Just Stay at Home

The story of the Kryptonian Nightwing and Flamebird seems to be almost over. It's been an interesting experiment, putting a couple of untested characters in the lead of what should be the premiere superhero comics. It's hard to say whether or not it worked; it's easy to say that it was never intended to be permanent.

The question then becomes: what happens to the two of them? I imagine they'll survive their scuffle with "Rao" and go on to play a part in War of the Supermen. Whether they make it out of that alive is hard to say. Chris is going to have to face his birth father at some point. That's a given. The confrontation has been brewing for a while and it's bound to be messy.

Thara is going to have to deal with Alura, too. After all, Supergirl's mother blames Thara for her Zor-El's murder. So that won't go well either. Still, both of these encounters will almost certainly happen.

But after War of the Supermen? It's hard to say where things will end up. It's distinctly possible that Kandor stays in the bottle. It's distinctly possible that it has to stay in the bottle for whatever reason. Really, I think when this is all over most things are going back to the status quo: Zod and his goons go back to the Phantom Zone, Alura and everyone else (save Supergirl) get stuck in the bottle, and Nightwing and Flamebird become the heroes of Kandor.

Still, I'd like to be wrong. I'd love for their to be a real shake up in the way things play out. But how often does something so radical -- not to mention permanent -- actually happen in comics?

Well, I was about a million degrees off on the identities of Flamebird and Nightwing in this week's issue of Action. But me being wrong is nothing new, so that's okay.

Really, I think this pair will turn out to have a much better story. Especially since their main enemies appear to be Zod and Ursa. The concept of "sleepers" on Earth is a fascinating one... Especially when you know where they're coming from.

Oh, and it seems that the only Kryptonians of the El brothers' generation capable of degree of common sense were Jor and Zor. Why are so many Kryptonians either completely oblivious or just damn mean?

As you probably already know Greg Rucka and Eddy Barrows are taking over Action Comics this month. The star of the book will not be Superman, but rather Nightwing and Flamebird. No, not that Nightwing.

At the moment we don't really know who the characters are. We've got little more than a few hints and a some speculation. But as I am wont to do here this night I shall make my own predictions as to who the characters are.

First up is Nightwing. This Nightwing is a young male with black hair, clearly possessing both the powers of super-strength and flight. He's also got something he calls "tactile telekinesis." So it's pretty obvious to me that it is Superboy.

The tactile telekinesis gives it away, but you've also got the fact that both Nightwing and Flamebird seemed to know exactly how "New Krypton" would end. And if you're reading Legion of Three Worlds it's pretty obvious that that is where Superboy will be returning to life. And if he came from the future, he already knew what would happen.

The other member of the duo is Flamebird. She's a little trickier to pin down -- we haven't actually seen her fly under her own power and clues to her identity are sparse. Still, if the preview of next week's issue is accurate she has brown hair. It's not much to go on, but I still believe that Flamebird is Linda Danvers, former Supergirl.

That seems like a bit of a longshot, yes? After all, she hasn't been seen in years. But there are a few things that lead me to that conclusion. First, her new codename is Flamebird -- and as Supergirl she sported a pair of flaming wings (if you don't know what I'm talking about it's needlessly complicated and I won't explain it here).

Secondly, with her on the team that would mean that Nightwing and Flamebird are both heroes who are partially human and have worn the "S". Who better to protect the Earth from evil Kryptonians?