It’s been a month since we last saw Supergirl in action but now we’re back and the Girl of Steel gets to flex her reporter muscles in this week’s “Ace Reporter.” There are spoilers ahead, but you knew that.
Related: Check out all of our Supergirl Season 2 Recaps
All is quiet in National City, which begs the question, what does Supergirl do when there’s a lull? J’onn has his budgets, Winn has his techy stuff, Alex has her knives, so what does that leave the Girl of Steel?
Apparently, it’s baking. As Kara throws away her fifth ruined dish, she gets a knock on her door. Lena (Katie McGrath) has come to pay her a visit, and she has favor to ask. There is a press conference happening that day and the CEO, Jack Spheer (iZombie’s Rahul Kohli), has invited Lena to attend. While this could be considered a courtesy, it is much more than that. Lena and Jack were romantically involved right up until she moved to National City, and Lena needs the support of her bestie Kara to keep an eye on her.
At the conference, Kara has a run in with Snapper Carr (Ian Gomez) who is still salty about Kara’s act of defiance from weeks before. “Wow, they’ll let anyone into these events now,” he says. Kara tries to hold her own in this contest of snappy comebacks, but Snapper reminds her, yet again, that he is the real reporter and she only has a lowly dotcom.
Once the presentation begins, we see what all the hubbub is about. Jack Spheer has invented nanobots, tiny robots that can heal wounds, cure diseases and prevent diseases from spreading. It is indeed a medical marvel, so it’s no surprise that after the presentation Kara is confronted by a mystery man who has some information on Jack Spheer.
Later that night we find Guardian and Winn doing what they do best: fighting crime. After taking out a bad guy, Guardian makes his way back to the van and finds it rocking. Not wanting to really know what’s happening in there, he opens the van doors anyway and finds Winn and Lyra (Tazmin Merchant) together. Guardian is understandably concerned that Wynn was distracted, but Winn knows that James had everything under control. What’s more, Lyra has a special surprise for James: she wants to join the team.
James in no way, shape, or form wants Lyra as a sidekick, but Winn begs him until he relents. The unstoppable duo is now an unstoppable trio.
Elsewhere in National City Kara meets with Joe Watkins (Andrew McNee), a former lab tech with Spheerical Industries who was fired from the company after finding a troubling discrepancy in the human trial archives. Not only were results of the human trials not archived, but it looks like whatever data they did have was fabricated. Joe is worried that the nanobots are dangerous, but before he can go on, Kara hears a noise from within the car. Just then, a swarm of nanobots attack the car and blow it up from within. Kara flies out and can only watch as Joe’s car is engulfed in flames.
The next day Kara goes to CatCo because she needs James to submit a Freedom of Information Act request so she can verify what Joe told her. Snapper shows up and he is surprised to see Kara there. She tells him what she’s planning and Snapper rejects the idea citing that James would “destroy the integrity of the media empire.” Kara decides it’s not worth getting James involved and goes to figure it out on her own. Before she leaves, she uses her super hearing and discovers that Snapper is going to meet with another source that night.
Over at L Corp, Lena gets an unexpected visit from Jack. They relive some of the good times they had, but it’s clear that they’re still emotionally dealing with their breakup. Jack invites Lena out to dinner and she takes him up on the offer.
That night Guardian and his “trusty” sidekick Lyra go to stop a robbery in progress at a convenient store. Guardian catches up the robber and pulls off his mask, revealing the face of a young kid. While James is fully prepared to let the kid go, Lyra has another idea. Unlike James, Lyra has an uncompromising view of justice (if you commit a crime you should be punished) and starts to knock the kid around. James quickly puts a stop to her.
Snapper arrives at Derrick Simmons’ (Johnny Ghorbani) apartment and starts questioning him about the human trials. Derrick tells Snapper that he was a part of the trials, but all he ever did was sign a form. Somehow knowing about the meeting, the nanobots come flying in and attack Snapper and Derrick. Supergirl swooshes in and is able to protect Snapper from the nanobot swarm, but she is unable to save Derrick.
Walking into her apartment, Kara finds Mon-El waiting for her. She is visibly upset that she couldn’t save the lives of both Joe and Derrick and Mon-El suggests that maybe she should talk to Lena who just happens to be having dinner with Jack. Kara recruits Mon-El’s help in meeting Lena.
At the restaurant, Kara and Mon-El “accidently” run into Lena and Jack. Taking a seat at the same table, Kara immediately starts to grill Jack about the nanobots. Lena jumps in and asks about how he cracked the code and Jack gives her a heartfelt, candid explanation. Mon-El picks up on the romantic vibes and gets Kara out of there.
But before they leave Mon-El gives Jack a big manly hug and steals his security badge.
Lena takes Jack back to L Corp where they continue their night where it left off at the restaurant. We find out that Jack gave Lena a choice between him and her family and she chose her family. It is a decision that he wants to now rectify. Instead of making her choose, he wants to be in her life, the Luthors included.
