I’ll defend Jame Gunn’s Superman on any hill. That movie was exactly what was needed to give DCU a new direction as well as a better more heartwarming feel for the Man of Steel. The best unexpected surprise tho? Finding out Krypto wasn’t Clark’s dog, he was just dog sitting for the actual owner. Then finding out that the owner was Kara Zor-El aka Supergirl, Clark/Kal-El’s cousin. This wasn’t a Supergirl we were used to. This Kara likes to party on planets with red suns so the liquor can really hit the system.
For me, this was a home run with a different perspective on Supergirl. Her history in DC comics is one of the most confusing and messiest knots to untangle. So many writers have tried to make sense of it, which has led to many retcons and out-there stories. I was looking forward to seeing more of this Kara Zor-El, then it was announced that a Supergirl movie would be next for the DCU. Which made me say, “Hey, I meant down the line, this is a little too soon.”
Supergirl didn’t really strike my interest because of that complicated comic history. Trying to adapt all that? Felt like a giant risk to me. I was content waiting til it was on TBS or TNT to catch it. Then it was announced that the movie would be an adaptation of Tom King and Bilquis Evely’s Woman of Tomorrow series. That got my interest because I had heard what a cool deviation from the norm that book was. A story about Supergirl helping a young girl named Ruthye in her quest for revenge. I love revenge! Plus, we exploring trauma? I was intrigued here but what really sold me was the song in the official trailer. It was Jimmy Ruffins’ “What Becomes of the Broken Hearted“. I hadn’t heard the song before, but I couldn’t stop replaying the trailer because of it. The lyrics matching perfectly with what we are learning about this Supergirl. How, unlike her cousin Clark, she remembers Krypton, a sliver of it. Kara also remembers the struggle to keep that sliver alive and that heartbreaking failure. That’s when I was in, and all it took was a song to amplify the narrative of the hurt Supergirl is dealing with, the loss of her home. As a kid that moved around for the earliest portions of my childhood, that’s what hooked me for this movie.
Spoilers ahead!
Always Moving and Goin’ Nowhere
My earliest memories are of North Carolina; staying with my Grandmother and her sister while my mom went to work. Sometimes going to my aunt Louise’s farm. My mom being annoyed with me cause I wouldn’t eat the peas she made but ate her sister’s with zero problem. I remember open fields, tag with cousins, glimpses of Pre-K, my mother’s car accident, and a Winnie the Pooh blanket. I don’t remember arriving in North Carolina, but I can recall leaving for Maryland where mom and I would be living with my father. The memories become more solid here, kindergarten and first grade, my first time at a friend’s birthday party, running with friends like Lucas, and Taryn, realizing Santa isn’t real because we live in an apartment with no chimney. Plus, my bedroom was the living room so if someone came through the front door I’d know. I remember my father leaving, that we were to follow later, furniture being gone, and using a U-Haul box as a table for a subway sandwich.
Then a move to Natick, Massachusetts, 2nd grade, climbing up to our third-floor balcony because the door was closed, being grounded and not being able to play (the just released to SNES) Street Fighter 2 til the weekend. The night dad laid mom’s clothes on the bed and said [redacted]. The quiet 4-hour car ride to Patterson, NJ. Meeting my Uncle Wilbert for the first time and staying with his family, 2nd grade fights as the new kid, then mom getting an apartment in a town called Hackensack. Then, for the first time at 7-years-old, having my own room (and being so scared in that room that I wheeled my bed into the hallway to be closer to my mom’s door so I could sleep). I was born in Danbury, Connecticut but Hackensack, New jersey was the longest place I’d ever lived. You don’t know what you don’t know and I didn’t know I was a child of divorce. I moved around the majority of my life and hated it. I experienced it again after my mother passed. It got to a point that when I moved in with my partner at the time whenever she something purchased big (and entirely practical) like a bookshelf, I’d always ask, “How are we going to pack this when we move?” I didn’t realize other people did not think about these things.
Home, for me, is hard to comprehend because it would eventually change. Growing up was a constant adaptation to circumstances. Even when being somewhere for years, the fear of change always loomed overhead. Supergirl unlocked that memory for me, and I was able to relate to Kara Zor-El. Her only keepsake of home is Krypto, a dog she became close with after her mother passed. The reveal that when Krypton went up, Kara’s parent saw Kal-El’s ship taking off before initiating a force field to save their city of Argo. How that plan worked for years. Kara grew up on this sliver of Krypton long enough to see the people being slowly killed overtime by kryptonite in the soil. This slow death taking her mother, friends, her people, and then starting to take her father. This is the part of Kryton that Clark/ Kal-El was spared from.
