"Supergirl" Recap: "How Does She Do It?"

Written by John Edward Betancourt

THIS IS THE EMERGENCY SPOILER ALERT SYSTEM...YOU ARE ADVISED TO READ AT YOUR OWN RISK...

After weeks of high flying and cheery storylines Supergirl decided to change it up and take us into a darker realm, one perhaps more appropriate of the current state of affairs in the superhero market and as expected, the show did it in spectacular fashion, all while maintaining the best elements of what we love about it. 

This week Kara faced off against a rogue bomber, one that seemed to be attacking random and odd targets all tied to Maxwell Lord in some form or fashion and in between that...she was doing her best to juggle her busy life. Turns out that Kara volunteered to help watch Cat's son while Ms. Grant headed off to Metropolis to accept an award and that's the first thing I'd like to talk about today, because this was a wonderful addition to Supergirl's story thus far.

Despite her ability to do anything and be anywhere, for the first time in this series Supergirl was actually overwhelmed, doing her best to juggle her job responsibilities, saving the world and keeping her personal life going and I loved this for one simple reason...it made her completely relatable on so many levels. Maybe not the saving the world part since hey, I sit on a couch and type words into a computer, but I digress, it's the fact that we are all struggling to find the balance in our daily lives. We too have demanding jobs and friends to balance and that takes quite a bit of effort and struggle and it's nice to see something like this addressed on a show where it looks like the character can do anything. Not to mention, I loved the twist that Supergirl had to make a tough choice between saving people at the airport...or saving people on a train.

That choice came about because of Ethan Knox, a former employee of Maxwell's who was fired six months ago and appeared to be the mastermind behind all of these awful bombings and as it turns out...he was merely a pawn in one of the series' best moments to date with the big reveal that Maxwell Lord may end up serving a type of Lex Luthor role on this show. Maxwell was merely testing our Girl of Steel, trying to learn her abilities and destroying his own infrastructure, and killing Ethan in the process to find out what she can do, and long term he hopes to reveal her true identity. It was a chilling storyline to say the least, one that I did not expect to see on the show and while Supergirl can't prove this scheme to the authorities...now we know what Lord is all about.  

The other little tidbit this episode managed to produce was the reinforcement of the theory that Daniel posed to me...that Hank Henshaw is the Martian Manhunter. After all, he was in tune with the bomb at the airport, exhibited some super strength in getting inside of it an was able to disable it no problem. The Hank Henshaw of the comics would have blown people up, the fact that this one saved the day...speaks volumes to the fact he is a friend for certain. Either way, this was a great episode. It handled a darker tone without bringing the audience down or leaving you devastated in any way and well, I liked the pacing this go round and the bolder storyline. I'm hoping they keep up with more diverse tales like this down the road. Until next time.

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