Supergirls In The Spotlight

The adventures of Solar Girl and Moonshine! Created by Thomas Castle.

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Somebody wanted to draw Solar Girl and wanted other drawings of her, so here's the Very First Drawing and here's also a couple drawings Shane did and hasn't scanned yet, which are important for showing other details. It's supposed to be somewhere between a military uniform and a cheerleader's outfit, and I haven't figured what all the colours in the original actually are or represent yet.

The top is a jacket or a vest over a black undershirt and I guess there are yellow epaulettes and a yellow collar of some kind. Also the mask is supposed to be white but the black stood out against the skin tone the original artist used.

I'm not sure why the sleeves on the second coloured picture are white or the epaulettes red? Sleeves are supposed to be black because it's a black undershirt and the epaulettes the same colour as the collar. The skirt on that one looks white but it's actually subtly shaded orange, like the proper skirt.

Bonus: The only known drawing of Dr Synergy, her arch-nemesis with a thing for merging creatures to make chimeras, with a particular focus on spiders and creating "the perfect spider-human". He was supposed to have a skull for a head and bloodied lab scrubs but I like this look a fair bit better. The dark spots are blood, presumably.

I'd put in Shane's drawing of Moonshine but it was unfinished, so uh.

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The Alliances of Spotlight City

In recent years of Spotlight City's history, a number of masked heroes and villains have shown up in increasing numbers, and a large variety of these have formed alliances of sorts. Regarded by a police force led by Commissioner Michael O'Hanlon as gangs and vigilantes, no matter if they're doing good things or not, some of these alliances are at war with each other while others fight alongside each other.

All of them are regarded by the general public as dangerous, their existence and seemingly constant involvement in personal matters with each other rendering Spotlight City essentially a war zone. Their almost constant generalised perseuction by the Spotlight Sun, an ostensible personal crusade against them by editor-in-chief Johnny Ocean, hasn't helped these matters, though Johnny himself has come to admit that his "crusade" is solely to sell papers.

Some of the more well-known alliances include:

The Limelighters - An alliance of masked heroes originally assembled by Solar Girl and Moonshine. They aren't as well associated with each other as some of the other alliances due to the fact that they spend most of their time going solo in sectors of the city they've agreed are their own, but they occasionally team up under the name "Limelighters" when they need backup or when something threatens the whole city. The Limelighters gain and drop new members all the time but the most common lineup consists of Solar Girl, Moonshine, Totem, Scarlet Court, Emerald Flash, and Foursight. Other occasional members have included Bound Radical, Spyderite, Hexcellence, Saber, the Jet Set, and the Bombshells.

The Court of Blood - An alliance of villains formed from previously solo villains who were thought dead but somehow resurrected. Organised and led by the Contessa, the Court of Blood's primary goal is, like the villains the team consists of, making people be more like them, with the secondary goal of hurting Solar Girl as much as possible. The Court of Blood consists of the Contessa (formerly in love with Rapture, the Contessa seeks to spread her almost religious ideals of torture and pain), Dr Synergy (whose primary goal is creating an army of spider-human hybrids), Professor Killjoy (whose primary goal is creating an army of perfect, education-obsessed students), the Hypno-Terrorist (who just wants to break people's minds so he can be the one to put them back together), Mr Right (a misogynistic pickup artist who seeks a conquest over the women of the world), and Graver and Lolita Darling (lovers who seek to create an undead army of goth-raving punks like them).

The Jet Set - An alliance of masked thieves who steal from rich scum like Esquire, Fleshmonger, the Hoarder, and Packrat while working on smashing the patriarchal culture that rules the city. The Jet Set consists of Rockefeller (the daughter of Esquire), Silver Stiletto (the daughter of the Contessa and Rapture and the twin sister of Lolita Darling), Mannequin (once in love with Status Quo, who is responsible for her transformation into a living doll), Graphique (a graphic designer who can control electricity), Mock Mirage (once enemies with Emerald Flash, now grudging allies), and twins Rag and Bone (themselves the daughters of the Hoarder and Packrat).

The Empty Force - An alliance of villains who have been broken by the world and seek to cause chaos in an attempt to fill the hole inside. and righting what they see as wrongs. Originally formed by Double Dare and Snake Eyes, the team consists of Double Dare (the brother of Emerald Flash, who can control people by double daring them to do things), Snake Eyes (a former gambler who is obsessed with gambling with people's lives based on the roll of his two loaded dice), Status Quo (the former lover of Mannequin who sought to relive his best days with her and can now trap people in time loops), Stun Gun (the former lover of Graphique who controls electricity).

