Red Death Speeds Toward Superman & Lois Season 3 & Willow!
It’s my eighth blogiversary! Let’s roll out the celebratory SPOILERS for the third season premiere of Superman & Lois! Will season three confirm or deny the existence of Beebo in its universe? (I’m glad we reside in the universe where Everything Everywhere All At Once swept the Oscars!) If that doesn’t have enough snark for you, I’m supplementing it with The Flash. You thought I was going to say Gotham Knights!
Instead I’m going to be furious that Disney+ cancelled Willow! When #stopWillow trended, people didn’t mean the show! Now we’ll never get 1/12 scale action figures for it! The crummy fake nostalgia 1/18 ReAction figures are a cruel mockery of a series that deserved better than to be axed by bean counters that didn’t give it a chance to grow its audience. Must we wait another thirty-four years for the story to be resolved? #SellWillowToNetflixSoTheyCanAlsoNotGiveItTimeToBuildViewershipBeforeCancellingItOnAnEvenBiggerCliffhanger is apparently longer than allowed for a hashtag. As if WB TV didn’t give me enough to be mad about. “Look at all these series we’ve axed in honor of International Women’s Day!”
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They don’t call her Swolois Lane for nothing!
If Saturn-winning Supes & Lo doesn’t feature the same versions of the duo introduced in earlier Beeboverse series, does this Lois variant still have an affinity for hammering her family’s foes? Can she wield the literal Hammers Of Journalism on adventures with John Henry & Nat this season? Or is this Lois just into tasers?
“Closer’s” cold open is practically an epilogue to its sophomore season. This show still has a problem with its melodrama. No matter how well written & acted it is, I still want to fast forward through all the scenes of regular Smallville life. It could be more mythic, even on a budget. Chrissy Beppo & Kyle Cushing hook up after the twins’ sweet sixteen party somewhat lampshades they’re a pairing of spares. Potential Steel x Mayor Lana is more relevant. (Meanwhile on Lois & Clark, Sam Lane made himself a gynoid named Baby Gunderson? Why is her name the aspect I’m least okay with?) Can Superman save the town budget by burning out the high school’s black mold himself?
Lois Lane didn’t get enough to do in S&L season two, so season three’s first trailer implies they’re fridging her? This scene doesn’t appear in the premiere. Instead Lois believes she’s pregnant after visiting John Henry’s doctor sister undercover to suss out why Intergang had his counterpart whacked. Abortion isn’t even considered for this surprise. After numerous scenes of the couple being delighted, it turns she may have breast cancer instead of a bun in the oven anyway. Considering Lois’s miscarriage, this misdirection seems extra cruel. They recycled the season two poster by erasing their kids to rub it in.
With Jon Kent being deftly recast with Michael Bishop, he’ll be brainwashed into believing he’s Bruno Mannheim’s dead son. (That’s a Batwoman joke!) Chad Coleman had previously played Tobias Church on Arrow on another Earth. Speaking of Green Arrow, Onomatopoeia makes his surprise live action debut by temporarily killing the newly empowered Atom Man in Suicide Slum by mimicking gunfire noises like a reverse mime. Giving him sonic powers via a pulsating mask that scrambles super hearing makes him a more challenging foe than typical superstrong baddies. Or is this going to be another masked premiere villain who turns out to be a completely different character? Does Intergang mean Whisper A’Daire may appear? I wanted much more Atomic Skull than just Jordan’s training simulation tease! That goes double for Titano, but at least this series technically reaches the CGI gorilla heights of The Flash, Legends Of Tomorrow, Doom Patrol, Peacemaker, Stargirl, & Titans.
They’ve cast a new Lex Luthor to to partake in the Elaborate Top Secret Deeply Humiliating Lex Luthor Hazing Ritual. Michael Cudlitz will be the first ginger to portray Lex Luthor? (Shouldn’t redheads be called turmerics?) Please adapt “The Lawless Lois Lane & The Musical Murder Of Superman!” Will original movie Invisible Woman, Rebecca Staab, play his Mercy Graves? Does The Mayfair Witches mean Alexandra Daddario & Kate Easton must forgo their dream of heckling Hoechlin? Cast Madelaine Petsch as Maxima!
Two episodes were cut from the season. This is the first time filming wrapped before any episodes aired, so hopefully this portends the pacing will be tight without any protracted airing pauses. Supposedly this isn’t the final season. That means Bitsie Tulloch can still bulk up for season four’s Swolois Lane! If Superman Legacy gets delayed as much as The Flash movie was, they’ll have to keep renewing it. I recommend Battle Of The Super Sons for more Superfam fun!
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I shut off my TV immediately after the SAL season premiere so I wouldn’t see Gotham Knights. Be proud of me for resisting my morbid curiosity! Sorry to everyone waiting for Schadenfreude. What’s the point of WB/CW making a third post-Batman series if this one doesn’t even have Rachel Skarsten? Instead I’ll wrap the first arc of The Flash’s final season!
