Final Verdict and Future Outlook

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Qince d. com slash Raiders Super girl, The next big tent poole film in the DCU is in theaters Was it as remarkable and fun as Superman or did it let audiences down down in detail our thoughts and feelings on the latest film starring Millie Alcock What's up movie friends? Welcome back to Raiders of the Lost Podcast. We are the ultimate film and TV podcasts in DC Warner Brothers were gracious enough to send us to an early screening of Supergirl Itally great to see it Milly Alcock was there. Jason Mimo was there. They introduced the film. It seemed like a great cast. got along really well. I gott to say Millie Alcock, really well cast. I think that she has a lot of potential as Supergirl, they chose the right actor for the job. And I think that there is a lot of upside for her going forward for DC Studios I think the character is in good hands alongside David Cornweet. One of the positives of this film is that they did find the right actor for the role And Momoa E Lobo, another big positive. He's a scene stealer He's embracing the loud, vulgar cigar chomping bounty hunter. He's been dying to play. He's basically born as loobo already. So I think that yeah, I think overall what I want to do with this episode is just talk about some things that the film did well. But and then we'll get into the critiques because this is it's a flawed film This is a movie that Did't fully deliver on its potential in a lot of ways and is a bit, I think of a speed bump going forward for the DCU in terms of setting up the verse and obviously man of tomorrow will come out next year and I think that will be a big turnaround. But this movie's not getting great response from critics, from audiences. It's very mixed The box office, it's not performing up to snuff. It's not really Loo like it's going to be a very profitable film for DC and for Warner Brrosers. But I do think that there are some good things to take away from this film. First of all Millie again, outstanding. She's breakout I think she delivered a very layered performance. She's fiery. She's justust like Clark is dealing with Clarark's trying to deal with being a human or fitting in with humanity. And all he's really ever known is humanity He doesn't remember Don, He doesn't remember he's from Hara's more complex where she does remember where she's from. She's from Krypton when it was destroyed and As the Hard andner family tried to survive, the few cryptonians that made it out of the destruction of the planet in that little bubble sphere they created until Radiation sickness ravaged the entire population In Kara's father sends her away to Eth. where her cousin got sense I think that exploring Krypton was interesting I will say I did not love the visual representation of Krypton in this movie comppared to what we've gotten in the past. I did enjoy once Millie's carara got to Earth and we got to see Cn sweat. I think that best part of Supergirl which isn't A great thing to say about the film, but I think it's revealing is it showed us how lucky we are to have David Corn swweat as Superman I think that's the greatest thing that the film did versus it should have been a major showcase for Supergirl. It did that in a lot of ways But I think there were different there's a better way to showcase her as a more heroic character which came very short. and sweet at the end I think the heroism was something that could have benefited the film earlier on Yeah, the biggest problem with the film is that the Superman scenes are the best scenes in the movie. And that's not what you want for your first film with your character a different character being the lead of the film and the film being for a different character Um But and I think that has nothing to do with Millie because I like I said, I think she's best casting possible for the role that she's a fantastic actor. I think she was just really let down by a screenplay that didn't know what to do with her and kind of made her exactly kind of made Supergirl For some reason, like this the passenger and in a way kind of a side character to her own to this her own story Um in favor of the other character Ruth, Ruthy And I like I like Ruthy. I think Avid Ridley is a really great young actor She did an excellent job, but it didn't really feel like a super Terrific. You remind me of a young Emma Watson. Yeah, yeah. but It didn't feel like it was a Supergirl movie. It really felt like it was a Ruthie movie at times and then she got Supergirl side as her sidekick. Um in a way and But the but there are things that did work, you know, the setup of, you know She is going through such immense grief that she's I think it was a great emotional and dramatic in characterization to have her choosing to stay on a planet that has a son that takes away her powers because then she can feel the effects of alcohol then she can finally numb herself U I think it's a great place to start with the character. I don't know. and again, James and I don't know the comics. I know this is based on a comic where she's alcoholic I thought it was a really, really strong place to begin for your character Especially a character like this when we're used to Superman being the boy Scout She is in a way, Spergirl is