The highly anticipated Supergirl premiered last night on CBS. In the lead-up to last night’s premiere, it seems as though the show, and its star Glee’s Melissa Benoist, have become synonymous with “feminism.”
The question remains, did it live up to the feminist hype? Is Supergirl more than just a girl in a red cape?
Spoilers ahead as we dig into the pilot episode to find out.
For those of you who recall Superman’s origin story (and who doesn’t?)… this is going to sound familiar since Supergirl’s origin is much the same as her famous cousin.
We first meet our heroine, Kara Zor-El, on Krypton as it’s about to blow. She’s 13 years old and being sent by Mama Zor-El (played by Nashville’s Laura Benanti) to Earth to watch after her baby cousin Kal-El. Having been launched right behind Kal, Kara gets caught in the blast from Krypton’s destruction and finds herself taking a nap in The Phantom Zone for 24 years. You know, the place where all of Krypton’s criminals get sent.
Fast forward. 24 years later, Kara finds herself still 13 and finally on Earth. While she was napping, her baby cousin grew up and became Superman. (Although not once in the premiere is the name Superman mentioned.) He finds his cousin and brings her to the Danvers family, which includes their daughter, Alex, wanting her to have a “normal” upbringing.
Incidentally, in some lovely casting decisions, Mama Danvers is none other than Supergirl’s Helen Slater, while Papa Danvers is Lois & Clark’s Dean Cain.
Finally, we meet Kara in the present day. Since her cousin has the hero thing all locked up, she’s chosen to try to fit in while ignoring her ability to see through things, hear everything, burn things with her eyes and, you know, fly.
Anyway, fit in she does, as an editorial assistant at CatCo Media in National City where she fetches coffee, gets a ton of attitude form her boss lady, Cat Grant (Ally McBeal’s Calista Flockhart), and is oblivious to the IT guy and friend zone resident Winn Schott’s (the adorable Jeremy Jordan from Smash) huge crush on her.
But wait! Straight from Metropolis and the Daily Planet comes James (not Jimmy…only the “big guy” and his mom call him that!) Olsen. Played by True Blood’s Mehcad Brooks, he is tall, athletic, handsome, and confident. Ladies, this is not your father’s Jimmy Olsen. Warning: There appears to be a love triangle a brewing among Supergirl, James, and Winn, folks! Like it or not, the producers are clearly heading in that direction. [Corrina’s note: In the comics, Schott is destined to be the villain Toyman, who murders a number of children, including Cat Grant’s son, Adam. So he’s an interesting choice for Kara’s friend.]
With all the pieces in place, it is clear—because she tells us—that Kara wants more than this provincial life. But that has to wait–she’s got a date tonight and has no idea what to wear! Big sis Alex (Grey’s Anatomy’s Chyler Leigh) to the rescue! She has a flight to Geneva to catch but makes time to stop by to lecture Kara and help her pick an outfit.
During pretty much the worst first date ever, as he takes a phone call, leaves, and finally hits on the waitress within Kara’s super earshot, the news breaks that a flight to Geneva is coming down over National City. Kara runs into action and flies off to carry the plane down safely.
Now, Superman has revealed himself in this way in several incarnations, the producers couldn’t come up with something else? Was this a lack of imagination on the producers’ part or a nice nod to the original? I haven’t quite decided, but I would have preferred to let her story stand on its own and not borrow from movies of Superman’s past.
But I digress, she saves the plane, her sister, and everyone else. This being 2015, everyone of course immediately whips out their cell phones and starts snapping pics to post to some social media outlet or another. Conveniently, not one of them got a clear shot. Seriously? Has no one a high enough resolution camera phone to get a good shot? I call b.s.!
Back at her apartment, Kara is having a little celebration while watching the news coverage of her heroics, when big sis Alex shows up and is angry that Kara has now exposed herself to the world and “can’t take it back.” So much for the sisterly support.
The next morning all anyone can talk about is Kara’s heroics. At CatCo, the newsroom is abuzz, but Kara can’t keep her super secret to herself. She has BFF Winn meet her on the roof and spills that she’s the plane-carrying-chick who saved the day. Winn, of course, doesn’t believe her, and in a comic relief cliche, thinks that Kara’s telling him that she’s gay, which must be the reason he’s not into her. With a leap off the building, Kara proves that she’s the hero.
