The final battle on Supergirl season 5, episode 19 commences as Kara and Lena attempt to work around their damaged relationship to save National City. Meanwhile, Brainy puts his life on the line to save the world.

For a makeshift finale, Supergirl season 5, episode 19 was a decent episode. A bit more doom and gloom than Supergirl fans are used to, but an interesting change of pace for the show, which really allowed for the main three women (Kara, Alex, and Lena) to shine. I mean, isn’t that what we’ve wanted all season?

However, it is a bit annoying that this terrible Lex/Leviathan story will drag over into season 6. It obviously wasn’t by choice, so we’ll just have to live with it, but I’m keeping my fingers crossed that it’s a story that’s wrapped up in the season 6 premiere. Time to move on to better things.

‘Supergirl’ season 5, episode 19 review

Supergirl season 5, episode 19 was a decent ending to a lackluster season. If you’ve been reading my reviews, you’ll know that post-Crisis Supergirl has not been my favorite.

Despite such a strong start to the season, Supergirl didn’t really tell a great story, since the focus on the mysterious organization, Leviathan, and Lex’s involvement was pushed until episode 17 (three episodes before the original end to the season, two before the actual end).

At the very least, this was an entertaining episode with many aspects that bring me to hope for Supergirl season 6 to be better. Kara and Lena’s friendship being rekindled, Alex’s vigilante life, Nia’s dream abilities expanding, and M’gann’s return (hopefully on a more permanent basis) could bring about an incredible, women-centric season after the messy focus on so many men during this half of season 5.

Kara and Lena

It’s nice to finally see real progress between Kara and Lena on Supergirl season 5, episode 19. Kara’s explosion at Lena, while warranted, partially seemed like a little bit of a regression for her. honestly.

Lena definitely deserved to be called out for how she hurt Kara in “every way imaginable,” but it’s like Kara completely forgot that she also hurt Lena in every way that hurt her most based on the past that Kara knew all about. And Lena definitely didn’t really grasp the fact that, in many ways, Kara did keep the secret to protect Lena from trouble. (Ignoring the fact that Lena was constantly in danger anyway…)

The part that felt like a regression was Kara yelling about making “one mistake” to “protect Lena” over and over again. Even in the season 5 premiere, Kara acknowledged that her secret led to so many moments where she hurt Lena to protect identity and that her justification for keeping her secret was also so she wouldn’t lose Lena’s friendship because of their incredibly rocky relationship when she was Supergirl, not Kara.

Perhaps it was just Kara’s anger shining through and blinding her to the entire picture, which is entirely possible after a season full of Lena’s betrayal hurting Kara, but it just felt unacceptable, to me, for the two to only become friends again with the blame placed entirely on Lena and Kara taking no responsibility for her actions. Lena didn’t do anything truly bad enough to excuse every lie Kara told, in my opinion.

I fear that this is going to be the end of the two talking through their issues, as the Arrow-verse shows rarely allow their titular heroes to have any real emotional moments and growth. But, ideally, we’ll see more deep, revealing conversations between Kara and Lena for the two to truly work through the past and move forward into the future with a better understanding of one another.

I really loved how hard Lena tried to fix things with Kara. Everything she did was simply to help Kara, regardless of whether or not it changed how Kara felt about her, which is a rare moment of true friendship on television.

Likewise, I loved how Kara slowly let Lena in through the episode, trusting Lena to do what was right and what would keep Kara safe, despite how Lena had hurt her. This felt a little more like the Kara we haven’t seen much of this season, who always sees the best in people (aside from Lex Luthor) and tries to get them to be the best versions of themselves.

Alex and Nia

Amazing, just amazing, to see Alex suit up on Supergirl season 5, episode 19 and Nia’s dream power further explored.

I’m a bit confused why Kelly specifically said that Alex should get a mask on the previous episode and the series then decided to put blue eyeshadow on Alex when in costume, which doesn’t hide her identity at all. Seems to defeat the purpose. Also, knowing we were supposed to find out Alex’s vigilante name in the next episode makes the season being cut short due to COVID-19 even harder.