like kind of the opposite side of the same coin And so it had a really interesting And I thought very strong start for the character of someone who's choosing to numb themselves to drink themselves into oblivion to avoid They scarred emotions deep down inside of her and to escape the past that she's trying to forget Um But I never felt like it really fleshed out into a resolute resolatory arc Um And I feel like didn't have a great Third for her character. She just be she just started saving the day U There' some great emotional beats, but I gota say from a strong start for the character. It kind of went in a direction where I was like, It really lost its impact startarting there I think you hit the nail in the head in terms of it not feeling like she was the main character for a lot of the film in the story. like they had similar motivations Cara and Ruthie in terms of the same villain for different reasons. Obviously she's trying to get the antidote to save crypto. And then Ruthie's trying to avenge her family They're paths of revenge are pointed in the same direction and it links them together But in terms of supergll, when you look at previous Supergirl Super Man movies or even woman Wonder Woman, other solo superhero movies They all have their moments of the character really coming into their own On their own, not with a sidekick or a buddy or team up And I think that's one of the reasons why it didn't feel fully like it was her movie for a lot of the film Orether standout parts of the film that I love though I love the practical filmmaking in this film. There's a lot of CGI and blue screen backdrops, of course. But the alien in creatures In this movie, we're outstanding. And they leaned so hard into it. And I love that aspect. I think it was the best part of the film leaning into the alien creature designs, the practical effects The animatronics. The campiness of it, the humor It felt like the way that Star Wars movies always treated their aliens in this fun campy sort of way, how different they are, you can kind of do anything practical makeup and also The practical makeup on Jason Moa's loobo was excellent. He looks so great as the character And how do you make a guy that big look even bigger is just so fun? because we got to see him in person. We were like ten feet from the guy. gu is enormous in real life, But Lobo is even bigger. He's like seven foot tall with this suit on So it seemed like Mamo's unhinged loomo energy was really just a standout part of the movie in a part that I really enjoyed and every time he was on screen I'm just like smiling ear to ear because You can tell how much fun he's having in the role And when Mamo iss having fun, I think audiences are having fun in general spepecifically when he's playing big blockbuster characters like this That's usually that's his strength Um I think I would say, yeah, the aliens and the practical effects, practical special effects are some of my favorite parts of the film Now I do have a I think the biggest con for me, it's not the screenwriting in terms of what's done with Kara But the biggest con for me is the villain in the crerem So I think your movie can only really be as good as your villain, especially when you're talking about a superhero film big blockbuster like this. Superman, I think is a really great movie One of the main reasons is Lex Luther, played by Nicholas Holt is excellent Then you look at Man of Steel, Zod is outstanding. Dark Knight, the Joker. Amazing villains Tram of the Yellow Hills played by Matiire Sharts, who's an awesome actor Awesome, awesome actor is a character whose motivation is a question to me. It's a mystery to me What are his goals? What is he trying to do outside of just stealing women to be their wives, which I do feel like was a bit of a Fury road copy Even the aesthetic and the look the brides all in whites But what is Crem's goal? You know, he goes and kills Ruthy's family for weapons doesn't end up taking the weapons And then he just sort of exists him, his clan exists around Kara and it's pretty easy to consistently find them But outside of him poisoning her dog. which, you know, is a bit of pllot arrmor McGuffin. I get random. It's forced a forced thing to get the expedition going and the plot going. What is the point of Crem? What does he want? What does I never really understood his motivations as a character outside just is his goal just to be a disgusting character and like a terrible being Sure, I guess Your villains are only great because of what their goals are. You know, you look at Zod and Man of Steel. He wants to Terraform Earth to become a new crypton. That's a great motivation Look at Lex Luther. He wants to kill Superman because of everything he's Against his suupermenis. He's against this alien taking over Eth. He's against this alien Living among them. He's also jealous. That's great motivation. T the Joker, what's his motivation? Chaos, destruction. I have to admit sometimes the workload of the podcast can get overwhelming with All the recording, the editing, we go to a lot of events, travel a lot and I get burnt out quite a bit. and I think that's where it's important to consider therapy and talking to somebody. 