman, Batgirl, Harley Quinn, Katana, and Poison Ivy are studying hard when they are each trapped by a mysterious villain! Will the students outsmart their captor, save Metropolis, and still pass their finals?
Summary[]
Chapter One: Super Hero High[]
The comic begins with Wonder Woman sparring with the Cheetah in Coach Wildcat's Physical Education class. Wonder Woman eventually wins by capturing her in her Lasso of Truth, and receives an "A" grade from Wildcat as their classmates cheer. While Supergirl and Batgirl congratulate her, the Cheetah hisses in jealousy. While walking through the halls of Super Hero High, an announcement summons all students to the auditorium, where Vice Principal Grodd sternly commands the students to be quiet for Principal Waller's announcement. She announces that semester finals are tomorrow, and to pass, students must prove that their powers have improved since their entrance evaluation. As Batgirl has Oracle set an alarm for the 9:00 finals at that time, Grodd abruptly ends the assembly. Later, Wonder Woman, Supergirl, and Batgirl prepare for their last Intro to Super Suits class before finals, as Supergirl abruptly dashes off, claiming to have left her stealth-suit project in her locker. At the Super Suits class, the teacher, Crazy Quilt panics about a fashion emergency before calming down as Wonder Woman suggests he is just being a trendsetter. Crazy Quilt takes the class' attendance; as he gets to Supergirl, he notices she is absent, and most of the other students don't recall seeing her. Batgirl notices her flying out of the school through the window and suggests that she wasn't feeling well. The shot is then of Supergirl flying away with a stressed look on her face.
Chapter Two: Homework[]
Supergirl flies out of Metropolis to the Kents' farm in Smallville, mentally admitting that seeing the farm helps her destress from the pressures of school. As Jonathan Kent sees her, she crashes into the barn. As Jonathan and Martha Kent ask her why she isn't in school, she tells them she plans to quit due to finals, admitting tests were a long time weakness of hers. As her adopted parents try to reassure her that a test cannot be too bad, Supergirl shares a memory back on Krypton before it was destroyed of her going to Finals at Krypton High on her horse Comet. Upon arriving, she gets bullied by other students who push her into a mud puddle for using a horse when she can fly and for having her house name on her bag. At the Finals, she tries to demonstrate a new way of accelerating the growth of crystals using drops from a solution. Despite practicing successfully several times, upon noticing Comet get stolen by one of the bullies outside the building, she drops the solution to chase after Comet, causing the Crystal to grow through the building. As she catches up and calms down Comet, she is given a failing grade for carelessness and neglect. Back in the present, the Kents comfort her and encourage her to do her best on the finals, as not doing so would be letting the bullies win. Supergirl gets motivated and hugs her them before flying off to return to the school. As she does so, she is spotted by a shadowy figure hiding in the trees, who shoots her with a kryptonite dart obtained off the internet. As she collapses to the ground unconscious, the figure scratches her name off a list which also includes her friends Wonder Woman, Bumblebee, Batgirl, Katana and Poison Ivy, and comments, "One down. Five to go".
Chapter Three: Growing Up[]
Back at the Intro to Super Suits Class, Batgirl shows off her stealth wear project and is praised by Crazy Quilt, while Poison Ivy thinks to herself that this project requires tech, which she disavows in favor of leaves, vines and chlorophyll, while creating a winding helix with the plants outside. After class ends, Ivy goes to a classroom for detention, and admits to Grodd that she used too much fertilizer for a Venus Flytrap which turned huge and smashed through a wall and attacked her fellow students, Starfire and Beast Boy. Grodd reprimands her for grinning in detention and warns her to keep her plants under control. While serving her detention, Ivy secretly and eagerly tells the Cheetah her plans for the Finals by creating the "biggest, wildest plant ever", while the Cheetah encourages her to prove it by cranking up the fertilizer. Grodd reprimands Ivy again for grinning during detention. After detention ends, she runs to her greenhouse with a small, potted plant that she "liberated" from Principal Waller's office and plans to turn it into her "most massive plant ever". Upon arriving at the door of the greenhouse, she finds a doorknob ad for a 50% off sale on radioactively enhanced fertilizer. She leaves the plant, Mister Greenberg by the door before leaving the school for the sale, passing by Bumblebee as she exits Capes & Cowls Café and causing nearby plants to grow as she walks by. She eventually arrives at Lexcorp Garden Supply, a "seedy" store from the ads directions, and gets locked inside by the same shadowy figure. They battle, but despite Ivy's intensive training, she is incapable of using her powers as the store has been sanitized and has no plants or fungi growing inside. After ducking from a laser beam, Ivy throws a cash register at her assailant, but is ultimately defeated and tied up by a rope. The figure then scratches Ivy's name off the list.
