Previously on Supergirl, Saturn Girl proved herself the best of the Legion of Superheroes, with Brainiac 5 in close second, and Supergirl was faced with a new foe called Reign who was also Sam in the same way that in Buffy—wait, I think I know too many people watching Buffy for the first time to make that reference. IF YOU KNOW, YOU KNOW.
ANYWAY, Reign was also called a worldkiller and was told there were more worldkillers afoot.
Alex’s leg is still broken, so Kara, Ruby and Sam come over to to bring her some food. While she’s there, Ruby’s babysitter cancels, so Alex offers to babysit since it’s not like she can go to work right now anyway. Kara teases her about scaring the pants off her by showing her The Shining, but after some laughter, it’s agreed. Alex will watch Ruby.
:cue Babysitter’s Club theme:
Kara suits up and goes to the DEO, where she learns that Fort Rozz’s namesake also wore the same glyph that Reign wears on her chest. Kara says it’s too bad Rozz is IN Fort Rozz and Fort Rozz is floating in space somewhere, but worry not, Fort Rozz has been found. Well, worry a little, because Fort Rozz has been found near a blue star, which is not close enough to a yellow sun to give her powers, and also, according to Saturn Girl, poisonous to anyone with a Y chromosome.
Kara then says, “Poisonous to men?!” which is not what Saturn Girl said at all, and we all know not all men have Y chromosomes and not all folks with Y chromosomes are men, but I think what Kara MEANT to say was, “Poisonous to THESE MEN IN PARTICULAR?!” referencing the people in the room, because that would mean most of the people on her team who don’t currently have a broken leg can’t go with her.
So the only obvious solution is to find Livewire and ask for her help.
Employee of the Month
Livewire laughs and laughs but Supergirl doesn’t buy her villain shtick anymore. She knows Livewire is scared, because Reign is targeting criminals, and she knows she wants to stop Reign as much as Supergirl does. Livewire saw Supergirl get beat, but Supergirl assures her they would just be collecting intel. She explains that they need to go to a place where she won’t have her powers and she needs someone to have her back, and Livewire again just laughs and laughs and laughs.
Asking for help is hard, even if you’re Supergirl.
But eventually she agrees, and goes with Supergirl back to the DEO. Supergirl has also recruited Evil Petra Psi, plucking her from her holding cell to aid in this mission. She agrees because she plans on escaping one day, and she doesn’t want to get out just to be killed by Reign. And, of course, Saturn Girl. The girls walk out like it’s the start of your new favorite movie.
Nothing but respect for MY Legion of Superheroes.
Super Spice, Shocking Spice, Psychic Spice, and Saturn Spice use the future-kids’ spaceship to head to Fort Rozz. Livewire and Psi are already fighting but honestly, I’m kind of into it. I’m also into Kara telling them to shut up. I dunno I’ve been in a weird place lately.
“This war is hard enough without infighting.”
Back down on Earth, Sam goes to L Corp to make some last minute plans for her work trip with Lena, who hugs her before sending her off, probably whispering something like, “Enjoy the screen time while it lasts…”
:whispers: “…and whatever you do, don’t fall in love with Kara, or you’ll get sidelined.”
As soon as Lena leaves, however, Sam’s eyes flicker and she goes all Reign, right there in the office.
In Alex’s apartment, Alex and Ruby are playing Trivial Pursuit, and Ruby is kicking ass because she’s super smart, and also a lot older than some people treat her sometimes. Alex moves to get up to make them some food, broken leg be damned, and Ruby calls her tough, which Alex is flattered by. But the universe is a fickle foe, and likes to knock people down a peg now and then, so while she’s basking in the glow of being called tough, she gets a text from Maggie.
It’s funny, I was JUST having this conversation with my friend, about how it seems like the one person you’re trying not to think about can sense the first time you go a full 24 hours without thinking about them. You finally think you might be ready to move on and BAM. A random text. When I saw Maggie’s name on the phone I felt like I got punched in the chest, and it wasn’t even my ex.
Is this particular face of re-opened emotional wounds queer culture? It feels like queer culture.