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Rula is committed to seeing you succeed in reaching your therapy goals, making sure that Their therapy providers are carefully screened and veted mononitoring the quality of their care and helping you monitor your progress in therapy Thousands of people are already using Rula to get affordable. high quality therapy that's actually covered by insurance. Visit rula. com slash riders to get started after you sign up. You'll be asked how you heard about them, Please support our show and let them know we sent you. That's RuLA. com slash Riders You deserve mental health care that works with you, not against your budget So what is Krem's motivation and goal? I don't know I don't know what he wants. I don't know what his goal is besides capturing woman And I think that that is the biggest flaw of the film And the villain just exists as a creepy guy with stuff all over his face to service fight sequences and goals for the characters to to reach Overall bit of a nothing of a villain, which really is, I think the biggest flaw of the film. If you had a better villain, I think the movie would have been Leagues better And It's such a shame because he's such a good actor And he he's one of my favorite actors And I walked into the film thinking, you know what? you know, Matthias is in this Can't wa just see him I watch all of his movies, I think's phenomenal. But the thing is like like you said, the not the villain serves nothing to the film other than just like next it's like the next checkpoint. It's like the next marker for the characters to go to And somehow, I mean Ruthie and Zora just likeike for they so easily find the crem at their next location and Basically this like your charac the villain' not stopping them from achieving their goal. The villain is just like moving on to their next location And then the characters are just like kind of following them from location to location Rather than, you know, your lead character, your protagonist wants something, they need something. They have a driving force. they're on a journey But then the villain or the antagonist keeps putting in these walls, keeps putting up these obstacles, keeps challenging the villain, the protagonist None of that happens in this film. What happens is a few action scenes where the villain escapes And then the the protagonists find them within two minutes Um, pretty lazy writing too of. they just multiple times just asked, you know where the creme are to random people? And for some reason Multiple people know where the crem always are no matter where they ask. So the way that the plot was structured and the way that char the characters in this movie went from But scene to scene just was kind of just like all plot armor and really had no depth to it. No complexity to the storytelling No real to the narrative. So I was just watching this being I was honestly kind of bored because evenven though, which is ironic because you're looking at huge sci fi spectacle Bombastic music exxplosions, you know, people flying But honestly, narratively, I thought it was a really stale story Um, We had a few moments here and there. I will say a highlight of the film was when when Tara revealed her powers to Ruthie They're taking that space bus, which I thought was a charming sequence. againg, with the aliens you mentioned And then she's finally in the in the gaze of a red sun Once she got shot out the the hatch in then yellow sun. yellow sun, sorry, yellow sun. Red sun takes away our powers. Again, not a comic book reader just a movie guy Well it's in all the movies, Anthony. Yeah, but whatever, man. I'm not Why does Wh does Superman fly into the space to get power, Anthony? I did not know that there are different The difference between a red sun and a yellow sun until this film, in no way you did either. That's not in any of the other movies. I knew this. What this What movie is it in this one Well, I knew I knew it from the lord. could but I'm talking about you, becausecause you don't know the cont. Okay I'm giving I'm just giving you a hard time. I thought all the sns except for the Kryptonite son, which we willll get to that U But I thought it was great when Cara was able to reveal her powers and just really showcase abilities against those like pirate ladies U I thought that was one of the strongest moments of the film There was just not enough of that and it didn't have like that if they had more sequences like that, more mostost scenes that had the feeling, I think it would have been a way better movie This movie also has like a certain Selection of showcasing powers Sometimes they do, sometimes they don't. Sometimes they do sometimes they don' And I think the Brigham's attack when they come to find her and They dropped the brides. That was a sequence where I could see ar She's weakened by the poison, but still I feel like she could have been murking these guys a lot easier. I want to talk about Crypto I think crypto iss one of the best parts of the film until he's just gone I love the opening with Crypto and Kara. Some of my favorite parts of the movie A girlown or dog It works so well. It's fun, it's silly, it's sweet It's charming And I think crypto would have served the story better to be more involved Like he was in Superman becausecause you know, this is her dog. And I think with the promise of crypto being heavily