Supergirl: Superbad Show

A while back Nya wrote a review for Supergirl that left some people upset. Claiming that he didn't watch the show objectively. There was one woman who even called for a boycott of Blerds Online, it's cool, she got over it when she gave up on the show half way through the season. So I sat down and figured I'd watch Supergirl and give it another chance. It couldn't possibly be as bad as he said it was.

Yeah well it was as bad as he said it was. It might have even been worse. The show follows Supergirl through some of her comic book stories, but mostly it is mostly the retelling of Superman stories. An example being "For The Girl Who Has Everything," is just a retelling of Superman's "For The Man Who Has Everything." She also falls in love with a coworker, at a media company. The show also can't help but to name drop Superman every episode and even promise he'll show up. Just for it to be a blur or several minutes of his boots. On one occasion it was a blurry face that kind of looked like Superman. They make a point to have Kara text Superman every episode.

Her strength also varies each episode. One moment she's stopping a train, next she's getting punched across the room by regular humans. Sometimes she has to focus to use her x-ray vision or super hearing. Other times it's something that's always on. It all depends on what the plot requires. To their credit, some but not all of the fight scenes are good. Fights involving the DEO, Hank and Alex are great. Supergirl's fights are usually punch really hard and then heat vision.

Then there's the issue where the show believes it's so progressive and it just isn't. The show constantly mentions feminism and brings up how important it is that strong women be visible. Yet, it took 11 episodes for a non white woman to even have a speaking role. I just didn't get that. They did all this talk about the importance of women in not just powerful positions but in general. Yet, it only applied to white women because the one woman of color with speaking lines was gone in just three episodes. Unless you want to count Braniac who was blue. Not only that it kind of pokes fun at other issues. There's a scene where Max Lord is talking to the press and says "Everyone is worried about the police killing people, but Supergirl is the real issue. We should be putting cameras on her instead." Then the show moves right along because it's not a real issue to them. Later there's a moment when Barry Allen, AKA The Flash, makes an appearance. He's told that he looks like he belongs in "the cast of a racially diverse but charming CW show." I just don't understand why they would go out of their way to make fun of The CW for having diverse casts, when it's something the lack.

I'll say some nice things now. The DEO along with Hank Henshaw, The Martian Manhunter, and Alex Danvers is the most interesting part of the show. We don't even need Kara. They need a spin-off. They're obviously busy catching aliens even when she isn't around, additionally they have a large prison of different aliens. They're way more interesting than Supergirl's office love triangles. Although, I would like to know more about Alex, she's kind of taken a backseat. We know how she was recruited into the DEO through a flashback, but we know nothing else. We know that when Kara is sad, Alex brings junk food, but what about Alex's actual life?

Yeah, Supergirl is bad. I didn't enjoy it and on some occasions it actually annoyed me. Max Lord brushing off police brutality and everyone saying "how dare he talk about Supergirl like that," while ignoring the police brutality line. The show keeps actively talking about how progressive they are yet it took 11 episodes for a non white woman to speak, and then she was an antagonist before being written out 3 episodes later. There are two black men in the show. Hank serves as a reluctant hero that nobody trust. Jimmy is literally eye candy who takes a beating every other episode, and this is blatantly said on the show, not by me. The show has this weird thing where they love brushing up against the 4th wall but it's not charming. It's usually to pat themselves on the back for something they didn't really do a good job of. As for other minorities, well fuck you, you don't get to be in the show. You should just watch a racially diverse but charming CW show.

I think it's that smugness that I really hate about the Supergirl show. They paint Cat Grant as this egotistical character, but that's the writing staff. They love patting themselves on the back for half-ass doing something expected of them like treating women fairly, but only the white women, while making fun of other shows for having diverse leads. You don't see Arrow ranting about the importance of women as leads while Black Canary mows down villains in the street. We don't hear it on Gotham while Selina proves to be the best thief ever and trains Bruce in stealth or while Fish Mooney takes control of organized crime with an army of insane meta-humans while proclaiming "I'm Fish Mooney bitch."

I would probably like Supergirl if it wasn't for the constant arrogance in their writing. Who exactly is this show doing this for? I actually regret watching the show. It was just as bad as Nya said, in fact it was worse. Watching this show only proved to me I was right for watching Gotham instead of Supergirl on Mondays. If CW keeps the show in the Monday at 8 time slot you can be sure I'm gonna be watching Gotham instead.

You can hear Darrell on the CP Time and Powerbomb Jutsu podcasts. He also plays classic arcade games on The Cabinet
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