Supergirl (A PopEntertainment.com Movie Review)

Supergirl

SUPERGIRL (2026)

Starring Milly Alcock, Matthias Schoenaerts, Eve Ridley, David Krumholtz, Emily Beecham, David Corenswet, Jason Momoa, Ferdinand Kingsley, Diarmaid Murtagh, Emily Piggford, Bruce Lennox, Audrey Brisson, Avye Leventis, Wil Coban, Keeley Forsyth, Paul Hunter, Charlie Rawes, Leo Bill, Craig Binning, Clara Rosager, Heather Agyepong and Alice Hewkin.

Screenplay by Ana Nogueira.

Directed by Craig Gillespie.

Distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures. 108 minutes. Rated PG-13.

It was a bit surprising when word started spreading that the new DC film reboot of Supergirl would feature Kara Zor-El as a shot-pounding Gen Z party girl. Now, admittedly, my knowledge of the character is rather limited, mostly coming from the Melissa Benoist TV series that ran from 2015-2021. (I also saw the 1984 Helen Slater movie years ago but have little memory of it.) This is definitely a distinctive look for the character.

However, I was assured by my nephew, my companion to the screening – someone with much more comic book knowledge than I have – that the new film is based on a 2021-2022 story arc that ran in the comics called Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow.

Okay, I figured, they’re going to make it as if the movie were going to be called Supergirls Gone Wild. Interesting dramatic choice. The question is, will it work?

The pleasant surprise is that it does work pretty well. Even more, Kara’s party girl tendencies are not one of my issues with this film. It is managed in a funny, slightly over-the-top way in the early scenes and then pretty much discarded as a plot point as the story kicks into gear.

In fact, my biggest issue with Supergirl was the same as in last year’s similarly enjoyable but uneven James Gunn reboot of Superman. And it is simply this – way too much of this film (and to a lesser extent Superman before it) takes place in outer space. In fact, in this situation, Kara doesn’t even arrive in Metropolis until the very end of the movie.

It seems that the James Gunn iteration of the DC Universe is putting a lot of stress on the universe part. Which is not a complete surprise, I suppose – Gunn got this gig by helming the Guardians of the Galaxy films for the rival Marvel Cinematic Universe. And even the Zack Snyder iterations of the Superman films leaned a bit into the Kryptonian backstory.

Still, surrounding the Superman family with enough weird aliens to fill a dozen cantina bands feels a bit like narrative drift. This is supposed to be Supergirl, not The Mandalorian.

But fine, granting the film its premise, it really isn’t bad. Not a classic, and it is somewhat hyperactively edited which makes some of the action scenes difficult to follow, but it works more often than it doesn’t.

And surprisingly, it’s Milly Alcock’s jaded and traumatized take on Kara that really makes the film fly. Whether she’s vacationing on planets with a red sun so that she can get blackout drunk or she’s reluctantly standing up for truth, justice and the alien way, Alcock’s take on the role is edgy and sometimes surprisingly tender.

She is dragged out of her stupor by Ruthye Marye Knoll (Eve Ridley) a young girl who also lost her family and now is vowing to avenge them by taking on their killers. In Ruthye, Kara sees a younger version of herself – idealistic, battered but determined for justice. Kara saves her as much to try to preserve the girl’s innocence as for any deep need that justice be done.

Also surprisingly fun is Jason Momoa’s take on the rogue alien bounty hunter Lobo – and I guess the fact that he’s taking on another DC character pretty much closes out the Aquaman chapter of the DCEU. Lobo is a truly psychotic, hard-drinking tough guy who occasionally shows an unexpected moral center.

Sadly, kind of the weak point of Supergirl is the villain Krem (Matthias Schoenaerts), who slaughtered Ruthye’s family and is traversing the universe abducting young girls in a trafficking scheme that spans the galaxy.

Krem is certainly a visually arresting character – with piercings dotting his face and head like freckles – but rather generic as a bad-guy character otherwise. He’s just irredeemably evil for evil’s sake but has little nuance or even seeming purpose other than being bad. And supervillain or not, anyone who reflexively tries to kill a cute dog is just waiting for cosmic comeuppance.

This all leads to a hyperactive series of standard-issue superhero megafights in which Supergirl loses much of its spunky individuality. Who would have thought, the scenes of Kara Zor-El getting plastered turn out to be the most intriguing parts.

Still, while it was an interesting detour, overall that angle wouldn’t sustain a series of films. We’re not looking for Leaving Metropolis or Kara’s Lost Weekend. Now, perhaps in the next Supergirl movie we can see her spend some time on Earth actually, you know, fighting crime.

Jay S. Jacobs

Copyright ©2026 PopEntertainment.com. All rights reserved. Posted: June 26, 2026.