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why did super girl become all political?

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  • why did super girl become all political?

    I was watching super girl last night and will never watch it again, took it off my favorites and deleted any involvement with it, I can see super girl becoming gay, that is kind of hot, but when they start talking about aliens deserving to be here without earning entry into the US , that is when it is over for me. I really enjoyed the show, but for them to try that brainwashing technique on just a syfy program was unnecessary. I was not watching it to remind me of the crap this country is in, it was supposed to be an escape.

  • #2
    I do agree that they did become a little heavy-handed with a few certain episodes. and that it was jarring when they mentioned "build a wall", when it was supposed to be an alternate universe where Donald trump never became president. Lynda Carter was president instead, so why would she even talk about that. It's like the writers forgot about that... it's amazing that nobody pointed this out to them post-production so that they could fix it.

    However, I don't think the majority of the episodes/seasons were like that, which is why I can still enjoy the rest of it despite any bad episodes that they might throw our way.

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    • #3
      I'm a German, so I have a European view on these issues. But Supergirl has always been very blatant with their messages, right from the pilot on ("Can you believe it? A female hero. Nice for my daughter to have someone like that to look up to." - she didn't even say "identify with" but "look up to". Can't her daughter look up to male heroes because they are not her gender?)

      But yes, that building a wall with real-alien-president Lynda Carter was very jarring, too.

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      • #4
        Originally posted by DJ Doena
        I'm a German, so I have a European view on these issues. But Supergirl has always been very blatant with their messages, right from the pilot on ("Can you believe it? A female hero. Nice for my daughter to have someone like that to look up to." - she didn't even say "identify with" but "look up to". Can't her daughter look up to male heroes because they are not her gender?)

        But yes, that building a wall with real-alien-president Lynda Carter was very jarring, too.
        I tend to see that differently as an American. Mainly because there's an overabundance of male heroes in every genre out there in American media. A male hero is pretty much just the norm here, so a main character who's actually female and a hero is unusual... or at least it was that way for my generation growing up. It was over time with cartoon shows like Justice League Unlimited that we saw more female super-heroines on TV.

        Heck, You should ask American writers about the reactions they get if they make the main character of their stories a woman instead of a man. They're always constantly questioned over why they made the person a woman instead of a man, because people were so used to the main character of ANY story always being a man 95% of the time that they found a woman kind of jarring. Weird as that sounds!

        I didn't see it as the person saying that they couldn't look up to male heroes, but that there was finally a female hero they could look up to. And in that universe, there might not had been a Wonder Woman coming out yet despite Lynda's cameos... so it kinda makes sense that Supergirl would be the first well-known superheroine to operate openly in public.

        But yeah, they did lay it on a little bit thick there when they said that. It would be very funny if there was other female superheroines out there who were said to operate behind the scenes and eventually showed up on supergirl, and they showed a flashback scene to that news report. Have them react to that line by saying: "Finally? I existed before Supergirl showed up. What am I, canned liver?"

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        • #5
          Truth be told, there hasn't been anything subtle about this show's social commentary. And to be honest, I was ok with most of it. Alex being gay, the aliens' arc being a metaphor for the refugee crisis...they were addressing real life problems. I don't watch these shows to get lectured on about real life problems and I may have a different take on some of them, but I don't mind as long as the characters aren't jeopardized.

          There were two examples where being too political hurt the characters:
          - Misandry. Some times the script wasn't even about empowering women. It was more about hating on men. Cat Grant was the prime example of this and sadly even Kara herself fell victim to it once or twice (like when she made a remark about angry male drivers in season 1).
          - Lynda Carter's character. For me, she was a character with issues and not necessarily a good person. Yet, Kara blindly idolized her because she's a woman. For example, while the Daxamites were above the city, the president took it upon herself to attack them and start a war. Kara's reaction was to marvel at how awesome the president was. And she's supposed to be the symbol for peace... Later on, when the president reveals herself to be a an alien and asks Kara and Alex to hide it from the public, they gladly obliged. Basically they lied to the people (don't watch Season 3, but I sure hope that came back to haunt them). I can't help but feel that Kara's reactions would have been much different if the trigger happy president was a man or if a male president asked her to lie to the public.

