Taking Flight: SUPERGIRL 213 Mr. & Mrs. MXYZPTLK

Last night's episode of SUPERGIRL explored Valentine's Day through the eyes of many of it's characters. While the title villain Mr. Mxyzptlk sought Kara's hand in marriage, one former romantic interest was mysteriously missing.

The absence of James Olsen only confirms my thoughts that, while moving him into the role of 'Guardian', the show just isn't quite sure what to do with his character. That's not to say they haven't given him a lot to do, running Cat Co is quite a chore, but a lot of what he does takes him away from the central plot of the season.

For the rest of the cast, however, the Valentine's Day episode is all about establishing personal relationships, even for the most unlikely of candidates: Winn. His arc in this episode felt a little forced and rushed...much like the date he went on. I like the idea of mixing races though as it touches on societal parallels. A strong and confident alien (Lyra) comes to Winn's defense and immediately demands he takes her on a date. My initial reaction was an eyeroll, but the more I thought on it...she's an alien. Her customs could be excused as aggressive in nature, hence her being quick to save Winn in the first place. So maybe they move fast in establishing a partner as well. As Lyra sat down with Winn, she commented on the looks she received. There's a clear feeling of tension as they are of two different races/species sitting together in a high-brow restaurant.

I feel the writers were attempting to do something similar to this in the first season with Kara and James, but there was little to no chemistry between them and it wasn't working.

The romance between Alex and Maggie took another step forward as we learned the truth behind Maggie's coming out as gay. It wasn't all sunshine and rainbows as she led Alex to believe. An argument broke out when Alex, who has never gotten to celebrate Valentine's Day with anyone before, tried to do something romantic for Maggie. Unfortunately, Maggie had a bad experience in the past and holds a grudge against the holiday. After talking with Kara, she realizes that it's not just about her and quickly makes up for it by delivering a 'prom'-like experience for Alex.

As a sidenote to the episode, J'onn J'onnz misses M'gan and sends a message to her on Mars. Even though they communicate telepathically, he states that writing things down is more powerful than the spoken word. Tuck that in your back pocket and save it for later.

Now, it's time to discuss the imp from the 5th Dimension: Mr. MXYZPTLK!

Everything about his character was as it should be. one part obnoxious, one part mischievous and one part magical. He weaved in and out of the episode with ease, controlling the pace and dictating the story. Releasing Parasite into the city, just to show Kara how powerful they could be together, while inadvertently putting Mon-El's incompetence on display, was posturing at its finest. By promising power, wealth and all the shallow materialistic ideals someone can cram into an ideal partner, he overlooked one small thing...true love.

He doesn't understand it. And because he can't force Kara to fall in love with him, he pulls out all the stops to convince her she should. He didn't try investing real time in 'wooing' her and showing her the type of man he could be and how he could compliment her emotionally. Meanwhile, Mon-El lets his jealousy get the better of him. Angry and feeling a little inadequate, Mon-El took to violence as his people had done in the past to rid their planet of 5th dimensional beings.

Unfortunately, Mon-El isn't the best combatant and quickly gets one-upped by the interstellar imp.

Kara realizes her only way to get MXYZPTLK off of Earth and save the ones she loves is to marry him. Mon-El is upset by the notion, as he should be. He didn't realize that Kara had a plan. Based on Mxy's rules, he can't stop Kara from drinking orange juice, taking her own life, and he can't force her to fall in love with him.

So Kara tricks Mxy into thinking she wishes to marry him, only to trap him inside the Fortress of Solitude, with a threat to kill herself when the self-destruct sequence begins counting down. Mxy tries to save her by entering the code but he doesn't understand Kryptonian language. Supergirl concedes and tells him which buttons to press, spelling his name backwards -- which is the only way to get rid of him. After all, writing things down is more powerful than the spoken word.

Mxy disappears and Kara returns home to explain what her plan was to Mon-El, because if she told him ahead of time, Mxy may have been listening and it wouldn't have worked.

We finally get the kiss we've been waiting for. Well, I have anyways. Many people wish things worked out with James and Kara, but I love the chemistry between Mon-El and Kara. Plus, given Mon-El's real backstory, it's going to create far more drama between the two of them. No romance on The CW can happen without some additional drama!

Overall the episode was a lovely boat ride of action through a tunnel of love.

As a little footnote to the episode, I absolutely LOVED the callout to Michael Keaton's line in BATMAN, "You wanna get nuts? Let's get nuts!" While Benoist didn't deliver the line nearly as well as Keaton did, it was a fun little nugget to have for us more 'seasoned' fans of the genre.

To get you ready for next week's episode, I've embedded the episode trailer that gives us the return of Jeremiah, family tension, a test of loyalties and Cyborg Superman!