"All About Eve" – Supergirl S04E17

Except... it's not all about Eve. Maybe about half. At most. But nothing close to "all". But I suppose they had to get a title.

"All About Eve" is a mix of several subplots, which makes it part for the course for Season Four. Although at least there's a sense that they're going somewhere, unlike some shows *cough American Gods cough*. We find out more about Eve's perfidy and Lex's long-term schemes. James goes through some finally-acknowledged trauma and realizes he needs help. Ben may begin to realize he's being played. J'onn gets some resolution on his "man of peace" subplot. Lillian Luthor may have had a change of heart. And the U.S. declares war on Supergirl.

What did happen? Most of the episode is the hunt for Lex, who gets a lot of mentions even though Jon Cryer is absent this week. In a cute scene, Supergirl shows up at the DEO bringing doughnuts, and Colonel Haley lets Alex work for her. They team up with Lena, who isn't big on Supergirl and vice versa. The trio visit Eve's aunt, who isn't home and somewhat confusingly there's a cousin Bitsie (Jill Morrison) there instead. Why not just have the aunt there? Bitsie was dying of cancer, and Eve gave her the Harun-El and cured her, which gave her super strength and invulnerability as well.

Bitsie tells them where they can find Eve's laboratory at the local university. They find the gun Eve used to shoot James, and files revealing that Lex turned Otis into a Metallo cyborg to bring him back to life. Another Metallo attacks them and they defeat it. Supergirl also apologizes to Lena for being all snippy with her, because Lena's research makes her feel vulnerable.

Kara eventually spots an image-inducer-disguised Eve at a press conference for the repeal of the Alien Amnesty Act. She goes there and spots Eve outside, but it's a trap. Snowbird, disguised as Supergirl, bursts into the Oval Office, kills a bunch of Secret Service agents, and sets the White House on fire. In the end, President Baker (Bruce Boxleitner) uses the whole thing as a reason to declare martial law. And labels Supergirl public enemy number one.

Does anyone else find it ironic that Boxleitner is playing the same kind of jerk-face president that his character Sheridan opposed on Babylon 5?

Ben is navigating politics in DC with his son at his side for no particular reason. He's trying to get enough votes to repeal the Alien Amnesty Act. One Senator (Karin Konoval) votes against the repeal but later changes her vote and glances nervously at who I think is supposed to be the disguised Eve. James also confronts Ben during the press conference and tells him he's unwittingly working for Lex. Ben is skeptical, but has a dawning-realization look on his face like he might be considering it.

James has been released from the hospital. He presumably has super strength like Lex and Bitsie, but there's no mention of it. His subplot is that his sister Kelly (Azie Tesfai) thinks he needs counselling. James doesn't agree, but he suffers from PTSD during Snowbird's attack and eventually goes to his sister and admits he needs help, and she hugs him and says she's not going anywhere. Awwww.

Lena goes to Lillian (Brenda Strong) asking for information about Lex. Lillian isn't at all helpful, but Lena finds blueprints for the prison in Eve's lab. She goes back to Lillian, shows her the blueprints, and says Lex was going to break in and kill Lillian. I'm not sure Lillian's name in red on blueprints is proof of that, but it convinces Lillian enough that she offers Lena some-yet-unspecified information about where to find Lex.

In the major subplot, J'onn is still trying to resolve his "man of peace" beliefs with his more violent "Martian Manhunter" persona. He goes into a telepathic trance and his subconscious takes on the form of M'yrnn (Carl Lumbly). Like J'onn, I miss having M'yrnn on the show. M'yrnn tells J'onn he's a failure and takes the Sacred Symbols of Mars, but then stays for a cup of coffee. He eventually prods J'onn into getting angry and admitting he's Martian Manhunter, and then apologizes for not giving him unconditional love and making him think he wanted him to follow in his footsteps and become a man of peace. "M'yrnn" is J'onn's subconscious, as "M'yrnn" notes. They share a hug and "M'yrnn" disappears.

In the end, J'onn heads to Mars to put the Sacred Symbols in the Martian desert. Which means he isn't there when Kara calls to ask for his help. Alex and Lena summon Supergirl and tell her they believe in her innocence and will help her.

Like I said, we see more of Eve's cousin and Eve's lab then we see of Eve. But that's okay: the joke that Andrea Brooks is basically playing Miss Teschmacher from the movies ran thin a long time ago. There's lots of little advancements: Supergirl apologizes to Lena, Haley seems to be coming around on Supergirl, James has some trauma from all the times Lex tried to kill him, J'onn has resolved his internal conflicts, Ben is starting to heel turn.

Lex isn't present this episode, but "Eve" builds up the concept that he's behind a lot of what has happened this season. It's more subtle than last week's "let's flashback and show Lex behind everything" approach.

There were a few confusing and/or convenient parts. As noted, why did they have Eve's cousin after establishing Eve's aunt? And Kara just happening to tune in when Eve's image inducer flickered moves the plot along but is one of those one-in-a-thousand things that American TV plots are fond of. The nature of Granberry's blackmailer (or whatever they did) isn't that clear.

But "Eve" put a lot of the pieces into place and now, after a two week hiatus, Supergirl can move along and wrap up the season in the last 5-6 episodes. It's still not clear where they're going: Snowbird is more of a plot contrivance than anything this week, and Melissa Benoist doesn't get to do anything special with her. Presumably she'll get more of a spotlight in weeks to come as she turns against Lex as was gaslit last week.

But that's just my opinion, I could be wrong. What do you think?