In 2023, James Gunn brought Superman back to theaters. This week, Director Craig Gillespie brought Supergirl back. This is the sophomore outing of the new DCU’s God’s and Monsters story arc.

We find Kara Zor-El offworld, going to planets with red suns where her powers don’t work (or eventually drain) She is doing this in order to keep her Kryptonian physiology from preventing the buzz from alcohol, etc. The conceit is that it is her 23rd birthday and she wants to celebrate

Once again, I have given myself the challenge of writing a review that doesn’t spoil the movie. Once again, I’m not going to include the trailers. We know we are going to see Krypto again. We see Jason Momoa return to DC, this time playing Lobo, intergalactic bounty hunter. We get to see the larger galactic side of the DCU.  We also get to see David Corenswet return as Kara’s cousin, Superman. If the previous movie Superman made you really believe that a dog can fly, this movie will give you the context for why Krypto matters so much to Kara. This movie takes a drastic tonal difference from Superman and that’s completely fair as this is a drastically different story. In Superman, we are reintroduced to hope. In Supergirl, we are reminded of how the destruction of Krypton was not a fairytale land to Kara, but a traumatic event that she has to deal with on a daily basis for the rest of her life. 

In contrast to the previous Kryptonian outing, I went to see this on preview night (Thursday, June 25th)  and was so enamoured with it that I took a friend with me the same weekend (Saturday, June 27th). I don’t normally do that. I needed confirmation from an independent source (my friend) that I’m not just a DC fanboy (I am a DC fanboy… I just needed someone else to confirm I wasn’t looking at this with rose colored glasses). I admit the following: I am shocked that I loved this movie more than Superman. I don’t even know where to begin without spoiling, but here goes. While Superman takes place in a lived-in universe, Supergirl is both that and an origin story, and somehow it is told in a way that fits in the overall narrative. It is my understanding that the movie took a degree of inspiration from the Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow comic. I will have to get back to you on that as it is now on my reading list. I had done my best to avoid other reviews, but in summation there are apparently a few significant changes from the source material. I don’t care. This Supergirl movie is its own thing. As a stand alone story, it puts all the pieces necessary for a newbie to understand what is going on from the beginning to the end. And it was solidly entertaining, if not sad in parts. Milly Alcock turns in one amazing performance as Kara Zor-El and Eve Ridley knocks it out of the park as Ruthye. They play off of each other well. (This is hard to not spoil things…)

My first impression on Thursday was this is a great movie that tells the audience everything it needs to know to enjoy it. My second impression reinforced this since we managed to see it in a theatre with the captions on. We do get snippets of the John Williams Superman theme. Some have argued that the movie is the DCU Guardians of the Galaxy. This is beyond lazy writing and analysis. If this is what James Gunn meant about each movie standing on its own while contributing to a larger narrative, bring me more.

5 out of 5 Super Milkbones.

Ed Mathews used to be the News Editor of The Slush Factory and the Co-Editor In Chief of PopImage. Fun fact: he was one of 3 people who got rec.arts.superman created on usenet. Now he is busy making sure computers work right and occasionally coming out of retirement for a comic book thought piece at GayLeague.com.