Previously on SUPERGIRL… 

The Children of Liberty move forward with their plans as Kara profiles an alien who can heal other aliens. 

SUPERGIRL seems to have gotten back into a regular groove, allowing the politics to loom over the overarching story instead of dominating the narrative. And I like the show much more this way. You can have an intelligent political discourse without beating it over the heads of your audience. 

We turn our focus to Kara’s other job, as a reporter for CatCo, where she is working on an interview with an alien, Amadei Derros, who has the ability to heal other aliens. Kara is still on her mission to bridge the divide between humans and extraterrestrials. But despite living in a world that has shown a horrible divide between the two sides, Kara is still surprised to see comments from trolls on her glowing profile. 

And to no surprise to anyone who’s ever done one of these glowing profiles, after it’s printed, she gets some information about Amadei that makes her question what she did: he has a daughter he’s never spoken to and an ex who hates his guts. 

The ex-wife is our gateway to the Children of Liberty and its leader, Ben Lockwood, Agent Liberty. The anti-alien movement has taken an ex-DEO agent, Jensen, and converted him not just into an ally, but a super-powered soldier who has been imbued with the Parasite virus that allows him to take the abilities of any alien he comes in contact with. Lockwood’s rhetoric was convincing enough to Amadei’s ex-wife, and she was angry enough with her ex-husband that she stole his amulet and gave it to Lockwood. 

And that brings us to Alex Danvers and the DEO. Last episode, Alex found out that Col. Lauren Haley was sent to oversee the DEO after the agency’s actions annoyed the new president. If you’ve seen any of the other shows in the ARROWVERSE, you know government agents coming to intervene is usually a bad thing. But SUPERGIRL swerves us a bit, and Col. Haley turns out to be a supportive supervisor who seems impressed with the job Alex is doing with the DEO.

At least, until Alex disobeys a direct order from Haley to kill Jensen in the final confrontation. But Alex instead takes a page out of her sister’s book and talks Jensen down. Haley reveals that she shares a negative view of aliens, specifically J’onn J’onzz, the former head of the DEO. So maybe Haley’s not as good as she was teased at the start of the episode… 

But Haley isn’t the only challenge looming. James Olsen is also having his own dealings with Agent Liberty, who has turned his alter ego, Guardian, into an icon for his movement. So, Olsen decides to take Lockwood down from the inside, and Lena is the only one who knows what’s happening. 

If SUPERGIRL can manage to keep on the track it’s going with the last couple of episodes, this could be an all-time great season. Agent Liberty is proving to be a great foil, while the storyline hits on a lot of things that resonate in these politically-volatile times. As long as it stays this side of those political landmines that brought down the first couple of episodes, things could be very good this season.