What Becomes of the Broken-Hearted?
Kara’s and Clark’s current relationship reminds me of Sasuke Uchiha and Naruto’s before the Shippuen time skip. Clark is Naruto trying to bring a more cheerful disposition to his Sasuke. Stressing the importance of bonds. I’m reminded of Naruto confessing how he doesn’t know what it’s like to have a brother but imagined his bond with Sasuke to being as close as possible to having one. That is Clark Kent to the “T”: Clark and Naruto both being raised around people but still being and feeling very alone, similarly to the orphans that Kara/Sasuke had become. However, Kara’s similarity to Sasuke lies in what he once told Naruto during their first big fight. “What the hell would you know about it?! You were alone from the start!” That’s the root of the disconnect between Kara and Clark, plus the divide between Supergirl and Superman.
Kal-EL grew up not knowing what he lost until he was older, which made adapting easy. Kara remembers the faces of her people dying a slow death. A death she was content with succumbing to. Kara was ready to die; it took her father’s persuasion to get her onto that ship headed for Earth. The irony is chilling that this planet her cousin calls home, that her parents hoped would be her salvation, is one Kara can’t stand to be on for too long as it’s a reminder of what she’s lost. Kara is so much more comfortable jumping around different planets and galaxies. We see her accustomed to different alien cultures. Kara’s only sense of belonging being Krypto, as she tells him, “Home is wherever you are.” Hence her desperation to save him once he’s poisoned by the villain Krem of the Yellow Hills.
Throughout the journey to get the antidote from Krem to save Krypto, Kara is telling Ruthye that revenge against Krem isn’t going to bring her back. How it won’t change anything and will make her no better than Krem. Personally, I’d let Ruthye find that out for herself, but what I did enjoy is that Supergirl let Ruthye choose whether she would take Krem’s life or not. When Ruthye decided against it and walked away in anger, we saw Kara take her sword and send Ruthye on her way before he changed her mind. What happened next was exactly what I was hoping for: Kara stabbed Krem in the stomach for Krypto, then in the neck for Ruthye and the family she lost to Krem.
This decision is a big deviation from the Woman of Tomorrow comic. Some disagreed with it, but I loved it because it shows the type of person that loss has made Supergirl. Killing Krem makes her look like a hypocrite but in my eyes, it made her someone that can do the hard thing. A woman that can live with the pain. What’s one more locker full of hurt for a woman whose love has been departed for so many years? This made me rock with Supergirl more not because she was willing to kill but because we see her as an imperfect character. It’s not often we see anyone with the “S” shield on their chest willingly taking a life (this far from the Snyder universe that is).
Nothing’s Gonna Stop Me Now, I’ll Find a Way Somehow
There’s a beautiful line from Shoresy that goes, “You got to find a place to put your love.” Throughout the film we saw where Kara placed her hurt and trauma within parties, drinking, and hangovers. Her love was solely placed in Krypto as he represented Krypton, the home she has lost. It isn’t until the end of the movie that we see Kara walking into Clark’s apartment. The awkward small talk as Kara asks how things have been since she’s bene gone. Clark tells her there was a big bad he could have used her help with, how he can always use her help. That line made me think of how Clark as Superman wanted Kara to put her love in Earth, to give it a chance. He was lucky in his found family finding him (literally).
However, Kara could have a chance to find her own found family. I think Kara is now finally ready to do that. Perhaps the trauma prevented her before as it may have felt like making Earth a home felt like replacing the memory of Krypton and those she lost. For Kara to now be ready to take this step, is one of faith on her end. She’s going to try to build connection, form bonds. She’s going to try and wade in the water instead of drowning in the bottle. “Home is where you make it” is an adage for a reason. You will cherish it, love it, defend it. We’ve seen the difference in how both Superman and Supergirl do these things. Clark asked for Kara’s help, he has yet to discover how far she’s willing to go to defend those in need or end a threat— permanently.
With all this in mind, I don’t care about Supergirl being a blockbuster or a flop. I care about the feel of it. That movie caught me off guard with the trailer and had me nodding throughout the film. I’m a sucker for a “you can never go back home” type of vibe. Perhaps that’s what got me caught up in the movie as I now find myself restructuring what home is and means to me. Seeing Kara Zor-El taking steps after being the broken hearted towards finding a place to put her love she had thought departed is the most gorgeous part of this story.
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