bluewaterrider
Senior Member
Memories are quicksilver. Notwithstanding, the TV episodes have generally exceeded my expectations. Feels like a love letter to the Silver and Bronze Age renditions of the character.
I'm going to give as detailed a summary as I can muster without aid.
Be warned: This is NOT the thread to read if you don't want to know what happened in the TV series so far. I'll go from general to specific at the drop of a hat.
Episode 1
I missed the first few minutes. Presumably the exposition was as brief if not briefer than the trailer. Planet explodes, Kara having been sent by her loving parents just moments before that happened. Gets stuck somehow in the Phantom Zone. For several years. Eventually freed by some noteworthy event. Crash lands on Earth. Found by Superman. Homage to Action Comics #252. Except without the detour to Midvale Orphanage. Taken in more or less DIRECTLY by the Danvers, who already have a daughter of their own named Alexandria or "Alex" for short, played by Chyler Leigh. No nickname for Kara, whose name is short enough as it is, not even "Linda" or "Linda Lee" or "Linda Danvers" or some such permutation. I wonder if copyright complications are part of the reason for this or if this was simply director's choice. Seems surprisingly natural though, as there are a surprising number of women with the name "Kara" born in the last 20 or 30 years.
Fast forward.
KARA Danvers works at National City newspaper. As an assistant for the boss of the building, who apparently is so powerful she owns several more: Cat Grant. Here the series seems to be following the surprisingly progressive line of the Superman Family comics that Kara was featured in during the late 1970s and early 1980s. People who are bit players in the regular series have matured and gained clout, sometimes considerable clout. Jimmy Olsen, transplanted from the Daily Planet in Metropolis, has gone from a teen photographer and cub reporter, to respected photojournalist JAMES Olsen. Pulitzer prize winner, too, if memory serves, which, a month removed from first viewing of this show, it might not.
The show has changed Jimmy from the freckle faced red-haired youth he used to be in notable ways. He is at once both less and more relate-able to me for those changes. Quite interesting.
Jimmy's traditional role has been partially assumed by a character named Winn Schott. In regular Superman lore, this is the villain known as The Toyman.
It will be interesting to learn what the backstory is for THIS version of Winn in the show. For now, far from being a villain, Winn is not only Kara's co-worker, but also one of her best friends.
She needs friends. Cat Grant is the boss from hell in this pilot, and not just for Kara. In fact, their first conversation has Cat asking Kara to prepare several hundred workers for termination. The magazine Cat owns has been undergoing slipping sales. Without a change, stat, she'll be forced to pull the plug. Seems she couldn't care less, either. SEEMS that way ...
Cat tells Kara the newspaper she came from (The Daily Planet) has few problems with sales because they ALWAYS have one noteworthy news source:
Superman. He is always an interesting and photogenic topic for readers.
National City? Needs his equivalent.
"Want to help?", Cat asks Kara. "Go find me a hero".
Kara unwinds from the stress of work with the dating scene.
She rebuffs Winn's offer of a movie only because she had accepted an online date invitation earlier. So now we meet Alex Danvers again, all grown up.
Because Kara needs someone to sound off on about life's troubles.
And because Kara needs help in figuring out which dress to wear.
Alex tells Kara she has to be on a plane to Geneva in 2 hours, but helps Kara anyway. Doesn't help. Kara's date turns out to be a jerk, who ditches her midstream. Just as well.
Kara has more important things on her plate.
We learned in the prior scene with her sister that Kara has downplayed her true abilities for the better part of a decade now. Trying to blend in, be normal.
She has powers, invulnerability redoubtable strength, flight, etcetera, but she hides this fact from the world. She's not even 100% certain she REMEMBERS how to fly now, it's been so long.
This changes, now. In an instant. In the immediate aftermath of the date ditching, Kara overhears an emergency news report, blaring over all channels. "Plane bound to Geneva ... now about to CRASH land!"
No time for subtlety now. Kara is in the alleyway outside in an eyeblink, doing everything she can to jog her memory and take flight. One bound! Two bounds! ... gliding, no, not right ... Come on, PLEASE!!
On the the third or fourth time she makes it. It's breathtaking. It IS the same plane her sister is on. Alex is scared for her life. You can see it in her eyes.
But then Alex sees Kara. Alex watches transfixed with the rest of the passengers and National City as Kara JUST manages to right the plane, slow it's descent, maneuver it barely, BARELY through the cable tent of Otto Binder bridge and plop the plane gently enough into the river to save the lives of all the people inside. Quite a treat to watch on giant screen TV. Special effects have come a LONG way since Helen Slater's time even for the Big Boys, let alone TV studios.
Even prior trailer exposure failed to lessen the impact.
What a scene.
'Bout the only person I can think of who is unhappy with all this ...?
Chyler Leigh's character.
Kara is so flush with excitement you can almost FEEL her deflate when Alex comes in an asks her "What were you thinking?!? How could you EXPOSE yourself like this?"
Not quite what Kara was expecting.
Well, sisters -- what are you gonna do?