So Alex doesn’t feel so tough. When the text first came through all I read was “I’m so sorry” and my heart ripped full open. But then when I found out it was just about mailing her passport back to her the pieces of my shredded heart thumped pathetically onto the floor.
Up in space, Team Girl Squad finds the run-down remains of Fort Rozz and Supergirl tries to open the door but she can’t. But that’s why Kara didn’t go alone; she steps back and lets Imra open the door with her mind.
Little bitty pretty one.
Inside they stumble across the body of a dead guy and they assume it must be the blue star eliminating all the cis men, which Livewire doesn’t think sounds like such a bad thing. What IS definitely a bad thing, though, is that the cell doors are all open. As they press on, suddenly a woman in trikru warpaint drops down and yells about the House of El symbol on Supergirl’s chest and starts to fight them. Livewire eventually overpowers her, and Psi hits her head and then accidentally mind-zaps Imra.
They are VERY close to each other. Just saying.
Down on Earth, Reign goes to her fortress of eviltude and her hooded friend tells her she’s late. Reign complains that the human shell she lives in is stronger than she accounted for, but the hooded woman doesn’t care. They need to stop Supergirl before she gets to Priestess Rozz and learns that there are more worldkillers than just Reign.
Back at Alex’s, Ruby notices her babysitter has been a little out if it since she got that text from Maggie, and Alex explains what happens. They find Maggie’s passport and look through it together and Alex gets sad thinking about the places they’ll never go together.
Make Alex Danvers Smile Again 2k18
She keeps thinking she’s starting to move on, but mostly she’s still just sad, and she’s kind of wondering she’ll just be sad forever. If this is just how things are now. Ruby understands the feeling of wondering if a new horrible reality is going to be the new normal, because she’s currently being cyberbullied all because she wouldn’t let this one girl cheat off her in class. Which is why you always let people cheat off you in class, especially when you’re in eighth grade and APPARENTLY the only one who did the Spanish homework AGAIN and it’s not like YOU’RE cheating really THEY’RE cheating and besides it’s the only time everyone is nice to you at once and—
Eh hem. Just kidding. Don’t cheat.
DO however, tell Auntie Alex if you’re being cyberbullied, because she takes one look at the posts about Ruby and decides right then and there she’s going to end it IMMEDIATELY.
“They want you to do what? With a concrete WHAT?! Oh HELL no.”
After they get the prisoner tied back up, they put the power dampening headband back on Psi, who claims invading Saturn Girl’s mind was an accident, but Imra is a little shook so they don’t want to take any chances. They go and talk to the prisoner and I really wish they had managed to turn her good and take her with them but alas, instead they just get information out of her.
10/10 would watch an entire spinoff about her home planet.
They learn where Rozz is…and that people who look for her usually don’t come back.
And then! Because things were going a little TOO smoothly, there is some turbulence and the girls’ ship starts being pulled into the star, so they have an hour to fix the ship and also get the information before everyone turns into stardust.
Imra stays behind to fix the ship, and Psi stays behind too because she’s useless without her powers, leaving Supergirl and Livewire to investigate. Livewire says, “What’s the deal with that beautiful girl?” and I for sure thought she was asking if Psi was single, but actually she was just asking if Imra was single.
They talk a little more while they walk, and Supergirl knows Livewire has more good in her than she lets on. So maybe Reign does, too. But Livewire is committed to her original thought that Reign deserves to die.
They follow some fog and fight some shadowbeasts and get split up for a bit. Supergirl wakes up to someone whispering her name, her Kryptonian name, “Kara Zor-El.”
I’m blue, da ba dee da ba die.
In National City, Alex pays a visit to Ruby’s bully, and to her advantage, the girl herself opens the door instead of her parents, full of attitude from the word go. Alex lays down some FBI realness, saying she broke the law and could go to juvie if she doesn’t stop slandering Ruby online, but that she will let it go if she apologizes to Ruby and promises never to do it again. The girl, a little scared of this bamf standing in her doorway, but also probably if she grows up to be queer will point to this very moment as her root, makes all the necessary promises before closing the door.
