CW Superhero Round Up – Week 19

It’s that time again! Let’s jump into the CW-verse!

Supergirl S2 Ep17 – ‘Distant Sun’

It’s always difficult when you disagree with the In-laws but at least most of us don’t have to worry that deadly killer will be sent our way! That’s what Supergirl has to face this week as Mrs Daxam (I’m aware that’s not actually her character name but I’m going with it) is really not happy that Mon-El has decided to stay on Earth. The Daxamites have stuck around hoping Mon-El will change his mind and when that doesn’t work, Mrs Daxam puts a bounty on Supergirl’s head thinking that if she dies Mon-El will come home. Harsh!

Before they learn who put the bounty out, we get a couple of bounty hunter fights, one of which looks like he’s stolen an alien costume from 1970s Doctor Who, the other claiming to be a really powerful telepath with a weird pulsing head who is defeated fairly easily by J’onn J’onnz, but not before he mentally controls Mon-El to fight Kara. The telepath gives up the Daxamites as the ones who put the bounty out enraging both Mon-El and Kara. J’onn warns Kara not to go after them as he has been given strict orders by the President not to engage so Kara suggests they ‘talk’ to his mother.

This inevitably goes wrong as Mrs Daxam attacks Supergirl with a pair of Kryptonite Sai’s, badly wounding her. To stop any more hurt Mon-El agrees to go back to Daxam to save Kara. We then get another example of J’onnz’ feelings getting the better of him after Kara pleads with him to let them attack the Daxamites. They infiltrate the ship in orbit, using a mix of a shape shifting J’onn decoy and the transporting portal from the Red Sun episode which Winn just so happens to have repaired!

Throughout the episode Kara and Mon-El have been spouting off about how people can change if given the chance. Mrs Daxam clearly doesn’t agree as another attack begins. Winn rescues Mon-El (with a nice little Star Wars reference) and they disrupt the fight until Mr Daxam let’s them all go, Mon-El has made his choice. Mr Daxam learns the hard way never to go against his wife as she kills him before stating she is not done with this world!!

It seems like the show runners had forgotten about Alex and Maggie’s relationship as they crowbar in another story of mis-trust which doesn’t fit well with the rest of the episode. They bump into one of Maggie’s old flames which she claims ended badly. Alex confronts the woman who tells her Maggie cheated on her, then after a harsh but loving conversation Alex and Maggie are back to being the perfect couple. Maggie really needs to stop hiding things from her!

It was an ok episode. I love Kara and Mon-El’s chemistry and he is genuinely funny. The Daxamites aren’t as threatening as Non and the Kryptonians from Season 1 and why did we get another tease of the President being an alien? Is this going to be important at the end of the season? There doesn’t seem to be a purpose to it at the moment. What will Mrs Daxams revenge be? Tune in next week!

The Flash S3 Ep18 – ‘Abra Kadabra’

It’s about time we had a formidable opponent for Team Flash to fight, and it’s different from the villains we’ve seen before. The beginning and end of the episode we very busy but the middle was a bit lack-lustre, so who is Abra Kadabra?

Well, he’s a time traveller from the 64th Century who has tech that is so advanced it looks like magic to us. Teleportation, matter manipulation and decoys are but a few of his tricks and they make for a really interesting bad guy as you never know what he will do next. The dimension hopping Gypsy arrives on his trail. He is a known criminal who we later find out is responsible for her partners death.

Abra Kadabra is stealing tech from places through the city until Barry catches him. Once in the pipeline he claims to know all about Barry and Iris and what Savitar will do. He offers Barry a deal that if he is released he will tell him who Savitar is! The Team need time to think while Gypsy is itching to get him back to Earth-19 for execution. She has an altercation with Cisco when he challenges her about her rage and they end the episode in an uneasy place. Poor Cisco, I thought he was finally going to get some good loving!

Abra Kadabra’s offer proves too much for Joe West to resist. He needs to know how to save his daughter and opens the cell. Just as Kadabra is about to tell him Savitar’s name, Gypsy arrives and spooks him, sending him running. During his escape Caitlin is badly wounded. She has to talk Julian through her own surgery to remove pieces of shrapnel from her abdomen which is a great success! That was a pretty good scene!

The Team finally figure out that Kadabra is building a time machine to get back to the future, the last piece of which was in the time vault in STAR Labs. The Flash, Kid Flash, Vibe and Gypsy team-up to stop Kadabra escaping through a wormhole, leading to the best shot of the episode as Barry does a phase jump through Kadabra’s ship and pulls him out of it seconds before it passes through the portal.

The Flash — “Abra Kadabra” — FLA318b_0351b.jpg — Pictured: David Dastmalchian as Abra Kadabra — Photo: Jack Rowand/The CW — © 2017 The CW Network, LLC. All rights reserved.

Barry begs Kadabra to tell him the name but he refuses so Gypsy takes him away. At last Barry decides his only option to save Iris is to go to the future to get ahead of the game. Cutting it close Barry!

I didn’t see this end scene coming! Caitlin and Julian share a brief romantic kiss just before she has a seizure and dies! Julian, HR and Cisco can do nothing to save her. In desperation and against her wishes, Julian rips her power dampening necklace off causing her Meta-powers to heal herself and then unfortunately she goes full Killer Frost! She blasts them all back and has fully transformed!

As I said it was an up and down episode but Abra Kadabra was entertaining to watch, which I guess is what you want from a Magician! It was good to see Barry using his powers in a new way and I’m glad he is actively trying everything he can to save Iris, regardless of the consequences. My one issue with the episode is Caitlin’s powers. Why is she the only Meta-human who is turned evil by her powers? The other bad Meta’s were just using their powers for selfish reasons. It just doesn’t make sense, but maybe we will see her fully unleash now!!

