Supergirl recap: A Reign-y day brings death and destruction

Curse those spaceship-stealing, red-shirt-murdering, Reign-resurrecting Daughters of Juru! They give black-cloak-wearers a bad name.

First, though, let’s check in on the DEO, where Myr’nn is preparing for the Reach by thanking Alex for showing him the joy of this strange new planet, and for loving his son. “You would’ve made an excellent green Martian,” he tells her. “I can depart with peace because I know my son is home.” In return, Alex hugs him and says she knows where J’onn gets his dignity and his heart.

Minutes into the episodes before I was in tears: four.

Myr’nn’s downright sanguine about the process of transferring the memories of the Martian people stretching back to the moment the planet was formed. After all, he lived for centuries believing he’d die and take the ancient knowledge of his people and his religion with him, but now he can pass them along to his son.

J’onn seems less convinced, especially because some of the memories are horrific, and each one brings him closer to losing his father. But Myr’nn assures him that he’ll feel whole when the process is complete. And in fact, when J’onn sees himself being born, he starts to understand what Myr’nn been saying about balancing his calling with the rest of his life, just as his father had to learn to do so long ago.

Elsewhere in the DEO, things are normal-ish as Winn asks his frenemy Demos to test his new omnidirectional subatomic belt buckle/personal shield by punching him. Demos happily complies and proves the effectiveness of the shield, part of the non-lethal weapons Winn’s making for J’onn. Winn offers Demos a buckle shield of his own as a “thanks for failing to punch me” gift.

Sam isn’t doing well, though. She brings Ruby with her to the DEO so Alex and Lena can try to solve her weakness and fatigue. The women discover that her cells are morphing into Kryptonian biology and try to treat her with copious sunlamps, to no avail. But at least this time Ruby is in the know.

Now let’s hop to Argo, where Kara and Mon-El are stranded after the Daughters of Juru stole their spaceship — the only one in the city. And thanks to Argo’s protective shield, they can’t warn the DEO that the trio of witches plan to activate Reign, who has separated herself from Sam and now lies dormant, ready to awaken and transform Earth into a new Krypton.

A search of Selena’s home triggers a Selena hologram, which detonates an explosion that injures Thara and destroys Mon-El’s Legion beacon.

Reasoning that Selena couldn’t have known Kara would return to Argo, Alura suggests that the Sisters of Juru originally planned to make it to Earth using the portal that Kara’s father was working on before the destruction of the planet.

They activate one of Kara’s cache crystals at the DEO, where it essentially acts as a holographic Kryptonian burner phone. Thankfully, Winn picks up the call and is greeted by Kara speaking through a hologram projection of Alura.

She swiftly explains that they’re stranded on Argo, Reign’s still alive, and Sam’s in trouble, causing Winn to bellow, “ALEXXXXXX!” Yeah, he gets it.

He and Mon-El set out to get the portals going, bro-talking as they do about Mon-El losing his chance to contact the Legion. Surprise, surprise, he’s okay with it. “I lost her once, Winn. I’m not sure I can do it again.” Yoooo, you’re still married! I know your absent 31st-century wife gave you a hall pass, and the legal issues will be tricky to navigate, but until you figure it all out, you’ve got entanglements!

Alura has also noticed the vibey vibe and asks Kara if she loves Mon-El. Kara says it’s complicated, leaving Alura wishing for some mother-daughter time to catch up on the goss.

Alas, just as they’re about to fire up the portals, the witch sisters strike. See, Thomas Coville acted as their human Renfield during their (painful-to-him) ceremony to resurrect Reign, but she came back weak because she lacked the blood of her sisters, Purity and Pestilence.

But the Sisters of Juru sniffed out the vials of Worldkiller blood stored at the DEO, and lemme tell ya, they could write an informative Buzzfeed article with tips and tricks for using your newly acquired yellow-sun powers for murder.

With J’onn tied up during the Reach, Alex takes control, ordering Demos to find and destroy the blood vials while the rest of the DEO holds them off.

Demos sneaks out the blood vials while Alex goes full-on BAMF, pummeling the witches with Kryptonite bullets and gloves before slow-motion jump-kicking them to a lower level. I would like to nominate Alex for every award and elected office, please and thank you.

But, uh, does Kara know about all those Kryptonite weapons? Because I suspect she’ll have… strong feelings. (Next page: Reign rises)

One of the witches also attacks Winn, whose life is saved by his buckle shield, although he’s knocked out and unable to push the button to activate the portal on his end.

