In the latest ‘Supergirl’ recap, Kara meets the president and tries to track down a dangerous alien who attempts to assassinate her…
By Damon Martin — Editor/Lead Writer
Leave it to a fun superhero romp like ‘Supergirl’ to inject a little bit of substance during a volatile political climate that is the 2016 Presidential election in the United States.
In an age where at least one candidate (Donald Trump) started his entire platform by stating that he wanted to build a way between the United States and Mexico, it’s no surprise that immigration has been a hot button subject during the campaign.
‘Supergirl’ decided to tackle the subject in the latest episode where the President in this story (played by Lynda Carter of ‘Wonder Woman’ fame) decides to sign into action the “Alien Amnesty Act” which will give aliens in the U.S. the chance to step out of the shadows and become full-fledged citizens.
There are more than a few detractors to this law, however, including those who fear that not all aliens are as kind as Superman or Supergirl with others worried that aliens being revealed could leave them exposed to a harsh and unaccepting world around them.
All arguments that could easily be heard during any debate forum on immigration during the 2016 election.
On top of that, Kara has to deal with her own prejudice towards an alien from a foreign world close to her home while her sister Alex deals with a feisty new police detective fresh on the alien beat in National City.
With that said, let’s recap the latest episode of ‘Supergirl’ titled ‘Welcome to Earth’…
Presidential Visit
The episode picks up just moments after last week as Kara stood by the bedside of the alien who landed on Earth in a Kryptonian pod and had been asleep ever since — or at least until he woke up and grabbed her by the throat.
The alien ultimately tossed Kara aside and then blasted through the rest of the DEO before escaping the building in a hurry. As much as Kara wanted to give chase, J’onn explained that they all had a bigger situation on their hands because President Olivia Marsdin was coming to National City to sign her “Alien Amnesty Act” into law and she wanted to meet Supergirl as part of her visit as well as stopping by to see the inside of the DEO facility.
At work, Kara is excited about this as well because James is going to assign her to interview POTUS, but Snapper Carr quickly shoots down the idea you know because she’s been on the job for five whole minutes and interview the President is a really, really big deal. Snapper instead assigns her to interview Lena Luthor to get her feelings on the new law seeing as her brother was one of the biggest opponents of aliens on Earth.
Kara goes to interview Lena and soon finds out that despite being adopted, she doesn’t fall far from the same tree as her brother when it comes to alien rights. It seems Lena’s new L-Corp has created a device that will detect an alien through a simple thumbprint detector. She hopes to sell this to businesses who can then test their customers to find out if they are serving aliens or not.
Of course, Kara is enraged at this idea and she ultimately writes a scathing editorial about the device, which Snapper promptly trashes and tells her to write it again. A news reporter (and this is very true) isn’t supposed to place judgment on a story, but instead just tell the facts. Snapper explains to Kara that she’s on the news beat, not opinion and the two won’t be entwined in this story.
Finally the day arrives when the President lands in National City but she barely steps off of Air Force One before fireballs start taking out her Secret Service agents and if not for the intervention of Supergirl, she would have taken a blast as well. Supergirl is convinced that the alien that landed in a Kryptonian pod is behind the attacks and now she’s on a mission to stop him.
The Alien Agenda
Following the attack on the President, Alex begins her investigation but runs into Detective Maggie Sawyer — a member of National City’s police force tasked with alien crimes — and while they clash at first, it’s clear these two have a lot in common.
Winn ultimately tracks down the location of the alien who escaped DEO custody but when Alex arrives, he’s gone but Maggie is already there. The two of them decide to pool their resources to track down this dangerous alien in hopes of stopping him before another attempt on the President’s life.
Maggie takes Alex to a special bar in town — one that caters specifically to aliens — and that’s where she explains how she’s getting so much intel. It seems Maggie grew up in Nebraska and as a “non-white, non-straight” girl, she had a lot more in common with aliens than the people she’d meet at any other bar.
Maggie then taps one of her resources at the bar who informs her that this alien is trying to send a signal to his home world and that might be the next place to find him. Of course both of them miss the alien sitting at the bar who just so happens to be boiling her drink by just touching it.
It turns out the alien that arrived on the Kryptonian ship has been trying to contact his home world of Daxam but after forcing a scientist to help him send out a signal, Supergirl arrives and thwarts his plan with an ass kicking before locking him up at the DEO.
Kara then reveals that Daxam was a neighboring planet to Krypton that engaged in a brutal war with her home world for several years until the two sides came to a stalemate. According to Kara, the war started due to Daxam being a monarchy that wanted to expand its reach to other worlds while Krypton was a democracy built on science and exploration.
Kara finally confronts the alien in his holding cell and accuses him of attacking the President, but he doesn’t even know what the word means. Perhaps he’s not the one responsible?
Fired Up
With the strange Daxamite alien in lockup, the President proceeds with her signing of the amnesty bill but moments later a fireball comes tearing through the sky, once again taking out her security team. Supergirl intervenes to save the day but in the ensuing battle, the alien makes off with Maggie as a hostage.
Alex goes back to the bar looking for answers and finds out where this alien has been hiding out. She arrives along with Supergirl, who battles the alien after finding out that she didn’t want to amnesty act and that’s why she was going after the President. It seems she believed aliens coming out of the shadows would only mark them for prejudice from the people who don’t want them around.
Ultimately with some help from Alex and Maggie, Supergirl stops the fiery super alien and shuts her down for good.
Back at the DEO, Kara apologizes to the alien from Daxam after making misconceptions about him based on where he was from. He introduces himself as Mon-El but she then has to tell him some really bad news — when Krypton exploded, debris landed on Daxam and its moon, which messed up the gravitational pull for the planet and the sun. Daxam is now an inhabitable wasteland where no one survived.
Meanwhile, J’onn has to face his own fears with the Alien Amnesty Act after he also showed reservations about the law being enacted. J’onn has stayed hidden due to his appearance and also felt the prejudice of what it was like to be a black man for the past 15 years, so he knows how judgmental the world can be. But after this latest experience, J’onn decides to visit the alien bar with no disguise where he quickly runs into a bartender that looks shocked by his appearance.
When the bartender leaves in a huff, J’onn follows her out and that’s where she reveals her true identity — she’s M’gann M’orzz aka Miss Martian aka the last daughter of Mars.
Back at the DEO, the president thanks Supergirl for her service before revealing on her exit that she’s also an alien.
Super-Bits
Kara gets a real lesson in journalism this week from Snapper Carr but the new boss of the investigative news division also gets put in check when he tries to run over James Olsen and his authority as the new boss in charge of Cat Co.
The alien bar in the show played only Dolly Parton music. Interesting choice.
It was revealed earlier this year that one of the established characters from the DC Extended Universe on the CW would discover their sexuality — given the obvious attraction between Maggie and Alex, that certainly seems to be a good bet thus far this season.
Lynda Carter gave a nice nod to her roots as Wonder Woman after Supergirl was in awe after visiting Air Force One and she said “you should see my other jet” aka the Invisible Jet from her old job.
‘Supergirl’ returns next Monday night at 8pm ET on the CW.
