Supergirl S3 Ep. 9 Thoughts & Easter Eggs

"Reign"

This year's mid-season finale of Supergirl is one that will surely leave an impact considering what it offers up in the end. With a nice helping of lore diving and our season villain finally coming into the spotlight in all of her world killing (or hero killing) glory, let's see how this week's episode fares in the end at delivering a highly anticipated super powered confrontation. 

It's nice to see that we're getting more scenes with Saturn Girl. Imra adds an interesting new dynamic to the Mon-El character and Supergirl legacy.

First, as with most Supergirl episodes now, we have to discuss the opening scene as there's usually something of note worth diving into. In this case, we get to learn about the Legion of Superheroes which was told to be formed by Mon-El as protectors of the world due to an eventually overwhelmed government. Mon-El's inspiration came from Supergirl as a symbol of what a superhero should aspire to be which I thought was a touching concept as it shows just how much of an impact Supergirl has in the far future (as well as her everlasting positive impression on Mon-El). We also learn that the Legion crash landed on Earth 12,000 years ago forcing them to set the ship's cryosleep function to wake them up in the 31st century. However, the Season 3 premiere's torpedo attack on the city re-activated them earlier than planned.

I was honestly a little worried about the way that they'd explain the Legion on the show, but I have to say that everything seems to fit into place nicely. Mon-El's character is given a much needed boost in importance and relevance and the introduction to time travel on the show doesn't feel completely jarring. If anything, I'm now really curious to see this 31st century crime fighting team in action even more now. The opening scene then ends with Supergirl being called to a site that was recently on fire to find a giant, burnt in version of the previously teased mysterious Kryptonian symbol. It's a nice way to finally kickstart the Supergirl-Reign conflict as we've now entered into the mid point of what has so far been a pretty decent season run.

Now, for one of my favorite parts of any science-fiction of fantasy universe, Supergirl starts diving into some deep mythology about it's hero's home planet. After visiting her AI mother's archives for information, we learn that the symbol predates recorded Kryptonian history and that the glyphs are known as "low speech". Immediately I started referencing Lord of the Rings in my mind thinking back at the ancient language created by Sauron for his servants known as "Black Speech", but that's another topic for another day. The speech here was used on a Kryptonian continent where life began by a civilization known as "the Juru". Eventually, when Rao came into place as their Sun God, there began a transition in culture and belief thereby creating Modern Krypton.

These are the types of scenes that catches my attention as I usually revel in any opportunity spent on expanding and diving into the lore of a fictional world. To some, this may come across as a simple scene with no excitement considering that it's literally just a character listening to a history lesson by another. However, for fans of this world, this is one of those special rare moments where the lore of the more fantastical elements of the show gets massively enriched. To that I say kudos to the writers for not rushing along these moments of importance for the sake of appealing to a certain crowd of people with a weakened attention span.

Continuing on this adventure of "The More You Know" sit-downs, Kara gets called in by local Rao and Supergirl fanatic, Thomas Coville for a nice chat about the "world killer". I still find it strange that some random guy on Earth who spent a couple of years collecting alien artifacts knows a little more about Krypton than Kara. Still, in concept, it is fascinating to know that Supergirl has two windows of information outlets to visit whenever she needs it (three if you count the Fortress of Solitude). Thomas explains that, on his quest for knowledge, he met a disgraced Kryptonian priestess from Fort Rozz who spoke about the God before Rao. It was described as a Lilith made of darkness and teeth who ends everything. If that didn't sound ominous and creepy enough, he breaks down the three steps leading to Krypton's version of the apocalypse.

First, the "mark of the beast" which are the symbols that are currently popping up around the city, then the "work of the beast" which will come in the form of many deaths (shown in a later action scene), then finally the "reign of the beast" which is essentially described as the dominance of the Kryptonian anti-christ. This is some pretty heavy stuff as Supergirl rarely ever dives into the dark supernatural corner of its universe. This is precisely why I really enjoyed this scene. Everything that Thomas describes gives Kara, and the series as a whole, a complete shift in tone and atmosphere alluding to the apocalypse and a seemingly unstoppable evil force of nature. The concern on Kara's eyes piled on with the amount of pressure being thrown onto her by Thomas as a supposed counter to said Devil felt massively weighted with stakes.

