TV Supergirl [Spoilers]

[The Darknight Detective]

And the fact that well, if the Queerbaiting is intentional and not just fan bullshit, then the fact that there's basically a 99% chance Supergirl can't be made openly bi means that everyone loses. Especially since it's likely that the show ends with Kara in the future so they don't have to explain why she's not around outside of big crossovers.

I believe some people were seeing things that weren't there for the rest of us viewers.

[The Darknight Detective]

Double post.

[RobinGA]

I wonder if we see Superman in the final?

I doubt it myself, but you never know.

[The Darknight Detective]

They absolutely derailed Laurel when they decided to jettison Black Canary as a love interest because fans wanted Felicity instead though. It became much more team focused post season 4.

How many fans actually wanted Olicity in the first place? Just because there was a vocal number online doesn't mean there were that many viewers who thought it was a great idea.

[RobinGA]

Producers often think a vocal group online is the vox populi.

[The Darknight Detective]

Producers often think a vocal group online is the vox populi.

Which is just nuts, IMO. Telling a good and coherent story should be more important than making a few fanfic viewers happy.

[Anarchist]

I don't care what anybody says, while he might have been a poor love interest, William developed into a decent character once they dropped that as of this Season. And he died as a solid, upstanding guy.

Next week is gonna be both epic and sad, I wager

[AnakinFlair]

How many fans actually wanted Olicity in the first place? Just because there was a vocal number online doesn't mean there were that many viewers who thought it was a great idea.

I think it came down to chemistry. Stephen and Emily has insanely good chemistry together. Stephen and Katie didn't. Not to mention they saddled the characters with a horrible backstory for a relationship- Laurel was pressuring Oliver to move in with her when he wasn't ready; Oliver was a serial cheater who took Laurel's sister on a love cruise behind her back. I could see them eventually becoming friends again after that; but I never thought they would work as a couple.

As for Supergirl, Melissa has insanely good chemistry with almost everyone in the cast, but the very first time she shared the screen with Katie McGrath, I thought they may be setting up a potential relationship between the two. They worked off one another effortlessly. And the writers wrote to that.

[The Darknight Detective]

I think it came down to chemistry. Stephen and Emily has insanely good chemistry together.

I never saw this at all. I did see how poorly Emily Bett Rickard handled dramatic scenes (she's good when it comes to humorous and light scenes, FWIW), though. She was downright laughable anytime she.. would... slow down... her speech... when she was... angry or something. Now Katie Cassidy might not be Meryl Streep, either, but she's clearly more effective in the serious scenes than Emily Bett is.

EDIT: No one was more of a fan of Felicity at first, but Olicity really derailed the show, IMO.

[RobinGA]

Now that the show is winding down it might be time to think about postmortems.

I think a show that survived for six seasons has had some successes.
But you can't help feel disappointed with what was done.
You feel that something better could have been achieved.

There was such excitement when Supergirl was on the air, especially as the first
season was on CBS.
But it seemed shortly afterwards that they got into a rut.
They became part of the formula we often saw on Arrow, Flash.
Supergirl's mythos could have been on the air more, many of the themes seems more
a part of Clark's world than Kara's.

I think that trying to shoehorn Kara in as a reporter, never really worked very well.
It might have made for more interesting stories if that part of her secret identity could
have been explored more.
Supergirl has had so many different career choices, I know many liked the idea of her as a
scientist. But counseling could have allowed her to explore more National City.

I have mixed feelings about the Super Friends (God, do I hate that label). More than anything
they seemed to hold her back, tying her into a formula that wasn't very satisfying. Alex
was such a mainstay, I enjoyed Nia and Brainy, but the whole structure just became like an
anchor Kara had to carry around. She can go anywhere on the planet, yet here she is working
with people who spend most of their time lecturing her.

Supergirl's plots really seemed to work best when she had a villain to really run against. Lex
Luthor, even if imported from Superman, brought the best out of Supergirl. But some other
villains never really worked well. It became the monster of the week.

I know that Kandor is a theme in the comics. But I never cared for the constantly returning
Kryptonians, especially Dad. I mean Clark and Kara are supposed to be immigrants, the last
survivors of Krypton, one of the greatest catastrophes in galactic history. But hey which Kryptonians
are guest starring this week? It just ran against the theme of Supergirl trying to fit into a new world.

