‘Supergirl’ season 2, and how to build a better villain
“Supergirl” on The CW is a show with so many different endearing qualities to it. After all, it’s funny, heartfelt, inspirational at times, and it’s a part of one of the greatest crossover universes that we’ve ever seen with television.
In the midst of all of the great stuff that we’ve seen it do over time, however, there is also a really clear flaw that unfortunately continues to rise the surface: The show just doesn’t have too many great villains. There is no equivalent of the Reverse-Flash or Malcolm Merlyn on this show, and it’s a shame because you have a character who fundamentally is so interesting. Maybe Astra could’ve been that, but the problem there was that the show had cast Laura Benanti, and eventually we were going to have to lose her.
As we try to wrestle with this particular conundrum on the show moving forward, let’s do our best to identify a number of the traits that we think are a part of great villains, and if there are ways at all to incorporate them into this show.
1. Enough power to be a significant threat – We don’t think on paper that there is any doubting this in the context of the show. However, the primary issue here comes out of the notion that you still need to be a threat proportionally to the character that you have as the hero, and Supergirl is so powerful that this is an infinitely harder thing to do. You need a character who can really be capable of killing the hero, even if that is not necessarily their motive. There haven’t been enough times where we’ve considered either Kara or any of her friends to be in real danger.
2. A great backstory – So many of the show’s villains have popped up out of thin air as of late, with Non and Astra being the key exceptions. Even someone like Cyborg Superman could’ve been so much more developed as the writers given us more time with the real Hank Henshaw rather than introducing him so time ago and then forgetting about him for a while. The great thing about people like a Malcolm or a Slade Wilson is that you understand them on an emotional level before you start to see all sides of their awfulness.
3. A connection to the hero – While not always necessary, we do think it definitely helps. Look at Prometheus on “Arrow” this season — a big part of what makes him so terrifying is the sole fact that he knows everything that there is to know about Oliver Queen, including what he has done in the past. One way or another, we need that emotional investment in who we see Supergirl fighting.
4. A lasting impact – Even with a Non or an Astra, they’re barely referenced at this point on the show. A great villain is someone who haunts you after they’re gone, and in that sense Lex Luthor is almost a better villain than anyone else on the show, even though we haven’t seen a single second of him. It’s almost like the writers are teasing us that there is this great, super-destructive man out there that is so bad that it makes you question Lena just by looking at her. We do think that this is very much a problem that the show has.
We don’t necessarily think that “Supergirl” needs all of these components in order to make a great villain, given that just two or three of them would do the trick. Yet, at the same time we feel like if they really want to do justice to these characters, it would absolutely help to consider everything that we’ve outlined ehre.
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