This is the type of set up that I had hoped for dating back to when Reign was first teased during the Season 2 finale. It's nice to see that the show has taken all of the right steps in setting up their season villain by doing nearly everything possible to hype up its power and downright scary mythology. In terms of character development on its own, Reign has already succeeded over Non and Rhea as an amazing antagonist worth getting excited over.

So, how does one follow up the building up of Supergirl's version of Damien from The Omen? Well, with a nice heartfelt scene between Samantha and Ruby discussing Christmas memories of course. I've heard several complaints since the season premiere about there being a downshift in investment whenever these two are onscreen, and although I myself may not find their scenes particularly exciting, I'd have to respectfully disagree. The reason I've been enjoying seeing these characters for the most part is that, as an audience, we get to experience the full spectrum of our villain's life before she makes her eventual transition. It gives us not only stakes for our heroes, but also the antagonist's very own life. This my friends is what we call a "sympathetic villain", and it's admirable to see the writers take as much time to flesh her out.

Now, let's take that touching mother-daughter moment and toss it to the side for a second, so we can talk about our first Reign action scene. Uh, this was quite interesting to say the least. During Sam and Ruby's holiday reminiscing, Sam was briefly shown gazing at a news story about the One-Seven gang causing trouble in the city. Later on, we see the gang commencing in drug dealing activities before getting completely slaughtered by Reign in a artistically curious fashion. I wasn't sure how to feel about this scene as our first big tease for the character. Reign just shows up, and like Batman, swiftly takes out a bunch of terrified street goons who can't seem to make heads or tails on where she's coming from. That makes two of us as I couldn't seem to make out whether or not I was seeing something terrifying or confusing.

After hearing about Morgan Edge being responsible for hiring someone to assassinate Lena, Sam goes out on another outing as Reign, only now, she's given her own Supergirl symbol reveal moment. Is it it a bit much that she'd do the exact same motion as Kara whenever she's about to change into her superhero attire? Sure, but all can be forgiven if the actual outfit looks incredible right? Unfortunately in this case, that symbol reveal isn't so easily skipped over as Reign's outfit is as unremarkable as you can get for a season villain with her set up. Ladies and gentlemen, our Kryptonian devil looks as lackluster as any run of the mill weekly villain which is tough to say coming from a guy who celebrates amazing character designs.

Once Supergirl and Reign finally confronted each other, I couldn't help but feel all of my previously racked up excitement begin to sink down. All of the incredible mythology exploring and character set up just to deliver someone who would better pass for a cool minion of Reign's than the actual villain herself. Now, before some of you get the wrong idea, I get that costumes aren't everything when delivering a new character, but it does play a crucial part in their presentation. Bruce Wayne is a fascinating character, and the idea of Batman is mind boggling, but what if Batman's costume ended up looking laughable? Bruce's tragic story isn't necessarily lost here, but your excitement in the Batman persona begins to wither away. Sadly, this is what happened to the Reign debut for me.

As Supergirl's talk with Reign about surrendering leads into a one big climactic battle sequence, things start to get even more mixed for me. There are many things that I loved about this scene, yet there are some that just didn't hit as strongly as they should've. For one thing, again, I simply couldn't get over the lackluster costume, and the majority of the fight was not as visually compelling as previous battles. However, there are tidbits that are worth geeking out over such as Reign completely overpowering Supergirl in what I like to call the show's "Bane moment". I also loved the scene to where Reign picks up a flaming car door, tosses it at Supergirl, then blasts her in mid-air with heat vision. This all leading up her then holding Kara over a building and dropping her like a rag doll. Yikes!

This is exactly the type of imagery that I had in mind when they first announced the character. It's an emotional and dramatic moment having the city and Kara's friends look upon her lifeless body in complete shock as Reign disappears from the scene. This is how you fully introduce your season villain in a way that truly sells the threat factor moving forward. I reference Arrow Season 3's mid-season finale where Ra's Al Ghul effortlessly defeats and "kills" Oliver Queen or The Flash Season 2 moment where Zoom comes in an completely handicaps Barry Allen. It's jaw dropping villain debuts like these that leaves a huge impact on the viewer especially if they're huge fans of the hero. Supergirl understands this with its mid-season finale, but with an unfortunately slightly lackluster presentation.

