S02.E03: Welcome To Earth

[BkWurm1]

9 minutes ago, GHScorpiosRule said:

And now it's my super sekrit wish that somehow, someway, they can convince Michael Rosenbaum to reprise his role as Lex, should Lex ever appear on this show. He was the BESTEST TV LEX EVAH!

I agree but I don't think the show would do it for fear someone would get confused.  The best we might hope is him coming to play some other part (maybe he can be the president after LC gets exposed as an alien.  He looks great in white, lol).  

 

On 10/26/2016 at 1:38 AM, Black Knight said:

Now that you put it that way, it's weird that they decided to put James at Cat's desk at all, because it keeps him stuck in the office and thus keeps Catco around as a location. It would've been much simpler to just have him and Kara as a journalist team roving around Metropolis, investigating stories together, him taking the pictures and her writing the copy. Maybe that's what they'll do after a few more episodes - James realizes he misses being out in the field and lets Snapper take over as the new Cat - and the reason they didn't just do it that way to start with is because Kara will probably be busy with Mon-El for a little bit, so they needed to sideline James temporarily.

I think that fact that they did NOT pair Kara and James as work partners like you describe is some heavy proof of just how hard they are pivoting away from Kara and James being a couple.  I still never say never, but that would have been the obvious fix for how to make James relevant.  

Edited October 27, 2016 by BkWurm1

[GHScorpiosRule]

Just now, BkWurm1 said:

I agree but I don't think the show would do it for fear someone would get confused.  The best we might hope is him coming to play some other part (maybe he can be the president after LC gets exposed as an alien, lol).  

 

 

Come on now, @BkWurm1! You and I, and other Smallville viewers know what happened to the real Lex, so it could just be Rosenbaum playing Lex AGAIN. I don't see why it can't happen!

But, like I said, it's my super sekrit wish! After all, I didn't get my wishes for Tom to be Clark/Supes and Lynda to be Wonder Woman/Diana!

[stealinghome]

Quote

I think that fact that they did NOT pair Kara and James as work partners like you describe is some heavy proof of just how hard they are pivoting away from Kara and James being a couple.  I still never say never, but that would have been the obvious fix for how to make James relevant.  

500% agreed. Well, that, and 1) I think all the writers in the Berlanti-verse are just shit at writing love interests and then knowing what to do with said love interests in general, 2) I think the writers are not at all ACTUALLY interested in Kara's reporter job, it's just another way for them to make her Superman in a skirt, and 3) I think the writers are struggling to try to keep Catco relevant when really they should just drop it for the most part, so making James the boss seemed like a quick fix to keep Catco around AND give him something to do.

But I have to agree that not making Kara and James work partners smacks of "we want to bury the romance so hard that we will hardly let them be on the screen together" to me.

[Tara Ariano]

In case you missed it, here's the Previously.TV post on the episode!

Supergirl's Jimmy Olsen Will Bankrupt Catco In Three Months

Daniel MacEachern is not a crackpot. He just thinks it's completely obvious that Snapper Carr is much more qualified to run Catco than Jimmy Olsen.

[Featherhat]

I agree that "I want to be a reporter!" was a way to make her Superman in a skirt but it does give her more reason to get out of the office and rescue people more than being Cat's assistant and so theoretically at her beck and call all the time, did. That said they could have found something slightly different from Clark.

They are pivoting away from the Kara/James ship hard I wonder if that's a reflection on how much they didn't think it was working at the end of last season or that it was very CBS mandated and they got out of it as quickly as they could because they never wanted it in the first place, or a little of both. I do feel sorry for Mechad Brooks for being side lined to a desk (and not even in the DEO) but I hope they find more for him to do. It's always possible the ship will come up again once Kara is more mature and secure as Supergirl ala Lucy Lane who has apparently disappeared off the face of the earth.

[Suz84]

I guess i share the same opinion with two other people in this thread...i saw no chemistry between maggie and alex and not only that i think the actress playing maggie is a terrible actress (like cringeworthy bad)...disappointed in this season..the show is coming off...off...the chemistry isnt the same

about that potential pairing:  if they do go that route the ending is predictable..which is that maggie is gonna be killed off by the end of the season...

Edited October 29, 2016 by Suz84

[Black Knight]

36 minutes ago, Suz84 said:

about that potential pairing:  if they do go that route the ending is predictable..which is that maggie is gonna be killed off by the end of the season...