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          • #6
            I have to agree with most of that.

            I wasn't a fan of the president even though I loved seeing Wonder woman's actress on Supergirl. I just wish they had gone with a different character for that actress. At first I didn't mind the fact that she was a president, and that Supergirl was caught up in the hype of having the first woman president ever. But it was like they went out of their way to make Carter's character immoral as possible. I'd like the writers to fix this down the road by revealing that the alien president actually had pheromones that affected how people saw her... thus she could get away with a lot of immoral behavior and still have people idolize her.

            It would at least fix the way they harmed Kara's character like that. Because not even Kryptonians were immune to that pheromone that made her like the president no matter what she did.

            With people like Cat Grant... eh, I tend to forgive Cat Grant a little more because she's a older woman, and she grew up in a time where things weren't as.... enlightened... as we were today. growing up during the 70's to 80's, and seeing a lot of guys get away with things like sexual harassment in the workplace would be bound to color how you viewed the male gender as a woman.

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            • #7
              Originally posted by Aurora Moon
              I tend to see that differently as an American. Mainly because there's an overabundance of male heroes in every genre out there in American media. A male hero is pretty much just the norm here, so a main character who's actually female and a hero is unusual... or at least it was that way for my generation growing up. It was over time with cartoon shows like Justice League Unlimited that we saw more female super-heroines on TV.

              Heck, You should ask American writers about the reactions they get if they make the main character of their stories a woman instead of a man. They're always constantly questioned over why they made the person a woman instead of a man, because people were so used to the main character of ANY story always being a man 95% of the time that they found a woman kind of jarring. Weird as that sounds!

              I didn't see it as the person saying that they couldn't look up to male heroes, but that there was finally a female hero they could look up to. And in that universe, there might not had been a Wonder Woman coming out yet despite Lynda's cameos... so it kinda makes sense that Supergirl would be the first well-known superheroine to operate openly in public.

              But yeah, they did lay it on a little bit thick there when they said that. It would be very funny if there was other female superheroines out there who were said to operate behind the scenes and eventually showed up on supergirl, and they showed a flashback scene to that news report. Have them react to that line by saying: "Finally? I existed before Supergirl showed up. What am I, canned liver?"
              huh?? while male hero protagonists are a majority, America has always had a fair share of women superheroes, Supergirl for one, but there´s Wonder Woman, Miss Martian, Artemis, Zatana, Black Canary, Star Fire, Batgirl, Wonder Girl, Arrowette, Big Barda, Powergirl, DawnStar, Huntress, Mera, Dawn Granger, Vixen, Donna Troy, Saturn Girl, Raven, Harbinger, Ice, Batwoman, Hawkgirl, Stargirl,Silk Specter, Catwoman (she´s mostly a hero more than a villain now), Thalia Al Ghul. This arent all, this is just the ones off the top of my head. Maybe 4 names are kind of obscure from my list, the rest have been around for years, across several mediums (movies, animated movies, animated shows, comics, etc.). Female superheroes have been around in America for a while, Supergirl had a great tvshow run as well as Wonder Woman. Oh and I would also consider Lois Lane a heroine.


              I like the show but the feminism is too heavy handed, they struggle to write proper male characters and they cant manage to have Supergirl as the main hero without depowering/dumbing down the rest, specially Mon-el, for christ sake, he should be as powerful as Supergirl, with decent writing you can still have her as the main heroe in the show without having to make him a damn fool who gets owned, bad, everytime he tries to help, cant recall a sigle instance he doesnt rush towards the baddie and gets caught/punched/zapped. When Mon el and Guardian attempted to save Livewire in season 2 "We can be heroes" episode, Livewire literally says "you know what I love, little boys, that think they can do a better job than a woman who is a real superhero" she said that to two men who went in there to rescue here, let that sink in, let it also sink in that if you reversed genders, there would be outrage because of the horrible sexist dialogue. This show needs to find balance between showing powerful women without making men look pitiful and they also need to cool it with the heavy handed political message, I am Mexican,I get it "the wall" but chill with the politics.
              Last edited by Kal-ed; 05-14-2018, 10:02 PM.