So Caitlin ended up essentially killing herself in her ill-advised scheme to resurrect Frost. If Khione has neither Dr. Caitlin Snow’s medical expertise nor Killer Frost’s cryokinesis, then what is the point of her? This tabula rasa hippie has blue-streaked hair like deep discount Illyria. She spouts meteorological metaphors & has excellent emotional intelligence, making Cecile redundant. There is debate about sticking her back into the machine to somehow turn her into either Frost or Caitlin by inputting memories out of her dead dad’s notebook. This is sort of like a Tuvix situation. It’s resolved by quitting while they’re ahead & Pied Piper destroying the machine, much to Chillblaine’s chagrin.
One of the oddest shortfalls of the series is that they never had a team-up of the classic Rogues despite having them all separately. The closest them got to a full gang was a quasi-assemblage in season one (Captain Cold, Golden Glider, Rainbow Raider, The Mist, Deathbolt, Peeka-A-Boo, Weather Wizard). (Does Golden Glider’s gun generate streams of genuine gold? Has Lisa Snart retired from robbery upon realizing her economy-upending gun is a more efficient source of income?) Captain Cold & Heatwave jumping ship to Legends Of Tomorrow is a big factor in the classic line not assembling, but they’ve done smaller groups of assorted supervillains since. Red Death’s rogues aren’t A-listers, but they did a good job of making them threatening.
Hartley Rathaway now owns a club & is trying to go straight in the streets but not in the sheets. He’s still prickly with the STAR Labs crew, but I’d still rather have Pied Piper full time the newbies. The Fiddler II (Caprica’s Magda Apanowicz) is sent to steal his gauntlets & other ingredient to build Red Death’s cosmic treadmill.
Gender-swapped Murmur is closer to the comics than the one you forgot was on Arrow. She has a needlessly nano-knife & a soundproof stealth suit that makes her immune to Hartley’s sonic powers. Alexandria Wailes provides authentic deaf representation & ASL.
Rogue team-ups are fun, & “Rogues Of War” had double! It was similar to “Gone Rogue.” Sadly my girl, Brie Larvan, doesn’t return. Barry recruits Pied Piper, Heatwave The Hotness, Golden Glider Goldface, & Captain Cold Chillblaine to help him heist the final component for a cosmic treadmill from General Eiling’s fort (Clancy Brown doesn’t guest star) before the Red Death’s crew can. Blacksmith doesn’t resurface because Katee Sackhoff was filming The Mandalorian’s third season Goldface cut a deal by dropping a dime on her. So much for the crimester power couple!
The team mutinies on Barry until he reveals his alter ego to the half that don’t know & works out an equitable payment plan. It confirms Pied Piper is superior to Chillblaine, in case there was any doubt. The Hotness & The Fiddler flirt. Chillblaine betrays Barry for Red Death. Goldface dubs the new speedster The Red Death despite her not killing anyone. Then she starts calling herself that despite not being present for this dialogue.
The boomerangs & stealth suit being Wayne Enterprises designs make sense, but what’s up with the fiddle? (More rogues are tech-based to appeal to fervent comics fans, which wasn’t an issue I ever had.) When Chester calls Luke Fox about this tech, he’s informed Ryan Wilder went missing. Why does this keep happening to Batwomen?
Not only did the original Rainbow Raider resurface after eight seasons, he finally uses a second color! (Cyberbullying the writers for years paid off at last!) Yellow is so effective at making Barry scared he instantly passes out in front of Taco Whiz. Sadly Roy G. Bivolo’s wardrobe is still drab. Victor Zsasz The Mist remains on the lam.
Barry mistakenly assumes Red Death is the new avatar of the Negative Speed Force. Instead of the Dark Multiverse, evil Ryan Wilder says she’s from an alternate timeline. The Dark Multiverse annoying assigns negative numbers to its alternate Earths to sound edgier, so this simplification is fine by me. She’s from a timeline without Batman where the Waynes adopted her. So she should be Ryan Wayne since Wilder was her adopted name on Prime Earth. After copying Flash’s speed, she went so draconian on her vendetta against crime that Flash had to enlist rogues to war against her. Then she somehow wound up in this timeline after accidentally killing Iris. It’s a lot of tell instead of show. She needs Barry’s natural speed to power the cosmic treadmill to get her home even though only XS & Impulse are natural speedsters.
While Flash is captured during a blackout, distressed “Ryan Wilder” barges her way into the West-Allen apartment. Iris points out that she doesn’t know her. Altverse Ryan knows too much about Batman for someone who came from a world where Bruce doesn’t exist to a world where his alter ego isn’t public knowledge. Iris correctly susses out this Ryan is a nogoodnick but fails to pop a cap in her when she has the chance. Ryan wearing a non-utility belt should’ve been a dead giveaway, plus the gray hair-streak. All this subterfuge is pointless since she’s just going to kidnap Iris at superspeed. Red Death quotes Batman frequently, which may either infuriate or delight you.
