There you have it, Krypton’s tenth and final episode just closed out the first season of the show. Did it disappoint? Big time. Was it the worst season finale that ever aired on television? Not quite, but definitely did not give me what I was looking for: an epic battle of some sort between Brainiac and literally anyone. We saw Seg do everything from herding rankless out of the city to sacrificing himself for the sake of Krypton (only to leave it in the hands of the General Zod we all know and love). Not only that, but Superman’s cape had turned into one with the House of Zod symbol. I’m assuming this means we’ll have to watch ten more episodes that show us how the cape turns back at a snail’s pace while teasing us throughout about seeing an actual super-powered battle. Yes, imagine that, on a show that’s centered around the grandfather of Superman, to expect that. All I can say is that this past season felt like one of the slowest builds I’ve ever seen that’s greatest achievement was seeing a cape come back. If Krypton wants to keep any fans (or at least this one), they’re going to have to step it up big time.
1. Brainiac
This was a huge disappointment. He literally stood there. He LITERALLY just stood there the entire time and made various hand signs to impose his will upon others. Yes, it was mildly cool to see several ships blow up from a mere gesture. But what the hell? How was there not any huge fight seen with Brainiac? Sure, he looked awesome, but it just felt like a huge tease with nothing to actually appease our long awaited hopes for some great fights. I can’t think of a single fight on Krypton that actually blew my mind, or even just made me say, “That was a great fight!”. I assumed that they were saving it for this episode, and how wrong I was.
2. Doomsday
Although I could’ve included this point in the prior thought, I’m so upset about this that it had to get it’s own ranting-section. How can you even say the word “Doomsday” in a show halfway through the season and give fans expectations of seeing him in action without giving us anything close to that? In some ways, I was more pissed seeing that half-hearted teaser of him breaking out of his box (which looks way less cool than in that of the comics) than having not seen him in a single fight this episode. It took that long to see a teaser? If that were to be the case, they shouldn’t have centered part of the plot around Doomsday for the last three or four episodes. More so than other easter eggs, they were really buttering us up to see some real action with one of Supes’ archenemies. I can’t describe how stupid and poorly thought out this decision was. Once again, this show just ends up being more of a tease than anything.
3. Seg-El
After finally seeing how the season closed out, I stand by what I’ve been saying about Seg: he’s a hero that is given so much more credit than he deserves within the show. What he did to trick Brainiac into getting himself trapped in the Phantom Zone was mildly exciting to see. But let’s think about this: a twelfth-level intellect gets tricked by Seg-El? Really? Its honestly kind of ridiculous. Yes, it was a clever way of wrapping things up, but just did not come off as genuine to characters.
I honestly cannot think of any other moments within the show where I said to myself, “Wow, that Seg-El, he just accomplishes so much with his attitude.” At best, he like a more underwhelming version of Saint Walker: he just sits there and hopes (no disrespect to our favorite Blue Lantern) but can’t actually do anything. Seg was great at that first part, but what actually came of it? Events that he attempted to influence would never move forward in any meaningful way.
Herein lies one of the bigger problems of Krypton: they didn’t give the plot a big enough scope and trajectory for it to actually feel like it was moving. For instance, episode one was about the inevitable invasion of Brainiac and when he would arrive. Episode ten was about Brainiac fully arriving and…that was it. Where was the development? Where were the big twists that actually affected the plot? I can’t remember any that had any significance.
Continued below4. Where is Adam Strange?
Adam Strange was seen in the final scene on what looked like a changed version of Earth. This was a fun way to set him up for the next season (where I assume he’ll once again travel through time to tell everyone that something has gone terribly wrong). But aside from that, I don’t think they handled his character well towards the end of the season. His relationship with Seg was left in a weird place, albeit in a better one since Seg knows that Strange sacrificed himself for them. But after that, Strange was off the radar. It would’ve been great if we had seen him stay connected to the plot by helping to subdue Brainiac in some other way. It will be very interesting (and when I say “interesting”, I mean most likely “disappointing”) to see if and how they will use this character in the second season of Krypton.
5. No Green Lanterns
I’m just gonna go ahead and say that while I didn’t expect it, I was super bummed about not seeing any Green Lanterns in the finale. I knew it was a long shot, but you can’t just drop a bomb like that several episodes back and not follow through on it! Given how Krypton has been treating they’re super-powered characters (which is a) don’t ever actually show them in any satisfying manner (Doomsday, Superman) or b) have them stand there and put their hands in various positions), I should’ve not set that impossible-hope as a standard for this finale. But how awesome would that have been?! I would say I’m holding out for the next season, but I know better than to hope for the impossible: Krypton actually following through on something other than soap opera-inspired interplay between relatives of characters we adore and love.