Chapter Four: On the Snack Run[]
Bumblebee crams for the finals with Starfire and the Flash, but as she is quizzed on the three "pows". A loud growling sound is heard, revealed to be her tummy and leaves to satisfy her hunger with a honey smoothie at Capes & Cowls, promising to return. She enters Capes & Cowls as Killer Croc robs the Café, and engages him in battle. She fires a sting at him, only for him to duck, but escapes his hands when he tries to catch her by shrinking. She finally defeats him by returning to normal size and stinging him. As Lois Lane asks her about how it feels to defeat Croc as he stole tuna sandwiches, she responds by saying she still feels as hungry as she was when she arrived and asks Steve Trevor to prepare a honey smoothie. Steve tells her that the smoothie machine is broken, and she shrinks and enters the machine to assess the problem. She discovers a damaged cable, and upon exiting the machine tells Steve she can fix it with a Solar Reconflabulator from the Weaponomics supply closet. Upon returning to the school and entering the Weaponomics room, she finds it empty, with no sign of Mr. Fox. But encounters Beast Boy transformed into a goat hiding from Katana. She promises him that she will not tell Katana of his whereabouts. She finds the tool, but as Mr. Fox cannot sign it out as he is nowhere to be found, she decides to take it to fix the smoothie machine and return it before anyone notices it missing. Back at Capes & Cowls, she fixes the machine and gets a free smoothie from Steve. As she flies through Metropolis enjoying the smoothie, she is attracted by the smell of honey foods. Lured into an alleyway, the shadowy figure rips out her suit's battery, leaving her powerless and promptly carries her off in a net with tape over her mouth and holding her flight pack.
Chapter Five: Slice of Life[]
Katana, having honed her sword skills nonstop throughout the semester, prepares for the finals by practicing with Beast Boy, who she finds the perfect partner for being quick, fun and unpredictable, chasing after him as he transforms into various animals. After Beast Boy wins three practice rounds and Katana wins 642, they decide to play "Super Hide and Seek" to help Katana practice her stealth. After finding him in Ivy's greenhouse as a bat, in the Super-Suit design classroom as a gorilla, and in the Weaponomics room as a goat, she finds him again as a chameleon in Principal Waller's office, but accidentally slices through a bowling trophy on Principal Waller's desk when her sword falls out when she dismounts from an air duct. To avoid punishment from Waller, they go to the Super-Suit design classroom and fix it with a hot glue gun. After seeing Waller in the hallway outside, Beast Boy distracts her by skateboarding through the hall as Waller chases after him while Katana sneaks the trophy back to Principal Waller's office. She eventually makes it to the office and puts the trophy back on the desk, but is attacked by the shadowy figure, whose suit's stealth technology and high speed, reactive movement enables the figure to disarm Katana of her sword and defeat her in hand-to-hand combat. The figure drives out of the school in a Lexcorp van with Katana tied up in the backseat. As the figure asks her if she would like to listen to country or smooth jazz, she protests to be let out, and the figure decides on the latter before scratching her name off the list.
Chapter Six: Extra Credit[]
Wonder Woman, Hawkgirl and Lady Shiva do a stakeout at twilight and discuss their Weaponomics pop quiz. Shiva and Hawkgirl both say that they got perfect scores and that they are still tied for first in the class. At 8:00, Hawkgirl asks the other two if they want to leave to study for finals, they decline to not let her get all the extra credit. As they try to find a villain to defeat for the extra credit, they spot Giganta attacking Steve at Capes & Cowls after she takes the wrong drink intended for Lois. Wonder Woman and her classmates spring into action and Wonder Woman saves Steve when Giganta drops him. In the ensuing battle, Wonder Woman tells Giganta to calm down and come with them, but she refuses. The three super heroes battle Giganta, with Hawkgirl pulling her hair, while Lady Shiva attacks her feet. Giganta pulls out a light post and clashes with Hawkgirl's mace while Lois Lane reports on the fight. Giganta tries to run away but is captured by Wonder Woman's lasso. As Commissioner Gordon takes over the situation, Hawkgirl and Lady Shiva decide to return to the school to rest for the finals with their extra credit work done. Wonder Woman declines to continue crime-fighting. Hawkgirl reminds her of a Super Hero High School rule that all after-hour villain nabbing must be done in a group of two or more in a buddy system, but she says she will just go out for fun. While patrolling Metropolis for crime, she hears Steve's voice calling for help, and tracks it to a voice recorder in front of the Lexcorp Garden Supply store. The shadowy figure then appears behind her, snatches her lasso and ties her up with it.