Alex has always been a hero, and it’s so exciting to see her free from the DEO and pursuing justice in a morally correct way. The DEO was such a fractured, inappropriate version of the law, so it’ll also be quite interesting to see if Alex struggles with this sudden shift in what she’s “allowed” to do as a vigilante vs. as a secret government employee.

The concept of Alex feeling more human than ever is also incredibly important, as it’s the one thing that really never made sense about James being Guardian on an Earth full of aliens. At least now there are far too many meta-humans on Earth-Prime for Alex to help stop, but we really need to see how she manages to help with stopping aliens without all of the DEO (and possibly even Supergirl) backing her.

As for Nia, seeing her powers grow is so wonderful and long overdue. I mean, this girl couldn’t even see “Crisis on Infinite Earths” coming.

I wonder how much her emotions impact her dream abilities, as it doesn’t seem like a coincidence that her biggest dreams so far were all about Brainy, someone she loves.

With Brainy’s life up in the air, one of the most exciting aspects of the show returning is seeing Nia’s reaction to what he did to save them and whether or not Brainy and Nia will reunite (should he survive). This relationship was really screwed over all season, and like the friendship between Kara and Lena being fractured, it really took away from the quality of (most of) the season and the stories told.

Supergirl writers, I beg of you: Please focus primarily on Kara, Alex, Lena, Nia, and Kelly next season… and leave the men as the supporting characters on what is supposed to be a show focusing on women.

‘Supergirl’ season 5, episode 19 final thoughts

My first question about Supergirl season 5, episode 19 is why were we forced to sit through so many episodes of Rama Khan when other “gods” were on Earth, too? Why wait until the finale to introduce the concept of the mysterious woman that Leviathan — even Gemma — answers to? Why wait until so late in the season to even make an attempt to work on Kara and Lena’s friendship?

Simply put, Supergirl season 5’s biggest issue was how everything interesting about the story was pushed until the final few episodes to even dig into? Why did we have to sit through so many filler episodes on the way that introduced basically nothing about the overarching story?

I will say that after season 5, it’s irrefutable how important the character of Lena Luthor is to the Supergirl mythos, at least on The CW. Lena was the character that writers used the 100th episode to focus on, outside of Kara, and now, during Kara’s iconic end-of-season hope speech, Lena had her own speech to give.

Lena has come through for Kara and helped saved National City every season since her appearance; without her, the super friends wouldn’t be able to handle the villains they’ve faced, as was proven in the reality where Lena and Kara never became friends.

I really hope that this officially marks the end of the tired story where we’re all supposed to question whether Lena is good or if she can be persuaded to be evil because she’s a Luthor. She survived and escaped Lex and, unknowingly, Lillian’s manipulation, again, and found her way back to light on her own. Lena saved her own soul and found her way back to being a hero, there’s absolutely no reason for this overdone story to ever show up again. She’s a hero, now and forever. Period.

Leaving off on such a big cliffhanger with Lex and Lillian cannot be good, and even though I’m beyond exhausted of Lex, a year-long break will do a little to make his villainous plan coming to fruition at the beginning of season 6 a little more bearable.

Lastly, of the two new characters added this season, I think it’s clear who needs to stay and who needs to go. Andrea Rojas has such potential, both with her Acrata powers and her role as the head of CatCo and Obsidian North after the failed launch of the VR lenses.

Andrea chose to spare Kara’s life and stand up to Leviathan, and there’s potential for her abilities to be used for heroic purposes, even if we’ll hopefully see some tension between her and Kara at work.

With William, Supergirl season 5, episode 19 basically cemented that he doesn’t really need to be on the show. His kidnapping was just an inconvenience. Even though it seems clear that much of this story was cut from the episode to make time for everything else, it’s very telling.

We already have Kara and Nia to tackle the reporting stories (another downside of season 5 as William became the lead reporter of the show, somehow), and it’s clear that the writers just don’t know how to write a proper romantic relationship for Kara and I’d rather see them stop trying after the multiple messes they’ve created.

Kara can and will be happy with her chosen family. Maybe new writers can come in to the show and write Kara a proper, healthy, and respectable romance before the series ends, as Kara is just as deserving of romantic love as any hero and shouldn’t miss out on that.

It’s going to be quite a while before Supergirl season 6 premieres, but stay tuned for news and features!