Supergirl S02E05 Review: Coming Out

Supergirl, Season 2, Episode 5: Crossfire

The new management for Supergirl has definitely shown a huge increase in terms of writing quality, and I think it's best seen here. This episode is very... filler-y. Aside from the larger screentime alloted to Cadmus's mysterious leader, and James becoming a superhero, it's a girl-show episode. We've got the main plot having Supergirl bring Mon-El along as this awkward fellow to work, and he  doesn't know what to do in human society. Oh, and Lena invites both Supergirl and Kara to show up to the gala, leading to dual identity hijinks. Oh, and Alex deals with her very-obvious crush towards Maggie and deals with coming out as gay. The main villains are truly disposable, a bunch of random punks with alien guns supplied by Cadmus. By rights it should be a boring, filler episode. And to a certain degree, it is. Out of the five episodes of Supergirl's third season, it is the most boring and the filleriest, but it clearly is made of a far higher quality than the first season's filler episodes.

Of course, the biggest problem, really, is the fact that the two big character developments seem to come out of nowhere. Alex coming out as gay isn't as random as the James plot, since it's obvious from day one that Alex and Maggie are meant to be shipped together, but it still seemed a bit oddly paced. I did like how Alex was still unsure about her emerging sexuality, just noting to Maggie that, yeah, there's a point and she's gonna go and hide now. 

James suddenly deciding to become a vigilante, though? James is not a character the show has been kind to. He has been uninteresting for most of his career, being lobbed around from 'handsome dude that friendzones Kara' to 'flat love interest' to 'not love interest' to 'boring boss' to, well, now he just wants to be a vigilante why? While I appreciate Winn getting more screentime mostly because the dude's hilarious, James has been so boring and uninteresting that his vigilantism antics just felt dumb, especially since we're dealing with alien-tier shit and not, like, Mad Dog and Starling taking on a bunch of gangsters over in Arrow. Winn's about to make him some armour to turn him into a superhero, which hopefully would make James somewhat more interesting? I dunno. Especially in light of Winn's very fine line of dialogue that it's no shame to report information, helping out in their own way... and with James basically quasi-threatening Winn and guilt-tripping him, James feels like a stupid child acting out because he wants to play with the big boys.

Kara and Mon-El's dynamic is hilarious, which isn't something I expected to say for a CatCo civilian plotline. They did crank up the charm, though I still am bored with any CatCo scene where Kara and Mon-El are not interacting. Between Mon-El thinking that his social security number is like his real ID that has to be spoken to everyone, to him being a bit of a clueless sexist bastard that got Tessmacher bang him and do all his work, to him referring to coffee as 'bribery drinks'... there's a bit of an oddity for a predominantly feminist show like Supergirl to show Mon-El as this sex-monster, but the show at least portrays him as being cluelessly charming instead of overtly douchey, which makes him more fun. The CatCo scene did ran for a bit too long, and I don't see the need of bringing Mon-El into the Luthor party, but I thought it was relatively well done.

Of course, Mon-El didn't really get to do much, though it does get Alex to confront Kara about her mentoring. Back when they were children, Alex tried to get Kara to like everything she did, as older siblings are wont to, but turns out that, hey, you let your little sisters and brothers do what they like. And Kara putting Mon-El in a sweater and telling him to work a desk job... doesn't work for Mon-El. And at the end of the episode, Kara decides to try another way that suits Mon-El's personality better. 

And we're definitely building up a romance between Kara and Mon-El, aren't we? As James and Winn points out, after the whole mess that was Kara's love life season one, it would feel weird for them to rip Kara and James apart just to have Kara end up with Mon-El... but honestly, in two episodes, Kara and Mon-El have more chemistry than she does with James for an entire season. So.

I thought the weird swap-back-and-forth thing between Supergirl and Kara is both utterly stupid and utterly funny. On paper, it's dumb. It's dumb because Lena Luthor shouldn't be that stupid to realize that Kara and Supergirl literally just whooshed in and out, plus they already did something similar to this situation in season one when J'onn showed up transformed as Supergirl. But at the same time, seeing Supergirl just Doubtfire her way through the encounter is honestly so hilarious that I think it's meant to be a semi-parody.

What amounts to a plot is the very boring and disposable Mr. Miner, a random thug given alien weapons by the female leader of Project Cadmus. The thugs are silly, and the special effects from the guns are honestly quite bad -- though Supergirl saving the policeman from the car flung into space, as well as Supergirl just laying waste with her (ugly blue) eye beams is cool. But Miner and his buddies are utterly as disposable as they come.

The female leader gives a couple of speeches about doing this for her son and daughter (which should've clued me in, but I didn't), how Miner is barred from attacking the gala (which definitely is something I didn't realize until writing this review) and how the hatred and swinging the public against aliens will eventually save earth. It's a bit of a generic motive rant, but okay, at least that's what she's about. The revelation that the Cadmus leader is actually Mama Luthor, though? And that she's in contact with Lena? That bit is interesting.

So yeah, a filler episode that I enjoyed a fair bit more than it's actually worth.

Sorry for the slow, slow release of TV episode reviews. I just have very little time to catch up with these new episodes. 

DC Easter Eggs Corner:

• Kara briefly mentions Rao, the Kryptonian god of the sun, and it's very common in DC comics for Kryptonians to go 'by Rao!' or 'thank Rao!' like what she does in this episode. 
• Mike Maxwell, of course, is Mon-El's civilian identity in the comics as well.
• In mainstream continuity, while Lex Luthor's father is a major figure in the villain's childhood, his mother is either a bystander, deceased or non-existent depending on the version of the story being told. The Smallville TV show had a Lilian Luthor as Lex's mother, though, who is a recurring character.
• Miner, I think, is completely original. I can't seem to find anyone named Miner anywhere but then I didn't look too hard.