I do think more could have been done with Kara learning about her new world. One of the things that makes
Kara's experience of Earth different is that Clark arrives as a baby, while Kara is a teenager. It creates a
totally different dynamic. National City was also just a backdrop, rather than a functioning place that
could be learned about. Well, I suppose we did learn it had a corrupt group of politicians.

That said the show was never dull. Melissa Benoist really was always making it a compelling watch. The
show could be preachy, maybe a little corny, but there was something about it that kept drawing you back. For me at least,
it was never a slog like Titans or Batwoman.

I'm curious what others think of the show now we are nearly at the end.

[AnakinFlair]

I'm curious what others think of the show now we are nearly at the end.

I pretty much agree with everything you said.

One of the problems with Supergirl is that she really doesn't have a mythology, despite being around for decades. I could only name two of her villains off the top of my head- Reign (and the World Killers), and Cyborg Superman (who wasn't Hank Henshaw, but was actually her father). Her biggest story involved her dying (Crisis). So this show was basically trying to create a whole new mythology for the character- and I guess the writers figured the best way to do this was to repurpose a lot of Superman's mythology. That's why we got Metallo, and the Luthors, and Reactron. Heck, Astra and Non were basically stand-ins for Zod and Ursa (or Faora).

I also feel that's why we got Kara as a reporter. They wanted a Superman feel to the show, so Kara's got to work at a news agency. I actually think that worked during the first season, when she was an assistant to Cat Grant. And maybe, if Cat had stuck around, the subsequent seasons could have been Kara learning directly from Cat, and becoming her apprentice. Instead, we got Snapper- who also quickly vanished.

I don't necessarily think the Super Friends (yes, I hate the label as well) were an anchor- they gave her people to work with, to partner with. I do feel they fell into the Arrowverse trap of creating a team that diminishes it's leader instead of enhancing it. This team should have been about Kara leading the others, not constantly being talked down to or lectured.

Also, the DEO had run it's course by about Season 3. Kara and Alex both should have moved on from that organization by Season 4. They even created the perfect scenario for it to happen- Col. Haley comes in and demands to know Supergirl's identity. Supergirl reminds Haley that she works WITH the DEO, not FOR them, and leaves. Then all of the other agents could have quit as well in protest. It may not have been realistic for all of them to quit a military installation, but then when do the writers care about logic? And Alex should have become a hero much sooner than last year (really, she just needed a better suit. Her first suit was terrible). And J'onn should have been wearing his own suit- as a human or in his Martian form- from the moment he was revealed to be an alien. They fact that they spent money on that suit, and that David would be wearing it as a reference for the CGI artists when they shot- it made no sense that they wouldn't get more mileage out of it.

One thing that I didn't care for was that 4 out of the 6 Big Bads of the seasons all came from Krypton, or the system it was in. Astra and Non, the Daxemites, Reign and the World Killers, and Leviathan were all basically Kryptonian villains. Even in Season 4, Red Daughter was Kryptonian (but grossly underused, and only a pawn to the real Big Bad, Lex). Leviathan in general was terrible. For villains, I'd say that Reign was the best. followed very closely by Lex.

I never had a problem with so many Kryptonians surviving- just as long as they stayed on Argo. Let Kara and Clark be the last Kryptonians on Earth; but I liked that there were survivors. But I agree it was eye-roll inducing that Kara's father also survived.

I've said it before, but the biggest problem this show had (other than the writing), was their ability to keep cast members. I don't ever think I've watched a show that had the amount of turnover that Supergirl had. Some of it was unavoidable due to the move to Canada. Others- like the actress who played Astra/Alura in Season 1, who decided they wanted to leave in the middle of the season- you can't cast actors and lock them into a contract?

Or Floriana Lima- Maggie Sawyer. They cast her as a recurring character, only intended to have her for a few episodes. That got extended. Then they do the engagement angle with Alex, and try to bump her up to Regular- but she didn't want that. So now they had written themselves into a corner, and had to figure out how to break off the engagement and write out a character that lots of people had grown to love. I get that sometimes magic happens with actors (I'll still maintain that Emily Bett-Rickards and Stephen Amell had great chemistry together), but if you are going to write an engagement angle, you might want to make sure all the actors involved want to remain on the show.