Chapter Seven: Keeping the Peace and Quiet[]
Batgirl studies and prepares for finals in her room, but is distracted by her roommate Harley Quinn playing loud dubstep music in her room. Incapable of studying in her room due to the loud music, she uses a zip line to study on a bench outside the school, but is distracted again by Poison Ivy baby-talking to Mister Greenberg, telling him that she will be her "most massive plant ever". Her subsequent efforts to find a quiet place to study at the greenhouse and at Capes & Cowls are also ruined respectively by Katana and Beast Boy playing Super Hide and Seek and the noises made by the broken smoothie machine. She files in the Batjet out of the school and explains to her father that she cannot study in the school. She arrives in her underground Batcave, but upon hearing a loud crash made by Giganta as she collapses to the ground after her battle with Hawkgirl, Lady Shiva and Wonder Woman, she goes to her beta Batcave near the Lexcorp Garden Supply store, but leaves again after hearing the noises made by the shadowy figure battling and capturing Ivy. Now late at night, she returns to the school to her risky last resort, her only completely sound proof Batcave. After sneaking through the hallways, she arrives at the only accessible point, the faculty lounge, forbidden to students, where her father is grading papers and would not be pleased if he discovers that she built a Batcave under the faculty lounge. Commissioner Gordon leaves when he receives a call that Solomon Grundy has been spotted downtown, and Batgirl enters the Batcave through a hidden door behind the lounge's water cooler. Upon entering, she notices the Batcave having no lights, and encounters the shadowy figure whose infrared night goggles makes the flashlight the figure brought unnecessary. The figure captures Batgirl, with her soundproofing preventing anyone else in the school from hearing her, before scratching her name, the final one off the list.
Chapter Eight: Blondes Have More Fun[]
While listening to dubstep music in her room, Harley Quinn receives a complaint from her roommate Batgirl over the noise she is making. After watching many of her schoolmates diligently preparing for finals, Harley decides now is a good time to have fun by giving back to the student body by dropping flyers for a party she is organizing after school in her room. Most students accept to go, but at the party, she notices her roommates and many of her best friends missing. She looks in Batgirl's room and apologizes for the music earlier, but finds it empty. She searches around the school and Metropolis, finding Katana's sword and Bumblebee's dropped smoothie before arriving at a bank while Solomon Grundy tries to rob it. She throws a glitter bomb at him, and asks where he has taken her friends. Grundy replies that he does not know about any friends and just wants to rob the bank. Upon noticing the grown vines around the bank's windows, she realizes Ivy has been here and leaves Grundy, following the vines to Lexcorp Garden Supply. As she tries to force her way through the door, she is noticed by the shadowy figure inside and her imprisoned friends. Ivy and Katana tell the figure to let them go before she makes him. The figure responds that although she didn't make his first cut, he does not "mind adding Harley to the guest list". He captures her using a trap door in front of the main door as she tries to break in. Harley drops into the kryptonite room containing the other girls.
Chapter Nine: Finals Countdown[]
The figure takes off his mask and reveals himself to be Lex Luthor, while Batgirl, Wonder Woman and Harley Quinn express unfamiliarity with him. Lex celebrates on the internet to his fans, the Lex-ites and thanks his sister for the inspiration and the suit which enabled him to defeat the top supers in the city. Meanwhile, Batgirl tells the captured heroes a plan to escape using outside help, despite their comm bracelets being scrambled by the prison. She clarifies and shows off her gadgets to build a power amplifier to enable Ivy's powers to reach the plants outside the building. Hours later, as Lex tells that his sister was rejected from SHHS for failing the psych test, there may now be space for her with many of their top students off the roster. With the amplifier completed, Katana suggests Ivy use stealth rather than get a big plant inside such a secure place. Ivy gets a small vine to sneak inside, disable the kryptonite, and free the heroes while Lex continues his broadcast and tells of his plans to make his sister the "greatest super in the world". Now free, Katana gives Bumblebee back her battery and Wonder Woman reclaims her lasso, and the Supers work together to defeat Lex, who despite being powerful enough to defeat them one-on-one, cannot defeat them as they combine forces as a team. He is finally defeated when Bumblebee opens his suit and destroys it from the inside. With Lex now trapped in the prison, Batgirl has Oracle alert the Metropolis S.C.U. to pick him up. Oracle also reminds her that the finals are in one minute. They race back to the school, but arrive at 9:01, a minute late, and Principal Waller does not allow them late entries. Though they each try to explain to her, she still refuses due to school rules. Batgirl then gets contacted by Lois Lane, who shows her a video she found streaming while looking for leads showing Batgirl and her friends working together to defeat Lex Luthor. She shows it to Principal Waller, arguing that the rules say that the finals don't have to be here at the school, and that by working together, they have shown that their powers have improved since first arriving at the school. Katana, Supergirl and Ivy also say that they were alone when first arriving and that by working together as a team, their powers are greater than ever before. Waller agrees, but gives the girls three weeks detention as they have admitted to breaking the rules yesterday, much to their disappointment. Grodd then yells at them for grumbling in detention. Some time later, Principal Waller congratulates the girls and their many classmates for passing their finals and says, "Hope you're ready, because things are about to get really super...".
Characters[]
Gallery[]
Trivia[]
- The smoothie machine at Capes & Cowls Cafe is made by Wayne Technologies.
- Amanda Waller's trophy is for the Bowl Reve Tournament, which is a reference to Belle Reve Prison, where the character usually works in the comics.
- The Beta Batcave has plushies of Batman and Nightwing.
- Also, Yvonne Craig's Batgirl suit from the 1966 Batman TV series was shown.
- Pages of the comics were shown on the opening scene of the 2016 Filipino film, Barcelona.
References
v • e Graphic Novels
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