involved in the movie is a surprise for when people see the film and he'll be in not as much as you'd expect Be he's been poisoned and he's lit on a timer basically until he dies And for some reason kind of like hot stuff. For some reason Crem the leader dude, where's the neecklace with the antidote on his neck for a dog that he randomly shot I can't help but think that there's an edit out there that goes into more detail about this because once they did they find out, I don't know how they find up, but they find out that she's a Kryptonian and then they're trying to lure her there. I feel like there was That's a better plot. I think that's more interesting if we understood that goal a little better. It seemed like there's just like one kind of one off line about like, oh, we're gonna learn the Kryptonian here That's what we're going to do Um becausecause they wanted to steal her blood, right So That It seemed like that was something maybe more involved a different version of the movie or the script I think subding your Big characters in a movie takes away so much momentum I think obviously with the Superman movie, you got to have Kryptonite at some point, not in every Superman movie or Super Girl movie, but oftentimes it's very effective. It was very effective in Superman The Krypt I mean, the the Kryptonite Taking away Clarark's powers for the sequences when he's inside of Lex's prison I thought that stuff worked great But in Supergirl The movie' called Supergirl She's out of commission for what felt like twenty, twenty five minutes inside the cave I think that that is the wrong thing to do with a character That is the star of the film put them out of commission for such a long period of time. because like Anthony, I agreed with you when you said it felt more like a Ruthie movie at a lot of times than the Supergirl movie which can work effectively But it's called Supergirl It's not called Supergirl and Ruthie. It's called Supergirl. And I understand woman of tomorrow is very much from what I understand. in a lot of ways like sort of like that buddy cop dyamic sure. When Kara was decommissioned for twenty five minutes inside of a cave from the Kryptonite I was sort of just let down about where the story was going from the second to third act because then it becomes so predictable The green sun's going to go down. the Yllows sun's going to rise then she's going to become supergirl. She's going to put the suit on. She's going save the day. Like it's all like you can this is a movie that's very safe And you can see the next scene as it's developing. You can already see what's going to happen next and I think that's a problem It becomes very predictable But I will say I was shocked I was shocked when she killed Crem I think that was a very controversial thing to do comparable to. Manesteal where Clark kills Zod, but he has to kill Zod because Zod is going to stop at nothing to destroy the entire planet and kill every human on Earth So so Clarark has to kill Zod. He has no choice. will stop at nothing Krem is defeated. he's crippled He's im mobile. He's already lost And again, he doesn't really have much motivation. It's not like he's trying to conquer the world or take over a planet He just kind of exists I think it was the wrong decision to have Hara kill Trem so mercilessly I put a distaste in my mouth in terms of what I think the character should show in terms of the heroism morality Goodness It seemed T brutal for something Supergirl to do. where she didn't it's not like This guy was going to had someone by gunpoint. It's not like he had a world by gunpint with he's going to blow up a plan or anything. He was already defeated So I think that that for me was the wrong move to end the film with. And I think it was very controversial I totallyree because it's a straight up execution. I mean, the guy, I mean the guy deserves to die, but that's not what you want your hero to do in this kind of movie Um I thought it was a really weird moment, honestly. And I fully support what they did with Man Steel. I thought it was a really interesting situation to put your character into And I think it was a really fresh idea that Zack came up with I still think it was a smart thing to do This one was a completely different thing because it's straight up execution U and I'm glad you brought out the cave because What happened was this is the moment when your second act turns and moves into the third act And this is where You know, the movie should really get going This is where it plot should really be In this kind of movie compulsive and exciting. And like you said, you handcuff your lead character for a while, which is fine. I get it. Superman movies have Kryptonite sequences But I thought that this cave sequence took out all the stakes for the movie because what happened was Ruthie saved Kara by dragging her into the cave to get her out of then direct sunlight. which is great. I was like, okay, fine Then A few minutes later, she's like gathering water at a pond And then Cm Cremes dudes found Ruthie. and took her away And rather than saying, oh This girl's here that I'm sure Supergirl must be nearby These guys just brought Ruthie back and then they just started doing like a bar knuckle boxing on the roof of their ship They spent like all day