Supergirl
Supergirl
Starring Milly Alcock, Matthias Schoenarts, Eve Ridley, Jason Momoa
Directed by Chris Gillespie
After being sent away from her home planet before it was totally destroyed, Kara Zor-El (Milly Alcock) lives a nomad life with her dog Kypto, traveling from planet to planet to get drunk, get into fights, and all but face her troubled past. While partying on a planet, young Ruthye Marye Knoll (Eve Ridley) arrives at the bar and announces she's seeking someone to help her find Krem of the Yellow Hills (Matthias Schoenaerts) who murdered her family in cold blood. Kara dismisses the young girl and doesn't want to help, until Krem shoots Krypto with a poison dart and the antidote only resides on Krem's person. Forcibly united with Ruthye, Kara travels from planet to planet to track down Krem before Krypto succumbs to the poison in three days, and during that time she tries to teach Ruthye that revenge won't bring her closure, but it seems she's almost telling herself that as well.
"Supergirl" is getting some major flack from a small but vocal percentage of people, most notably men, who love nothing more than to bring down female superhero films. "Wonder Woman," "Black Widow" and "Captain Marvel" have been met with severe criticism from insecure men who can't stand seeing a woman in power, and in this case Milly Alcock has also been attacked for her lack of physical attractiveness. None of this factors into my review because I'm not an insecure manchild, but it didn't help the lack of box office gross.
There's a few things the movie does well. One is Milly Alcock, who makes her cinematic debut with this film. James Gunn is doing a great job at casting unknown actors in leading roles, giving a deeper sense of excitement because you're not immediately thinking, "oh, it's Samara Weaving as Supergirl" or "Ryan Gosling is Superman, all I see is Ryan Gosling." Alcock exudes the emotions that Kara epitomizes: she is a tortured girl tormented by having to flee her home planet and her loving parents since it was about to be destroyed. She has no real home world, her only friend is her dog, and she spends her days and nights traveling to red-sun planets to drink because she can actually feel the effects to hide from her troubles. Yet she's also highly sarcastic and fun, which Alcock delivers in spades, and is vastly different than her cousin, Superman. She even says that Superman sees the good in people, while she sees the truth, and it shows in how she handles herself. She gives a great performance with the limited resources, and hopefully she'll get some other chances to blow audiences away.
Jason Momoa returns to the DCEU as the bounty hunter Lobo, instead of his heroic stint as Aquaman, and it's obvious to see why Momoa wanted to play Lobo in the first place - not just physically, but personality-wise, he fits Lobo to a T. Sarcastic, boisterous, and a behemoth, Lobo is a being of immense strength that even Supergirl fears, but deep down he's a big softie that will never admit it, especially towards young Ruthye. Hopefully he'll return in more than just a cameo turn.
The action set pieces were exciting, if not typical. There's numerous ones throughout the film that were shot brilliantly, and showcased Alcock's physical prowess as well. There's been a lot of talk about this movie having the worst "needle drop" in history (meaning a song associated with an action sequence), but to me it wasn't as egregious.
The rest of the movie plays out like a generic superhero film that prevents it from becoming anything more than just a middle-of-the-road superhero flick and proves the naysayers right about not wanting these types of movies anymore, also known as superhero fatigue (although you wouldn't guess that after seeing the substantial presale tickets for "Spider-Man: Brand New Day"). Reluctant hero emerges as a hero because someone she loves suffers. A ticking clock to save aforementioned loved one. Only solution rests in the literal hands of the villain. Yadda yadda yadda. There's nothing new here that hasn't been told better in other movies, but it doesn't make them downright terrible.
The terrible part is with other aspects that you see in movies like this. Eve Ridley is a great actress who's horribly neutered in the script as Ruthye, who's only character trait is seeking revenge against her family's murder. She repeats the same introduction over and over, and is repeatedly relegated to just standing away from the danger (if you did a drinking game every time Kara tells her to "stay put" only for her not to listen and do something that endangers herself and others, you'd be dead).
Likewise, the villain is essentially a villain-of-the-week, a character with no discernible characteristics other than creating carnage for carnage sake. Matthias Schoenaerts' Krem is as bland as any numerous superhero villains of late, who just appears randomly, throws some shade, does a little fighting, and does so with an inflated sense of ego. Nothing exciting, nothing new, nothing memorable.
So while "Supergirl" is getting some unjustified hate from a small but loud contingent of basement-dwelling losers, the overall feel for the film is that it's nothing we haven't seen before, and, more erroneously, less memorable.
The Score: B+
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