*This review contains minor spoilers*
Click here to watch the SPOILER review on YouTube
“Krypton” unevenly introduces us to a new Superman mythos. High production values and stories involving political intrigue and world-ending threats give the show a “Game of Thrones” vibe with a sci-fi twist. But boring characters and mediocre execution keep the show from reaching its potential.
The weakest aspect of this series it the main characters. While the acting is fine, they just aren’t very compelling. The headliner, Seg-El, is fairly bland. There are no character traits that allow him to stand out. He’s not a great fighter or smooth talker. He’s just a reluctant hero that never stands out from the crowd. In fact, the strongest character is Jayna-Zod. Time-traveler Adam Strange is also a weak link. He’s the catalyst that gets the plot rolling, but does little to push along the narrative. He could’ve left the show after giving Seg Superman’s cape and then left without it hurting the show. The character of Kem seems like he’s going to be the show’s comic relief, but that doesn’t last much past the first few episodes. His main purposed becomes providing someplace the characters can hide when in trouble. She’s a badass warrior, that while duty-bound to Krypton, still shows pride and love for her daughter.
As far as the show’s villains go, it’s a mixed bag. Brainiac is suitably scary, but we’re given a pseudo-Brainiac for most of this season. It’s an interesting choice that doesn’t always work. The Vex’s aren’t too much more than the typical plotting political villains. They make a few attempts to flesh them out, but there’s nothing substantial about them. The secret villain revealed with the plot twist is pretty cool, but the tweak to his origin and the lack of what makes him truly a threat to Superman keeps him from feeling like the character we know and love to hate. Fortunately, his story gains some major traction in the final few episodes.
The plot has major pacing issues. The initial focus on Brainiac doesn’t seem to add up, and the plot twist that’s supposed to rectify that isn’t as strong as they think it is. The show goes for a heavily serialized format. Episodes tend to flow into the next, which makes individual episodes less memorable. And with only 10 episodes to work with, there’s a lack of urgency to keep things moving. Also, it becomes murky on who we should root for. On one end, you want the heroes to survive and save Krypton. On the other, history needs Brainiac to succeed to preserve the future. The show seems to be creating its own continuity that’s separate from any current Superman lore. So, like “Gotham,” it feels like they’re going to do their own thing and we won’t get the conclusion we expect in the end.
They seemed to have spent a lot of money making this series and it shows. The costumes and sets are elaborate, and the special effects are well done. Brainiac’s ship looks amazing. And so does Brainiac, for the most part. The plodding plot and uninteresting characters derail most of their efforts, but next season looks promising to push the limited narrative forward.
Season’s best episode: “The Phantom Zone” (Episode 10): A fairly strong climax, with a solid twist ending.
Season’s worst episode: “House of El” (Episode 2): Not a bad episode, but it starts to get bogged down with a lot of political mumbo jumbo that really doesn’t pay off later.
** out of *****