chilling rather than looking for Supergirl, the thing they're looking for During a green sun when they know she's Kryptonian. they know that this is the moment where if you want to take her, if you want to strike, this is the moment And they found Kryptonian's companion gathering water. Obviously the Kryptonian is a stone's throw away So the fact that nobody None of these guys went looking for the Kryptonian and went looking for Supergirl after finding her partner I was just like, what the hell is going on? Okay, then there's no stakes to this movie They found like, why wouldn't they search the nearby area for the Kryptonian Why wouldn't they take advantage of the Green suun and try to you, spread out and find the Kryptonian Obviously The sun's gonna set and then the yellow sun will rise and you guys are all fucked And so I was like, when the yellow sun rose, I was like What was the point of any of this And that's ye, that's that's all story. That's all screenwriting. And I think that's the major letdown of the film. You know, this movie obviously Big on visuals Big on character less so focused on a tight plot Which I think is a disappointment because Supergirl is a very interesting character that you can explore. And they started to with the film explore her in a really beautiful poetic way with the tragedy of her past and trying to not able She's having trouble fitting in on earth like like Clark fit in so seamlessly. and she doesnn't really want to find people yet. She hasn't grieved completely And obviously it's a journey she goes on with Ruthy where they're both They're bonded by trauma, they're bonded by grief and they're fuel together But I think the story just lets them down. Lets the characters down. The writing lets the characters down. because there's a great there's a great, great movie in there somewhere But It just didn't get pulled off with this film. Um It's a disappointment because the DCU is still early in its phases And I don't think this will affect it going forward too much. You know, I think you got Mdeal coming out. I'm sure they'll get something else cooking. they have clayface coming out at the end of the year. So I think Clayface at the end of this year, Superman of tomorrow next year. I think it'll course correct really effectively with those films But overall, you know, Supergirl, a bit of a letdown. Enertaining Very fun at times Great, great performances and great stars Mamoa, Millie. Ridley really proving themselves as defefinitive character performers for these for these roles for years to come Great moments with science fiction, aliens, creature design Some great action spectacle set pieces. I really like the bar fight Although the couple that owned the bar didn't really care that Millie destroyed it. but I did enjoy the bar fight. I thought that was a lot of fun But it just, yeah, it just was very safe. It was a very safe film. It was, u By the books, by the numbers It seemed very corporate approved, very boardroom approved. everyvery line of dialogue seems like it was approved by thirty people Um, it just it just it felt like it was a movie that was taking any chances or risks It could have benefited from greatly And's there's something that I think it iss time to stop And I think it's time to stop the James Gun one or fight scene. I think it's a circle one Yeah the onener that spins around the lead character or characters as they fight a bunch of bad guys in No, it spins around the companion of a characterins around a companion It's time to stop. ' done I'm done. It was the same. I will say that That's when car was saving Ruthy from everyone at the end. It' it's exactly the same as mister Terrific Guardians to three. Guardians three. So I agree that's the guys I was watching it it felt like yeah I just watched this. Yeah It's time to stop with that shot We've goneten it too much. I don't want to see that act there's different ways to do action guys But yeah, that's that's our take on Supergirl. Enertaining, but For sure, fllawed is all right is right. But yeah, let us know in the comments what you guys think. Did you enjoy the film Do you have some of the same opinions? Do you think it had flaws? What do you think it could have done better? What do you think it did great? Love to see what you all think We appreciate you tuning in as always Anthony's in Italy right now, so these episodes are a bit shorter because of the time difference in the scheduling. So that's why we're running like thirty fourute forty minute episodes. But doing some great interviews lately. Doug Jones recently. Martin Freeman, fucking Bilbo was on the show for thirty minutes last week Cooper Tomllinson from who plays Ian in Obsession Craig Barkner Craig Barker's creative partner. He was on the show. He was a great guest. I don't know if you listen to episode Anthony is excellent U So yeah, I've been doing some great guest spots while Anthony's been away We appreciate you all tuning in as always, go to movieposters. com Use our code Raiderss ten at checkout to get ten percent off all your posters like this Ver vendetta poster behind me, which is provided to us by them inside this beautiful light box Go to Patreonot com slash,aders of Lost pods for bonus content, bonus episodes In the meantime, take everybody and see you next time