The Bombshells - An extremist alliance with a focus on destroying institutions they feel are unnecessary or outright harmful, such as schools, hospitals, and the patriarchy in general. Originally showed up in Spotlight City after the destruction of New Dawn High School, whereupon they declared war on Professor Killjoy and his Honour Roll. The Bombshells consist of Cherry Bomb (a former cheerleader at New Dawn), Firecracker (a former football player at New Dawn), and Bottle Rocket (a former physics whiz at New Dawn).

There does exist, of course, solo masks who don't ally themselves with other masks - masks such as Rapture, Spyderite, Bound Radical, Hexcellence, Pilgrim, and many others - as well as alliances who don't operate in Spotlight City or once operated in the past and no longer exist, but those are not the focus of this spotlight.

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Character Spotlight: The Lost Boy

Long before the Haberdasher assembled the Outfit, he was just a lonely old man who sought companionship around his workshop, a problem he spent months and months to solve. He eventually developed his first and only living puppet in the form of a young boy that the Haberdasher called the Lost Boy, though he eventually took the name Bastian Marionette for himself.

Raised in captivity, the Lost Boy became very shy but also very lonely, especially after the Haberdasher's disappearance. Unable to keep track of time, the time between the Haberdasher's disappearance and new companionship felt like an eternity to the effectively-immortal Bastian. But he soon found new companions in the form of Stanley Quinn and his recently-deceased wife Amanda.

Wishing to make Stanley happy again, though the two only just met, Bastian walked him through the process of transferring Amanda's brain into one of the Haberdasher's enchanted mannequins. The process went wrong, however, in the form of the confusion and physical dissonance that resulted from Amanda's sudden death and subsequent resurrection in the body of a mannequin.

She ran from the shop, though she wouldn't be gone forever. Stanley left soon after, leaving the Lost Boy all alone again. Only a few months later, though he had no idea exactly how long or short of a time it was, Amanda came back to the shop, now calling herself Mannequin. She had forgotten much of her past and most of what happened to her to make her this way and sought information.

The Lost Boy welcomed the companionship once again and the two quickly bonded over their similarities. Like Mannequin, the Lost Boy was a living doll who wanted to be human. Like Mannequin, the Lost Boy would never grow up and would never die, as long as his body remained intact.

Though Bastian didn't steal skin in the hopes of becoming human again, he did begin helping Mannequin in much the same way he helped the Haberdasher. She even helped him with some of his problems, such as his shyness. They ended up being grounds of sorts for each other, the only one keeping the other altogether.

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Character Spotlight: Mannequin

A tragic and slightly unhinged character, Mannequin is a living mannequin who wasn't always a mannequin. She was originally the model and photographer Amanda Quinn, newlywed wife of clockmaker Stanley Quinn and a good friend of fellow model Selena Cross (better known as Silver Stiletto).

Amanda's human life came to an end while on a date with Stanley shortly after their honeymoon. Completely by accident, she became one of Graphique's first victims shortly after she acquired her new powers. Though Graphique ran after the murder, the distraught widow Stanley took Amanda's body into what appeared to be a nearby abandoned storefront to hide from the killer.

This storefront ended up being the Haberdashery, the former headquarters of the Haberdasher and the Outfit. After the Haberdasher's disappearance and the Outfit's dissolution, the storefront became abandoned and fell into mild disrepair. Stanley was greeted here by a living puppet called the Lost Boy, though he preferred Bastian Marionette.

Created by the Haberdasher to help around the shop, the Lost Boy was the only artificially living puppet he created. However, he also created a number of enchanted mannequins to act as test models for the Outfit.

Though a bit shy, the Lost Boy was also very lonely and welcomed Stanley's impromptu companionship and quickly noticed Amanda's recently-deceased corpse. He sought to help Stanley by bringing Amanda back to life and walked him through the very bloody process of transferring Amanda's brain from her own body to one of the Haberdasher's enchanted mannequins.

The process worked...sort of. She did come back to life. However, she was now a human soul in the body of an unfeeling mannequin, and the confusion of her sudden death mixed with the waves of dysphoria from her new body and drove her mad. She ran from Stanley and retreated into the underground.

Soon after that, she developed her rogue persona as she forgot more and more of how she became a mannequin and lost more and more of her emotions. She became Mannequin, skilled at stealth, frequently pretending to be mannequins in the offices of the very same fashion magazines that once valued her face so much. She eventually started skinning the kinds of people she wanted to be, especially other models, and wearing their skin in an attempt to replace them and feel human again.

Her best friend as Mannequin ended up being Bastian, as she soon went back to the Haberdashery for information about what had happened. Stanley was gone, however, and the only living thing left there was Bastian, and the two bonded over their similarities.

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Character Spotlight: Graphique

The most prominent case of the accidental villain in Supergirls In The Spotlight, Graphique was once a twentysomething graphic designer named Chloe O'Hanlon who had the misfortune of being in love with an electrician and inventor by the name of Ramona Craven. Later known as Stun Gun, Ramona's goal was to create specialised types of lightning that could accomplish various things.