What’s the opposite of “scared straight”?
On the ship, while Imra is fixing their communicator, Psi starts reciting a poem about blackbirds, which is her way of saying Reign is here.
Inside Fort Rozz, Kara follows the voice calling her name to the priestess she was seeking, who, fun fact, played Ursa, a villain in the 1978 Superman movie (and its sequel). The priestess says that uncertainty will be Supergirl’s doom, that she flies too close to the sun, and that there are more worldkillers, Power, Pestilence and Purity.
Reign arrives and Rozz is delighted until Reign fries her right up with her eyes. Supergirl is a little bummed Reign’s powers work here where hers don’t, but she still holds her head high and says my favorite Supergirl line, “I am not afraid.” Kara tries to talk to her, saying they can work together to find justice, but Reign isn’t buying it.
The more I see this mask, the more I want one.
Knowing Reign is there, Imra wants to help, but she also has to stay on the ship. Psi begs to help, and convinces Imra to take off her dampening headband. Imra is a little hesitant, but despite whatever Psi made her confront in her head, is still fairly quick to agree. Quick to trust this stranger who they took out of holding. I hope we learn more about Imra, I think she could be a really interesting character.
Anyway, they get really close with their faces and Psi calls her “Matilda,” which is cute because Livewire called her that earlier.
So many ships, so little time.
Reign and Livewire fight and explode in a burst of power, but Kara stops them. Reign turns her attack on Kara instead but Livewire jumps in front of Supergirl to protect her. Psi shows up just in time and blasts Reign with her brainpower. Reign stumbles for a minute and Sam starts to fight to the surface. She sees Ruby in her mind’s eye and it lets Sam take over for a brief moment.
“Where am I and why do I feel the urge to sing spunky British pop music?”
Kara sees this flash of humanity and tries to reason with her, but Reign quickly flashes back into control and flies away. Supergirl runs to Livewire’s side and Livewire smiles up at her, saying maybe they weren’t so different after all, before flickering out. And y’all I’m SO sad they brought her back just to kill her. I would have loved more of that electric misandrist. Rest in peace, Livewire.
The girls return home and Kara thanks Psi for her help. Psi at first tries to scoff at such things as gratitude, but then softens a bit and says she’s sorry Livewire died. Supergirl tells Psi’s guards to give Psi a nicer room. With a window. Maybe something, say, a tall, thin woman with psychic powers could fit through. And Psi smiles the smirkiest smile back at her.
Please come back to me, my poetic psychic mind-meddler.
At the loft, Alex thanks Ruby for being a stand-in little sister for the day, and Sam shows up to pick her up. When Alex asks how her work trip was, Sam looks at her like she’s speaking in tongues and looks at her phone. She’s missed a bunch of Lena’s texts and calls; a car was sent for her for this work trip and she just never went. She finally—FINALLY—tells Alex that for a little while time she has found herself…missing time. She thought maybe Ruby was an unreliable narrator at first, but now she’s starting to think something might be really wrong.
“I thought I was just having rage blackouts but today it happened after Lena hugged me so I know THAT can’t be right.”
And the RELIEF I felt that someone finally knows. Now they can HELP my precious worldkiller and let her fight out the badness and join Kara to form a REAL Legion of Superheroes.
Back at the DEO, Kara laments that she couldn’t get through to Reign. That she saw that glimmer of humanity and couldn’t quite grasp onto it. She thinks that maybe if she had, Livewire would still be alive. But the truth—a truth she knows deep down inside—is that Livewire wouldn’t have even been fighting at her side if she hadn’t eventually reached the humanity in HER, so there’s still hope for reaching Reign. Plus, she didn’t die in vain. Kara now knows that there are two more worldkillers she needs to find, called Purity and Pestilence.
Cut to two women walking down the street. One is called Julia and she’s refusing to be resigned to a cubicle the rest of her life when a car comes careening toward them. Julia pushes her friend out of the way, getting pinned between the cars herself in the process. But after a beat, her eyes open, and she seems fine. She pushes the car off of her and my friends I think we’ve found our next Worldkiller.
