Supergirl: For The Girl Who Has Everything
February 8, 2016 8:00 PM - Season 1, Episode 13 - Subscribe

Kara gets glommed onto by some kind of freaky "daffodil" called the Black Mercy that leaves her mentally in a fantasy world where Krypton still exists. Everyone else either tries to save her or covers absolutely horribly for her absence at work.

Tiny recap: Astra's shitty husband Non gets Kara attacked by a freaky parasite flower called the "Black Mercy," which even Astra doesn't approve of and goes behind her husband's back to help Alex deal with. While the parasite is on her, Kara's asleep but dreaming that she's home on Krypton as an adult. (Heck, we even see Child Clark....er, Kal-El.) Alex will do anything to save her sister, even going "in." By the time Kara comes out of it, holy shit she is mad at Non for making her lose her family again. Generally speaking, that part is very touching.

In other news, RIP Astra at the hands and shiny neon swordsaber of Alex, but Hank takes the credit/blame. ("Astra was a righteous kill.") Myriad, whatever that is that Astra and Non were working on, is good to go though.

Meanwhile, Keerah (according to my closed captioning because closed captioning is totally amused at this) doesn't answer Cat's phone calls or bring her her coffee, and Kara's bros are just goddamned terrible at covering for her absence. Seriously, neither of these guys can just say, "Yeah, we went by her house and she's hella sick?" Winn makes up a terrible story about a tick while James frantically signals at him from behind, and Hank pretends to be Kara again with Cat, except he does an amazingly terrible job because he brings coffee with whole milk and just stares at Cat coldly instead of stammering and being scared. The whole thing is so ridiculously awful you're all, "Why hasn't Cat already fired her?" the whole time. Not to mention as you watch the episode you're thinking, "How on earth is poor Kara going to have to account for this day with Cat tomorrow since somehow she wasn't fired?"

In the end, there's no place like home, Kara and Winn make up, and James brings over ice cream and pot stickers. And then Alex has to tell Kara that Hank tried to cover for her.... "But let's save the Catco talk for tomorrow."

Seriously, I enjoyed the superhero stuff and hated the whole Catco thing. How on earth would Kara not have been fired for not showing up, much less showing up with 'tude and the wrong coffee? How the shit are they going to fanwank this? "Oh, btw, my twin Supergirl came by to do me a favor and she's not good with coffee?"
posted by jenfullmoon (11 comments total)
 
What a weird combination of stuff I thought was really good and stuff I thought was woefully cheesy and lame.

Benoist is so good at being so chipper and cute and bouncy that when she gets really, really pissed off, it's actually kind of scary. And that's a good thing.

Also liked the comic relief of Benoist doing Hank Henshaw doing Kara, and him doing it so horribly. From what little I know of the Silver Age, this is wildly appropriate. Weren't they always trotting out Superman robots to show up while Clark Kent was there to throw people off his secret identity?

And the death of Astra was affecting. Especially after Alex was all about trying to bring her back over to the light side, but will flat out kill her to save Hank.

But the whole business of the Black Mercy and the Krypton fantasy. At least they didn't try to make the viewer actually pretend to buy that the whole premise of the show has been a lie and the character is living the life they would have lived had fundamental inciting incident of the whole story never happened, the way so many other shows would. They told you up front it was because she had an incredibly lame special effect on her chest. But even so, just hated that part. And what the hell is it about having one character enter another character's mind to bring them out of a dream. Jesus Christ.

So on the whole, I'm very conflicted about this episode.
posted by Naberius at 8:14 PM on February 8, 2016


What a weird combination of stuff I thought was really good and stuff I thought was woefully cheesy and lame.

As Meatloaf sung...

Yeah, this was an awful, cliche'd version of the original story from the comics, but some of the cast were amazing at selling their roles in the "real world", and the end, where they are all chillin', worked. It even undid the bad taste in my mouth from Alex bringing the Two Stooges into the DEO.

And the death of Astra was affecting. Especially after Alex was all about trying to bring her back over to the light side, but will flat out kill her to save Hank.

Weren't they always trotting out Superman robots to show up while Clark Kent was there to throw people off his secret identity?

And how! Lois often seemed to end up spanked, too.

Moore could use silly Silver Age plots and make them mean something. Here, it was not used well, but I didn't mind so much.

And, yeah, Benoist is amazing, even if there are times when I can see her wanting to *jazz hands* it, but her pain at Non was solid.