How would I exactly label this episode overall depends on how I classify it. As just another Supergirl episode furthering the story and presenting new ideas, I'd say this was a major success. The expansion in lore, the immense build up of the looming threat, the eventual hero-villain encounter and confrontation, and the tragic hero's defeat all makes this an astounding episode...on paper. It's the unimaginative execution of the villain's appearance and the not entirely eye opening action scene that brings this episode down from being a near perfect entry. Overall, I'd still consider this to be quite the thrilling mid-season finale to leave off on, but one that I hope doesn't set the peak of quality for what's to come. If this is merely a teaser for Reign's future then I'm more than ready to happily eat my own words.

 Bonus Thoughts

Easter Eggs

1. Supergirl's Almost Successful "Bane Moment"

A "Bane moment" is a phrase that I created back when Ra's Al Ghul effortlessly defeated and nearly killed Oliver during Arrow's mid-season finale. It's a moment where a villain, much like Batman's Bane, surprises the hero with their dominating power and, in an epic fashion, completely obliterates them thereby leaving audiences in utter shock. Supergirl nearly delivers this special moment, but is set back due to a few lackluster artistic choices. For example, during a fight inside of an office building's christmas party, holiday music is used as background music during what should be a dramatic and heart racing scene. There's also a few moments of unimpressive visual FX and less than stellar fight choreography. The highest praise here really comes with Supergirl realizing that she's bleeding. It's a powerful shot that signifies the reality of her defeat.

2. Guardian In Action

It was nice getting to see James get some Guardian action for a change as he saves Lena from an assailant. James takes out is shield in a manner similiar to Oliver during the Crisis On Earth-X wedding when he pulled out his retractable bow. Speaking of which, note that Jimmy's scarf colors possibly invokes his Earth-X counterpart's armor's colors. 

3. Fort Rozz Namedrop

During his conversation with Kara, Thomas briefly mentions Fort Rozz and a banished Kryptonian priestess that he found. It's crazy how easy it was to forget that Season 1 literally featured a giant prison filled with cosmic criminals. One must wonder if this will play into future story lines. Perhaps this mentioned Kryptonian priestess may show up soon allowing Supergirl to have an edge in the fight.

4. A Reminder That Supergirl Defeated Superman

As some fans might disagree on this, yes, in some iterations, they make it pretty clear that Supergirl is more powerful than the man of steel. With the Supergirl TV series, it would seem that the writers are happy to throw on a spotlight over the fact that Kara had to "put down" her cousin when the time called for it. This is referenced when she alludes to the team what she might have to do when facing Reign.

5. The Holiday Special

This being an episode taking place around Christmas and a series that includes aliens in literally every episode, I was surprise that I never thought of the possibility of a Star Wars reference. That's right folks, the "you have to see it to believe it" Star Wars Holiday special gets referenced here as J'onn, M'yrnn, and Wynn discusses "Life Day" followed by the Empire Strikes Back. We also see the heated beginnings of James and Lena's romantic relationship.

6. Reign's "What if?" Transformation

Alright, you've seen me rant about Reign's outfit multiple times during this review, but what I failed to bring up is the fact that I don't necessarily hate it. It's just that Reign from the comics look bizarrely alien and humanoid all at once which is fascinating. The outfit shown in the series is fine to a degree, but it's Sam's not so threatening physique that brings it down for me. I was hoping for an actual physical transformation to take place. Perhaps this might happen before the season ends?

7. Ruby's Fate

This situation's an interesting one. The final scene that we see before the ending credits starts rolling is Ruby coming down stairs to find Sam staring out of the window with a clenched fist before swiftly turning around. What does this mean? Well, it means that I doubt that the writers at CW's Supergirl will allow a little girl to get slaughtered onscreen by her mother. We're either going to hear about an offscreen murder (highly doubted) or this is a misleading scene that will kick start an off kilter family relationship.

8. Sam's Situation

Similiar to the Bruce Banner-Hulk situation, Sam wakes up having little to no recollection of what she's done as Reign. There's a brief glimpse of what appears to be a POV shot of heat vision blasting at the ground which leads to Sam waking up from a nightmare. This is later revealed to be Reign's mission to mark her creator's symbol around the city.

9. "The End" Foreshadow

There's a brief shot of a sign (possibly a pamphlet or book cover) inside of CATCO that reads "The End" possibly foreshadowing events to come. What exactly is the future of Season 3's apocalyptic set up? A future of desperate alliances and visually spectacular and horrifying carnage? Fingers crossed that the producers know how to satisfyingly deliver on this promisingly epic concept.

Episode Rating: 9/10