Brainy: “I’m terrified that I’m becoming the bad guy.”
A scattered episode, with some entertaining moments, and confusing logic, which may not actually be logic in the conventional sense of actually being logical.
The episode opens with Brainy arranging for an accident to liberate Winn Schott – Evil Winn – from a prison bus, presumably in his alliance with Lex Luthor. After Brainy takes Winn to Lex, we learn that this version of Toyman got caught 16 hours after arriving on this earth, so we kind of do want to know why Lex is relying on him at all.
The next scene shows us Nia spending the evening with Kara, Alex, and Kelly, attempting to console Nia with candy. Nia doesn’t really understand why Brainy broke up with her, but rationalizes that she doesn’t understand him, so maybe it’s a good thing.
Our Winn – we’ll call him that to distinguish him from Evil Winn – is pulled out of the future in a really cool ship. Some of the best moments in the episode are the hugs and the wisdom given by Our Winn to our heroes. He’s now a husband and a father, which makes him appear to have grown so much more than our heroes.
Nia sees a white tiger in her dream, which she interprets just to be her being disturbed by her breakup with Brainy, as she says her nickname for him is Wildcat (but real wildcats aren’t white). However, robot white tigers appear later, so her dream was on point.
The action is mostly spent chasing down Evil Winn, who is at Toycon (great idea, I loved the idea of Lex Luthor action figure) and also at a VR announcement, with some fight scenes that didn’t make sense to me. Couldn’t Supergirl just eliminate the robot tigers by going superfast and behaving super strong? She does the superfast stuff later, when she gets several people out of danger, but I didn’t get why the robot tigers were such a threat.
The Tower (later to be known as the Hall of Justice) didn’t seem that cool to me, but I can appreciate that, with Lex treacherous now running the DEO, our heroes need their own space and that they would be psyched about it. Still, I’m reminded of how the writers and the directors celebrated the set created for J’onn’s sleuthing practice and how little we saw of that (or the practice).
Lena isn’t in this episode much, but at her brother’s urging she goes to Andrea and works off their former friendship to get some information she needs in order to help. Now, Lena may be using some twisted logic to justify her actions, or maybe it’s straight logic, who can tell, but it seems that she is behaving as badly toward Andrea as Kara ever behaved toward her.
William Dey wants to investigate Lex Luthor, which is something that Lex Luthor really doesn’t want, and threatens to have William killed. This puts Kara in a conflict as she really wants Lex Luthor exposed, but she doesn’t want William to die. Some wise advice from Our Winn reminds her that her friends have always been doing dangerous things, and they have all survived because she keeps rescuing them. So Kara goes to William and tells him that they should work together, in order to make sure she can rescue him when it’s needed.
Now, I confess that when I went to the IMDB page on this episode, something I always do when I start a Doux review – I use it as a reference for the cast and the spelling – I was shocked by how poorly the episode was rated. I peeked at the reviews and discovered that a whole bunch of users had rated the episode 1 star out of 10, because they don’t want Kara linked romantically with William. I agree that the writers seem to be headed in that direction, and that linking Kara with William is a mistake, because they have zero chemistry. However, given what actually happened in the episode, the low ratings (which I viewed as cries of alarm, not genuine ratings) were not justified. Maybe the writers won’t go that way. One can hope.
Lex wanted some information off Our Winn’s ship, which was the whole point of bringing Our Winn back from the future, which made me wonder why they didn't just steal the ship and leave Our Winn alone. In case you missed it, Lex found a picture, or rather a picture of a painting, from someone in the past who looks a lot like someone alive today. Implying it’s the same person, which it is, and this person (Gemma Cooper) is a Leviathan.
In what is the most emotional, moving scene of the episode, Brainy confesses to Our Winn, whose life he messed up by bringing back Our Winn from the future. Brainy, despite being allegedly driven only by logic now that he has removed the psychoinhibitors, is an emotional mess. He still believes he needs to fight Leviathan with Lex, but he doesn’t trust Lex and he hates lying to his friends. He really hates it. Now, I don’t know why Brainy can tell Our Winn – perhaps because he’s from the future? – and not his friends about what's going on, but it made for a touching scene.
Title musings: “Back from the Future” is obviously a play on the phrase Back to the Future, the movie series starring Michael J. Fox. It’s a good choice, especially as there is more than one in both series. There’s even an homage to the movie, when one character calls Our Winn “Marty.”
Bits and pieces
Are candy trays for break-ups a thing? How come no one ever brought me trays of candy when I went through breakups?
I thought pointing out how #Toyman was dangerous was intriguing, and a reminder of how often people - apparently out of boredom - are ready to cheer on evil.
Really fun use of the song "Eye of the Tiger."
Lena’s hairstyle reminds me of Morticia Addams. That's not a compliment.
I liked the idea that "Kara" is a very popular name in the future.
Quotes
Kara: And deprive us a night of guilt-free chocolate?
Kara: No beach vacation can mask evil.
Evil Winn: I figured I would save my thanks until after I heard your proposition.
Lex: The Lena I know wouldn’t let a little thing like friendship get in the way of saving the world.
Lex: This was supposed to be a puff piece. Why did I just get Frost/Nixoned by a Boy Scout?
Our Winn: You always give the best hugs, papa bear.
William Dey: We don’t have to promote bloodshed for your bottom line.
Andrea: According to your paycheck, yes, you do.
Our Winn: Never let anyone make you question your own worth.
Our Winn: I became a dad and suddenly it was like my heart was on the outside of my body.
Overall Rating
It’s always hard to rate the first part of a two-parter, because the rating can be changed by what happens later. This was fun, but it was also scattered and felt illogical. Two and a half out of four guilt-free chocolates.
Victoria Grossack loves birds, math, Greek mythology, Jane Austen and great storytelling in many forms.
The mere hint that Kara might date a dude rather than Lena and predictably the reviews get bombed. They will probably bully the actor on twitter and he will receive the same abuse and hate as Mon el and Jimmy. Who I didn't like as they were both annoying and boring but the vitriol towards them was way above normal. Hopefully I'm wrong.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Anonymous, for the insight. I hate those negative campaigns.
ReplyDeletePlease read the following for some insight into why a large number of people are not happy:
ReplyDeletehttps://leighlew3.tumblr.com/post/190498502316/holy-cow-my-inbox-okay-heres-what-im-gonna-do
Thanks for the opportunity to comment.
Thanks, Anonymous. Interesting analysis.
ReplyDelete