Taking one look at evil chanteuse EMERALD EMPRESS’ striking features, one would immediately assume that the Marvel Comics character she reminded me of was Lorna Dane, that OTHER green-locked vixen POLARIS of the X-Men...but you would be wrong!
While it’s true that the two girls look awfully similar in both appearance AND their flight/attack mode, for some reason, the character that Emerald Empress always reminded me of was that THOR and AVENGERS baddie The Enchantress! Maybe part of it was the similar sounding names and green-coordinated outfit. And perhaps part of it was her haughty yet alluring personality that was so akin to the Asgardian outcast. But most likely, the BIGGEST reason was that both were paired up with a giant armored warrior with a huge-ass axe!
As the reigning queen of the Legion of Super-Heroes diabolical arch enemy group THE FATAL FIVE , she appeared alongside four other baddies: Leader THAROK and his mind controlled powerhouse VALIDUS, MANO, the mutant with powers to make things crumble at his touch, and finally, THE PERSUADER, the wielder of the giant battle “Atomic” Axe, the character that reminded me SO MUCH of Enchantress’ sidekick / partner THE EXECUTIONER!
I never drew any connections between them when I was reading Legion comics with the Fatal Five intact (i.e., all five members present) but when Emerald Empress and Persuader broke off from the group and became a duo , something in my mind clicked! Ahahahaha!
By the way, it was interesting to note that in almost every story where the Fatal Five (or sometimes even all by her lonesome), at the end when The Empress is “defeated”, she’s always detained simply by being held down by one of the male members of the group, and when you look at some of the illustrations, part of me thinks Superboy and the guys rather looked forward to their chance to "subdue" her...!
Sarya's one of the Legion's oldest foes and one of the most enduring characters, She's absolutely my favorite villain in the series, and she sports one of my very favorite costumes as well! That's a thumbs up, all around! Now If I could only catch her without that darn Emerald Eye spying on me...
