We’ve got another strong Tuesday lineup to break down with more new episodes of Stargirl and Supergirl! Starting on Earth-2, the JSA dealt with quite a dark Fourth of July as Eclipso set his sights toward Beth and breaking down the (relatively) new Dr. Mid-Nite. At the same time, Rick sought to protect Solomon Grundy from hunters in the woods while also considering whether the creature responsible for his parents’ death was truly a monster or not. Back on Earth-Prime, Lena returned to the Super Friends just in time to help them start going after the totems, starting with the Totem of Courage. But with Nyxly also in pursuit and fifth-dimensional magic being strewn all over National City, things are sure to get even more chaotic for Kara and her team.
Stargirl – “Summer School: Chapter Eight”
After such a devastating incident, do you think it’s possible that Rick could still be a hero after this? If so, how?
Amid his other manipulations, what did you make of Eclipso’s racist insults toward Beth?
Supergirl – “The Gauntlet”
What do you think it would’ve taken for Kara to pass the gauntlet of courage?
With this episode adding more detail to Nyxly’s backstory with her brother, how is she faring overall compared to other big bads from the show?
Well first off there’s the issue of him getting arrested. That’s a tricky one considering they can’t exactly use a defense of “the epitome of evil made him think he was fighting a giant zombie creature.” I think the only way he’ll avoid jail/juvie time is if his uncle pulls through and doesn’t press charges. While I doubt he’ll suddenly be filled w/ a ton of family love, maybe he won’t want it getting out that he got the crap kicked out of him by Rick and would instead tell people that he got jumped by a gang or something. As for the hourglass, I can’t remember if it’s been mentioned if Rex Tyler ever left behind his formula for the hourglass solution/substance. If he did, then it’s possible that it could be rebuilt, though it’d still be quite the challenge
But the real challenge will be convincing Rick to take up the mantle again. His uncle surviving would be a bit of a boost to his morale, but it’d definitely take a lot more than that to convince him to be Hourman again. I’m sure he knew when he destroyed the hourglass that he had been manipulated by Eclipso, but he also would’ve felt that if he didn’t have that super strength, he wouldn’t have been able to hurt his uncle so much in the 1st place. Where Yolanda’s “retirement” feels more temporary until she gets her mind back in order, this move is definitely Rick attempting to give up Hourman for good. He may be in store for an even longer journey toward getting back to being a hero, and maybe it could even extend past this season. Perhaps he’ll still try to help as just himself, but we might have to be ready for the possibility that Hourman won’t be the in the final fight against Eclipso. This was a highly traumatic incident for him, and regardless of whether he’s able to suit up again, it’s gonna haunt him for a long, long time
This may seem like a weird thing to bring up or criticize for this reason, but I really felt that those few lines seemed really out of place. Don’t get me wrong, I know why they were there – Eclipso is supposed to be evil incarnate and racism is an incredibly huge evil in our world. But part of what makes Eclipso an effective villain is the way he’s been able to specifically target his victims to break them down. He focused on Yolanda’s guilt and PTSD over killing Brainwave (assuming those hallucinations were in fact him and not Brainwave’s psychic remnants) and he constructed a pretty elaborate ruse to manipulate Rick’s complicated feelings over Grundy. And true, most of his efforts against Beth did focus on her insecurities of not being “chosen” and feeling like she doesn’t belong, but the racist stuff just felt really unnecessary. Like most of his lines were things that really only Beth would’ve been hurt by, but there’s a large group of people who would’ve been insulted by the racial stereotypes, so it feels less personal and therefore less effective as a way to break her down. It seemed like most of his words were actually having that effective, but the racist stuff only served to piss her off, and he would’ve wanted her feeling totally defeated, not angry
And I guess I also just felt that Eclipso wouldn’t have had to stoop to such methods. Racism is obviously evil, but it’s a really stupid, ignorant kind of evil, and Eclipso is neither of those. Like I’m imagining his approach for when he eventually goes after Courtney, and he’d have plenty of material to work w/ in targeting her. He could go after her insecurities of not being able to help her friends, Cosmo included, failing to live up to Starman’s legacy, etc., but then imagine that he just starts being sexist out of nowhere. It’d really take you out of the experience, and that’s how I felt here w/ Beth
