Gina wrote us an email about her thoughts on The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly in the Season 3 finale episode, “Battles Lost and Won”!

So, season three has finally ended (it really felt like a long season) and it went out in an interesting fashion. I really think the issue I have with this last part of the season is that they really, really stuffed a lot of things in a short amount of time. The finale was no exception.

The Good:

– Ending the season with the Danvers sisters being the Danvers sisters, eating pizza on Kara’s couch! I could watch a whole episode of them just talking and emoting. I think if they handled this back end of the season well relating to Kara’s season long arc, this would have been such a bigger pay off than it was. Don’t get me wrong, it was a conversation I needed and you can always rely on Melissa and Chyler to make the most out of the little screen time they have. But, Kara’s realization that home was on Earth with Alex didn’t seem earned because she made the impulsive decision to go home to Argo for half an episode then came back to Earth because the witches came to Earth. It all went too quickly for me. As well as Melissa delivered that line and it still tugged at my heartstrings, at the same time, there was something off about it.

– Alex being promoted! Well-deserved even though it took Myr’nn sacrificing himself to get J’onn to make the decision to step down. It wasn’t something I was expecting and it was a good thing. It helps keep Alex in the DEO and allows her to step away from the heavy action. At least she’s had some experience – I believe she was Director for a second in the first season.

– Mon-El leaving gracefully. I never thought I would be closer to Mon-Positive after all this time, but this was the closest I’ve ever been. He was the grown man we hoped he would be and that one action actually made me sort of happy he didn’t end up dying.

– Winn’s destiny and goodbye. Obviously, it’s not a good thing Winn left, but his goodbye had the emotional punch Kara’s goodbye should have have had. I’m glad he received it, though. That guy deserved so much more than he got last season and I hope he gets all the honor for being a hero in the future that he didn’t get nearly as much as he should have in the present.

The Bad:

– Myr’nn’s sacrifice and ultimate demise. It’s only bad because he’s gone 🙁 I really think his storyline was the only thing the writers handled fairly well for the back half of the season. This obviously led J’onn to think about how he spends his time on Earth. I love the homage to J’onn in the Justice League cartoon with him putting on the hat in human form and disappearing into the city crowd.

– The big action scene…it went REALLY quickly. It was interesting that the big fight was in the beginning of the episode and the Reign resolution part of it felt like whiplash. There seemed to be, like all seasons, a build up of a big fight to end the season. But, the pacing of it didn’t feel right.

The Ugly:

– Kara pulling a Superman: the Movie and turning back time. I don’t watch any of the other DCTV shows except Legends (via Netflix), but I’m disappointed the writers went there with this show. Turning back time as easily as that never makes for a good story plot.

Granted, it looks like from the final scene there might be some sort of consequence, but for a second, I thought this show was going to present real consequences and real stakes in the fight. When I saw Sam go down from Reign’s punch, it made me gasp. When I saw Alura get hit by the heat vision beam, I felt really sad that Kara lost her mother again. When Mon-El pushes J’onn out of the way…well, to be honest, there was a cheer coming from our couch, but then I actually felt bad for Kara. I was like, “Okay. Here we go. This went kinda dark but we’re getting somewhere with the writing here.” And then suddenly, Supergirl’s like, “Oh! I can go back and time and bring them all back to life and quickly resolve my mistake!”

Oy.

Again, it seems like there is a consequence to her actions, but it was just an odd choice of action in the middle of everything to pull off.

Cliffhangers:

Which brings me to the two ending scenes:

–  What is Lena up to? And is Miss Teschmacher her new partner in crime? If so, I’m here for it!

– Naked Kara in Siberia… I really, really like where this is going. I’m interested in seeing if the writers do take this towards the Red Son direction like in the comics. Either way, Kara’s struggle with identity looks like it will rear its ugly head again. I’m just hoping the writers handle next season the way they handled the first half of this season. Because honestly, I thought the mirror image metaphor was Supergirl and Reign. To bring it back to this idea is a little redundant. However, seeing Melissa Benoist play a darker, even evil, version of Supergirl for at least half a season sounds like a TON OF FUN.

These two ending scenes brought me back into the fold because for the last few weeks, I was beginning to roll off the Supergirl track. I wasn’t ready to give up on the show by any means, but I want to see what brought me to this show in the first place.

– Gina

About the author

Rebecca Johnson