A Hero Without a Script
Milly Alcock shines in Supergirl, but a muddled script and emotionally inert direction ground DC's newest heroine before she ever takes flight.
By MIGUEL MATEO | JUNE 24, 2026
Sitting in the IMAX theater for Supergirl, I genuinely wanted to love it. Women-led superhero films have faced unfair scrutiny for years, dismissed by bad-faith critics looking for reasons to reject them rather than engage with what's actually on screen. That history made me all the more determined to meet this film on its own terms. But walking out, I found myself searching for moments that had moved me, and coming up nearly empty.
The biggest frustration is that Milly Alcock, who was one of the strongest reasons the first season of House of the Dragon worked, is clearly the right person for this role. She carries a sullen, coiled energy that could have made Kara Zor-El genuinely compelling, and you sense the character's potential in flashes. The problem is the script, which gives her nowhere interesting to go. Critics have been harsh across the board, with Variety's Owen Gleiberman calling it the worst script he could recall for a DC outing, and Hollywood Reporter noting that fragmented editing leaves the overarching story feeling "disappointingly flat." I don't think it's quite that bad, but I don't think they're wrong, either.
The film loses me earliest with Krypto. The filmmakers use the dog as a device to get Kara invested in hunting down the villain, which makes narrative sense, but it happens so early, and with so little setup, that the emotional stakes never land. The movie seems to assume you've already bonded with Krypto from Superman, that his presence alone is enough. It isn't. I kept waiting for scenes of the two of them together, something to make me feel the relationship before it was threatened. Instead, we get a single recurring flashback of how they met. As a dog owner, I'm usually a guaranteed casualty in any film that puts a dog in danger. Here, I felt almost nothing.
The supporting ensemble is similarly underserved. Ruthye, played by Eve Ridley, gets more screen time than the film can justify for a character who is not the title hero. I understand the narrative angle, but the balance is off. Jason Momoa's Lobo, meanwhile, registers more as a cartoon than a character, though the film's detractors who complained about the creature designs and alien aesthetics are, I think, missing the point. This is a comic book movie. A certain degree of kitschy spectacle comes with the territory. The villain, Krem of the Yellow Hills played by Matthias Schoenaerts, is intimidating in a generic way, with some interesting vocal work, but his motivations are never made clear enough to make him feel like a real threat. I left the theater unable to tell you what he actually wanted.
David Corenswet's Superman cameos feel obligatory rather than earned. There's an obvious case for including him given the shared universe, but the appearances read as exactly what they are: tie-in moments forced into a film that might have been stronger without them. The bride subplot, reaching for a Mad Max register, also falls flat for me. And the film's action sequences, whatever you think of the visual palette, generate almost no visceral excitement. I watched Kara take hits and deal them out and felt my attention drifting. That's a more damning verdict than any review can deliver.
None of this means Supergirl is the catastrophe some critics have made it out to be. The hit pieces have felt excessive, and the film is more watchable than what they all suggest. Alcock, given a better script and a director willing to excavate what's underneath the character's guarded exterior, could command this franchise. Right now, that version of the film exists only in glimpses: not a disaster, but a significant missed opportunity for a character who deserved a proper introduction.
TRating: ★★ out of ★★★★★
Now in theaters
Directed by Craig Gillespie. With Milly Alcock, Eve Ridley, Matthias Schoenaerts, Jason Momoa. 108 minutes. PG-13.