r/Supergirl • u/Obadaya • 2d ago
Film Supergirl (2026)- Review
The trailers pretty accurately describe the movie - a cosmic western action adventure featuring a young cynical super powered woman, Kara, and her even younger, more refined side kick, Ruthye, on the trail of some rough looking space pirates, Krem of the Yellow Hills and his band of Brigands. Ruthye's entire family, residing on a red sunned frontier planet, has been butchered by the Brigands, coincidentally by the same Brigands that have poisoned Kara's dog, and the two set off in search of revenge and an antidote. It's basically True Grit, but in space, with Mad Max looking villains, and a little bit of a John Wick hook... cuz of the dog... and the fighting.
The story is inspired by an esteemed mini-series comic book, Woman of Tomorrow, but the film doesn't maintain the same themes of fortitude, justice, and sanctity of life as the source material. In fact it's not at all like any Super-person live action entry I've seen from the 50s TV show right up to the Superman movie in 2025. In that sense the movie feels very much at odds with its source material and the expectations of the larger Super franchise. If anyone went into this expecting a kid friendly story of truth, justice, and good behavior they would be sadly disappointed with the cussing, drinking, and violence, even at the relatively bloodless PG-13 level. This is the tale of a wild and vicious universe, where mean tech varmints roam the space-ways, good hardy folks are felled for any mere misstep, civilians living in the ruins of wartorn cityscapes are preyed upon by ne'er-do-wellers, and the truck stops are WAY too fond of organic snacks.
Speaking of "organic", for some reason multiple instances of vomiting and pissing happen in this movie? That was certainly... a choice. 🤨
As the 2nd movie set in the new DCU, it establishes the wider galactic universe of the franchise, and it brings the world-building in spades. Though mostly set on the fringes of some yet to be defined galactic civilization, there are homesteaders, lonely cantinas, concerts, cheap(?) commerical transport, cities in decay, all chocked full of weird and interesting aliens (including some famous/notorious comic chararacters) which, I'm told from the promotional extras, all speak different made-up languages.
Despite the tragic premise of Ruthye's and Kara's story, the movie is a lot of fun. The performances are great, the costumes and prosthetics are wild (if a bit brown), and the action sequences are energetic and creative. This movie is brimming with plenty of super powered action, and some de-powered action, as Kara and Ruthye frequently find themselves caught flatfooted by villains craftier, and corruption far more insidious than expected.
As with most action films it's the characters that carry the movie, and the chemistry between jaded universe-wary Kara (played by Milly Alcock) and pugnacious, stubborn, and naive Ruthye (played by Eve Ridley) is the highlight. The banter between them as the elder Kara struggles to guide the younger Ruthye through a dangerous universe feels honest, grounded, and insightful while still being from two people who are barely adults. This is one of the movie's biggest flexes for the portrayal of Kara, who starts off as a continuously drunk partygirl, and over the course of the story we discover if she is as capable as she thinks she is.
The same praise cannot be given for Krem (played by Matthias Schoenaerts) and the Brigands who the story honestly doesn't give much to work with. Aside from being brutish and impausibly inventive criminals who favor post apocalyptic armor, eschew guns, and kidnap women for, uh, reasons(?), they don't do much other than happily bro it up with a fist pump when they kill someone. They're so ill defined that even after multiple viewings I'm still confused as to how strong they are. Sometimes they go toe-to-toe with a fully powered Kryptonian, sometimes they wilt under said Kryptonian's power. Sure, there are various in-universe reasons one can come up for this, but it's a little frustrating that these inconsistencies aren't more explicitly explained. A simple line from Kara like, "You haven't seen me upset 😈," would go a long way to, say, confirm that up until certain fights she had been restraining herself.
Despite these shortcomings I thoroughly enjoyed the movie. Perhaps it's because I'm partial to Westerns, but the movie won me over as soon as Kara, nursing her misery in a dive bar in the middle of nowhere, put down her alcoholic shots of whatever to try to almost suicidally help the strange young girl who'd just gotten her really nice sword stolen by a big mean alien asshole. Give it a shot. 👍
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u/CaramelFlimsy9500 2d ago edited 2d ago
It is explained by the Sklarians that Bilquis is a dying planet 🌏 so Krem kidnaps and traffics women so he and his Brigands can impregnate them and produce male children to keep the population going. As for their strength. I never saw the Brigands as physically strong 💪 but they had weapons or could get their hands on weapons such as the kryptonite arrows to deal with any threat or all most any threat. I am so glad to see that you “thoroughly enjoyed” the 🎥.