Hi everyone, I’ve flown in to fill for your regular reviewer Elias, who is unable to cover the season finale of Supergirl. This is gonna be a fun exercise, closely examining the finale of a show I only watch passively out of habit. The season finale saw Supergirl and friends uniting to stop Reign and her three masters once and for all… so nothing new, but as it was the season finale it set up a whole lot of other things for the Fall.
1. That’s an expensive opening
For a show about a woman who can do anything and go anywhere, Supergirl can be really low-key: the two main locations I can think of on the show are the DEO’s HQ, and er, warehouse. That said, they saved wisely for a spectacular opening, where Supergirl and her mom use their freeze breath to render a tidal wave approaching Central City rock solid. Yet amidst the spectacle, there is emotion too, as M’yrnn J’onzz sacrifices himself to stop Reign: I feel this entire opening resolution to last week’s cliffhanger would’ve made a very fine conclusion if they had chosen to make it the season finale instead.
2. The Power of Unmasking
There’s another great moment during the opening where Jimmy takes off his Guardian helmet, to calm down a woman who wants to rush back into a burning building to save her child. I think it demonstrated why Supergirl – and her cousin – are such inspirational characters, because they don’t wear masks, and symbolize the courage, and innate heroism that can be awoken, in ordinary, every day people. It made me ponder all too often people design superheroes to look cool, or badass, when all it does is reinforce the notion that you have to be scary to be strong. I mean Batman is cool, but he’s hardly a symbol of hope is he?
3. Supergirl? I hardly know her
After momentarily stopping Reign, the group reconvenes at the DEO. Mon-El talks to Saturn Girl about the state of their marriage. Brainiac-5 reveals to Mon-El and Winn that Pestilence’s removal from the timeline means his evil ancestor is alive, and has created a virus to destroy all AI apart from him. Winn tells Jimmy he’s going to have to go to the future to stop Brainiac-1. Jimmy talks to Winn about that moment of unmasking. Lena and Alex have another talk about motherhood. Sam’s in her hokey dreamscape, having the reconcilation with her mother she always dreamed about. Someone’s missing from all this, can you guess who?
Yup, Supergirl. The moment she arrived to confront Reign at her lair, I realized that must’ve been the first close-up she’s had in ages. It was then I started to pinpoint why this show’s loyal fanbase has been so frustrated with the past season-and-a-half, that all the interesting stuff on this show is being written for other characters, and when Kara does have screentime, it’s with that lovesick puppy Mon-El. She gets perfunctory moments with the other cast members, hugging J’onn after the loss of her mother, or bidding Winn goodbye, when the show should be really exploring what impact these events are having on her.
4. Turning back time
The episode is at its most interesting on a metatextual level with its climax, where Supergirl’s killing of Reign blows up in her face, killing Sam, her mother, and Mon-El. At first I wanted to applaud the show for going completely Game of Thrones on the extraneous cast members, but then the show revealed it was going to trot out a huge retort to the Man of Steel version of Superman – that still hangs like a big cloud over the mythology – by way of a huge Christopher Reeve homage.
Kara, by using a Legion ring and entering a temporal disruption, gets to replay the scenario by using one of the magic stones (it’s ok, I’ve stopped trying to make sense of it as well) to merge her and Sam with Reign, enabling Sam to triumph over her personal demon, and kill the fiend mentally, not physically. It was a symbolic commentary on how a hero is a hero not just because they slay a dragon, but by helping someone else overcome their trauma too.
Continued belowI think it does open up a problem though. If Supergirl can just don a Legion ring and enter a disruption every time, where’s the jeopardy? This isn’t like having the Legends’ Windrider show up in the same place twice.
5. Bizarro 2.0
Let’s delve into what’s been set up for Supergirl season 4. The new dynamic at the DEO, with Kara answering directly to her sister directly, and Jesse Rath’s fish-out-of-water Brainiac-5 as the new tech wiz, should be very exciting. I’m keen to see if we’ll see Martian Manhunter making new friends and stopping in at the DEO, or if he’s going to recede from the show the way Cat Grant or Superman have.
The big set-up was that Kara’s holding the stone caused the Reign virus – so to speak – to generate a new form resembling her. I asked for more of Melissa Benoist, and I guess that’s how they’re gonna accomplish that. I imagine nature vs. nurture will continue to play a big role on the show, and that we’ll see both versions of Kara playing the angel and devil on Lena Luthor’s shoulders. After all, she made that mysterious phone call right before the reveal.
Bonus thoughts:
– I imagine Braniac-5 would find Star Wars too ordinary, or slice-of-life, for his era, Kara.
– The cultist at the Fortress of Sanctuary still being alive was really contrived.