I doubt it, not after all the uproar - producer Ali Adler is a lesbian, and Maggie is a DC canon character. They'd just have her leave town, probably with a Gotham reference thrown in. There isn't any need to resort to BuryTheGays because it's simple enough to devise a plausible breakup that breaks Alex's heart. Even though Alex is getting a life that doesn't revolve entirely around her sister, Kara's still always going to be the most important person in her life, so the writers would just have to structure a conflict between Alex and Maggie about that that leads to them breaking up.

It's interesting to think about because, as I commented earlier, Kara is used to having Alex at her beck and call for the slightest of things, no matter what else Alex has going on. With Alex getting more of a life, that won't happen anymore. Maggie "wins" that one, and Kara will have to adjust. But when it's something important, Alex is still going to drop everything and come running. That's never going to change. Kara "wins" that one, and Maggie will have to accept it or leave.

[FurryFury]

I hated the episode, it was just WAY too anvilicious and preachy. Horrible all around.

Didn't care about Maggie's actress, she was just trying too hard and really, really generic-acting. 

The bar reminded me of Angel SO MUCH. I half-expected to see Lorne among all these aliens.

The President being an alien was the only interesting thing. I don't have an opinion on Mon-El yet, there was too little of him, but I agree that making Kara's new LI Lex's son would have been a much better idea in general. Or they could have set up Daxam earlier so it wouldn't feel like a retcon (I do know it exists in the comics but it's weird its existence hasn't even been alluded to).

Edited October 29, 2016 by FurryFury

[prican58]

Watching Maggie and I see a watered down Shaw from Person of Interest. Both actresses are similar physically but Shaw had a more dangerous component whereas Maggie does not. I am not a DC/Superman Universe person so I am not judging. Is Ms Lima portraying Maggie the way she is normally written/drawn?

Just wondering.

[BkWurm1]

16 minutes ago, prican58 said:

Watching Maggie and I see a watered down Shaw from Person of Interest. Both actresses are similar physically but Shaw had a more dangerous component whereas Maggie does not. I am not a DC/Superman Universe person so I am not judging. Is Ms Lima portraying Maggie the way she is normally written/drawn?

Just wondering.

My exposure to the character is limited to a couple appearances on Smallville (I think it was a couple) and her showing up in animated shows (If I saw her anywhere else live action I don't remember it) and I would have put her personality closer to what we see of Alex, someone that seems pretty by the book and serious but it makes sense to change that since we already have it in Alex.  

Edited October 29, 2016 by BkWurm1

[KirkB]

13 hours ago, FurryFury said:

Or they could have set up Daxam earlier so it wouldn't feel like a retcon (I do know it exists in the comics but it's weird its existence hasn't even been alluded to

That's the one part that doesn't bother me. Kara made a point of saying the Kryptonians hate the...is it Daxamites? Anyway, some part of her wasn't too broken up by Daxam being decimated by Kryptons destruction. So it doesn't surprise me she wouldn't have brought it up. Though as I type this I have to wonder, HOW does she know what happened to Daxam? She was asleep in the Phantom Zone.

[legaleagle53]

8 minutes ago, KirkB said:

That's the one part that doesn't bother me. Kara made a point of saying the Kryptonians hate the...is it Daxamites? Anyway, some part of her wasn't too broken up by Daxam being decimated by Kryptons destruction. So it doesn't surprise me she wouldn't have brought it up. Though as I type this I have to wonder, HOW does she know what happened to Daxam? She was asleep in the Phantom Zone.

Kal probably filled her in at some point, or with her telescopic vision, she could have seen the damage done to Daxam and figured it out for herself (since Krypton and Daxam's solar system is still there; only those two planets have been destroyed, with Krypton having been obliterated and Daxam lying in ruins as a dead wasteland).

Edited October 30, 2016 by legaleagle53

[Perfect Xero]

I think that Jor and/or Zor would have scienced out what would happen to Daxam when Krypton exploded (which would explain why they would send their kids to Earth instead of seeking refuge on neighboring Daxam).

[Agent Dark]

6 hours ago, prican58 said:

Watching Maggie and I see a watered down Shaw from Person of Interest. Both actresses are similar physically but Shaw had a more dangerous component whereas Maggie does not. I am not a DC/Superman Universe person so I am not judging. Is Ms Lima portraying Maggie the way she is normally written/drawn?

Just wondering.

Maggie Sawyer is white and blonde in the comics, and she's drawn as a bit 'older' (like in her 30s) since she's usually depicted as a Captain.  Supergirl's Maggie Sawyer actually seems more like Renee Montoya from the pre-New52 continuity to be honest - a Latina detective in the GCPD, who is also gay and also dated Kate Kane lol.  Montoya is a Batman character mainly though, whereas Sawyer was originally a Superman character that moved across to the Batman comics for a while.

