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There’s a scene toward the end of “Supergirl” that perfectly encapsulates how tonally inept it is. After what feels like an eternity, our Kryptonian hero, Kara Zor-El (Milly Alcock), has quit drinking away her sorrows,
embraced her superpowers, thrown on her cape and decided to whoop some evil ass. It’s a moment of triumph for the 23-year-old, whose planet-hopping party-girl persona had masked a deep pain stemming from the loss of her parents and home planet, and demands a rousing tune to mark the milestone. All of a sudden, the sound drops; the action slows to a crawl; and the deafening silence is broken by the strumming of an acoustic guitar, followed by a woman’s voice softly crooning the lyrics to “The Middle” by Jimmy Eat World. It’s not only remarkably deflating but also one of the worst needle drops ever. And the man responsible is none other than James Gunn, the new steward of DC Studios.
“That was probably the biggest discussion,” director Craig Gillespie told Rolling Stone of the song’s selection. “And I gotta credit James Gunn for that one.”
The issues with “Supergirl” extend far beyond that one song, of course. As Variety critic Owen Gleiberman wrote in his review of the film, it’s “a comic-book movie with the worst script I can remember” that’s “full of action yet numbingly flat”; it received a B- Cinemascore among opening-night audiences, the lowest of any DC Comics movie adaptation other than “Joker Folie à Deux”; and grossed a meager $38 million in its opening weekend against a $170 million budget (plus worldwide marketing expenses). “Supergirl” is just the latest in a long line of disappointing movies — or, in the worrying case of “Batgirl,” axed projects — centering a female superhero since Patty Jenkins’ impressive “Wonder Woman” back in 2017.
Why can’t Hollywood get it right?
“Supergirl” Crashes Down to Earth
One could argue that “Supergirl” was set up for failure given the way the character was introduced into the DC Universe in Gunn’s “Superman”: drunkenly stumbling into the Fortress of Solitude looking for her dog Krypto in a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it cameo. Unlike the first appearance of Gal Gadot’s Wonder Woman in “Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice,” where she joins Batman and Superman in battling Doomsday, or the acrobatic intro of Tom Holland’s Spider-Man in “Captain America: Civil War,” our interest hadn’t been piqued in Supergirl as a standalone character by a superpowers-flexing sequence; rather, we were treated to a sitcom-esque drop-in that was met with befuddlement more than anything else.
In fact, Gillespie’s “Supergirl” feels slight in scale, as though the character was dropped into an episode of “The Mandalorian,” instead of an epic superhero movie. As our critic pointed out, much of its runtime is dedicated to Kara navigating dark desert worlds, crossing paths with creature after creature straight out of the Mos Eisley Cantina, including a two-headed rat and an armadillo-like pet furiously pooping in a cage. And I do mean dark: large stretches of “Supergirl” are as caliginous as a David Fincher film. It’s almost ironic that Supergirl is powered by the yellow sun because her movie is drained of color.
Despite the best efforts of Alcock in the title role and Eve Ridley as Ruthye Marye Knoll, a young girl out to avenge the killing of her family at the hands of a band of human-trafficking space pirates known as the Brigands, they are let down by Ana Nogueira’s mess of a script, which fails to illuminate what drives its characters and provides context through thinly-rendered, momentum-killing flashbacks (e.g. the destruction of Krypton). Who are Knoll’s parents? What is motivating Supergirl beyond retrieving an antidote for her poisoned dog? Why are the Brigands, led by Krem of the Yellow Hills (a pin-faced, pony-tailed Matthias Schoenerts) trafficking little girls, who they call “the brides?” That we’re not privy to any of their backstory other than a throwaway line about repopulating a planet makes the human-trafficking subplot seem like a cheap knockoff of “Mad Max: Fury Road.”
