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HOLLYWOOD (AP) – Last year\u2019s \u201cSuperman\u201d ended with Iggy Pop singing \u201cBecause I\u2019m a punk rocker, yes I am\u201d \u2014 an ironic coda for a superlatively square hero. But it rings straightforwardly true for Superman\u2019s cousin.<\/p>\n
Milly Alcock\u2019s Kara Zor-El, or Supergirl, sports not a spandex suit but a Blondie T-shirt. When we meet her in Craig Gillespie\u2019s \u201cSupergirl,\u201d she\u2019s been on an interstellar bender for days. She\u2019s more Courtney Love than Clark Kent.<\/p>\n
Nonchalant and sarcastic, Kara is also a little Han Solo-ish, you might say, given that she moves capriciously through the galaxy in her junky spaceship while getting in fights in extraterrestrial bars. She\u2019s a welcome, jagged riff on more buttoned-up superheroes, and Alcock is terrific in the role. If only \u201cSupergirl\u201d was as good as she is.<\/p>\n
While the latest DC release, and second under James Gunn \u2019s stewardship, has its moments, \u201cSupergirl\u201d struggles to match Kara\u2019s punk-rock energy with an equally spirited supporting cast and story. <\/p>\n
Skepticism seems to have gathered for \u201cSupergirl\u201d ahead of its release. Many fans have argued it wasn\u2019t the right next step for DCU. But I\u2019m not so sure. Alcock\u2019s breezy cameo in \u201cSuperman\u201d was one of that movie\u2019s highlights. Handing the follow-up to her, and her faithful floating dog Krypto, strikes me as an extremely natural next step. When in doubt, follow the dog.<\/p>\n
And much of \u201cSupergirl\u201d is winning. It resides almost entirely in space, touching down only momentarily on Earth. In its consistently creative production design, clever needle drops and underdog story arc, \u201cSupergirl\u201d resides a little closer to Gunn\u2019s \u201cGuardians of the Galaxy\u201d movies than other DC entries. Its outer space is filled with cosmic detritus, mean characters and cute critters. Seth Rogen as the voice of a tiny alien co-piloting a space bus is an inspired concoction, as is a shabbier sci-fi realm with rest stops along the intergalactic highway.<\/p>\n
Kara, drunk and disheveled as she celebrates her 23rd birthday, prefers such environs even if it means, thanks to the distance from a yellow sun, her powers don\u2019t work. But as much as she\u2019d like to remain off the superhero grid, Kara is reluctantly compelled into action. A young girl, Ruthye Marye Knoll (Eve Ridley), whose family is slain by space pirates known as the Brigands, enlists her to avenge their deaths. Kara wants no part in it, but when the Brigand leader, Krem (Matthias Schoenaerts), poisons Krypto, she sets off to get the antidote that hangs around Krem\u2019s neck.<\/p>\n
Little in the story, scripted by Ana Nogueira and inspired by the comic-book series \u201cSupergirl: Woman of Tomorrow,\u201d will bowl you over for its originality. But it\u2019s a sturdy enough vessel \u2014 a Western, really, with Kara playing the hired-gun part of John Wayne in \u201cTrue Grit.\u201d It inevitably leads Kara to superhero maturity, with Krypton flashbacks that reveal the roots of the pain she\u2019s trying to drink away.<\/p>\n
Less ideal are some of Kara\u2019s companions. Ruthye is too soberly hellbent on revenge to be much fun. Jason Momoa\u2019s bounty hunter, Lobo, who rides a space motorcycle and looks ready to sing for a Kiss cover band, is a bit much even for a movie with a flying dog. Schoenaerts menacingly grins his way through the movie, with appealingly bulging eyes. But no characteristic of the bland Krem is as interesting as his studded face.<\/p>\n
His metallic touches and the movie\u2019s biker-gang flourishes, not to mention a plot that involves \u201cbrides\u201d trapped by the all-male Brigands, will no doubt bring \u201cMad Max\u201d to mind. But to the credit of \u201cSupergirl,\u201d the film often feels like it\u2019s striving for fresh ground in big-screen superhero-dom. Modest Mouse and Jenny Lewis are heard here, after all. Gillespie, who made \u201cI, Tonya\u201d and \u201cDumb Money,\u201d utilizes the IMAX cameras to vivid effect, even if his grip on the material isn\u2019t convincing.<\/p>\n
The zip the movie needs isn\u2019t quite there, though. Alcock does her best to keep \u201cSupergirl\u201d aloft, but she\u2019s let down by too much of what\u2019s around her \u2014 most of whom are men, truth be told. Maybe the mistake all along was taking the dog out of the story. John Wayne, after all, always had his horse.<\/p>\n
\u201cSupergirl,\u201d a Warner Bros. release in theaters Friday, is rated PG-13 by the Motion Picture Association for sequences of strong violence, action, language, and smoking. Running time: 107 minutes. Two and a half stars out of four.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
HOLLYWOOD (AP) – Last year\u2019s \u201cSuperman\u201d ended with Iggy Pop singing \u201cBecause I\u2019m a punk rocker, yes I am\u201d \u2014 an ironic coda for a superlatively square hero. But it rings straightforwardly true for Superman\u2019s cousin. Milly Alcock\u2019s Kara Zor-El, or Supergirl, sports not a spandex suit but a Blondie T-shirt. When we meet her … Continue reading Movie Review: Supergirl is a blast, but the movie doesn\u2019t match her punk-rock spirit<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":65,"featured_media":1518065,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1451],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1518064","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-abc-entertainment-news"],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":true,"date":"2026-06-26 12:38:10","action":"change-status","newStatus":"trash","terms":[0],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1518064","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/65"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1518064"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1518064\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1518066,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1518064\/revisions\/1518066"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1518065"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1518064"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1518064"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ktbb.com\/post\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1518064"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}