“That’s not even a Poe story!”
Red Death’s armor is so powerful it can monologue independently to Barry while she gaslights Iris across town & then fly to evil Ryan like Iron Man Mk 42. So what does she need Rogues for? She doesn’t even like this cowardly & superstitious lot! She wouldn’t have to go through all this if she’d just used Rainbow Raider’s emotion manipulation to make Barry & Iris amenable to her scheme.
Just as quickly as he turned on Barry last episode, Chillblaine is instantly talked into sabotaging Red Death’s cosmic treadmill in the next. During the rescue mission, Barry’s rogues abandon Chillblaine to be killed by RD’s rogues. Only Barry & Khione are chagrined by this. Sadly Red Death kept him alive for a trap that didn’t accomplish much. She says she somehow drained all of Barry’s speed, but isn’t The Speed Force an inexhaustible resource?
With the treadmill destroyed, Wayne switches to instituting martial law via telepathic duplicates. Unlike her plan to return home, they don’t lay any groundwork for this contingency scheme. Making tons of psychic clones per city to fry lawbreakers’ minds is very inefficient. We only see Red Death murder one rando, so her name is arguably a misnomer like Killer Frost. Are none of her bloodthirsty crew worried she’ll turn on them?
Red Death enlisted Grodd in telepathically boosting her psychic clones globally. When last we’d seen Grodd, he was being transferred to custody in Gorilla City. Now he says Barry abandoned him because the gorillas were scattered & reduced in mentality despite the series explicitly stating Gorilla City had been integrated into Prime Earth. Somebody stole Grodd’s apes! Instead of reaching out to Flash about this huge discrepancy, he went along with Red Death’s scheme in exchange for her aid in mending the ape diaspora. What could she do that he couldn’t already? So he stands in the Serengeti that looks suspiciously like British Colombia until Barry convinces Grodd to give back the psychic lightning he lent him. This is repeated a few times & it’s still confusing. So the cause & solution to Barry’s immediate problems happened to be the same ape. It was great seeing Grodd one last time, but he deserved a better sendoff than being tacked onto an unrelated story.
Aside from Captain Kramer in a chilling CCPD takeover, none of RD’s rgues interact with any heroes in the arc’s finale. Captain Boomerang & Murmur get knocked out when feedback wrecks the satellite dish. We don’t see anything happen to Rainbow Raider & Fiddler. There was a scene cut from the script about that duo escaping. Flash being unable to apprehend Rainbow Raider without Green Arrow’s help is becoming a running gag.
Episodes keep cutting back to Cecille & Khione (they’re either boring or distract from WestAllen) when they should be focusing on Captain Boomerang & Rainbow Raider! Richard Harmon has a blast doing so much with so little. If you’ve seen Fakes or The 100, you know he can do even more. (If Digger Harkness didn’t raise his bastard, does that mean not assuming an Aussie accent is authentic?) It’s a bummer Owen Mercer is reduced to a lackey after the premiere. Maybe he’ll swoop back again like a boomerang more powerful than ever?
After one of the better speedster spats, Batwoman randomly appears to knock out her doppelgänger. She’d vanished in Gotham, leading us to assume she’d been captured by Red Death. There’s no confirmation of this, so why was she conveniently missing? If Wayne hadn’t kidnapped her, how was Wilder in Central City for the climax? (Martian Manhunter flying in from nowhere to punch a psychic menace wouldn’t have needed an explanation.) Ryan Wilder finally meets some superheroes in a timeline that’s not erased. Ryan also claims to have regular brunches with the Supergirl squad, which rubs in how we were robbed of full World’s Finest crossovers.
Many fans justifiably think it isn’t The Flash’s responsibility to give the Beeboverse a send-off, even when its sibling shows were prematurely cancelled. Then Eric Wallace made the season’s first arc about the Red Death. Not only did I not expect this fifth season namedrop to be anything more than an Easter Egg, he also put a version of Ryan Wilder beneath the mask. So this is basically a coda for Batwoman. If he could work out a clever way to tie Batwoman into the final season, why couldn’t he find room to save Legends Of Tomorrow from time jail too? With Red Death building a cosmic treadmill, that could’ve been the prop influential to rescuing them. The remaining eight episodes had better pull out all the stops so I’m not constantly thinking about how The Waverider would be worthier.
This was a pretty fun arc until it fell apart in the end. Either this needed an extra installment or it should’ve been streamlined. The finale confusingly added even more moving parts without utilizing the ones it already had. Red Death got a lot of hype from both Dark Knights Metal & Batwoman fans, whom sometimes at odds with each other over this adaptation. Aside from her costume (which is the #1 reason RD has any fans from the comics), this iteration of the villain didn’t gel despite Javicia Leslie getting to cut loose. The titular character technically doesn’t defeat any of his foes, which is a bizarre way to kick off The Flash farewell tour. I knew getting my hopes up based on the season premiere would’ve been a mistake.
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Next up is the SHAZAM! 2 collaboreview!