And although Kara can see what the hologram sees, it can’t physically interact with anything on Earth. So when a Juru witch sweeps by, the Alura hologram lures her into the room and insults her intelligence until she punches through the hologram and activates the portal. Bet she feels even dumber when Mon-El leaps through and clocks her, followed by Kara and Alura, making her first trip to Earth.

Winn, now awake, urges Demos to activate his buckle shield and deliver the blood to Kara, but Winn’s tech can’t withstand the combined heat-vision blasts of three Kryptonians, and the trio incinerate him as he tosses the vials to Kara. Demoooooooossss!

Selena taunts Kara that caring makes her weak, so Kara proves her wrong by… *checks notes*… tossing Selena the blood vials she wants. I mean, sure, she laser-eye-blasts them midair, but that was a weird tactical choice. Could she not have tossed them, I don’t know, LITERALLY ANYWHERE ELSE while eye-blasting them? If I’m misunderstanding this strategic move, somebody please let me know.

Then about 50 different things happen in the final few minutes.

Winn, naturally, blames himself for Demos’ death, even lashing out at James, who stopped by to check on his friend before getting down to the business of coordinating with the mayor on the best way to use CatCo as a PR tool to calm the National City citizenry. The upshot is that Winn is now doubting his near-death-experience plans to get back to the business of being awesome and saving the world, which hurts my heart a little.

Selena somehow absorbed the blood of Pestilence and Purity despite Kara’s clever “give these things to my enemy” plan, so she slices open her hand and dribbles the needed DNA on Reign’s body. It does the trick, and Reign roars to life, grabbing the Sword of Juru and using it to sow the seeds of the terraforming that will reshape the Earth.

Now that the worldkilling is underway, they have no more use for Thomas Coville, and despite his stuttered protests that he faithfully served them, they laser him (presumably) to death without a second thought. Kryptonian witches are mean.

Kara introduces Alex and Alura, and her mother hugs the woman who rescued her daughter and gave her a home. It’s nice.

With Eve Teschmacher’s help, Lena discovers that as Sam’s cells weaken, Reign’s grow stronger, which leads Alura to suggest that they find the mythical Fountains of Lillith in the Dark Valley, where one fountain allegedly provides infinite strength and the other infinite weakness.

Even in her puny state, Sam insists that Lena use the electric-shock method to transport her back to the Dark Valley. With Ruby by her side, she endures the pain of the electricity and wakes up in the Dark Valley, where whispered voices urge her to run.

The worldkilling begins in earnest, with earthquakes and tsunamis and superstorms erupting all over the globe. (Winn isn’t too grief-stricken to quip, “100 percent chance of, you guessed it, Reign.”) Mon-El estimates they have mere hours until the genesis event is complete and all life on Earth is wiped out, starting from the Earth’s core.

The planet’s instability interrupts the Reach, and J’onn and Myr’nn agree that this is too important to ignore. J’onn assumes control of the DEO, barking orders, and Myr’nn offers to shapeshift into the Earth and bond with it to stop the genesis event, even though it will tear him apart. He assures J’onn that this sacrifice is worth it to save his son’s home, even if the memory transfer hasn’t been completed.

And that’s the chaos descending on the planet at the end of season 3’s penultimate episode.

Snaps of the cape

• Since Supergirl returned from its odd mid-season hiatus, it’s been frustratingly disjointed, with 20 pounds of plot crammed into a 10-pound bag at the expense of character and emotion. Kara learning that she’s not the last daughter of Krytpon and being reunited with her mother has been bafflingly rushed and devoid of the deep emotions that should accompany this story line. It’s doubly frustrating because we know the show is capable of more. I was braced for nothing but waterworks as J’onn said goodbye to his father this week, and while their scenes were strong, they still fell short of the powerfully moving emotions in “Far from the Tree” or “Midvale” earlier this season. Nevertheless, I’m holding out hope for the finale. Like Kara, I’m an optimist.

• Wouldn’t Winn already have established “prove you’re you” protocols for everybody in the DEO in case of doppelgängers? It seems like a quintessential Winn move, and he definitely would’ve come up with something more esoteric than Kara’s first pet being Streaky the Supercat, which errbody knows.

• Raise your hand if you’re glad to have Odette Annable back as Reign. Wow, does she have fun with that role.

• Until next week’s finale, friends! In the meantime, don’t go sharing the 500 million moves on the Ok’Rock’Tock board with Zook.