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              • #8
                Originally posted by costas22
                Truth be told, there hasn't been anything subtle about this show's social commentary. And to be honest, I was ok with most of it. Alex being gay, the aliens' arc being a metaphor for the refugee crisis...they were addressing real life problems. I don't watch these shows to get lectured on about real life problems and I may have a different take on some of them, but I don't mind as long as the characters aren't jeopardized.
                I think the gay thing came out of nowhere so it felt like bad writing, the gay thing itself wasn't the problem, like Chloe being a meteor freak after 6 seasons of her being normal and being lesbian and her relationship with Maggie kinda took over a big part of her character, I like ships in shows, I think love is essential to the human(kryptonian) experience, best books include great love stories: Peace and War, Crime and Punishment, The Sorrows of Young Werther, The Unbarable Lightness of being, Faust, Romeo and Juliette, Don Quixote, etc. so I dont mind couples, i actually think they make a good couple but I think it took over much of her character.

                There were two examples where being too political hurt the characters:
                - Misandry. Some times the script wasn't even about empowering women. It was more about hating on men. Cat Grant was the prime example of this and sadly even Kara herself fell victim to it once or twice (like when she made a remark about angry male drivers in season 1).
                Yeah its scattered, its not a misandrist show by any means but there are instances were it just takes things too far, not just instory but in a meta sense, like how NO ONE can save the day other than Kara, they may asist, they may help, they may look incompetent here and there but only Kara can have success, and kind of on her own, they never even have Mon El holding the villain while Kara punches them, there cant be a single doubt that while the help was appreciated, Kara could have dealt with it on her own.

                - Lynda Carter's character. For me, she was a character with issues and not necessarily a good person. Yet, Kara blindly idolized her because she's a woman. For example, while the Daxamites were above the city, the president took it upon herself to attack them and start a war. Kara's reaction was to marvel at how awesome the president was. And she's supposed to be the symbol for peace... Later on, when the president reveals herself to be a an alien and asks Kara and Alex to hide it from the public, they gladly obliged. Basically they lied to the people (don't watch Season 3, but I sure hope that came back to haunt them). I can't help but feel that Kara's reactions would have been much different if the trigger happy president was a man or if a male president asked her to lie to the public.
                very good point, I failed to notice the blind fanatism, I mean I did notice but at the time didnt give it a second thought but good point.

                Comment


                • #9
                  Originally posted by Kal-ed
                  huh?? while male hero protagonists are a majority, America has always had a fair share of women superheroes, Supergirl for one, but there´s Wonder Woman, Miss Martian, Artemis, Zatana, Black Canary, Star Fire, Batgirl, Wonder Girl, Arrowette, Big Barda, Powergirl, DawnStar, Huntress, Mera, Dawn Granger, Vixen, Donna Troy, Saturn Girl, Raven, Harbinger, Ice, Batwoman, Hawkgirl, Stargirl,Silk Specter, Catwoman (she´s mostly a hero more than a villain now), Thalia Al Ghul. This arent all, this is just the ones off the top of my head. Maybe 4 names are kind of obscure from my list, the rest have been around for years, across several mediums (movies, animated movies, animated shows, comics, etc.). Female superheroes have been around in America for a while, Supergirl had a great tvshow run as well as Wonder Woman. Oh and I would also consider Lois Lane a heroine.
                  You will notice that I did point out the JLA cartoons as a way that they eventually started to have female heroines on TV. I'm just speaking from experience as a American woman who grew up as a little girl in the 80's, etc. Back then we did have heroines like She-ra, Jem, etc but for the most part the market was overly saturated with male heroes, etc. And then when we did get female heroes then it'd be in "Girly shows" meant for little girls, so of course it'd be supersaturated with pink and them telling us how girls were supposed to behave. and worse, the super-heroines would be so overly perfect and boring. completely two dimensional. Jem was the closest that they came to depicting somebody who felt like a real person... because Jem was flawed but interesting.

