Last week we took a look at a new nemesis for the Man of Steel who calls himself H'el. In the current H'el on Earth story arc, we're seeing Superman, Supergirl and Superboy deal with an individual that claims to be from Krypton and is completely loyal to the House of El. He wants to bring Krypton back and has shared this plan with Supergirl. He has also pointed out that Superboy is a clone and an abomination while Superman has turned his back on his Kryptonian heritage by living as an Earthling.
In his first appearances in SUPERBOY #0, SUPERMAN #13 and SUPERBOY #14, H'el had an inverted Superman/House of El symbol inverted on his chest. He even had it on the cover of SUPERGIRL #14. Yet in the pages of SUPERGIRL when he approaches her, he doesn't have the symbol. Is there a reason for this or could there have been a decision to remove the image?
== TEASER ==
It's been suspected that originally H'el was meant to be a New 52 update of Bizarro. That would explain the backwards symbol. Some have suspected that either we're seeing some artistic goofs or DC simply wants to have the symbol go away to distance H'el from the notion of Bizarro. This clearly isn't the case. There is a reason we're sometimes seeing it and others times it's gone.
It was in the pages of SUPERGIRL #14 that sheds a little light on the matter. H'el first surprises Kara during their first encounter. He transported her to the sun and comes up behind her. He doesn't have the symbol on his chest but her immediate reaction is to strike him at full force. When she hits him in the chest, you can see a glimpse of the symbol. Kara was unable to hurt H'el and as he explains who he is and what his mission is, he looks down at his chest, almost as if he's checking to see that the symbol isn't showing.
What does this mean?
We know he's doing his best to turn Kara against Superman and Superboy. He's making sure she doesn't see the symbol on his chest. She is the only one that could recognize any possible meaning since she actually grew up on Krypton.
H'el claims to be an explorer sent to the stars by Jor-El. He told Kara that Jor-El was his teacher, mentor and practically a father to him. Before the Krypton's destruction, Jor-El sent him away to safeguard their science on his ship. This seems like a lie. Didn't Jor-El only have one ship and that was used to send Kal-El to safety?
Having the symbol carved onto his skin backwards has to have a darker meaning. If Kara were to see it, she'd immediately know H'el was full of lies. There must be some Kryptonian symbolism in the crest being backwards. Kara should have questioned the fact that he claims his name is "H'el" when he also told her right away that he doesn't share the "blood" of her family. So how could his name contain "El"?
Of course there could be a completely different reason he doesn't want Kara to see his scar. Maybe he's really interested in trying to bring Kryptonians back the old fashioned way…
Whoever H'el is, he does have a great deal of knowledge of Krypton. It could somehow be possible that he actually is Kryptonian. Superman would have some way to detect if he actually had Kryptonian DNA or not. Having H'el sent out into space by Jor-El seems like a bit of a stretch but then again, you never can tell exactly what Jor-El may or may not have done before Krypton's destruction. We'll have to wait for the story to continue to unfold. We should all pay close attention to when he does and doesn't show his scar in order to try to uncover the reason he keeps hiding it.