That said, if it was ultimately more meant to set up the talk w/ her parents at the end of the episode, then I can cut this more slack. Not only was that a non-cringeworthy way of talking about racism, but we actually got to see her parents be legitimately loving and supporting for once! (well mostly her mom, but still)
It’s a bit hard to say since we don’t actually know what she did on her 2nd attempt, but we can still speculate after seeing the 1st one. And after seeing what it took for Nyxly to pass her gauntlet, it’s evident that passing the challenge isn’t just about a show of physical strength, which is what failed Kara initially. Now Kara didn’t really have anyone to confront in her challenge like Nyxly did, so it’s not an exact translation, but perhaps there can still be something learned in generally doing something that’s not comfortable. Since this isn’t a case where Kara can actually change how her 1st night as Supergirl went, similar to what Mxy offered to do in the 100th episode, perhaps this is more about taking in and accepting the consequences of what’s already happened, also similar to the 100th. Kara can’t literally save the other person who was in danger that night no matter what she does, but what she can do is see what ultimately happened as a result of her not saving him. I’m sure it wouldn’t be enjoyable to watch and take in at all, but it would certainly be courageous of her to accept the consequences of her action and find a way to move on from it. Given that Nyxly now has the full courage totem, we might never find out what it takes for Kara to pass, but something tells me that if she does get a 3rd opportunity, she won’t fail again. It’s like Lena said, she is the epitome of courage, and she’d be sure to learn what the right call is
It could be the result of lowered expectations after I got sick of Lex and Leviathan fell completely flat, but Nyxly has felt like a breath of fresh air in the villain department this season. It’s really impressive to see how she’s able to play both sides of the villain card – being gleefully fun to watch revel in how bad she is, but also having the sympathetic element so that you understand why she’s doing what she’s doing. As much as you obviously don’t want her to win, actually getting to see the backstory she’s described makes it resonate even stronger, making you wish things would’ve turned out better for her and maybe even that she can be redeemed. Now she may ultimately be too far gone for that to happen, but now that she’s psychically linked to Kara, some of her goodness could very well end up rubbing off on Nyxly. We already saw that she can feel how happy Kara was even after a defeat, so if the connection lasts long enough, maybe it could have a lasting positive effect on Nyxly. Of course that also begs the question of whether her negative aspects will also rub off on Kara, but hopefully the possibility of a happy, satisfying ending for all is worth that risk. Whatever happens, I feel like I’m definitely gonna end up remembering Nyxly fondly as a villain once the show’s ended
I’m all caught up on Supergirl and now I’m one behind on Stargirl but I’ll watch tomorrow.
I wonder if the courage to not save Alex would have been what would have passed her. But at the same time the episode proved that there are many types of courage. So Kara was so focused on one type of courage that it’s possible it was something completely different.
The courage to stay after the plane crash and help the people off the jet? I don’t know, I feel like there are a dozen options including the idea that Kara is the symbol of hope, not courage. She was never going to pass the courage trial.
These revenge driven big bads are rough. We want to sympathize but the show also doesn’t want us to. At the same time though, what is the worse that Nxy has done? Blown up a building? Trapped Mxy in a crystal? What’s her big play here? She’s gonna get the all-totem to kill her father. How does that impact Earth?
I guess I’m confused as to why we care. Besides the fact that Kara and Nia are the ones that let her out of the Phantom Zone.
She isn’t a big bad as much as she is a revenge driven side character that the main character wants to redeem.
Ok, for the first time in weeks I am all caught up on my tv shows.
I think so. If he can get out of jail… Also, how are they explaining the injuries to the uncle? Rick hit him with super strength, thinking it was Grundy. Honestly, how is the uncle alive other than the writers didn’t want to turn Rick into a killer.
But of all the characters, I think Rick can come back from this. It’ll be rough but I think after Beth explains (hopefully) what happened to her, that’ll get everyone to fully see what is going on.
Ooff, this whole sequence was rough for me. The racist insults were pointedly so and how Beth dealt with them was amazing. But they did feel out of place. The ‘your people’ lines were rough. Everything else has been customized for every person. Why broaden everything for Beth? It felt like the writers wanted to drop in racism as a talking point for this episode but it stood out a lot.