[stealinghome]

Yeah, I've wondered if the showrunners actually wanted Renee Montoya but couldn't get her because she's a Bat character, so they're using a Super character name but basically writing Montoya.

[BooBear]

13 hours ago, prican58 said:

Watching Maggie and I see a watered down Shaw from Person of Interest. Both actresses are similar physically but Shaw had a more dangerous component whereas Maggie does not. I am not a DC/Superman Universe person so I am not judging. Is Ms Lima portraying Maggie the way she is normally written/drawn?

The actress played almost a carbon copy of this super aggressive lesbian seducer over on "the family" earlier in the year. Only difference was that she was't a cop she was a reporter.  I suspect that is her range. 

[LisaM]

I really liked Alex/Maggie. I hope that the show goes there. I didn't see the same sparks with Kara/Lena but perhaps it is because I want Kara to have a female friend and Lena can fit the bill. Zero interest in Snapper and James - the absence of Cat Grant is very telling. Calista made such a good impression in this role and dominated every scene she was in - very hard to fill that void. 

Liked the introduction of a potential love interest or at least a Martian friend for Hank.

[ottoDbusdriver]

On 10/24/2016 at 10:04 PM, quarks said:

3. Is it just me, or are the villains of the week really boring this season so far?

So far that seems to be the case.

On 10/25/2016 at 11:35 AM, MarkHB said:

I just looked it up.  Per both IMDB and the actress's Twitter account, the character's name was "Scorcher" (which is also the name of a Marvel character apparently).

I was going to go with nameless redheaded alien with fire powers -- since in the context of the show she never introduced herself, or what planet she was from (although it was mentioned early on in the episode that only two races have heat vision).   And Scorcher is a pretty lame name ofr the VotW -- did she give herself that name, because no one else in the episode called her anything.  And do we just assume that she is locked up at the DEO ?  Because they never really showed that either.  And how do they dampen her fire powers ?

On 10/25/2016 at 11:22 PM, gazebo said:

Yay, Chris Wood!  Chris Wood!  I loved this actor when he was on The Vampire Diaries!  I think he will be great as Mon-El!  I think he's a very good looking and talented young actor.

However, Chris Wood was terrible as Jake in Containment -- still can't get past the creepy shower curtain sex scene.

I still can't believe that no one with a camera at that Presidential arrival backtracked the source of the heat vision or the fire balls to the source.  No one ?  Really ?  Not even Supergirl ?

Lynda Carter's acting was not very good.  Even discovering she was acting as an alien impersonating the President didn't help.

Alex needs to go back to DEO school -- if you are going to fake pretend to be a secret service agent, don't use your real name.

[kdm07]

On 10/26/2016 at 3:28 PM, DigitalCount said:

Everyone has covered the deep end parts of the episode, so I'll be over here in the shallow end. As long as Katie McGrath is on this show, I'll be watching it, accent slips and all. (In her defense, it's much better this episode than it was the last time, where she was going full-on OOH CURSES ME LUCKY CHARMS.) I also love how the Tess Mercer overt sexuality legacy lives on. I couldn't get Tess/Lois in Smallville (to the chagrin of both me and Cassidy Freeman) and I probably won't get Kara/Lena here, but a man can dream.

*clears throat* She's a big reason why I returned for Season 2 *clears throat again*

Also, why couldn't they have just let her keep her accent? She's adopted so they could've used that as an excuse.

Edited October 31, 2016 by kdm07

[mac123x]

On ‎10‎/‎25‎/‎2016 at 10:57 AM, Dobian said:

Great to see Lynda Carter, she looks fantastic

I hate to say this, but while she looked fantastic, her acting was horrific, so bad that I had to check Wikipedia because I thought maybe she'd had a stroke and I was being cruel.  Nope.  Was she reading from cue cards?  Such flat line readings, especially when she's talking about something that she allegedly had a lot of passion about, the Mutant Registration Act, err, the Sokovia Accords, errr, I mean, the Alien Amnesty Whatever.  (Seriously, the ham-handed references to current events had me rolling my eyes a LOT).

 

Snapper Carr was right but he's fighting a losing battle.  Objective reporters are a rare commodity anymore.  Besides, isn't Catco more of a magazine than a newspaper?  One-sided, agenda driven reporting is pretty much expected.

 

On the plus side, I really liked Mon-El, though I think a lot of that has to do with the actor;  I enjoyed his stint on the Vampire Diaries.  I hope he picks a pseudonym soon though.