Now she has the beginnings of her very own Scooby Gang! They head to her apartment to have a super suit discovery montage. During the montage, in what was the most heavy-handed “we are for the feminists” line of the night, a diner employee states, “A female hero. It’s nice for my daughter to have someone like that to look up to.”
While I do agree that it is wonderful to see female superheroes on the small screen again, they are trying way too hard here. You don’t need to beat me over the head with this, let her show us and earn it.
Once Kara and Winn have that whole suit thing settled, Kara takes flight only to be taken down by some Kryptonite laced darts courtesy of the Department of Extranormal Operations (DEO), whose sole purpose is to keep the existence of aliens a secret from humans. She wakes up in the underground lair, I mean base, for the DEO to be confronted by grumpy agency Director Henshaw.
Oh, and by the way, Alex works for the DEO! And it’s Kara’s turn to be angry. It was wonderful to see a woman actually be allowed to express anger on TV, even though it was short lived.
Much like a college professor, Director Henshaw tells Kara that she wasn’t the only one who escaped The Phantom Zone all those years ago. Krypton’s super max prison Fort Rozz followed her ship out and its inhabitants are now roaming Earth.
I’m sure it will be addressed at some point (I hope), but where have these bad guys been? Why are we all just hearing about this now if they have been here for twenty-four years? Just wondering.
Kara returns to work the next morning to find that boss lady Cat has named her “Supergirl” and Kara is not pleased. And in the second most heavy-handed bit of dialogue of the night, Cat responds, “‘I’m a girl and your boss and powerful and rich and hot and smart so if you perceive Supergirl as anything less than excellent, isn’t the problem you?”
Again folks, stop trying so hard. Peggy Carter doesn’t need to tell us she’s excellent, she shows the audience and the men around her time and time again. Take note.
As Cat is about to fire Kara, James comes in to break the tension and reveal that they now have a clear picture of Supergirl. Plus he gives all the credit to Kara for the photo, rescuing her and saving her job. Cat tells Kara that she needs to learn to speak up and take the credit.
As they leave the meeting, Kara super hears this week’s villain challenge her to a fight. What’s a heroine to do? Fly off and fight him of course! Bad idea, chica.
Supergirl pretty much gets her ass kicked by Vartox, an escapee of The Phantom Zone, who tried to take down the plane. While he’s tossing her around like a rag doll, he explains that since her mother, Alura Zor-El, sent him, and everyone else, to The Phantom Zone, he is happy to kill her. He almost succeeds, but Alex comes to the rescue. The defeat has shaken Kara’s resolve, so she quits and heads home.
Alex comes over, and from the hallway explains that she was jealous of Kara and her powers while they were growing up. Seriously, doesn’t she have neighbors? Shouldn’t Alex want to protect her sister’s secret identity? Does nobody in Berlanti’s DC universe understand the importance of a secret identity?? I mean Barry Allen discusses being the Flash in the middle of a crowded coffee shop and that Oliver Queen is the Arrow is the worst kept secret since, well, ever.
When Kara finally lets Alex in, she has a gift for her in the form of a holographic message from her mom! After mom’s wise words, “You were sent to protect Kal-El, but your path isn’t tied to his. Find your way to the brave girl you always were.” The sisters head back to the DEO and demand that Supergirl be allowed to take down Vartox. In the worst pep talk ever, Director Curmudgeon agrees, telling her to win. [Corrina’s note: In the comics, Hank Henshaw became the city-destroying Cyborg Superman. It may explain his grumpiness here.]
Confidence restored, Kara flies in and stops a Mac truck without breaking a sweat. Now, she knows how to fight. That happened kinda quickly but, seeing as they only had an hour, I’ll let it go. Kara uses the fact that Vartox underestimates her to her advantage and kicks his ass this time.
The next day at CatCo, Kara and Winn chat about her night and he exclaims, “The Super Friends are back!” She puts the kibosh on the name, but I giggle at the reference to one of my favorite childhood cartoons.
She then bumps into James, who admits he knows she’s Supergirl and she needs to meet him on the roof! He reveals that her cousin sent him to look out for her and he comes bearing a gift, the blanket Kal-El was wrapped in as a baby. “This cape won’t shred,” James tells her with his sexy smile.
