Supergirl, Season 1, Episode 11: Strange Visitors From Another Planet
Well, this isn't half-bad. The Adam/Cat subplot was entirely forgettable and I honestly don't have anything to say about it. It isn't even really bad, so I really don't have much to rant about it... it's just mind-numbingly boring. It takes so long, every single 'twist' in the interactions between Adam (played by Melissa Benoist's real-life husband), Cat and Kara are all predictable, the way this subplot was injected into the series (Kara randomly decides to finish one of Cat's letters) is actually a really shitty thing to do, and honestly I don't give a flying shit about Adam not when the main plot this episode is so much more interesting. TL;DR, Winn is in self-friendzone mode, Adam is going on a date with Kara. This reviewer continues to not give a shit.
The main plot of the episode features some exploration on J'onn J'onzz's backstory, in that a White Martian attacks a thinly-veiled fictional counterpart of Donald Trump, except with space aliens instead of human aliens. It's honestly a bit eyeball-rolling, and I honestly don't care that much for the Senator's story... she's put down mercilessly with thinly-disguised jabs thanks to Cat, and ends up changing her stance after being rescued by Supergirl and J'onn.
Alas, the White Martian's plan kinda falls apart a bit, and I'm not quite sure where in all that chaos did the White Martian manage to hide the real senator under the sewers and switch back up -- Supergirl seemed to be pretty fast in chasing after the White Martian. I honestly thought that there was a pair of White Martians working together throughout the entire episode, and was honestly kind of confused when they took out just the one.
The White Martian... doesn't quite work when she's disguised as a human, but when she's rampaging... oh, that is some pretty cool CGI. See, Supergirl? You can too make good-looking enemies. Why shame yourself with Bad Cosplay Tornado? The White Martian is just evil, chaotic race supremacists who conquered and slaughtered the Green Martians with thinly-veiled Nazi parallels. The Green/White Martian rivalry existed in the source material, of course, but the backstory didn't involve concentration camps and the White Martians weren't the ones responsible for wiping out the Green Martians (in the comics the martians' extinction was caused by the H'ronmeer Curse). It's a backstory that still works for this incarnation of J'onn J'onzz, though, and not one that I'm going to bitch about too much.
I thought the sudden shift to "I must kill the White Martian" to "I'm tired of living, I want to get this over with" was odd and jarring, and the episode would be better served just choosing a single extreme -- either make J'onn angry and ready to kill despite being a good guy, or just make him a death seeker. Either way it gives ample material for Kara and Alex to redeem J'onn. I'm more or less satisfied with what we got, though, it being the best material for J'onn J'onzz so far.
Because I haven't had a chance to mention it, the title of this episode, "Strange Visitor From Another Planet", is an old nickname for Superman before things like the catchier and more heroic "Man of Steel" stuck.
Overall, rubbish sideplot aside, this is a pretty decent episode, with a stinger showing that, hey, an impostor Supergirl is flying around town! Whatever could it be? Oh, the next episode is titled "Bizarro". Well.
That is some wickedly strong glass they cage those aliens in, huh? Aren't Martians supposed to have near Superman level strength? Yet, there that Martian was, pounding on the glass and it held. Thought it would be worth a mention at least, like have Hank/J'onn say something like "Luckily, we have that super strong glass we recovered from Fort Rozz.." or something like that.
ReplyDeleteThe episode itself? It was okay. Loads of squandered potential, though. Having an anti alien politician as a regular adversary would be interesting, but then gave her a VERY fast change of heart at the end (WTF?)
That is some wickedly strong glass they cage those aliens in, huh? Aren't Martians supposed to have near Superman level strength? Yet, there that Martian was, pounding on the glass and it held. Thought it would be worth a mention at least, like have Hank/J'onn say something like "Luckily, we have that super strong glass we recovered from Fort Rozz.." or something like that.
ReplyDeleteThe episode itself? It was okay. Loads of squandered potential, though. Having an anti alien politician as a regular adversary would be interesting, but then gave her a VERY fast change of heart at the end (WTF?)
Pretty sure that Martians in this universe have less strength than Kryptonians -- J'onn is shown to be consistently less physically powerful than Astra or Kara. Still on their ballpark but nowhere as big a physical threat as another Kryptonian would be. Furthermore the Martians got hit with nerfing out their phasing and eye-beam abilities and turning the race's mind-reading/emotion-sensing powers into something that J'onn can barely control.
DeleteWhich is totally fine, since having J'onn unable to control (or lacking access to) a lot of his powers would turn every single episode into 'why didn't they bring J'onn in? He could kick the villain's ass so much more effectively'. And honestly if J'onn outshines Kara in strength in addition to having a set of far more versatile superpowers it wouldn't be really fun to root for Supergirl.
But yeah, the reason they could cage dudes like Astra is because of Kryptonite. I highly doubt they have something called Martianite or whatever (this ain't Pokemon) so it's a bit of a plot hole there.