Polite Dissent

12 Responses to “ Bad Medicine Theater, starring Batgirl and Supergirl ”

1. Dave Sikula
   February 23rd, 2008 at 1:22 am
   

   Damn! Were Kara’s “lungs” ever more filled than in that last panel?

2. Seth Finkelstein
   February 23rd, 2008 at 2:01 am
   

   But don’t powered Kryptonians (even at “reduced” levels?) not need to breathe? I assume they do it in their secret identities, for show, as part of the masquerade. But would “rescue breathing” be necessary? Maybe what Batgirl did in fact had no effect at all, and Supergirl was just recovering per her (reduced) super-powers.

3. MSJ
   February 23rd, 2008 at 3:47 am
   

   ‘You sure know how to fill a girl’s lungs’

   That sounds dirty somehow.

4. Scott
   February 23rd, 2008 at 7:16 am
   Official Comment

   Seth,
   At this point in the story, Supergirl had been magically stripped of all of her powers (which makes me wonder why Batgirl was unable to do rescue breathing by herself). But again, this is a Silver Age Kryptonian, so pretty much anything is possible as far as her powers are concerned.

5. Keith
   February 23rd, 2008 at 7:51 am
   

   To quote Captain Jack Harkness, “This is very homoerotic.”

6. Evil102
   February 23rd, 2008 at 8:21 am
   

   Hmm…being stripped of all her powers ruins the only possible explanation I could think of: That Batgirl wasn’t able to inflate Supergirl’s lungs as she wasn’t able to blow hard enough, so she had to use the tyre since the air pressure inside was much higher.

7. EMT Student
   February 23rd, 2008 at 10:09 am
   

   Am I just confused or did I miss something? wouldn’t she have just been doing rescue breathing and not CPR? I never saw anything related to CPR in those frames.
   But I would never do rescue breathing off of a tire. She would be bagged with a BVM via NPA or a OPA, or if needed… my personal favorite, a duel lumen airway.
   of course I would have also checked a pulse….

8. Alan Bryan
   February 23rd, 2008 at 10:31 am
   

   This trick was used in the TV show Alias (season 1 or 2).

   Sydney’s mom or Sydney (I forget) were being chased and drove off a pier.

   Sydney (or her mom) survived by using the air on the tire valve to remain underwater.

   That wouldn’t work either. right?

   Even when I read the Batgirl/Supergirl story at age 11 or so it didn’t seem logical. I recall a friend and I discussing this for an hour.

   We thought of testing it somehow but then decided not to.

9. Scott
   February 23rd, 2008 at 10:48 am
   Official Comment

   EMT Student,
   You’re right — it’s rescue breathing and not CPR per se, but “CPR” is just so much more succinct and eye-catching in this situation (plus rescue breathing is part of CPR, so I figure my caption is not technically incorrect).

   Alan Bryan,
   Mythbusters did an episode on that idea, and considered it “busted.” If you look around the web, there’s some interesting discussion about whether it can actually work or not. It seems it may be possible if you trap the air escaping from the tire and use that (as opposed to putting your mouth on the stem), but either way it’s not as easy as movies/TV suggest.

10. Eric Henry
    February 24th, 2008 at 12:15 am
    

    I’m glad I’m not the only one to whom “You sure know how to fill a girl’s lungs!” sounded dirty.

    James Bond did the breathing from a a car tyre in “View to a Kill”.

11. Ray Tate
    February 24th, 2008 at 11:55 am
    

    Actually, we discussed this scene a couple of years ago on our site. I can’t see why this trick wouldn’t work on a Kryptonian. A Kryptonian’s tissue is after all invulnerable. On a human, it’s a bad idea, but Kara’s not human.

    However, I can see it working in Alias because that was a planned escape. So Sydney’s father and Vaughn could have arranged for the specially fitted tire to actually be a source of oxygen–even just as a contingency plan.

    This would also explain how Syd got the tire valve open because you’re supposed to be only able to do that with some kind of tool–which I assume Batgirl would carry in her utility belt.

    Also, I don’t think there need be a conflict in the idea of Kryptonians being able to hold their breath in space near indefinitely and being threatened with suffocation. Given that they are aliens, perhaps, they have a different lung structure which allows for a kind of back-up air-supply.

    Ray

12. Jon
    February 25th, 2008 at 10:14 am
    

    Superman Family #171 is the first comic I ever remember looking at as a kid (I was about 3 or 4). I remember being so puzzled by what was going on that I resolved to learn how to read ASAP so that I could find out what was being said in the word balloons. By the time I did learn how to read, the comic book had disappeared, so I never got to read it (until fairly recently when I finally managed to figure out what comic it was and track it down). Still, it was pretty much the “gateway drug” that got me hooked on comics.

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