One night, after a bad fight between the two that led to a set of drunken experiments, Ramona accidentally trapped Chloe between a set of specialised electric coils. Chloe was struck by the lightning produced by these coils, which Ramona initially thought to be fatal. However, Chloe soon exploded in a mass of electricity that destroyed the entire building and was thought to have killed Ramona along with it.

In the weeks following, Chloe found she now had the ability to control electromagnetism, though with her lack of knowledge as to how it all worked, she could only ever manifest her powers in bursts of lightning and electricity. Discovering these powers, however, came with a price in the form of accidentally electrocuting several people around the city, including Graciela Butera and Amanda Quinn.

Hunted by the police, including her own father Commissioner O'Hanlon, she was eventually cornered by Solar Girl and Moonshine and allowed to escape the city. She soon took up the mask persona of Graphique, a name originating in her background in graphic design, and began trying to get her powers under control in order to start helping people.

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Character Spotlight: Rockefeller and Silver Stiletto

The only biological offspring of Esquire, Rockefeller is the older (adopted) sibling of Socialighter, though Socialighter's habit of snapping at them drove the two apart early on. Born Morgan Fitzsimmons, they, like Hannah, were the victim of Esquire's abuse. It was worse on Morgan, however, considering Esquire's particular set of heteronormative values.

While his views saved Morgan from escort training, it also drove them into a mindset of paranoid secrecy and self-loathing. They developed a habit of sneaking out at night and stealing materialistic things, which they would end up spend hours hating themself for. It was in this life that they met a girl who would become the only good thing in their life: Selena Cross, a model who dabbled in the same kind of thievery Morgan did.

The two don't have any powers but Selena soon used her own history of gymnastics training and skills with breaking and entering to train Morgan in the same sorts of things. Soon enough, they masked up and began stealing things, mostly for themselves. Selena donned the name Silver Stiletto and Morgan donned the name Rockefeller, from the old rich family of the same name.

They eventually formed a small team of similarly-motivated thieves called the Jet Set and were occasional allies of the Limelighters, though none of them had any powers.

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Character Spotlight: Socialighter

The adopted child of Esquire and the younger sibling of Rockefeller, Socialighter is a very angry young girl who, like Rockefeller, grew up a victim of the abusive wrath of Esquire, by then a single father. Homeschooled, kept from the world, and forced into escort training from an early age, Hannah was around the same age as Solar Girl when she discovered, during a fit of pyromania, that fire no longer burned her.

In the months that followed, she started to realise she could feel less and less, and after a while, the pain receptors in her body failed completely. Now emotionally and physically dead inside, she engaged in more and more dangerous fire-related activities to try to feel anything at all.

Finally, after discovering her real parentage, she lost all control. She set a nearly fatal fire in the penthouse where she, Rockefeller, and Esquire lived and set off to kill her real parents for giving her up. She soon became a problem for Solar Girl and the rest of the Limelighters and developed an obsessive hatred for Solar Girl, for reasons only she knew at the time.

As one of the only rogues with control over fire, battles between Solar Girl and Socialighter were some of the most evenly-matched battles Solar Girl fought, as well as being some of the most destructive. Some might say Socialighter represents what Solar Girl would be if she ever lost control of everything.

She chose her rogue name from the socialites her father called escorts and her pyromania.

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Character Spotlight: Esquire

Often considered the upper-class equivalent to Fleshmonger, Esquire is both a rich crime lord and a genuine philanthropist - if one calls genuinely caring for his fellow rich people and casting everybody else away being a philanthropist. Born Eugene Fitzsimmons, Esquire is the biological father of the androgynous Morgan Fitzsimmons (later known as the masked thief Rockefeller) and the adopted father of Hannah Fitzsimmons (later known as the rage-fueled ball of flame Socialighter).

He operates a variety of charities that solely benefit other rich people around the city and backs these up with various illicit escort services (which he insists is not prostitution, like the brothels Fleshmonger runs) and high-quality drug trades. He is also at war with Fleshmonger out of a deep-seated hatred for everything Fleshmonger controls and stands for.

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Character Spotlight: Fleshmonger

Taking his rogue name from a derogatory nickname given to him by his prostitutes, Fleshmonger is a skeevy mobster well-known for controlling most of Spotlight City's underworld (including the prostitution and drug trades), his affinity for garish 70s stereotypes, and his continuing wars with both his upper-class equivalent Esquire and the middle-class artifact collector known as the Hoarder.

Originally known as Gordon William Hughes, Fleshmonger has gone to great lengths to erase that name from as many records as he can get his hands on, in an attempt to distance himself both from who he was and the law. In addition to controlling most of the city's gangs, he also owns a number of nightclubs in the city, through which he distributes his wares. The most well-known of these is the Seven Sins Disco Lounge.

