“Supergirl” is an enjoyable enough DC superhero movie, even though it has flaws. A good origin story is offset by an initially dissolute Kara aka Supergirl who is unappealing as a protagonist. The arc of the story slowly develops and there are some well-choreographed fight scenes.

The film begins with a hungover Kara (Milly Alcock) in what appears to be some kind of trailer. Her dog Krypto is either destroying things, eating, or urinating. He appears to be ill-trained and mischevious in general. We see another iteration. Superman is leaving messages on a videoscreen asking how her birthday celebration is going. She has traveled to a planet with a red sun so she can get drunk.

On another planet, Brigands led by Krem (Matthias Schoenaerts) have arrived at Ruthye Knoll (Eve Ridley)’s family home. They want a sword designed by her father. After initial bantering, all of Ruthye’s family are murdered.

Throughout the film there are flashbacks of Kara’s origin story. After the destruction of Krypton, Kara’s father and others escape in a separate object named Argo City. All goes well until it is revealed that kryptonite pervades the soil. As all around her die, her father re-designs Kal-El’s escape pod and sets it to go to Earth. Kara is reluctant to leave her relatives, but is joined by a white puppy, Krypto, and the two escape in the pod. They later are reunited with Kal-El (David Corenswet) on Earth.

Kara enters a bar and encounters Ruthye. The latter offers her father’s sword to anyone who will kill Krem. Kara and others decline. A fight ensues but nothing is resolved.

At Kara’s trailer/space vehicle, Krem has entered and found a ship to travel the universe. When Kara and Krypto resist, Krypto is poisoned by Krem. Kara is advised by a healer that she has three moons to save Krypto by getting the antidote. Bizarrely, Krem keeps the antidote in a vial on the front of his suit.

With her own ship hijacked, Kara and Ruthye are forced to take a space bus to pursue Krem. Tech aliens invade the ship. Kara is able to turn the tide on them and gain valuable information as she pursues the Brigands.

Eventually Ruthye and Kara end up in an eating establishment on another planet, Bilquis, where the Brigands have stationed themselves. There they meet Lobo (Jason Momoa), who smokes cigars and has his eyes on hunting a particular Brigand.

The owners of the café take them to their home, where they drug Kara. They hope to exchange Kara and Ruthye for their own daughter, now a captive of the Brigands. The Brigands have been abducting young women for brides.

As the Brigands arrive, Kara is recovered enough from her poisoning to fight them with the help of Lobo. Ruthye, after being told to stay put, of course disobeys to chase Krem who is chasing the family’s daughter who has escaped. Kara prevents Ruthye from killing Krem and the Brigands escape.

Kara ditches Ruthye and follows the Brigands to another planet. The sun unfortunately is green at the moment, which severely weakens Kara. Ruthye brings her the Supergirl suit as she assumes that the costume is a source of power for Kara, which it is not.

Will Kara survive the green sun? Will Ruthye ever listen to Kara and not keep getting into trouble? Will Krypto survive?

Full disclosure: Although I have read many Marvel comics, I have not read many DC comics. So I have a basic understanding of Superman, but not much of Supergirl or, for that matter, Krypto.

I did enjoy Kara’s origin story. It was very well-plotted and tied in nicely with the Kal-El origin story. The Argo City and pod effects were well-crafted. I liked the twist of the Kryptonite poisoning of the inhabitants.

This was the first film where I encountered the effects of different-colored suns on the powers of Superman and Supergirl. I found this to be intriguing and consistently-applied.

Although I will say that I did not care for the red-sun planet where Kara got drunk. Perhaps this portrayal of a typical young adult appeals to that demographic, but this older person did not care for her dissolute lifestyle at all. To have it begin the movie, with Krypto going on a binge of destruction in the trailer/spaceship, albeit to a good choice of music, turned me off.

The portrayal of Superman in this picture also was too one-dimensional. He is too goody-two-shoes and has no depth of character. He doesn’t get angry with her at all but has the patience of Job. I would have liked him to be a real person.

The plot had plenty of violence to make me wonder why this was rated PG-13. I liked the fight scenes in general, although sometimes the chaos was confusing. I especially appreciated the final fight scenes with the Brigands. It is a little predictable to have them be engaged in human trafficking, a trope to make them super-evil and deserving of death.

This leads me to the score by Claudia Sarne. When Kara is fighting, the music is spot-on intense and powerful. This is an incredible enhancement to the visuals.

Kara’s character does improve throughout the movie. But in truth how much can you expect from a 23-year-old? She is dealing with the death of her family and people, and now has to cope with being a mentor to an equally-bereaved Ruthye. In the end, her arc seemed a little too conveniently wrapped up for the audience.

Alcock’s performance is not outstanding. She does yeoman’s work. But I feel the character was underwritten in terms of development. She ended up being an archetypal person rather a real one. None of the other acting is worth mentioning either.

I have to make a comment about the various bar scenes and bus trip. After the initial Star Wars cantina scene, having different types of creatures only seems to be a boring re-hash of this trope.

All in all, not really dull, but not really thrilling either. Frankly, there was too little Krypto, who is a CGI creation. This is very violent in places. No young children should go. Parents should consider whether tweens should see it.

Three out of five stars

When an unexpected and ruthless adversary strikes too close to home, Kara Zor-El, aka Supergirl, reluctantly joins forces with an unlikely companion on an epic, interstellar journey of vengeance and justice.

Starring Milly Alcock, Matthias Schoenaerts, Eve Ridley, David Krumholtz, Emily Beecham, and Jason Momoa
Directed by Craig Gillespie
Screenplay by Ana Nogueira