With a Little Help From My Friends
A little more on Krem of the Yellow Hills. Whereas Gunn’s “Superman” was buoyed by Nicholas Hoult’s scenery-chewing performance as Lex Luthor, the villain of “Supergirl” barely registers thanks to his missing backstory. Gunn also surrounded David Corensweet’s Superman with a team of intriguing superheroes, such as Mister Terrific (Edi Gathegi), Green Lantern (Nathan Fillion), Metamorpho (Anthony Carrigan) and Hawkgirl (Isabela Merced), as well as the always-great Skyler Gisondo as Jimmy Olsen. Alcock’s Supergirl has Lobo, a glam rock bounty hunter on a motorcycle played by Jason Momoa (who already portrayed DC superhero Aquaman across four films) that we know precious little about; her cousin, Corenswet’s Superman, who mostly pops up on video calls or in flashback; Ridley’s Knoll; and her poisoned dog. Oh, and Seth Rogen voices a miniature alien in a couple of scenes. These aren’t exactly the Guardians of the Galaxy.
As for the lame Krypton flashbacks, a big reason why “Wonder Woman” was so effective (and “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever,” for that matter) is because its rich in context. We bear witness to the glory of Themyscira, Diana’s home planet of Amazons, and the mentoring and guidance bestowed on her by her mother, Queen Hippolyta (Connie Nielsen), and her warrior-sister, Antiope (Robin Wright). We understand the world that shaped Diana and her calling as Wonder Woman. In “Supergirl,” we’re treated to subtitled scenes of her mother (Emily Beecham) and father (David Krumholtz?) telling her to “be good,” as we witness the destruction of Krypton for the umpteenth time. And the poisoned dog she spends the entire film trying to save? Their entire backstory boils down to her stumbling across it one day during a funeral procession.
The Culture War
While the culture war is a contributing factor in the poor performance of female-led superhero films, with hordes of online misogynists lashing out at them sight unseen, previous entries like “Wonder Woman” and “Captain Marvel” withstood similar backlash — who can forget the manly meltdown over women-only screenings of “Wonder Woman?” — to big box office returns, and the female-focused “Barbie” shattered records, grossing $1.4 billion worldwide. That’s because those films were made with care and consideration, unlike “Supergirl” or other recent movies centering women superheroes such as “Wonder Woman 1984,” “The New Mutants,” “Eternals,” “The Marvels,” “Madame Web” and last year’s “Red Sonja,” which grossed a grand total of $271,461.
It is, however, hard to imagine that a male superhero would be treated with the same disrespect as “Batgirl,” Adil & Bilall’s film starring Leslie Grace as the titular superheroine, Brendan Fraser as the villain Firefly and Michael Keaton returning as Batman. Filming had already been completed on the $90 million project when DC Films’ parent company, Warner Bros. Discovery, decided to cancel it during post-production, treating it as a tax write-down following its merger.
“The product— I’m sorry ‘content’—is being commodified to the extent that it’s more valuable to burn it down and get the insurance on it than to give it a shot in the marketplace,” Fraser said at the time.
Audiences are also experiencing a general sense of superhero fatigue thanks to an oversaturated marketplace bursting with sequels, spinoffs and second-tier heroes with weak IP. It’s one reason why younger audiences are turning toward original horror films from YouTube creators.
THE ROAD AHEAD
Nogueira, the aforementioned writer of “Supergirl,” has been tasked with penning an upcoming “Wonder Woman” film for Gunn and DC Studios, though future projects are all up in the air given Paramount Skydance’s pending takeover of Warner Bros. That is the only stand-alone female superhero project currently in production. Over the years, several female heroes (and villains) have deserved their own spinoff films, from Michelle Pfeiffer’s Catwoman and Jennifer Lawrence’s Mystique to Tessa Thompson’s Valkyrie. And there are a number of other appealing female comic-book heroes who could feature in big-screen adaptations, like DC Comics’ Mari Jiwe/Vixen, Marvel’s Cindy Moon/Silk or a “Tank Girl” redo. Perhaps Marvel’s upcoming “X-Men” reboot will inspire a long-awaited Storm movie. Whatever happens, they should heed the lessons learned from “Supergirl” on what not to do.
