Welcome back all you Supergirl fans! Of all the things to have happened in the lead up to the season finale, Lex Luthor getting character growth is not something I would have predicted. What’s next? Livewire becoming a SuperFriend? …Actually, I’d be super down for that. Damn. Now I’ve just made myself sad.
And as always, spoilers ahead.
1. Lay All Your Lex On Me
Let’s get this out of the way first because I don’t want to spend a lot of time on Lex. I actually enjoyed his presence in this episode! Or, more accurately, I enjoyed how his motivations were selflessly selfish. It kept the essence of Lex that Cryer embodies while also giving him something new to do. He provides real complications to the narrative and his actions aren’t presented as being “all according to keikaku.” It’s a good way to get around the Superfriends actually becoming competent and gives Nyxly the kick in the ass to grow beyond the petulant child she’s been acting like for the past few episodes.
I also wanted to correct my erroneous statement that Lex was vaporized in episode 1 of the season. He was fine, went on trial, got off scott free (get your head out of the gutter,) and then poofed away through a portal for…reasons. This is what you get when a show takes a lengthy impromptu break after a lackluster first half.
2. Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! (A Totem After Midnight)
The totem this week is the love totem, which could have given the writers full license to talk about different loves, into selfish and selfless loves, and to showcase the power of love to triumph over hatred. I couldn’t argue with a straight face that NONE of this happens but, really, I would be hard-pressed to point out…anything of note beyond Lex and Kelly/Alex. Oh, and Esme’s love of mozzarella sticks. Gotta have the mozz.
Like, love is less of a theme this week than it is a thing to be talked about. There’s no depth to any of it and it left me cold. What’s most maddening is how utterly saccharine and over-stated everything with Kelly and Alex is. I’m glad we get to see a happy lesbian couple on a CW show – and lord knows this show could do with one after letting the last one implode spectacularly – but the way the script almost worships these two’s love without doing much to demonstrate it frustrates me to no end.
Literally every conversation they have this week is about how much they love each other! I want something meatier than that. What’s present it sweet in a vacuum but when taken in the context of the show’s actual portrayal of their relationship, it’s literally just same-old, same-old but this time with the weight of a proposal behind it. A proposal, I might add, I was convinced had already happened. Shows what I know.
3. Managing, Managing, Managing
Supergirl’s CatCo storylines have a problem. Namely, they’re dull, uninspired, and for almost five seasons have oscillated between half-way decent to atrocious. Rojas’ presence last season was frustrating to say the least but at least her antagonism was properly situated within the larger narrative. In season 6? They’re trying to have her be both a legitimate head of the company, dispensing tough but fair advice, AND an antagonistic force that must be fought in order for good journalism to triumph.
If the character had good points, or if the show deigned to show her doing something, ANYTHING other than saying the same three things in different ways, then maybe these conflicting aspects could have worked. Instead, she’s even more of a stock character than Snapper Carr was in season 2, and HE at least had a personality that wasn’t “we need to be number one for reasons.” It’s clear what the writers are, and have been, trying to do. It’s pretty obvious even from how I structured that second sentence. They’re missing Cat Grant.
Cat Grant was the rock and the center of the CatCo storylines in season one, in no small part thanks to her actress, Calista Flockhart. She is the kind of character they want in the role and no matter how much the show tries, it is simply unable to recapture the perfect storm that animated the character into being. Without Flockhart’s pitch perfect performances, and the proper characterization to back her up, every new person who tries to fill the role falls short. Even James Olsen, who was the only one to NOT try to fit the mold. He might be the only one who escaped the trap, even if he was given little to do and couldn’t recapture the magic.
Continued belowIt sucks and yet she got me to write more about her than Kelly & Alex, despite being in the episode for a grand total of, like, three short scenes. Ugh.
4. Under Attack
Putting my gripes that I somehow manage to blow out of proportion aside, the plot I found the most engaging was actually the Kara/J’onn interactions. They’re trying to work out how to get around the dream totem and potentially use the courage and humanity totems for protection. J’onn’s courage trial was moving, thanks to Harewood’s acting, and the conversations the two share feel the most real and natural they have in a long time.
They’re vulnerable with each other in a relaxed way, as opposed to the usually rigid kinds of cathartic conversation characters have in CW shows. It actually felt like two people who’d known each other for a long time sharing a moment of profound uncertainty and openness. It made their journey through using the totems, both when it failed and when it succeeded, more meaningful. The same is true of Lena but her whole thing is wrapped up in Lex and the less said about him the better.
5. SOS
Brainy and Nia have really been getting the short end of the stick this season in terms of having storylines that play out during the episodes rather than in the periphery. Nia doesn’t have it as bad after last week’s episode but Brainy’s whole “I cannot contact the future” thing was severely underdeveloped. The conflict went unexplored outside a couple brief interactions and then it’s resolved by the end. I’m glad he’s calling to the future for help but dang, I’d have much preferred to see the struggle a little more.
That about does it for now! There are only three episodes left and, if I’m reading my release schedule right, only two more weeks for this show, so I can only ask this a few more times: what did you think of the episode? Are you ready for the final couple totems to be found? Did you call that the totems would reform because I didn’t even get to talk about that! Let me know in the comments and I’ll see you all in a week for the death of William??? (Probably not.) Until then, stay super y’all.
Best Line of the Night:
Lex: “No. Forcing a woman to love you is the basis of a toxic relationship.”
Otis Graves: “I thought you loved toxic relationships.”
Lex: “Not as much as I love Nyxly.”