Listen I’ve already followed Krys Marshall on Instagram I’M ATTACHED, DON’T TAKE HER FROM ME.
Which just makes me hope even more that Supergirl will be able to flip the worldkillers to be more like worldsavers and have TWO super-powered women of color by her side.
Things are getting intense and we only have two more episodes before we go on one heck of a hiatus…anyone else as stressed as I am??
Livewire totally should have joined the Legends! With the new arrival of Wally West coming up, the ratio on that team of big, excitable, dorks who run around calling themselves heroes : cynical badasses with a dark side is dangerously off :( But maybe there’ll be room for Psy sometime in the future…
Are you sure you want that Buffy reference to play out? Because it means somebody will have to play the part of Giles and the fandom might revolt if Space Dad m-*muffled as River Song puts a hand over my mouth*
“Hush now, spoilers.”
I will look this up and shout it to the skies if it results in River Song hands and hushing.
Brain-to-typing filter, come back
It doesn’t. I was mixing fandom references.
RE: Reign – “The more I see this mask, the more I want one.”
RIGHT?!?! Like, all of Reign’s costuming is bad ass–the v. practical pants and dark lipstick? Oh my.
I really want Sam to stay on the series so-so-so much, but it really looks like they want Ruby to be Alex’s surrogate kiddo and that just makes me so nervous…
Speaking of that Y chromosome part, it was ridiculously unscientific for another reason — Y chromosome exists only in mammals, and not even all species of mammals (some already lost it, while for example Wood Lemmings have subset of females with XY chromosomes who always give birth to females).
Meanwhile as for birds, females have ZW sex chromosomes while males ZZ (by the way in fact all chromosomes look like X, even Y chromosome, it’s just a name to differ it from mammalian sex chromosomes), and many reptiles like Crocodiles don’t have any sex chromosomes – for them, sex differentiation is determined by environment – egg incubation temperature.
? #science
“What’s the opposite of scared straight?”
Bahaha
– Mon-El mansplaining to Saturn Girl.
– I really like Yael Groblas
– He there, Winn. Why don’t you just say Kara’s real name out loud?
– Gee, a way for Winn to show up Brainiac 5, who’s a twelth level intellect. I didn’t see that coming.
– I wonder why Psi’s abilities are messing up. Is it a character arc, or was it just for plot convience and we’ll never see it again?
– What’s the opposite of “scared straight”? Lesbia-naughty?
– Please, PLEASE don’t have Psi have some effect on Imra that “frees” Mon-El from her influence.
– Mon-El has grown, I like his relationship with Kara now, but I can’t enjoy their interactions together because I keep fearing that the writers are going to do something stupid like have him kiss Kara.
“Mon-El has grown, I like his relationship with Kara now, but I can’t enjoy their interactions together because I keep fearing that the writers are going to do something stupid like have him kiss Kara”.
YES! Thank you! I also fear that everytime they look at each other.
It’s so weird, because in the comics, Mon-El was married to Shadow Lass (also a Legion member), not Saturn Girl, and they were married for decades. And Saturn Girl was married for decades to someone else. Mon-El was never romantically involved with Supergirl, who was the girlfriend of a different Legion member.
Unless there’s some great difference between Shadow Lass and Saturn Girl’s powers, it doesn’t make sense that they would switch his wife out with another team member. I’m trying to follow why they did that, but…
It may be for no other reason than to further signal to those who follow or know of comic canon that the show will not be following comic canon.
Sorry but since when is showing concern “mansplaining”? When I remind my wife the streets are slick I’m not “mansplaining,” I’m saying “Be careful because you matter to me,” not “You’re too stupid to know the streets are slick.”
Davidddd what are you doingggg
Yeah, I realize this isn’t necessarily the ideal place for a straight guy but I’m also a Supergirl fan and when I saw something posted that wasn’t necessarily true I decided to respond. So that’s what I’m doingggg. Sorry if I broke some rule.
You know that you can express concern without trying to explain something to a woman that knows more about it than you do, right? Try it with me, “Baby, I’m worried about you. Please be careful.”
