SPOILER-FREE PLOT SUMMARY
Celebrating her birthday by drinking around the galaxy, Kara Zor-El (played by Milly Alcock) and her dog Krypto are enjoying a listless evening when recently orphaned teenager Ruthye Knoll (Eve Ridley in her feature film debut) walks into the bar asking for help. In exchange for one of her dad’s highly coveted swords, she begs somebody to help her find Krem of the Yellow Hills (Matthias Schoenaerts), the leader of the Brigands, who killed her family in cold blood. When a thug steals the sword she’s carrying outright, Kara does her a solid by going after him and getting it back, warning Ruthye not to pursue her revenge quest. Meanwhile, Krem shoots Crypto with a poisonous dart that paralyzes him. Knowing the local village, Ruthye returns Kara’s favor by leading her to a healer who explains that the poison will claim his life in three “moon rises.” Turns out the poison is actually part of a Brigands negotiation tactic where they inject somebody and then dangle the anecdote in front of them to extract information which means they always carry it on their person. Now, not only does Ruthye want to track down Krem but Kara needs to in order to get the anecdote and save her dog’s life.
SPOILER-FREE REVIEW
First and foremost, Alcock is great. Her character starts out pretty uninspired (i.e. a drunken stuper) but really goes on a growth journey throughout the movie and she brings that depth every step of the way. Whether she’s worried about her dog, reluctantly helping Ruthye or coming to terms with her life choices, Alcock brings each of them to life. The DCEU should be thrilled their franchise is hitched to her wagon.
The pacing was also a highlight. A lot of times, flashbacks and backstories can feel either forced or outright can kill the momentum. SUPERGIRL’s flashback scenes — most notably how she left Krypton — is perfectly placed, perfectly timed and perfectly informed.
But then there’s the writing.
The dialogue is hardly special, the “jokes” are average at best and there’s next to nothing creative about the way the characters are used. It’s not bad like MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE but it does leave a lot to be desired. It makes one wonder why James Gunn was so eager to bring Ana Nogueira in to write for DCEU projects.
If you want to get nit picky, you can wonder the likelihood of whatever planet Kara’s on has exactly the same day length as Earth (“72 hours” is used synonymously with three moon rises) or why Krem says “this one dies before the day ends” instead of just killing her right there or how the Krypton community floating in space gets enough water to fill decorative pools. You can wonder those things and those questions (and others) would be valid. We’ve seen really well-written superhero movies before and SUPERGIRL ain’t it.
Also, something about certain scenes feels cheap. Ruthye in a field and Kara at her ship are sharing a sweet moment but the camera doesn’t use the over-the-shoulder technique that helps the brain believe the two actors are having a real exchange. Instead, a clean-single is used for both characters, almost as if they were reshoots and/or weren’t on set together. And that’s just one example of curious choices by director Craig Gillespie.
SUPERGIRL is like that hit song on the radio that’s fun to hear but has no staying power. It’s not bad by any means but every song played before and after seems to be varying degrees of better. Alcock gives it her all and is a joy to watch but the writing, CGI-heavy fight scenes and directing choices regress SUPERGIRL to the mean. After a pretty enjoyable SUPERMAN last year, I’m sure DC Studios was hoping for a little momentum headed into the future but, unfortunately, they’re back to where they were pre-Gunn.
JKG SCORE: 5.5 out of 10
Untitled Film Project 