                  Very rarely did we get Super-heroines who simply worked alongside superheroes in a TV show that could be for everyone, just not for little girls only or little boys only. That's why when the JLA cartoon came out, it was such a treat. Finally, Heroines who didn't constantly wear pink all the time, felt like real people who made mistakes occasionally, but were also powerful beings who you could look up to.

                  The heroines in books however, is still sadly true to this day. Heck, you should ask an author like seanan mcguire how many times she constantly gets asked whenever turning the heroines in her books into men would be more "realistic". Like, they don't think it's realistic that a woman could turn into a werewolf but it's okay if a man does that?
                  Or how many times they ask her if she's writing self-insert wish fulfillment when she just wanted to write stories about female werewolves and the like. For the record, none of the heroines she writes about even remotely resembles her in real life, in any way at all.
                  Yet she often gets peppered with sexist questions like that on a regular basis.

                  And just the other day on one of the writing forums I go there was an argument over whenever having women in an fantasy army would be unrealistic, even though this is the same setting that has dragons and magic in it. And even though we pointed out real life examples like shield maidens in the viking armies, the Chinese swords-women, Female Japanese ninja spies and how women often played support roles in armies during an active war... the dude still kept on saying it was "unrealistic".

                  There's alot going on behind the scenes that you don't see just simply because you're a guy. Men behave differently around other men than they do when alone around other women, so the men never gets to see how badly their associates can behave when alone with a woman. And we also tend to notice different things because we both have different viewpoints on what is important, etc.
                  I'm not surprised that you would deny that there was a lack of super-heroines, etc... while failing to notice that more than often times a lot of those super-heroines aren't the central focus of the TV Shows and whatnot. the TV shows focused more on the male heroes with the females as a supporting role. At best we get a few episodes focused exclusively on those super-heroines. Those heroines you mentioned doesn't have their own shows. But most of the male heroes do have their own shows.

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                  • #10
                    I agree. The show has become far too political. Supergirl should be escapist entertainment. The gun control episode was downright laughable. Why would the DEO give up their guns? Just asinine.

                    And the 'build a space wall' stuff to keep the aliens out....it's all so heavy handed.

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                    • #11
                      I have always loved this show until this season. The whole anti-alien agenda is just too much of a coincidence to real-world politics. I watch Supergirl, Arrow, and Flash because I want to watch science fiction program's, not tune into the news. I just want to watch Supergirl save National City, not watch a political debate.

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                      • #12
                        Supergirl has been political since the Pilot.

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                        • #13
                          One of the most fascinating things about watching Supergirl for the past three seasons has been tracing the evolution of its politics.

                          When it launched as a CBS series back in 2015—a month before the debut of Netflix’s Jessica Jones and two years before Wonder Woman’s trailblazing big screen debut—Supergirl was content to engage in the simplest of “girl power” feminism.

                          Since then, however, the series has grown both more explicit and more nuanced in its handling of social and political issues. “American Alien” feels like a culmination of where Supergirl has been headed for a long time.

                          The fourth season premiere picks up the aliens-as-opposed-minorities metaphor that was a central part of the show’s second season.

                          And it draws crystal clear, impossible-to-miss parallels to America’s current political landscape, especially when it comes to immigrants. You couldn’t call “American Alien” a subtle episode, but considering how unsubtle real-world political villainy has become lately,

                          I don’t mind our superhero stories tackling these issues so directly. After all, comic books have a long history of doing just that.

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