Supergirl is the Real Punk Rocker (and the chuds can't handle it)

A year ago, I was sufficiently entertained by James Gunn's Superman that I wound up writing about it. I walked out of the theater with a sense of optimism that I hadn't felt in a while, have not often felt since. I felt that Gunn's goofy hick kid version of the iconic power fantasy character had just enough humility, humanity, and determination to do good to offset the darker power fantasies that seem fated to consume what's left of a society that no longer even bothers to pretend that there is any such thing as 'truth, justice, and the American way'.

This year's Supergirl  is both a darker and more complex character and a somewhat darker movie. When Milly Alcock's version of the titular character was introduced at the end of last year's outing, we knew she was fond of visiting star systems with red suns for purposes of partying (since her and her cousin's yellow sun triggered super powers also enforce sobriety). Well, know we know why. We also know she ain't flying to these places just by going 'up, up, and away'.

Think of it as galactic van life in a second hand starship badly in need of a good cleaning. Kara Zor-El may share her cousin Kal-El's superhuman abilities, but that's pretty much where the similarities end. Kal-El/Superman was sent to earth by his father as a baby. He never knew his Kyptonian homeworld. He really is a hick kid from Kansas. Kara, on the other hand, was born after their world's destruction in a city that had escaped that destruction... only to die a slower and more painful death.

A death that Kara Zore-El/Supergirl grew up watching firsthand before her own father sent her to Earth as well. No surprise that she has a few issues.

I'm not going to spoil the film for anyone who has managed to avoid the reviews (I don't do film reviews), but I do want to comment on the overwhelmingly negative nature of these reviews and the cultural quirks that I think motivate them (I do write about this sort of crap).  I avoided the reviews myself so I could see the film with an open mind. Having seen the film and circled back to the reviews, my advice is to see the film and skip the reviews -- which seem to be almost entirely motivated by the systemic misogyny that is poisoning our culture.

If the film had featured the Power Girl variant of the character, complete with boob window / thong costume, and starred someone with the amount of cleavage the costume requires, the review-bombing probably would've reduced by as much as the reduction of fabric in the costume. If the plot had not focused on a complex, damaged young woman recovering from trauma by way of handing a space-based gang of pedophile rapists their collective asses, the review bombing might've been as half-assed as the current pedophile in chief's attempts to change the subject with actual bombs.

Luckily, for those of us not threatened by strong women or strong female characters, that did not happen. Instead a solidly entertaining summer film had a disappointing opening weekend as people who have yet to get lucky in any sense exercised the only real potency they have. I have every confidence the movie will make up for the slow opening box office, confidence that next summer's Man of Tomorrow will be just as entertaining as its predecessors. 

Most likely, the online chuds and incels will find it less challenging to their tender sensibilities than they did Supergirl, but you never know. For people who like to throw around the word 'triggered' as disparagement, the basement dwellers tend to be easily triggered themselves.

Meanwhile, I am going to close as I did a year ago: Go see the damn movie. You'll be glad you did.