Ugh, you bastards, I did it, I binged this entire season in 2 days
The irony of dropping the show as everyone claims it finally got an actual good season was never lost on me, but I didn't buy it. Y'all would occasionally talk about in the other Beeboverse threads, and I'd lurk here out of curiousity to see how people felt, but I was adamant that I didn't wanna waste my time with this show again. But with the final nudge of seeing Jon Cryer as Lex in the preview trailers, it looked interesting enough that I finally decided to say fuck it and see what the fuss is all about.
And.... wow, y'all were right, Supergirl is actually having the strongest season this time around. (Except for Legends, still the GOAT) I'll see how the rest of the season goes before saying its up with the Beeboverse's best, but I can certainly see the argument for this season being up there.
Especially on the villain side. Agent Liberty is pretty good, with his episode on how he gradually became radicalized being easily one of the best in the entire show. Manchester Black is a pretty charismatic anti-hero (though maybe he's a villain at this point, w/e) for the most part. His quest for vengeance all because of Fiona's death is kinda weak considering we barely got to see their relationship, but the actor is good enough to make the material work for the most part. Also I'm very, very late, but the "Intolerant Left" line got a good laugh out of me. I hope he isn't dead...
And Lex is really damn great, nuff' said. And I'll echo others on being happy that this Red Daughter stuff actually turned out to be an interesting subplot.
Nia turned out to be a rather cool addition to the cast, been enjoying her storyline a lot for the most part. Brainy also turned out to be a pleasant surprise. I don't remember much about how I felt about him from last season, just maybe groaned a little at the idea of him becoming the new Winn. Not that I ever cared about Winn, but after him and Cisco, I'm very much over these type of characters. Fortunately, Brainy is actually rather endearing and humorous at times, something Cisco used to be...
James... exists. The noticeable reduced screentime of him as Guardian helps a ton, but the character itself still does very little for me. His lowest moment was definitely when he briefly flirted with some "both sides" shit early on in the season. Still not into his relationship with Lena either, it doesn't do anything interesting for either character.
And the rest of the cast I enjoy well enough. I think having what ended up being an extended break from the show admittedly helped me appreciate the core group a little more. The whole subplot with Alex erasing her memories of Kara being Supergirl is probably something one could poke a bunch of holes as to how exactly that works without being a massive mess, but whatever, it was a good moment.
What I'll definitely compliment about this season compared to stuff like Arrow and Flash in their respective seasons is that it feels a lot more confident about what it wants to do. Its clearly doing a much better job of being consistent with its themes, largely helped by the fact that its doing the whole mini-arc thing where they tie into one another... but also the villains are actually good this time around, so I've been enjoying it more than any other season of Supergirl.