[Dobian]

13 minutes ago, mac123x said:

Snapper Carr was right but he's fighting a losing battle.  Objective reporters are a rare commodity anymore.  Besides, isn't Catco more of a magazine than a newspaper?  One-sided, agenda driven reporting is pretty much expected.

Yeah when I think Catco I think Us Magazine.  It seems to have the journalistic integrity of Yahoo News.  To paraphrase Cat, who cares if it's true or not, as log as it has feeeeeeeling!!!

[BkWurm1]

I got that impression that Cat just recently hired Snapper and just started the whole hard news division.  

For Kara.

She HAS to know Kara is Supergirl.  

[AudienceofOne]

On 25/10/2016 at 5:54 PM, regularlyleaded said:

Not just that actually. Alex also mentioned dating guys in conversation(s) with Kara. So it's not like people who think Alex is heterosexual are off the reservation for thinking that.

All women are bi, didn't you get the memo? It's not like we're sick and tired of heterosexual women having random homosexual relationships in TV so we can get male viewers in for their non-threatening 'I Kissed a Girl' kicks. If you want a lesbian character, write a lesbian character. Stop having established heterosexual women end up in lesbian relationships for no apparent reason. At this stage, it's pissing me off. TV isn't exactly full of gay men but at least they're given permission to be gay. If Alex was gay or bi then they should have made her gay or bi from the start. But I guess then female sexuality would be about the women involved and not about male viewers. Can't have that.

I guess we can all look forward to the frisson of lesbian love and the inevitable lesbian death and subsequent male hero that Alex ends up with because lesbianism is just a phase or a bad soft-porn film about college experimentation. Or maybe, just maybe, we could have a strong female heterosexual character be friends with a lesbian character. Or is that too radical?

[MarkHB]

All we know about Alex is that none of her college relationships have lasted (at least not long enough to marry so far as we can tell), and I've seen varying interpretations of her encounters with Max Lord (whether or not it was all one-sided, from his side).  So I think they've got room to write the "she either hasn't realized or hasn't allowed herself to accept it" angle if that's what they're going for.  How common that is in RL I have no idea, particularly since I'd guess that Alex is roughly 28 (figuring a year or two older than Kara).

[legaleagle53]

23 hours ago, AudienceofOne said:

All women are bi, didn't you get the memo? It's not like we're sick and tired of heterosexual women having random homosexual relationships in TV so we can get male viewers in for their non-threatening 'I Kissed a Girl' kicks. If you want a lesbian character, write a lesbian character. Stop having established heterosexual women end up in lesbian relationships for no apparent reason. At this stage, it's pissing me off. TV isn't exactly full of gay men but at least they're given permission to be gay. If Alex was gay or bi then they should have made her gay or bi from the start. But I guess then female sexuality would be about the women involved and not about male viewers. Can't have that.

I guess we can all look forward to the frisson of lesbian love and the inevitable lesbian death and subsequent male hero that Alex ends up with because lesbianism is just a phase or a bad soft-porn film about college experimentation. Or maybe, just maybe, we could have a strong female heterosexual character be friends with a lesbian character. Or is that too radical?

Thank you!  You said what I recently said about this subject, only in a much classier way than I did.  If I could, I'd like this post a few million times!

Edited November 2, 2016 by legaleagle53

[Lady Calypso]

On 11/1/2016 at 3:11 AM, AudienceofOne said:

All women are bi, didn't you get the memo? It's not like we're sick and tired of heterosexual women having random homosexual relationships in TV so we can get male viewers in for their non-threatening 'I Kissed a Girl' kicks. If you want a lesbian character, write a lesbian character. Stop having established heterosexual women end up in lesbian relationships for no apparent reason. At this stage, it's pissing me off. TV isn't exactly full of gay men but at least they're given permission to be gay. If Alex was gay or bi then they should have made her gay or bi from the start. But I guess then female sexuality would be about the women involved and not about male viewers. Can't have that.

I guess we can all look forward to the frisson of lesbian love and the inevitable lesbian death and subsequent male hero that Alex ends up with because lesbianism is just a phase or a bad soft-porn film about college experimentation. Or maybe, just maybe, we could have a strong female heterosexual character be friends with a lesbian character. Or is that too radical?