This show had a lot of potential. Most of it got wasted. But some really good things came out of it as well. Loved the relationship between Alex and Kara, and between the girls and J'onn. J'onn, Alex, Brainy and Dreamer all had really good arcs. Winn did as well, though his felt truncated. James and Kelly- I liked their base characters well enough, but it really did feel like they were stretching for a way to put them in costume. William would have been better if he had just been a journalist chasing a story to bring down Lex, who dies nobly at the end, but does achieve his goal. I probably would have liked him more if he had never had an abortive attempted at a relationship with Kara, and if he had never been the team's press contact. Lena had a very good journey, though I felt that most of Season 5 for her was ri-goddang-diculous.

I hope that, going forward in the Arrowverse, we get to see these characters again. I'm glad we'll see Alex in the crossover this year, but I'd like to see Brainy, and Dreamer- and especially Kara- pop in from time to time. Who knows, maybe Melissa will appear on Superman and Lois in Season 3.

[j9ac9k]

FWIW, I like the name "Superfriends" - it obviously is a nod to history while referencing Supergirl as their most prominent member and it's not any other DC team, so I'm glad they didn't give them some other established DC team name.

[Frontier]

Isn't it weird that Supergirl would get so excited about a co-worker's wedding? Oh yeah, William never found out Kara was Supergirl.

Somebody finally calls out Andrea for being a terrible journalist and head of CatCo and it's much deserved. She's basically nothing but her petty grievances and vices at this point. And her grudge against Lex got William killed. She's probably the most unlikable person in the cast, even compared to the villains. She's lucky Lena's had character development or she would probably have agreed that she's terrible.

Pretty rough going for Brainy that he has to go back in time and sacrifice his essence to stop Brainiac. Pretty cold of the Legion to ask him to do that too. But I guess he was always supposed to go back to his own time, although maybe they'll find a way to split him so he can go to the future and stay in the present? I did like seeing classic Brainy in green.

I think we've gotten more of Martian Manhunter in his Martian form in these last few episodes than we've gotten last season, maybe more. Were they really saving up all their budget for the final episodes?

I can buy William is close enough to babysit Esme but not close enough that he would've been invited to the engagement party.

Alex has only been a mom for...what, a week? A few weeks? And she's already getting very defensive when Kara brings up reasonable points about living as an alien with destructive powers. Like, how do you control abilities that you just gain randomly from being in proximity to another alien? When you might not even realize is an alien? And I don't think that's all that equitable to living your truth as a lesbian, but that's just my opinion. If anything Alex and Kelly should just move out of the alien capital of the Arrowverse.

I can't even keep track of which Totems are which and who has which Totems. Why didn't Kara get the first Totem again?

Mxy killing the mood of two villains about to finally bang.

William had enough leeway to record Lex killing him to ensure he faces justice once he's defeated at the end of the season but not too text someone for help?

William's death...I mean, of the entire cast, he was probably the most expendable while still killing off a cast member to add some stakes, so it feels a tad obvious. I feel like the actor got the short thrift from the writers just not knowing what to do with the character but trying to make him happen, but I guess they gave up in the end. At the end of the day he'll stand as a character who tried to uphold good journalism.

FWIW, I like the name "Superfriends" - it obviously is a nod to history while referencing Supergirl as their most prominent member and it's not any other DC team, so I'm glad they didn't give them some other established DC team name.

Was "Team Supergirl" too on-the-nose?

[AnakinFlair]

Pretty rough going for Brainy that he has to go back in time and sacrifice his essence to stop Brainiac. Pretty cold of the Legion to ask him to do that too. But I guess he was always supposed to go back to his own time, although maybe they'll find a way to split him so he can go to the future and stay in the present? I did like seeing classic Brainy in green.

William had enough leeway to record Lex killing him to ensure he faces justice once he's defeated at the end of the season but not too text someone for help?

Isn't Brainy carrying like three other versions of himself within himself at the moment? Can't he reconstitute one of them and ask them to sacrifice themself?

It looked like William grabbed his phone (was it already recording?), but an instant after he grabbed it, Lex came back in and shot him. Once that happened, he knew he was dead, but he could still get proof that Lex killed him and did several other things, thanks to Lex monologuing.

[Frontier]

Isn't Brainy carrying like three other versions of himself within himself at the moment? Can't he reconstitute one of them and ask them to sacrifice themself?

That's what I'm thinking might happen.

It looked like William grabbed his phone (was it already recording?), but an instant after he grabbed it, Lex came back in and shot him. Once that happened, he knew he was dead, but he could still get proof that Lex killed him and did several other things, thanks to Lex monologuing.

He had a few seconds with his phone before they even found him, and when Lex's back was turned, so it felt like he had time to text.