Supergirl fails to fly high in this listless superhero adventure.
By: Craig Allan
Two Stars. Do not see.
DC Universe (DCU) producers James Gunn and Peter Safran are trying to reboot DC Comics’ slate of heroes at an interesting time. Audiences have seen it all before and are looking for something new. This makes the hard refresh that Gunn and Safran (Gunn via the creative) are trying to do ever more difficult. The Gunn-directed Superman (2025) showed that the superhero genre is not dead, because the more popular heroes can still bring in fans at the box office; the real test comes with the more minor characters. Can less featured characters still break through? In the case of Supergirl, the answer is a resounding no. Despite a relatively charming lead in Milly Alcock, Supergirl is a horribly paced mess that never feels epic or important.
Alcock, as the wayward Kryptonian Kara Zor-El/Supergirl, is the best part of the movie. She can deliver the painful moments, but can also be a lot of fun. Scenes like her beating up bad guys or rolling around with her dog, Krypto, are all very fun. The failure of the movie mostly falls to everything she has to say or do, not the performance of the star.
I’ll also hand some flowers to the costume designer. Supergirl’s look, with the trench coat, sunglasses, and orange headphones, is pretty cool. This, combined with aliens who have some really practical designs, especially on an intergalactic bus, and some great creative flairs shine through the murky aesthetic, adding a fun dimension to the film.
While Alcock flies high, the rest of the movie is left in the doldrums. The worst part of this movie is the pacing, which is the worst I have ever seen. Nothing flows well from scene to scene, making the film feel like a boring slog. The movie is told with flashbacks, but it would have been better served to do the movie in a linear format. The movie’s momentum stops and starts, which takes you out of the action. Kara is doing this to save her dog, Krypto, but Krypto constantly feels like an afterthought to the point where the film feels like it has to remind us at various times, “Oh yeah, she’s doing this for the dog.”
While I am blaming the editing more than the writing, the writing is also horrendous. The film was written by Ana Nogueira in her first feature film, and I don’t think Nogueira was up to the task. There just isn’t enough fun in this movie. Jason Momoa is brought in to add some fun, playing Lobo, but if you cut every one of his scenes, you wouldn’t lose a thing. The script is also riddled with cliches, like a key plot of Kara being sent to a planet that she defines as a prison, but also has a yellow sun that can allow her to escape after a few hours, which makes it decidedly not a prison.
I have liked director Craig Gillespie’s previous works. I, Tonya (2017) is a really good sports biopic, and Cruella (2021) is one of the best Disney live-action films of the last few years, but here his style and creativity feel muted. It doesn’t help that the colour palette of this film is an orgy of the darkest browns and yellows that could be put to screen. Despite his previous successes, this movie is like Gunn directing with his weak hand, with the other securely over Gillespie’s mouth.
Audiences are getting far more sophisticated. While superhero fare is not going to go away, audiences need more than just spandex and punching. If Gunn and Safran want these movies, and the overall connected universe they are building, to work, they are going to need to really embrace doing something unique. It is scary, especially with the budgets these films command, but it is necessary if they want to find the audience. No amount of yellow sun exposure can save Supergirl from its fatal editing, writing, and direction that downs its heroine worse than a kryptonite arrow to the heart.