And presumably you know an expression of concern toward a woman isn’t necessarily a power move or an attempt to belittle her, right? Try it with me, “Babe, I know you’re worried but I’ll be fine, really.” It’s all in how you choose to interpret it, with the emphasis on “choose.”
You realize that nothing that you just said invalidates what I said, right?
For whatever reason I can’t reply directly to your last comment so bear with me. Of course it doesn’t invalidate your point. You have a right to choose to object when some random guy doesn’t express himself the way you think he should. You have a right to say, “I refuse to accept your expression of concern unless you say it the way I want.”
The rub comes when you assume motivations you don’t know, especially the motivations of a guy who doesn’t even exist. There are reasons to dislike Mon-El: his lack of honesty with Kara about being married and that he doesn’t seem to have grown up much in seven years. But those are mostly bad writing. The episode in question was written by the man/woman team of Gabriel Llanas and Anna Musky-Goldwyn. I for one don’t know who was responsible for the offending line of dialogue or what the intent behind the line was. I doubt you do either but you seem inclined to interpret it in a negative way. I’m inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt. Please allow me the same right you claim for yourself. Thanks.
When you remind your wife the roads are slick, you’re expressing concern. But if you were like, “Don’t forget to turn your headlights on, it’s nighttime. And the brake is the one on the left. Oh and blinkers are important!!” even though she’s been driving since she was a teenager, that would be mansplaining. Imra’s husband wasn’t telling her to be careful or watch out for comets. He was unnecessarily explaining to her how to pilot a spaceship she’s flown more than he has. He was mansplaining, and then you tried to mansplain mansplaining, incorrectly at that. I have no problem with anyone reading my recaps, even if they’re not the usual visitors of the site, but not if all they’re going to do is tell people they’re wrong when they’re not and condescend to the people actually trying to talk about the episode.
Anyone else notice that the address Alex put on the envelope for Maggie did not match the address Maggie text her? Was it just a super faux pas from the props department or Alex being like “you text me after all this time for your freakin’ passport, here go find it in Timbuktu”
I noticed that the zip code that Alex put on the envelope is for Los Angeles, despite the fact that it said National City. So all of that speculation that National City is the Earth-38 version of Los Angeles seems to be spot on.
Maggie texted her address as…
709 Halston Street
National City, 44333.
Alex sent the envelope to…
13 Flower Street Apt #6
National City, USA 91604.
Yeah I think that was just a (major) continuity error. If just the addresses were wrong I’d say Alex spaced and just sent it to Maggie’s old address by accident and it would be a Whole Thing, but the zip codes are too different to both be National City.
I love Alex as much as the next person but was bullying really the answer to bullying? Not sure scaring a child was the way to go.
Also, could someone please explain to me how you like Ruby, she annoys the hell outta me. What is she 14? No 14 year old needs a babysitter if it’s only a few hours!
It feels like they wrote the part of Ruby for a 9 year old but then got the chance to cast a Tremblay and took it, even though Emma is 13. But they committed to writing her like a 9 year old. Most of the time.
I liked that Alex didn’t yell at the girl, she just tried to show her that her actions could have consequences. It would have been bad if she had like, threatened her the way she threatens Winn, but I think that was a reasonable way to handle that. Probably more effective than going through her parents, tbh.
I thought it was reasonable too. Alex reminded her of boundaries, that what she was doing was wrong, which the girl knew as she had no problem accepting that she could be arrested for her actions. And since some of the real-world consequences of her actions are the death of the victims, best someone like Alex comes along and does the reminding before it gets out of hand.
Ruby isn’t 14, she’s 10 or 11. She performed in the same school talent show with girls who were obviously in grade school. Middle school starts with 6th grade so Ruby is 5th grade or younger. It doesn’t matter how old the actress is, the character is 10 or 11.
It does matter if the character doesn’t look/act the way their lines are written/lines are written about them.