In the stinger that revealed the Big Bad, Vatrox’s boss meets with The General. I assumed that the causal mention of The General earlier in the episode was to Zod, but no! This General is Alura’s twin sister, who wants to take over Earth and is happy to kill her niece to do it.
Once again hitting us over the head, Kara proclaims, “Earth doesn’t have just one hero anymore. Now it has me. Now it has Supergirl.”
With the title of “most-watched fall drama debut,” we know that there is an audience. We know that women and girls alike will watch and that we have waited for our heroines to take center stage for far too long.
The question remains, is this version of Supergirl the feminist hero we’ve been waiting for?
Frankly, she isn’t. Not yet anyway.
She has big shoes to fill and I’m not talking about her super cousin’s. I’m talking about the TV heroines of years past, Lynda Carter’s Wonder Woman, and Yvonne Craig’s Batgirl. More recently with the resurgence of superhero movies and TV shows there has been a glut of women superheroes.
While the focus has been on the men in the titles, Scarlett Johansson’s Black Widow, Ming-Na Wen’s Agent Melinda May, Chloe Bennet’s Quake, and of course, Hayley Atwell’s Peggy Carter have a lot to teach Melissa Benoist’s Supergirl about what it means to be a feminist superhero.
I do think she’s flying in the right direction and I, for one, can’t wait to see how high she goes.
This Winn is the junior – casting was announced for his father.
I really enjoyed watching Jimmy play with making it borderline obvious he knew. She reads as much younger than her age, and I wonder how much of that is left over from focusing on content for the CW for so long.
I’m giving it a few episodes to see how it develops. It felt v ‘smack you over the head with archetypes’, but that’s pilot-land.
The producing team has two shows on the CW so I’m willing to bet shaking that will be hard for them, but it has my attention and I’m interested to see where it goes.
I was not impressed. The plot is very unimaginative. There are no secrets, no subtlety, no mystery. There is no internal conflict. It took her all of a few minutes to decide to by a superhero and go do that, very little doubting. They could have spread her conflict over becoming a superhero over several episodes, or even a season. She could have started smaller (muggers, robbers, etc.) instead they pulled out all the stop, going straight to the big villain and revealing who he is, now they have no where to go.
They could have kept her sister’s employment a secret for along time, Kara only getting hints for quite some time, building suspense and mystery.
Then they refer to Superman as “he” or “him” throughout which was really unnatural.
They felt like they had to start with a bang and it was really unfulfilling.
I wanted the overall quality of the writing–the dialogue especially–to be better. I want this to succeed but, so far, it didn’t yet for me. Here’s hoping.
I do agree with all your points, but there was a lot of ground to cover in this pilot. Give it at least two more episodes before walking away. I have faith in these producers, as they have successfully built a wonderful universe filled with Arrow and The Flash. Tune in next week…and let’s see what happens!
I liked that it was a light and upbeat show. It seems right now like too many shows are trying to be dark, mysterious, and gritty. Which also makes them very NOT family friendly and drag out story-lines forever. I never felt like there was a “OMG don’t come downstairs NOW” moment for my 5 year old son.
I liked the look. Arrow has this weird “let’s make everything shades of green” going in their set designs. This felt like a realistic world.
Clothing choices were great. I complained before how shows like Arrow would make clothing choices that made no sense for the characters (police officer daughter grows up to be lawyer for the poor and wears designer suits with tiny skirts and spike heels). The clothing looked natural and normal for the jobs/personalities (boss wearing designer but still business clothes, Kara isn’t dressed like a sex kitten while watching TV, she’s in normal sweats/pajamas and eating pizza).
Alex jealous of her sister made PERFECT sense. She was an only child to highly accomplished parents and suddenly they have a second daughter who takes a great deal of attention from her and can do many things better (is pretty, and remember, can’t get acne), and it’s not even their kid, but some strangers’. Jealously would be a completely normal teen reaction. Also I love that Kara runs to tell her friend after saving the plane and doesn’t do the “I CAN’T tell ANYONE, I must SUFFER ALONE” BS.
It did strike me as very weird that she clearly idolized Superman but kept calling him cousin. Not Kal-El, not Clark, not Superman. In the age of email and text messaging, how could they not be in communication? “He sent me..” should have been followed up by a text of “you send me a babysitter and can’t oh, I don’t know, CALL ME AFTER I LAND A PLANE???”