Supergirl - Season Four

I haven't seen this mentioned anywhere and had it spoiled for me by Supergirl Radio, but Supergirl is apparently pulling a page from the L.E.G.I.O.N. comics and introducing the heroic 21st Century ancestor of a Legion of Superheroes character via Nia Nal, having designed her to be the ancestor of the Legionnaire Nura Nal, right down to sharing/potentially sharing codenames.... which is really rather neat.

 

Or maybe they're just reinterpreting a Legion character as a present-day hero, in the same way they've reinterpreted other characters -- turning Mia Dearden into Thea Queen, splitting Black Canary into several different characters, inventing a superheroic ancestor for Vixen, combining various different descendants of Barry Allen into Nora Allen/XS, etc.

 

The familial connection between Nia and Nura has been officially confirmed, but I hadn't heard about it until I heard it mentioned on Supergirl Radio during their most recent episode, which was all about the Supergirl series' presence at San Diego Comic-Con.

 

Brent Spiner to recur

 

Uh-oh. Something tells me President Marsdin is going to be outed as an alien and forced to step down -- if not worse.

 

I could see Agent Liberty assassinating her. I wouldn't be surprised if the vice President is the bad guy behind it.

 

Yeah, having an evil president would certainly make it easier to do allegories for current events.

 

Episode 4x01 is titled "The American Alien", and

Spoiler

I have a sneaking suspicion that it's a reference to Marsdin since Lynda has been confirmed to be returning for the episode.

 

The current POTUS isn't evil; he's just abhorrent.

 

I think history will show that's far too generous an assessment, but it's beside the point here, since we're talking about allegory in fiction, which doesn't require absolutely exact parallels. The point is that having a sympathetic and noble figure in Supergirl's White House makes it harder for them to parallel current events than having an antagonistic one (of any degree) would.

 

I much prefer what we got here to them fighting over him. Both women were god, reasonable people so it really wouldn't fit either of their characters for them to get into a fight over Mon El.

I thought the Laurel Lance and Dinah Drake were two different characters in he comics?

Awesome news about Brent Spiner, but this does sound bad for Pres. Marsdin.

 

Well, sort of, retroactively. The original 1940s Black Canary was Dinah Drake, whose love interest was Larry Lance. In the 1960s, when the '40s characters were brought back on "Earth-2," she was reintroduce as Mrs. Dinah Lance, and she relocated to Earth-1 when her husband Larry was killed. But in the '80s, to deal with the increasing span of time since the Golden Age, the Earth-1 Dinah Lance was retconned into Dinah Laurel Lance, the daughter of Dinah Drake and Larry Lance. (That's the simplified version.) So making Dinah Drake a contemporary, unrelated character who's the successor to the Black Canary mantle instead of its originator is certainly a change.

Also, I'm counting Sara Lance among the "several different characters," since she was the first Black Canary in the Arrowverse (at least as Cisco Ramon and the toy tie-ins count it, even though her original code name was simply "the Canary").

 

Thought we were talking about Supergirl not 24?

 

If someone gets attacked by a cougar I am all in.

 

Is Flockhart coming back?

 

I am too, I just didn't mention her since I already knew she was an original character who didn't come from the comics. I have to admit, I'm a bit surprised they haven't incorporated her into the comics.
I've seen in some of the recent Green Arrow solicits that they have given Ollie a sister, although she's not Thea.

 

Yes, but that's exactly my point -- that they reinterpreted the Black Canary character, handled her differently than they did in the comics. The fact that Sara is an entirely original character makes her more relevant to that point, not less.

 

If they wanted, they could nail President Marsdin for not having a birth certificate but that might actually be to dated of a reference. It's certainly not the worst thing Trump is now remembered for. My theory is this setting up a future season that deals with a presidental election like in lets say 2020. I mentioned earlier about the idea of Lex Luthor running for president on the show and that was mostly just tossing a fun idea out their but I now wonder if something like it might come true. Lex Luthor vs Cat Grant in 2020. Sounds like a fun election story.

Jason

 

Obama aside: Marsdin was constitutionally ineligible to be president. All her actions (and the actions of her administration) could be over-turned by the courts. Her court nominees would also be invalid (including any made to the Supreme Court), and their subsequent rulings (including Supreme Court rulings) would be called into question (which could mean appeals being re-argued and prisoners going back to prison after being set free by the invalid judges). Any negotiated treaties could also be considered invalid, and that could lead to some major problems with foreign governments. It would be a logistical nightmare of historic proportions.

Note: the above assumes Earth 38 has the same Constitution as our Earth. Of course, the simple fact of her citizenship application/status being fraudulent should create issues on their own.

 

Yes. I never understood why they didn't just make her an alien born on Earth, say that her parents immigrated here before she was born, so that they could sidestep that whole issue. Now I'm thinking maybe they intended to make an issue out of it all along, that they were setting her up for a storyline where she was exposed and forced to step down.

Then again... Do we know when Marsdin's family came to Earth? Article II, Section 1, Clause 5 of the Constitution says "No Person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President." So if Durlans in this continuity are really long-lived and her family settled in US territory before 1787, then she would be eligible. Of course, her identity documents would still be fraudulent, but there's nothing in the Constitution that says that would disqualify her as long as she met the age and citizenship requirements and had not been convicted in an earlier impeachment trial, rebelled against the United States, or served two prior terms as President.