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Character Spotlight: Dr Synergy

One of Solar Girl's creepiest rogues, Dr Synergy is a mad scientist archetype whose primary goal is the creation of a perfect hybrid species between humans and spiders, and using this species to create more of this species.

Dr Synergy was originally a biology teacher named Gerard Sinclair, working at New Dawn High School in Spotlight City. Even back then, he was one of the creepiest teachers at the school, frequently seen staring after some of the students and even more frequently discussing his obsession with spiders in class.

Several months after Solar Girl's first appearance on the scene, during a fight with another villain that took place in the school, Gerard accidentally got blasted with one of Solar Girl's signature fireballs. He sustained severe burns, especially to his face, and was in the hospital for some time afterward.

He never fully recovered and escaped from the hospital as soon as he was able to walk, retreating back to the secret basement laboratory beneath his house. The pain from the burns mixed with his attraction to students like Sarah and his obsession with spiders, and the cocktail drove him into fits of madness.

Purchasing secondhand technology off a black market supervillain tech dealer, he went to work furthering his goals while attempting to get back at Solar Girl, whom he both loved and hated.

Dr Synergy's rogue name was given to him by the Spotlight Sun, a news magazine run by Johnny Ocean.

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Character Spotlight: Moonshine

For the first several months of her career, Solar Girl had neither a sidekick nor very many traditional supervillains to fight (excluding the Phantom Fjorder). That all changed when her best friend, Caitlin Deckard, found out that she was leading a double life as Solar Girl.

Caitlin is the 15 year old daughter of world-famous inventor Richard Deckard (formerly known as Ghostwing of the All-Star Corps) and former Soviet model Karina Durova (formerly known as Ruby Justice of the All-Star Corps) and the youngest sibling of the family. Though she was raised in America, she was taught Russian by her mother from a young age and is very antisocial. The only person she is willing to open up to most of the time is her best friend Sarah; she doesn't say a whole lot to a whole lot of people the rest of the time.

While she doesn't have a history of cheerleading practice, she does have a history of martial arts taught to her by her mother, as well as being very very intelligent, especially where technology is concerned. Shortly after finding out about Sarah's double life, Caitlin found a lunar crystal in the forest - similar to the solar crystal that Sarah found, this crystal contained a uniform, a pair of lunar cuffs, and similar instructions. These cuffs, charged by darkness and shadows, gave her control over water and gravity (again, on a strictly personal level), as well as allowing her to almost instantly heal almost any injury she sustains.

She soon demanded to mask up alongside Solar Girl, taking up the mask name Moonshine (originating from her illicit alcoholism, though she prefers vodka to traditional moonshine) and working on developing technology to help the two out on the streets.

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Character Spotlight: Solar Girl

The star of Supergirls In The Spotlight, Solar Girl is a 15 year old superhero operating in Spotlight City alongside her best friend Moonshine. They are currently the leaders of the Limelighters. Solar Girl was born Sarah Gardner, the daughter of Walter Gardner (previously known as Centurion of the Irregulars) and Suzanne Walker (previously known as Streetwalker of the Irregulars), and grew up with a love of masked crimefighters like her parents. She became a superhero after finding a solar crystal, the last of its kind, in the forest outside Spotlight City.

Inside this crystal, she found a pair of solar cuffs, which, as long as she's wearing them, gives her control over fire and gravity (on a strictly personal level), as well as allowing her to almost instantly heal almost any injury she sustains. The cuffs are charged by sunlight and were found in the crystal along with a uniform and a set of instructions explaining it all.

Sarah, a cheerleader and a lifelong fan of comics, took the opportunity almost instantly and masked up as Solar Girl, using the gymnastic skills given to her by years of cheerleading practice to start busting criminals in the city. After a while, she was joined by her best friend Moonshine.

A few months later, a handful of other masked heroes showed up around the city, leading to an alliance between them. Though they normally patrolled agreed-upon sectors of the city, the allies, collectively called the Limelighters, also provide backup for each other and team up when the entire city is in danger.

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Right. This blog is for everything relating to Thomas Castle's Supergirls In The Spotlight. It'll probably just be for character profiles and things at the moment, but there might be a webcomic or something somewhere down the line.

So before we get to the character profiles, let's explain a bit about my superhero story and whatnot. The main story is called Supergirls In The Spotlight. Set in the fictional Spotlight City, the story stars sun-themed superhero Solar Girl and her best friend, the moon-themed Moonshine. It's all very dark, but if you know anything about me, you'll know how much I love dark things.

It's gone through a few different versions, all unfinished, since its creation about a year go. The first version was in blog form but that fizzled out after six or so months. The second version was supposed to be actual narrated stories but that fizzled out before the first story was even finished. The third version is supposed to be in webcomic form but Shane and I haven't even started work on it yet.

That's pretty much all I can think of at the moment.