Her hairstyles were interesting. I was trying to work out if they were supposed to represent the power of tyhe Black Mercy's control or not

And I'm a bit pissed she didn't "BURN" that walking daffodil. Or Non. But I think the flower would have worked better for the show.
posted by Mezentian at 4:06 AM on February 9, 2016 [1 favorite]


And I'm a bit pissed she didn't "BURN" that walking daffodil. Or Non. But I think the flower would have worked better for the show

This. When the Black Mercy crawled off her and started sliding across the floor, I kept expecting Kara to fry it with her heat vision.
posted by Roger Pittman at 4:30 AM on February 9, 2016 [1 favorite]


I am a total sucker for actors playing characters pretending to be other characters played by other actors, so I loved Benoist as Henshaw as Kara. Just the way she moved and stood was delightful.
posted by Bulgaroktonos at 5:40 AM on February 9, 2016 [5 favorites]


When the Black Mercy crawled off her and started sliding across the floor, I kept expecting Kara to fry it with her heat vision.

Or maybe for anybody to do anything about the unbelievably scary threat which is now AMBULATORY. Maybe someone could step on that thing? ktnx.

Is this Martian Manhunter not telepathic? Because I was kind of confused by all this VR blither blather when you have J'onn who could just talk straight into Supes' brain. I get that maybe that doesn't scratch this family itch which is kinda poison ivy level for the writers, but I would personally have preferred a competent Kara who wasn't quite buying it all and who needed less of a push.
posted by phearlez at 6:46 AM on February 9, 2016


I would personally have preferred a competent Kara who wasn't quite buying it all and who needed less of a push.

Well at first she wasn't buying it, was she? She rejected the hallucination on her own at first, and I understand why that wouldn't count for plot reasons, but it still bugged me. It felt like she accepted her Krypton life mostly off-camera. As the AV Club review points out, this is a pretty common plot, but it was weirdly executed here. I didn't feel any conflict where I wanted the Krypton life to be real for her, and that's a pretty big part of how that plot is typically done. Without some sort of conflict between the dream Krypton life and real world, the whole Black Mercy thing felt superfluous.

On the other hand, I really enjoy family dynamics the Kara, Alex, J'onzz trio so I liked the episode overall.
posted by Bulgaroktonos at 7:08 AM on February 9, 2016 [1 favorite]


jeremy jordan (winn) on twitter: Awesome episode of #Supergirl coming tonight! (before we got extended it was the finale, so u know iz gonna be epic!)...

that explains the across the board aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaannnngst.

i'm not ok with astra dying. "dying?" it's a comic book show? but what if they get a season 2 but anyways non is so one note and astra was the only thing making that storyline remotely interesting and

Especially after Alex was all about trying to bring her back over to the light side

yes. fuck. fucking hell. i wanted a redemption arc but that'll teach me to check imdb before i get my hopes up. it built on some stuff these 2 had earlier-- 1x08 when astra is in a DEO cell and she gives alex props for killing the insect alien ("you're the one who defeated the hellgrammite. i like you."), and 1x09 when they're making the astra/hank prisoner exchange:
astra: Despite your earlier bravado, you're clearly conflicted about this deal.

alex: If it were up to me, I'd leave you rotting in that cell. But I want your people to see that we're better than General Lane, because maybe then we'll find a way to end this war.

astra: You sound just like my niece.

alex: She has a powerful effect on people.
i had hopes is what i'm saying. bonding over kara. i think alex probably holds back some things from kara as a protective older sibling, like how she feels about killing that guy controlling red tornado, stuff that astra would get. space eco terrorist aunt astra who does the borg/robot/alien trope where "oh backwards humans and your silly customs, btw i have just discovered this wonderful thing, it's called netflix/cat gifs/peanut butter/beyonce, do you know it????"

but instead we got this oops i killed one of your last 2 family members from krypton lie between alex and kara and fuck.

the ending was sweet but there is no way that kara would be up for that after losing astra. nope.
posted by twist my arm at 3:29 PM on February 9, 2016


I liked it over all, and I was honestly glad they were willing to kill Astra so early in the series. Not that she wasn't a good character, but I get frustrated when your main antagonist can never be risked. Here's hoping they can move on with the next stage successfully--and that they don't do a lame Astra resurrection.

