Supergirl

 

Supergirl follows the titular hero, reprised by Milly Alcock, as she reluctantly teams up with an unlikely companion for an interstellar journey of vengeance and justice, after a ruthless adversary strikes a little too close to home.

Alcock is a phenomenal actress (I absolutely loved her in House of the Dragon), and she showed real range here, it's genuinely a disservice to her talent that the material around her didn’t rise to meet it.

The film almost tapped into some great meta-commentary about why she's still labeled a "girl" as a hero while her male counterpart gets called Superman, but it never fully committed to the idea.

Unfortunately, the villains just didn’t have the presence to feel genuinely dangerous. Jason Momoa played Lobo like a kid-friendly caricature, channeling a cartoonish, Jack Nicholson-style Joker, and at this point you have to wonder if every character he plays is contractually obligated to ride a motorcycle.

The fight choreography came off as largely chaotic, lacking the crisp, creative execution you see in top-tier action films. The one major exception was a fantastic slow-motion sequence near the end that mirrored the style James Gunn. I actually assumed Gunn directed this going in, and finding out he didn't explained why it ultimately lacked the spark of Superman.

The narrative explored some touching, grounded themes around loss, grief, and finding your purpose without needing to be perfect, but the movie as a whole was just okay. It was missing that vital piece needed to really lock you in and make you care.

Unfortunately because the film is bombing this could end up costing Alcock the chance to keep playing this character, which would be a real loss. Ultimately, releasing a lackluster Supergirl right after a brand-new Superman film was a misstep. Asking audiences to immediately pivot to another hero with nearly identical powers made the universe feel redundant rather than expanding it into a broader Justice League world.