Supergirl, 2.06 - "Changing"

Warning: SPOILERS IF YOU HAVE NOT WATCHED.

I looked forward to this episode all week and watched so many scenes in the 2 minute videos released online, and it was actually pretty decent. However, there are some discoveries I made that....I don't know if I can get over, and definitely decreased my enjoyment of the episode. Let's get into it.


I've never really been invested in the show, so you all know that when Sanvers became a thing, I was genuinely excited and happy to see their flirting, and actually started making an effort to watch. But then....I found out Floriana isn't even a woman of color - she's Italian. And that really disappoints me. The showrunners EXPLICITLY had Maggie say she's nonwhite - by casting a white actor to play a canonically Latina woman, the writers have completely erased her identity and any kind of LGBT representation of color. Half of Maggie's appeal was that she wasn't white - a WLW woman of color, like me. I mean, LGBT representation is great, but there is definitely a difference in the experiences of LGBT white women and LGBT women of color. Representation of straight nonwhite characters is already so rare - why take away what little fans of color get to themselves? I can never look at Maggie/Floriana/Sanvers the same way again, and that makes me sad. I was so ready to get invested in an interracial f/f relationship, so finding out I'm just shipping two white women is heartbreaking. It's unforgiveable, but it only exacerbates the CW's track record of racism.

Regardless, Floriana and Chyler have insane chemistry and the way Alex gushes about Maggie is still so heart eyes. Alex's coming out positively impacts the Danvers sisters' relationship, which was great to see. "You are not alone," Kara tells her adoptive sister. And that's what's so great - LGBT people only recently out of the closet should always have a support system. Knowing there are people they can count on makes the coming out process so much easier, from observation and personal experience. Kara admits that she hasn't paid as much attention to Alex's struggles as she should've, and they break down some psychological barriers. Alex's heartbreak after learning Maggie wants to stay friends is so absolutely raw and real, and definitely hit close to home. The way Alex's voice shakes when admitting to Kara that Maggie doesn't like her "that way", the way she stutters on the 'hu' in "humiliated", the way she instinctively shakes her head when Kara says, "I'm proud of you" (and Kara nods back! What kind of synchronization!) because she isn't used to praise.....Chyler's acting is on point, and I will always admire how accurately she portrays the feeling of unrequited love. In this house, we love and protect Alex Danvers. Always.

In the same house, however, we do NOT love and protect Mon-El. First, I would just like to say that he and Kara have no chemistry at all, and if the writers are pushing them in a romantic angle, I will literally barge into the writers' room and fight them. Yes, Kara constantly being annoyed with and disappointed in Mon-El totally equates to relationship goals. Second, he somehow got more annoying this episode. His attempts at being "cute" are not working. He does not care enough to look for a job and cultivate his skills, and that bothers me. It's not adorable; it's lazy, and entitled. They're trying to garner sympathy for him, and it's not working. When the people around him are talented, driven and successful, and try to help him, he pushes them away. It's strange that Kara accepts letting her train him as a good alternate to searching for jobs, seemingly abandoning her own in the process. There was not a single scene of her at Catco. I thought she wanted to prove herself as a reporter???? They're two different things that can be conducted at the same time? Also, why does Mon-El literally suck at fighting? Why can't Kara be that good at fighting villains? The writers of all DCTV shows tend to make their heroes' fighting skills inconsistent. It's good or bad depending on which is needed, and just makes the characters look silly and incompetent. Don't erase their hard work and training, people!

Man, three paragraphs of ranting and I still didn't get to the central conflict. This week, an alien parasite hijacks the body of Dr. Rudy Jones, a professor passionate about stopping climate change, causing him to attack his coworkers and eventually National City. (The CGI was laughable.) Its previous host was a wolf that had been dead for thousands of years. Um....how could it use a dead body as a host? Logistics aside - it of course starts causing havoc. Mon-El is finally reluctantly persuaded to be a hero, and with less persuasion, James takes up his title as Guardian. It's mindblowing that Kara can't figure out who he is. To be fair, his costume is the most effective disguise out of all the DCTV superhero costumes, but still - she kissed the man! Now that Karolsen has been brought up by myself, I would just like to say that I am still bitter. James clearly still cares for Kara by the way he rushed to her side while she was comatose. I know that Kara does too, but the writers don't care enough about James to show it. I still feel James is too inexperienced and that the Guardian storyline was rushed because they couldn't make him effective as a reporter. He deserves better than this; we should've seen more training time as well as his impact on Catco. The small good thing that came out of James' storyline was his and Winn's friendship.

Fortunatley, J'onn is back, and so is M'gann. J'onn somehow loses a significant amount of blood on this mission, and Alex begs M'gann to donate some of her own. Only thing is - M'gann is a white Martian, only no one knows. She goes through with the deed, but can see some of the blood's side effects in J'onn when he wakes up. Man, it sure is lucky J'onn loses a dangerous amount of blood when we know there is another Martian nearby. Is he really lucky not to have been as gravely injured on previous missions? Also, I still don't know how I'm supposed to feel about M'gann. I want to like her, but will the white Martian thing make her evil? I hope not!!!

Oh yeah - Mon-El thinks he could try the whole superhero thing, only to be kidnapped by Cadmus in the last two minutes of the episode. Oh no - will Mon-El's rescue lead to him and Kara hooking up? What kind of heterosexual white nonsense is this? Maybe I jinxed it - I'm praying that it won't.

Overall, the episode was well-paced, well-written and riveting. It probably would've been my favorite Supergirl episode of all time if it weren't for the thing I mentioned at the beginning. Supergirl has potential - it tackles a lot of social justice issues (well, for the CW) and has interesting characters. But the whitewashing and erasure of POC is unacceptable, and I need Supergirl fans gushing about the progressiveness of their show to be able to call the writers out on their sh*t when needed. It's not that hard to cast actors of color!

Rating: 8.1
Extras that didn't make it in: Drunk Kara is cute.

*My next review will hopefully be of Pitch! See you then!