Agreed that everyone was way too casual about letting the "messed up daffodil" slither off. And the scene of Alex arguing with Kara's holo-mom was painfully bad. It's a computer, Alex. Let it go.
posted by Pater Aletheias at 7:13 PM on February 9, 2016 [2 favorites]


How on earth would Kara not have been fired for not showing up, much less showing up with 'tude and the wrong coffee? How the shit are they going to fanwank this?

cat thinks they are having a friendship fight and she's thrown off by kara being weird. cat's not quite ready to throw it all away based on an off day, the day after she friend-dumped her and is now regretting it, but she can't fix it when kara is not even meeting her halfway. she thinks enough of kara to mentor her, defend kara to her mother, allow her to date her son (although there were selfish reasons for that. still, i don't think cat would've been ok with it if she didn't like kara already, she seems like an "only the best for my boy(s)" type of mom.). so carter almost died on the speedy train bombing BUT cat was still impressed that he opened up to kara because he doesn't do that with just anyone. maybe it's genetic.

then there's this line to winn: I have watched you cover for her, day after day. is that... recognition that kara mysteriously disappears on the regular and she is either so irreplaceable as her assistant or in her life that cat overlooks this? my headcanon is that kara's actually a pretty good assistant and cat's never had one that was good enough to escape firing, strong enough to not quit, AND wanted to stay with cat. other good assistants were promoted or left for better jobs on the strength of working successfully under cat grant, but kara stays because, well, we saw her fangirling in every conversation she had with adam, she thinks cat is the shit.

and so they have this unacknowledged, unprofessional, maybe-proto-friendship. the biggest step they made from cat's pov (supergirl stuff doesn't count if she doesn't know they're the same person, and those events are more about kara's growth) was when kara got up in cat's life and (wrongly, inappropriately) contacted adam. it didn't work out perfectly but the reality is adam left cat on good terms and they have a foundation to build on, kara gave her that. it's wrong of her to take it out on kara, it was an immature and emotional reaction to adam leaving, she didn't mean it, at least not forever-ever, just like she increasingly doesn't mean it every time she's threatened to fire kara. she expected kara to stick around because she doesn't give up on cat, and eventually they'd get over it like they always do.

but kara, being supergirl, got sidelined by an alien land octopus bouquet and the first "kara" she sees after the friendship breakup is a hank!kara that is late (playing hooky, you coward!), fucks up her coffee (clearly deliberate!), is cold and standoffish (how dare you not be the adorable but still competent kicked puppy kara that i expected, ARE YOU LEAVING ME?). there is maybe even an aspect of cat that likes the fight, because underlings usually cower and she thought she'd be able to predict kara's reaction, mumbly wounded "yes miss grants" and waiting to be let out of the dog house. for god's sake kiera, if you're going to stand up for yourself, at least do it in a way that preserves your dignity-- and my respect. fake. c.rying? have you learned nothing from me?? are you trying to get fired?!?

no predictions, but resolving this emotional rift is something they could do alongside a second supergirl reveal with cat. there was a lot more evidence in the bizarro episode-- doppleganger which will lead cat to revisit the kara/supergirl in one room problem, and coincidental absences on dates with adam. i know everyone was pissed about the rollback (not i!) but i assumed they were going to build it up again and this would fit that profile.

Keerah (according to my closed captioning because closed captioning is totally amused at this)

i was wondering about this! so you're saying the cc consistently reflects cat's deliberate mispronunciation? allegedly, in the balcony scene where cat freaks out after the first failed adam dinner, kara says i will fix it, leaves, and cat, crying, rolls her eyes and says "kara." it sounded like "god" to me but fans screencapped that cc'ed "kara." allegedly.

SO OK. i have an actual point. in this episode: You are a real hero (!) Karla (!!). KARLA--butthurt literal 15yo cat sending a shot across the bow. because kiera is her asshole inside joke nickname, but at least it was consistent, and kara is on notice. one day cat will call kara kara to her face. she might be unconscious, or one or both of them will be dying, or she will finally know for sure she is supergirl, but they're saving it up for something.
posted by twist my arm at 8:02 PM on February 9, 2016 [1 favorite]


I haven't been paying attention that closely, but do watch with captioning on, and don't think it's been that consistent on the Kara/Keerah thing.
posted by jimw at 10:06 PM on February 10, 2016


Those claw machines? They never, ever work.
posted by joeyh at 7:46 PM on February 14, 2016 [1 favorite]


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