The adventures of Supergirl continue! This episode continues the trend of the show just being darn good television.
Now, I don’t want to pre-amble too much so let’s just dive into the Five Thoughts, shall we?
1. The Toyman Cometh
I’m going to have to admit: I think Toyman is up there with Livewire in terms of the show’s best villains so far.
Much like Batman’s Mad Hatter, The Toyman is of inherently terrifying. There’s something universally awful about a supervillain whose gimmick revolves around putting children in harm’s way and this show pulled that off to a tee. Henry Czerny put in a performance I was really impressed by as he brings a quiet dread to the episode as opposed to chewing the scenery as you would imagine from a villain like this.
Unfortunately he does get somewhat buried under the myriad of plotlines this episode has going on, but Czerny’s performance was engaging enough that, like Livewire, I hope he comes back for more. There’s also one other reason he’s a standout in this episode…
2. Winn Gets Interesting
Winn is a character I haven’t talked much about before now and that’s because I think he’s boring as sin. He’s the most generic ass comedic relief tech sidekick that the show really wants to be the male Felicity Smoak, but has about a tenth the charm. That is, I thought that until this episode. This episode was really about Winn in a lot of ways as it explored his relationship to his father, Toyman, and how he worries that his mental behaviour might reflect on him.
It allowed Jeremy Jordan to actually act for once in his time on the show (as opposed to standing in the background pining over Kara) and structuring the finale of the episode around his emotional conflict with Toyman allowed the villain to appear formidable without actually killing kids on network TV.
Still, I’m really bummed that the show is trying to push this will they/won’t they romance between Kara and Winn. No one wants to see these two pine for each other for the rest of the season. Please make it stop.
3. J’onn J’onnz Versus Lord Technologies
Remember how I said about the show having a myriad of plotlines this episode? Yeah, the show’s still building Max Lord as some kind of overarching villain for this half of the season while Astra’s off doing… something? And this episode we see J’onn J’onnz infiltrate Lord Technologies while disguised as Maxwell Lord. This was actually a neat little subplot that continued to tease Bizarro Supergirl while giving David Harewood something to do that isn’t standing around bossing Supergirl around and the scenes with Peter Facinelli as J’onn disguised as Lord were some good comic relief.
Also the pathos they’re bringing to J’onn and his reasons for staying as Hank Henshaw (even though it’s clearly just budget constrictions) were really well written, especially the scene where J’onn’s forced to mind wipe the security guard. It shows J’onn with a little more of a grey morality, especially compared to Supergirl, and I’m interested to see where they go for that.
4. Alex Danvers Versus Maxwell Lord
This… was a less favourable plotline. I know nothing’s actually going to come of it and Lord is clearly just using Alex to get to Supergirl (which was actually portrayed perfectly and by which I mean terrifyingly in the final scene), but I really want them to just skip to that part already so I don’t have to watch these two awkwardly flirt at each other while neither of them actually care.
Or I want them to show the lengths these two will go to call the other’s bluff in this game of flirt chicken. I want the most half-hearted sex scene known to man. I want them to go all the way on this.
5. Lucy Lane Is Here To Stay
So I was kind of convinced Lucy Lane was going to be one, maybe two episode tops cameo for the show. Apparently not. Apparently she’s like in this show for the long haul as evidenced by her recent move to National City in a previous episode and now she’s getting a job at CatCo. That’s really cool. I like Jenna Dewan Tatum in the role and I think she makes a solid contribution to the cast.
You know what isn’t as cool? The fact that neither Lucy nor Jimmy Olsen actually talked to each other like adults throughout this entire episode. This drawn out TV conflict 101 where a simple problem that could have been worked out almost immediately gets drawn out into a huge episode long argument because Jimmy Olsen just can’t express his feelings like a goddamn adult. This kind of thing infuriates me and left their scenes feeling less like Supergirl and more like a bad soap opera. If Lucy Lane is hanging about the show full time now, I expect better writing than this.
