Adventures of Superman Dagger Island Television 

Five Thoughts on Adventures of Superman‘s “Dagger Island” and “Blackmail”

By | September 22nd, 2020
Posted in Television | % Comments

As we near the end of our Summer TV Binge, Adventures of Superman keeps up its silliness in Season 4, and delivers two fun, if slight, episodes.

1. Exposition Junction

The plot behind “Dagger Island” is absurd for many reasons, but instead of working out a better story, or giving natural reasons, they just have each character describe themselves in ways that would never, ever come up naturally. Has anyone ever described their status in life as “sort of a playboy, I suppose?” No, no they haven’t. There are moments like that throughout the entire episode, where there’s no way around a piece of information, so they just need to plow right through it. It’s not terrible, but it’s certainly not the smoothest way to deliver information.

The plot of the episode essentially focuses on a quartet of cousins whose relative has died, and has hidden one million dollars worth of diamonds on Dagger Island, a Caribbean island where one of the cousins lives as a hermit. Now, he’s a hermit, but has to have water shipped in from the mainland, so he’s a hermit except when in need of supplies, which basically makes him me. Except I don’t live on a tropical island.

2. What the fuck, Olsen?

The way that the diamonds are found is because Jimmy Olsen shares the story of a ‘captain’s palm tree,’ an albino tree. This helps solve the riddle in the poem left by the deceased, and eventually leads to the diamonds. However, Olsen admits that he made the whole thing up. That plot point makes no sense whatsoever, and I have been, for two days now, trying to figure out exactly why that was included. He could know about the tree, because people know random facts. Make it that his uncle was a botanist or some shit. Having him make something up “to get the ball rolling” and then actually solve a mystery is…well, it’s really dumb.

3. Another repeat

The titular “Bully of Dry Gulch” from season 3 is back in this episode as one of the potential heirs, and the one who winds up with the diamonds at the end. The actor does a pretty good job playing a different character. All four of the potential heirs appeared on this show more than once, including a few of them appearing on this season’s finale which, from the thumbnail on DC Universe, uses the same island set.

Well, I should say the three heirs and the one who left the fortune. In a bizarre twist, the ‘fourth cousin’ is actually the guy who left the treasure, who isn’t dead, and just wanted to see who was honest in his family. Some family, close enough that you could literally be stranded on a deserted island with a member and not recognize them.

4. Superman’s lover

I know that it would never have been in the actual text, but watch any Inspector Henderson episode of Adventures of Superman and tell me that he and Clark aren’t in a relationship. They are the only people who can walk into the other’s office unannounced, and do so all the time. Clark calls Olsen “Jim” because he’s his underling, but calls everyone else “Miss Lane” or “Mr. White.” He calls Henderson Bill, and he’s clearly not his superior. They miss each other, they want to spend a lot of time together.

It’s a really nice representation of a couple built around mutual respect. Sadly, it never gets beyond subtext. But they’ll always have those moments where they find excuses to touch each other for no reason, like when Henderson grabs Kent’s forearm when saying goodbye.

5. Sort of a nothing episode

This episode doesn’t have too much going for it, discussion wise, except that we get actually smart crooks! Well, and that they have a gun that’s designed to stop Superman. Of course, it just makes smoke and winds up hurting the shooter, so it’s not exactly effective.

But the crooks make an actual good plan! That’s exceedingly rare on this series, and this is now two episodes in the last four with actual plans. They even thought to rent/hide out in a bomb shelter. That’s actual good thinking!


//TAGS | Adventures of Superman

Brian Salvatore

Brian Salvatore is an editor, podcaster, reviewer, writer at large, and general task master at Multiversity. When not writing, he can be found playing music, hanging out with his kids, or playing music with his kids. He also has a dog named Lola, a rowboat, and once met Jimmy Carter. Feel free to email him about good beer, the New York Mets, or the best way to make Chicken Parmagiana (add a thin slice of prosciutto under the cheese).

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