I don’t like that they killed of Livewire. Not just because they presented her as a queer woman, though I feel like I’ll probably be complaining about that trope for the rest of my life, but because they need more recurring “gray” characters they can call upon as the story demands. It helps bring out more layers in Supergirl when she connects to those types of characters. Plus, Livewire was a powerful, delightfully snarky one that Kara has a personal investment in, which made her perfect for recurring stuff. A friend of mine pointed out that they have a villain problem on Supergirl, as in they don’t seem to quite know what to do with a good villain/redemption/back-and-forth storyline apart from just killing everyone. Like that’s the most dramatic thing they can do. And it really reads as lazy at this point, or at the very least unnecessary. Like, comics are retconned all the time to recover from moves like this. Why build in the necessity? There are other ways to create good drama and high stakes!
That said, Livewire at least got to go out through her own agency, and it’s cool that it was in service to Supergirl.
All I have to say is that this was the queerest Supergirl episode ever! Everytime PSI looked at Imra I almost saw the electricity flowing between them and now we have another shipping material to play a little bit!
I’d be devastated if they end up killing Sam at the end of the season. She deserves a great redemption arc that doesn’t end in straight death or ultimate sacrifice – like Livewire – and it would show respect and considertion for Odete, too cause she is a sweetheart and her presence added very much to the group’s interactions.
This episode was much better than the last one. Let’s hope the next one follows the progression.
I keep hoping she won’t die also. Supergirl history (and even this episode backs up) shows us that the only thing they do is have the villain dying, but a redemption storyline would be more complex and interesting for all involved, in my opinion, and potentially ties in Kara, Alex, and Lena storylines.
I will take a mostly lady-centric ep of any show, any day of the week, but I could’ve done with even less Mon-el, Brainiac 5, and even Winn. I didn’t like Mon-el mansplaining the ship to Imra, which seemed less cute and concerned than disrespectful of her capability, and it didn’t like him being Kara’s confidant in the end. I really would love a story in which Kara and Imra could see their common goals and turn them into a friendship, maybe even one that lets Kara confide in Imra without the baggage of an old relationship, if only because I can sense a reignition of a Karamel romance and it’s giving me hives. It seems like the writers can’t help themselves.
Also, not enough Lena, which really makes me worry she’s going to be stuck in damsel/love interest purgatory until the writers have comfortably sanitized her friendship with Kara.
I know we’re moving full steam ahead into this foster-mom Alex bonding with Ruby plotline, but hoo boy I’m not into it, especially if it means losing Sam. Alex confiding in a middle schooler was kind of sad and weird. Like, I know children, and they can be good and decent listeners, but maybe not when it comes to discussing the end of your engagement?
Their scenes might have worked better for me if Lena (who wasn’t doing anything all day ig) had come to hang out too. Like, uber-rich and powerful Lena Luthor hanging out with one BFF’s kid and the other BFF’s sister? Lena Luthor wearing comfy clothes again and rolling her eyes when Alex makes some crack about a CEO owning threadbare sweats and watching the Shining through her fingers while Ruby doesn’t even flinch. Ruby, confiding in Lena and Alex because they seem cool and collected and respected by their peers, and the two of them arguing because Alex wants to give this bully the shakedown but Lena is like “just let me hack right in and put a parental control on her account”, and Ruby being in awe of these extra ass cool aunts she has.
I just don’t like Alex not having anymore adult confidants/good friends whenever Kara is gone, and I don’t want Lena sequestered until she can be poisoned or shot or kissed, and I feel like it would be a more organic way to incorporate Sam in the in group.
Huh!
I usually love this show for a myriad of reasons, and I usually also love reading your reviews Valerie Anne, but for the first time, I liked your review better than the episode. And, I was late coming into it because I didn’t like the episode.
I should have kept my expectations low, I guess. I was hoping for Kara and Imra to get some time together and become friends and get beyond the “We have Mon El between us” thing.
Also. Bad science. Not every male has Y chromosomes; And Blue Star is supposed to enhance Kara’s powers if you keep the rationale consistent.
Also. Didn’t like the Mon El-Kara discussion at the end. I mean, Kara needed that, but would have liked anyone else there. Winn, J’onn or best of all, Alex.