Supergirl has been struggling for the past few episodes. Viewership has been dropping. But I think it will manage to stick around. Some shows just start slow.
People weren’t receptive to Red Tornado’s appearance. I don’t blame them. He looks like an android made out of bloody stool samples. He is haunting. That being said, it works better in motion than in stills. And since they blew him up, we probably won’t see him again without a healthy dose of comics bullshit. It’s funny, the things they’ll go “Batman movie” on.
The real winner here, though, is General Lane. He is such a massive, unlikeable prick that it really stretches believably. We are talking about someone who is such an asshole that he can do the mental gymnastics necessary to convince himself that the things he did were in fact someone else’s fault. He literally all but railroads Supergirl into “testing” Red Tornado’s capabilities through legal mumbo jumbo, them throws a hissy fit when she beats the ever-loving shit out of it. Also, he doesn’t like Jimmy at all, due to his fraternization with Superman. He really doesn’t like any aliens, and it almost feels like he walked in off the set of an X-Men movie.
The whole “parents are dicks” thing really runs through the episode. We get to see Cat’s mother, and holy shit does everything there make sense. She is a horrible media snob, and says pretty much anything to keep her daughter down. It’s really one of the things that once again prompts the same damn conversations, however. Kara blows up at Cat, which prompts Cat to take her to a bar. Over drinks, Cat mentions how it’s inappropriate for women to get mad at work, recounting a time back when she was working at The Daily Planet where Perry White got so pissed off about someone not turning in their article on time that he defenestrated a chair. She then goes on to say that it was considered okay since he’s a man, but that if she did so, it would’ve made the headlines. First and foremost, it’s not okay; it simply isn’t sensationalist enough to make headlines when Perry White does it.
It’s probably not too far from being in character, but it isn’t right for him to do so. It would be more out of the ordinary for Cat; she owns a media empire, so you’d think she knows what that means. No one gives a shit about Perry White doing it other than the direct ramifications of the action itself because, at least in this universe, it isn’t too out of the ordinary for his temperament. However, the idea that a dose of stoicism is what the doctor calls for, at least as far as Kara is concerned, is actually correct. She herself is the only variable she truly has control of in her life, and she should exercise that control wisely.
So she organizes a vent session with Jimmy; he gets a sandbag to beat on, she gets a beat up car, somehow. I mean, the episode did let us know she isn’t paid all that much, so where did she get it? Anyway, he vents about General Lane being a dick. She punches the engine out of the car over all of the completely unresolved issue in her life, realizing that Cat was right when she said that she wasn’t really mad about Cat’s treatment of her. This helps her realize that what she needs to do is constructively channel her negative emotions. In this case, it means heat visioning the crap out of Red Tornado
They also have a little subplot where Alex and Kara strongarm Winn into hacking the DEO to find out what happened to Alex’s father. All they really turn up is that he didn’t come back from a mission to South America, and the other agent sent came back with no memories. That agent, of course, being Hank Henshaw, who then proceeded to redact the entire file.
This show has potential. It didn’t quite come out the gate like The Flash did, but that’s not a crime. It’s heavily contingent on finding the groove that the show needs to settle into, and hopefully that happens before the ordered run is up.
Final Thoughts:
- Dr. T.O. Morrow has an awful name, and I’m guessing his mind is merged with Red Tornado.
- That tornado effect looks really similar to the one used in The Flash.
- They make mention that the President is a woman. President Waller, maybe?
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