Meanwhile, Kara and Mon-El infiltrate Spheerical Technologies using Jack’s stolen badge. They easily make their way into Jack’s office and log onto his computer. Clicking through files, Kara makes a disturbing discovering. She finds out that there weren’t any human trials was because Jack was the human trial. Finding video footage of what he’s done, Kara and Mon-El now know that the nanobots reside inside Jack.
At L Corp, Jack senses that something has happened. Breaking off his kiss with Lena he makes a hasty and awkward departure.
It isn’t long before the nanobots come swarming into Jack’s office. Fortunately, Mon-El and Kara had enough time to grab the flash drive that has the downloaded video and get out of there. Once they’re gone, Jack appears in his office.
The next day Kara meets up with Lena and tells her the truth about Jack. Once she sees the video of Jack injecting himself with the nanobots, Lena is understandably devastated. As a favor, Lena asks Kara to let her talk to Jack before Kara makes the news public.
At the Alien Bar, Winn has a chat with Lyra about her crime fighting tactics. After only one night, Lyra has made so many mistakes that they need to let her go. Lyra doesn’t take the news very well and walks away from Winn in a fit of rage.
Over at CatCo, Kara arrives with a couple of things she needs to do. Being unemployed has given her time to reflect and her recent run-ins with Snapper have helped her realize what it means to be a journalist. “It’s not the reporter that matters, it’s the truth that matters,” she tells Snapper. Knowing that CatCo has a far greater reach than KaraDanvers.com, Kara gives Snapper everything she has on Jack and his company. Snapper, impressed with her work, gives Kara some valuable information. Beth Breen (Claudia Doumit), Spheerical’s CFO, has a lot to lose if the nanobots fail. Suddenly everything starts to make sense and Kara leaves Snapper in a hurry.
Lena goes to confronts Jack about the video, and the lies, and the people he’s killed, and the fake human trials. Jack is absolutely confused by her accusations and it suddenly dawns on Lena that he has no idea what he’s done. From behind Jack, Beth Breen appears and tells Lena her diabolical plan to not only control Jack through the nanobots, but to also control her, and by extension L Corp. As Jack starts to slowly approach Lena, nanobot injector in hand, Lena begins to back away. This gives the cavalry enough time to arrive.
Supergirl bursts into the lab and goes head-to-head against Jack and the Nanobots. Lena takes on Beth “I have a Blackbelt” Breen, but the fight hardly seems fair. Even with her blackbelt, Beth is no match for the sheer awesome power of a Luthor. Supergirl tries to freeze the nanobots, but because there are so many of them, they quickly overtake her. As the nanobots starts to crawl around Supergirl, Lena stomps on the earpiece that Beth used to command the nanobots. This frees Jack, but the nanobots have become unstable. Jack starts to shift between human and nanobots, but he is still able to tell Lena how to override the nanobots.
Overriding the bots; however, comes with a major price to pay. If she overrides the nanobots, Jack will certainly die, but if she doesn’t, Supergirl will die. Having to choose between Jack and Supergirl is a difficult and painful decision, but Jack begs Lena to override the bots. Lena realizes that she has no choice but to do it.
Once the nanobots are shut down, Supergirl is free from their grasp, but Jack collapses to the floor. Rushing to his side, all Lena can do is watch him die.
The next day, Kara goes to see Lena and finds her emotionless and scared. Lena is concerned that she will eventually turn out like her mother, a woman devoid of almost all emotion. Her fear is that if she does start to feel something, that she will not like the true person underneath.
That night James has a talk with Winn. He admits that he could have handled the Lyra situation better, but all James really wants Winn to know is that he is more than just a friend…he’s a brother. As a way to make things right between them, James has asked Lyra to come back to the team, which she accepts. Hero, sidekick, man in the van. Let’s go Team Guardian!
Kara sees Snapper one more time to deliver a peace offering of homemade danishes. Snapper hands her the article that he wrote about Spheerical, but with an added surprise: Kara’s name appears next to his on the byline. Not only that, but Snapper gives Kara her old job back. With everything she went through to get to the truth, he has a newfound respect for her.
Back at L Corp, Rhea enters Lena’s office, and she has a business proposition for her.
Oh no.
Supergirl airs Mondays at 8pm PST on The CW.
Superthoughts
- When Lena asked Kara what her Kryptonite is, I felt that it was a little nudge to us that Lena knows who Kara is.
- “We’re not clickbait Millennials” – oh Snapper.
- I don’t care what people say, Mon-El is great. Not sure about that fake Japanese accent, but he does the appropriate amount of comic relief when he needs to.
- A “man-nection.” I dig it.
- Beth: “You know it’s true what they saw. Behind every great man is a strong woman.” Lena: “I wouldn’t know. I never stood behind a man.” LENA! Stop making me like you.
- I really, really like the Winn, Lyra, Guardian team. They all have a great dynamic.
- Just a few important observations. This episode premiered on April 24, Armenian Genocide Remembrance Day and because of this, it shouldn’t be ignored that this episode was directed by Armenian-American director Armen V. Kevorkian. Also, the character Derrick Simmons wore a System of a Down T-shirt, an Armenian-American rock band. I’m sure there were other subtle nods, but it’s clear where the cast and the production team stand on such an important day.
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