I agree with this, although I remember reading one of the showrunners (I don't think it was Berlanti, but Kreisberg?) saying that they wanted to do it last season but I think it was the network (now we know it was CBS) not giving them permission to go for it. So I guess Alex possibly not being heterosexual wasn't a spur of the moment thing from this season. It really sucks because shows should be allowed to include anyone that they want to. But Alex was never actually established as heterosexual. She's talked about dating men in the past, but we haven't seen her date a man. And yes, I realize that your point is completely valid. It really does suck if they are doing this. I wish Alex was not already finding herself, because it would be nice if she was already comfortable with whatever sexuality she is. However, how often do we see a lesbian coming out story on a show that's not predominantly LGBTQ? It's usually the men that get coming out storylines, at least in the shows that I watch. 

Although, if Maggie is actually killed or she disappears and Alex starts dating a guy, I'll call shenanigans. But I do want to give them the benefit of the doubt here, especially since they've already created a wonderful bisexual character in Sara Lance on Legends of Tomorrow. 

[Cranberry]

Admittedly, I haven't watched every episode of Supergirl, but Alex never came across as an established heterosexual character to me. I buy this new flirtation, and I get the impression that this won't be a coming out story (and I hope it's not; we have enough of those and it would be nice to see this budding romance treated the same way as any other. So far, it has been, in all its tropey goodness).

It's also wonderful* to see the reaction from LGBT fans on sites like Autostraddle and Tumblr; they have been asking for something like this and are thrilled that it's happening.

 

 

*Wonderful but also sad, because there was so much joy in the LGBT fandom when

Maggie and Alex simply held hands in episode 2x4

, something fans of straight ships would take completely for granted.

[GHScorpiosRule]

2 hours ago, Lady Calypso said:

I agree with this, although I remember reading one of the showrunners (I don't think it was Berlanti, but Kreisberg?) saying that they wanted to do it last season but I think it was the network (now we know it was CBS) not giving them permission to go for it. So I guess Alex possibly not being heterosexual wasn't a spur of the moment thing from this season. It really sucks because shows should be allowed to include anyone that they want to. But Alex was never actually established as heterosexual. She's talked about dating men in the past, but we haven't seen her date a man. And yes, I realize that your point is completely valid. It really does suck if they are doing this. I wish Alex was not already finding herself, because it would be nice if she was already comfortable with whatever sexuality she is. However, how often do we see a lesbian coming out story on a show that's not predominantly LGBTQ? It's usually the men that get coming out storylines, at least in the shows that I watch. 

 

Considering that CBS also aired The Good Wife that had a bisexual character (Kalinda Sharma) and showed her in love scenes with a few different women and men, this just makes me scratch my head. It's not as if showing Alex to be bi, would have been the first time to do this with a character.

[stealinghome]

I hear what you're saying, but (sadly, it shouldn't be this way) it's very different to have a bisexual character on your 9pm adult prestige drama than it is to have one on your 8pm "family friendly, aimed at preteen girls" fluff show. Just look at all the nasty comments on Chyler Leigh's recent Instagram pics with Floriana Lima.

Kalinda also wasn't allowed to kiss a woman until either S2 or S3, can't remember which. There were definitely times in S1 when the show had been told they couldn't show Kalinda kissing a lady imo (the show kind of poked fun at the restrictions!).

Edited November 2, 2016 by stealinghome

[John Potts]

So we've learnt that in the SG-Verse, the President is all for inclusivity and not building a giant wall in space. So I guess Hillary won the election, although she's actually an alien - and possibly also Wonder Woman (who definitely isn't a Natural born US citizen, so SG's version of Trump was probably right about the whole Obama/birth certificate thing)! I guess we'll see whether they were right in THIS Universe imminently (well, probably by the time you're reading this, in fact).

As for orientation issues, bearing in mind any relationship between Kryptonians and Earthlings would be more like me dating a pitcher plant than a person (or even a gorilla). The pitcher plant at least evolved on Earth, so we probably share more DNA than Earthlings & Kryptonians (I know that inevitably that human & Kryptonian DNA - or whatever genetic transmission Kryptonians use - will MIRACULOUSLY be compatible with human DNA, if it comes to it, but it MAKES NO SENSE!)

...and yes, I know I'm using logic on a show that features flying aliens that can shoot fire from their eyes!
 

Quote

 

Lady Calypso Man, I'm totally on Snapper's side

 

Me three! I'm totally getting Gilmore Girls flashbacks to when Rory got chewed out by Mr Huntsburger (I thought he was right too). He could have been nicer about it, but she needs to grow a thicker skin (ironically, given she's actually bullet proof!).
 

Quote

 

kdm07 I got some serious Buffy flashbacks there too.

 

So did I, but it does seem as if aliens are now EVERYWHERE, when last season they were all from the same couple of places (either Krypton or Mars). And sad to think that there are people watching SG who weren't born when Buffy was first airing. Let's all feel old!