If you are following my Did You Hear? series you know there’s been a lot of announcements about developments in the upcoming CW five part Crisis on Infinite Earths crossover which will air at the end of this year. In an effort to make sure our Spoilerites have the best viewing experience possible I’ll be doing a series of these recaps bringing you up-to-date on all the important events from the previous seasons which will hurtle us ever closer to Crisis.
Let’s review … Supergirl!
The fourth season of Supergirl saw a pretty big cast shift. Mon-El (Chris Wood), was out of the picture, James (Mehcad Brooks), and Winn (Jeremy Jordan), both took steps back and eventually faded away over the course of the season and Brainiac 5 (Jesse Rath), got to stick around and really come into his own in a move which felt like a step toward developing his relationship with Kara (Melissa Benoist), that is so classically highlighted in the comics.
For his part, James struggled throughout this season of Supergirl with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder that felt both topical, while also serving to remove him from active duty on Team Supergirl.
Nia Nal (Nicole Maines), joined the cast as the first transgender superhero on television. Her superhero identity as Dreamer was quickly introduced and Supergirl season 4 saw her struggle with encountering and learning how to team up with Supergirl, Martian Manhunter, et al. It took until about the halfway point of the season for her powers to fully manifest. They are generational, rather than traditionally metahuman, which actually makes her power set closer to that or Kara and Clark than some of the other Arrowverse cast.
In a mirror narrative to Kara’s struggle to embrace her powers during Supergirl season 1 and come to peace with her Kryptonian heritage, Nia struggled to embrace whether or not she was comfortable continuing her familiar “dreamer” line. These dreams make her prone to bouts of narcolepsy and affects her ability to do her day job where she joins Kara at CatCo.
Agent Liberty (Sam Witwer), joined the cast this season in the school of returning cast member Lena Luthor (Katie McGrath), presenting as a person of questionable moral stances. Agent Liberty heads up everything from anti-alien rallies to attacks on friends of Team Supergirl, which quickly drew him into their crosshairs. In what could be seen as a reflection of real world events Agent Liberty quickly garnered popularity and a substantial following who named themselves “Children of Liberty” and only exacerbated the unrest in National City.
Supergirl season 4 introduced and publicized more aliens than ever and really embraced its intergalactic nature. With Krypton having passed out of production Supergirl is in a better position than ever to continue embracing their extraterrestrial elements.
Manchester Black (David Ajala), also joined season 4 of Supergirl as an early ally of J’onn J’onzz (David Harewood, who directed an episode this season), although he quickly embraces his comic book villain status by drawing out Supergirl to an alien immigration center and engaging her in hand-to-hand combat. Previously mentioned Lena Luthor isn’t pure-hearted for the entire season either carrying out experiments on humans to see if she can bring about the manifestations of enhanced powers in a move that feels much more inspired by her Luthor heritage than anything viewers had seen her get up to before.
Further to the Luthor’s – Lex (Jon Cryer), finally made his debut on this season of Supergirl. It was brief and the fans loved it!
Also well received by viewers was Kara’s part in the Elseworlds crossover. I’ve not included much about the crossovers in these breakdowns because the events generally have very little with the overall continuity of the seasons, but Supergirl had a pretty wonderful interaction with Batwoman (Ruby Rose). With persistent rumours that Supergirl will be brought into the main Arrowverse continuity during the upcoming Crisis on Infinite Earths crossover I can’t help but put on my Stephen-Schleicher-conspiracy-theory-tin-foil-hat and wonder if Kara will appear in the Batwoman pilot OR if they women will be teamed up in an homage to World’s Finest by this time next year?
Lex sets off a Kaznian invasion with the hopes of presenting himself as the hero to save the world from an impending war. This allows Lena a nice moment of redemption where she gets to take him down and help Supergirl and prove to her friend that her heart and soul are really in the right place after all.
The Monitor also makes an appearance in the Supergirl finale heralding his heavy-handed medling to come this winter!
Supergirl season 5 airs Sunday, October 6th on the CW.
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She/her. Canadian actress. Bi Queen. Canadian co-host of Geek History Lesson. Canadian comic book writer: Witchblade, Apollo IX, Jupiter Jet series, Science! The Elements of Dark Energy, Aurora and The Eagle. Award-losing: actor, writer, podcaster. https://linktr.ee/AshleyVRobinson