Arrow S5 Ep18 – ‘Disbanded’

Reeling from the torture inflicted by Adrian Chase, Oliver tells his team to leave, there is no more Team Arrow. In typical Arrow style the Team do leave the Arrow Cave but they ignore his request to stop. Oliver has been convinced by Chase that everyone around him gets hurt or killed (which is true!) and his campaign has been an excuse to justify his murder spree! Most of the episode is taken up with Oliver being downtrodden, telling people to stop what they are doing. Stephen Amell’s acting has taken leaps and bounds recently and this week he genuinely seems like a broken man.

While Team Arrow continue to protect the city and find a way to bring Chase to justice, Oliver calls in his Bratva friend Anatoli and makes a deal with them to kill Chase. He feels like he is beyond redemption and this is his last play. When the rest of the team find out they are furious, Diggle especially. Oliver tells them to stand down again but they ignore him and disrupt the attempt to assassinate Chase. Chase is put into Federal protective custody, preventing the Bratva from getting to him.

After what seems like the hundredth time they have had a similar conversation, Diggle manages to convince Oliver not to give up and they pull the team back together, even if Oliver isn’t ready to wear the hood again just yet.

This was a pretty good episode, I think because they cram quite a lot in a small amount of time. Oliver and Anatoli’s relationship is pushed past the breaking point when Mayor Queen reneges on their deal. The flashbacks tie into this when Oliver had decided he was going to return to Lian Yu. Anatoli had said he was worried what he might turn into if Oliver wasn’t around, and it looks like he is just a normal ruthless Bratva leader! They are not friends anymore!

Meanwhile Felicity and her Helix friends have found footage of Prometheus removing his mask on camera. Felicity and Curtis have to steal some Kord Industries tech to unscramble the footage but they manage it, with Curtis actually being brave enough to go hand to hand against Chase in order to secretly hack his tech! Team Arrow make the footage public and Chase knows he has been outed. He brutally kills his guards and makes his way back to Star City! Oh dear, all bets are off now!

I enjoyed this episode but some things still didn’t sit right. Why is Chase not even being investigated for Susan’s kidnap when she has given a statement? Why didn’t Oliver kill Chase when the knife was offered if he was going to get the Bratva to do it anyway!? How did Chase know his identity had been revealed just from the sound of a guards phone alert? How many times can Oliver question his campaign, only to be brought back again? Pick a different story. The season seems to be gearing up for a big finish!

Legends of Tomorrow S2 Ep16 – ‘Doomworld’

We get another fun episode this week, and it’s all because the Legion of Doom are centre stage. The Spear of Destiny has been used to create a ‘Doomworld’. Reality has been altered to the whim of the Legion. Let’s go through the differences.

• Damian Darhk is Mayor of Star City and has killed most of the CW heroes, including a Vigilante Felicity.

• Eobard Thawne is the head of S.T.A.R. Labs and is a world renound genius, having fixed some of the worlds problems.
• Malcolm Merlyn has his wife and son back, Thea loves him and he even has both hands.
• Leonard Snart and Mick are on a bank robbing spree without the interference from the police has they own half the city.

• Sara and Vixen are Damian Darkhs muscle.
• Ray is a Janitor at S.T.A.R. Labs.
• Professor Stein and Jacks both work at the lab for Thawne.

• Rip is trapped inside the Waverider making cakes having given up.
• Nate is a nerdy conspiracy theorist.
• None of the Legends have their powers either.

Oh and none of the Legends except Rip and Mick remember what came before this world. Luckily Nate has noticed things in the world he calls reality scars and comes to Thawne for help to fix them. Thawne tasks Captain Cold and Heatwave with killing him but Mick has another change of heart. He saves Nate then they go about rescuing the rest of the Legends. Coincidentally, Ray’s subconscious has allowed him to build a device which restores their memories, I’d call it a ‘Ray Gun’! Once all the Legends are back together, following a brief fight with Sara and Vixen who have been sent to kill them, they work on trying to get the spear back.

Jacks fails to restore Stein’s memories before the huge incinerator Thawne got them to build is completed. Thawne’s plan was to destroy the Spear so no one else could change the reality they had made. Realising they have been duped by their ‘team-mate’ Merlyn, Snart and Darhk temporarily join forces with the Legends against Thawne to retrieve the spear. The Lab fight with everyone is really entertaining. Evenly matched combatants tossing the spear around trying to get the upper hand. Nate even manages to launch Thawne across the room with a thwack from the spear.

Eventually, Mick gets hold of the spear and turns against his old friend Snart. He doesn’t want to be a ‘good dog’ anymore, he does the right thing giving the spear to Vixen who starts to use the spear, only for Captain Cold to freeze and shatter her!

Using this distraction, Thawne grabs the spear and drops it into the reactor where it disintegrates. The Legends have lost, Thawne lets them go to live out their days in this world. Re-grouping the Legends decide to try and find Rip so they can time travel back to before the Legion get the spear, even if it means interacting with events they were involved in, creating the possibility of time implosion!

I love the Legion heavy episodes. The chemistry between the three main members is always great, they are always just on the verge of betrayal and you never know which way they will go. Having Snart on the Legion still doesn’t make sense though. He was removed from an earlier time, meaning he wouldn’t have been able to join the Legends, meaning this would never have happened….paradox….my brain hurts. It was a fun episode and the finale next week stands to be full of action as the Team try and rescue Rip for his miniature Waverider and fix reality. Fingers crossed!!

It was a close call this week but I think Legends have it, just because the Legion are so fun. Will they be able to finish with a bang? Tune in next time!

 

Follow us on Twitter @JackGeekstalk, Instagram jack_geekstalk, YouTube Jack Geekstalk and subscribe to our podcast on ITunes and Podbean.com, Jack and the Geeks Talk.