I will say, I laughed when Beth called Eclipso out on it, though. He’s an ancient all powerful demon who she has seen inhale a person in front of her. And she’s gonna call him a racist? It was a really funny moment in a scary spot.
But his taunting did work. Beth figured herself out. She earned her title. I wasn’t sure how she was going to work through his attacks and I loved that she did. She was the only one. I really do love that.
It’s possible, though I’m not sure what that would’ve accomplished. It wasn’t just Alex, but that entire plane full of people. Not saving her could be seen as cowardly, so I feel like there’d have to be some sort of greater good accomplished by not saving her and the other passengers
I like this one. Doing so would’ve probably exposed her identity, but it’d also be doing as much as possible to help them, especially since some of them could’ve still sustained injuries on the flight
Could be more so the destruction she’d cause in pursuit of the totems. Plus she’s still angry w/ Kara after the Phantom Zone, so maybe after taking down her father, she’d set her sights back on Earth to take on Kara
I doubt she has any anger toward Nia, but she escaped in spite of Kara trying to stop her, so that’d definitely leave a grudge
I was shocked to see that he was still breathing. Maybe being under Eclipso’s influence dulled his strength just barely enough to not cross that line?
Thankfully that last conversation w/ Beth’s parents smoothed things out, but overall I can’t say they dealt w/ the topic as well as Supergirl did the week before
I was thinking the courage to not reveal there was another Kryptonian on Earth by allowing the plane to crash. Leaving Kara’s secret intact, Supergirl would never be born but Alex dies. The courage to allow all of that to happen might have been what the gauntlet was going for?
This makes sense. It still hasn’t been explained very well. So it just feels weird.
Yeah, that’s a reasonable explanation. The next problem will be what the uncle remembers when he wakes up.
OK, I can understand that a little more, though they’d still need to explain how the benefits of keeping her presence hidden would outweigh the loss of all those people, especially Alex. I’m not sure I can think of a reason, but there could be something there
I mean he’s definitely gonna remember Rick being the crap out of him, and I’m not sure anything else would be relevant. Rick would’ve been shouting about a monster, which isn’t much of a stretch from how his uncle treated him, and even if he said something about Grundy specifically, that’s not gonna mean anything to the uncle
I think the journey back for Rick to becoming a hero will not be an easy or quick one. He still has the heart of a hero and wants to do the right thing. He has shown this by taking care of Grundy, the creature who had killed his parents. He had shown compassion in taking care of him and seemed to want to help him when others were “chasing him”, but you could tell how hurt he was when he “found out he had killed a girl”. I feel he has unresolved anger issues which he showed with how much he was beating his uncle and he will need to learn to control his rage, as with the hourman powers, he was extremely strong. Of course, he is now arrested for this beating and so there may be jailtime involved. Wouldn’t it be interesting if he was in the same jail as the Crocks? Maybe they could talk to him about their criminal life and maybe it will help him realize to stay a hero? It really seems like Eclipso has been dismantling the team and is doing it much easier than the ISA did.
I did feel that the racist insults felt very out of place. At first, I was not sure if that is what he was saying but then it became clear. Now, if we had seen Beth face some racism in an earlier season, or racism being shown by some bullies at school, but it seems from the start the school was inclusive. It was just that she was an outsider it seemed because she was smart and shy around others. I had enjoyed how Eclipso was trying to pry the team apart so far, but this one did not seem to have as much an impact. Having her parents blame their divorce on her was a nice touch and they should have leaned more into that.
Yeah, that much still seems evident. He’s gotten better from looking after Grundy, but even that wasn’t enough to notably dull his rage. They’re gonna have to come up w/ a more creative solution for him to still have a future as Hourman
Wait, that could actually be really funny. He’d have to be tried as an adult and based on how the jails are set up, he could only be in the same prison as Sportsmaster, but that’d still be enough to make for a hilarious episode. Like Larry is trying to be all friendly w/ Rick as he continues to put up this wall, but it slowly starts to come down. Maybe there’s even a prison break at the end of the episode, which would allow them to go free again and give Larry a chance to go and break Paula out as well (I know they’re currently in there voluntarily, but they also probably can’t be regulars next season from inside jail cells)
That was definitely a much more effective way to emotionally torture Beth, though between that and the random maggots, I feel like she also should’ve realized something was up at that point
It was a really funny moment in a scary spot.