Our very own Jill gives her thoughts on CBS’s latest show, Supergirl!
I have to be honest and say that upon first seeing the promos for Supergirl, it made me think of the SNL fake trailer for a Black Widow series. My expectations were not high for this show. On the flipside, DC has been killing it with TV series, with the success of Arrow, The Flash, and Gotham (R.I.P., Constantine). Theoretically, Supergirl, being a DC property on the small screen, should have a ton of potential. Even though I wasn’t impressed with the trailer, I decided to give the pilot a go.
I have to say, it wasn’t terrible.
For those of you not in the know, Supergirl is actually Superman’s older cousin. She was sent to Earth at the same time as Clark, as his protector, but in a separate ship [wut?]. It was driven off course, and she was stuck in the Phantom Zone for twenty-five years. Eventually, she makes it to Earth, only to find that her cousin is all grown up, flying around and protecting the planet and stuff. Making sure she doesn’t end up in foster care, Clark has two adoptive parents ready and waiting for her as soon as her ship lands. Melissa Benoist’s Kara grows up in a solid, two parent household of professionals with a sister.
She’s an assistant to Calista Flockart’s Cat Grant, who is like a watered down version of Miranda Priestly (“The Devil Wears Prada”). Still, it’s good to see Flockart on the small screen again, rounding out the cast. While we don’t see Superman, exactly, we see his former colleague James “Jimmy” Olsen, who knows of Kara’s super-past. He is not only there to build up his career, but to assist Kara on behalf of Clark. He arrives in the nick of time, as up until then, Kara has lived a mundane life, not utilizing her powers in any capacity [while simultaneously complaining about her ordinary life]. A near fatal plane crash involving her sister, however, breaks her out of her average-Jane stupor, and invigorates her life. This change of opting to follow in her cousin’s footsteps, donning a cape of her own, is much to the chagrin of her sister [who as it turns out, is in the DC version of S.H.I.E.L.D. basically].
The long and short of it is this: the pilot wasn’t terrible. I didn’t half watch it, and was engaged enough to give it my full attention. I’m going to watch the second episode, which airs tonight at 8PM central on CBS, and see how it goes. Given that it is on CBS, I think the series will have more room to breathe and grow and not be canceled prematurely. I say this, giving a HUGE side-eye to NBC and the terrible job they are doing with their programming (R.I.P., Hannibal).
The good news? There isn’t a lot going on Monday nights anyway, so give Supergirl a whirl.
Episode two of Supergirl airs tonight at 8PM EST on CBS!