Supergirl
June 23rd, 2026
MOVIE: SUPERGIRL
STARRING: MILLY ALCOCK, EVE RIDLEY, MATTHIAS SCHOENAERTS, JASON MAMOA
DIRECTED BY: CRAIG GILLESPIE
AMovieGuy.com’s RATING: 2 STARS (Out of 4)
RATED: PG-13
RUN TIME: 107 MINUTES
The state of the superhero movie is in flux. With the rise of independent horror and audiences increasingly craving original stories, capes and cowls have taken a back seat. The newest DC installment, Supergirl, follows up on James Gunn’s successful Superman and hopes to continue establishing a new universe of heroes. Having I, Tonya director Craig Gillespie behind the camera is certainly a strong start, but as filmmakers like Chloe Zhao and Sam Raimi have discovered, making a superhero movie feel fresh is a difficult task. Supergirl has the right actress leading the charge, but it ultimately fails to distinguish itself from the countless films that came before it.
We catch up with Kara Zor-El (played excellently by Milly Alcock), who is living on a lonely red planet with her rambunctious dog, Krypto. She spends her days drinking and wallowing in the sadness of losing her people on Krypton. We also meet Ruthye (Eve Ridley), a teenager orphaned by the ruthless Krem (Matthias Schoenaerts) and consumed by thoughts of vengeance. When Ruthye seeks Kara’s help, Krem retaliates by poisoning Krypto with a paralyzing toxin, forcing the two young women to band together. Their search for an antidote takes them across the galaxy, where they encounter strange alien worlds and bizarre creatures, all while pursuing Krem and trying to save their beloved dog.
Narratively, Supergirl is all over the place. Ana Nogueira’s screenplay blends a gnarly trek through a vast space wasteland- inviting comparisons to Mad Max: Fury Road and Furiosa– with a story about a hero discovering her true self. Mixed into that are the familiar James Gunn-style needle drops, where the heroine dispatches waves of bad guys to a soundtrack of catchy songs. At one moment, Supergirl is surprisingly violent; the next, it’s delivering cute dog scenes or overt messages of empowerment. The film struggles to settle into a consistent tone or develop any one theme in a meaningful way.
One of the film’s stronger moments comes when Kara recounts her past, taking us back to life on Krypton before the planet’s collapse. Those scenes offer a glimpse of a more compelling movie. Unfortunately, every return to the central quest for Krypto’s antidote causes the momentum to stall. Jason Momoa also pops in for a brief cameo as the cigar-chomping bounty hunter Lobo, a role he seems born to play, but his appearance is too short to leave much of an impression.
The visuals don’t help matters. At times, the film is so dark that it becomes difficult to make out the action. Other scenes look like generic science-fiction landscapes or artificial green-screen environments lacking texture and personality. The result is a movie that rarely generates the excitement its premise promises.
That may be the best way to describe Supergirl: it offers very little that feels exciting or original within a genre that desperately needs both. It stumbles in two major areas—a forgettable villain and a lack of anything new to say. It also never fully feels like a Craig Gillespie film, despite his talent behind the camera. To be fair, this is far from the worst superhero movie ever made. Milly Alcock is a bright and charismatic new talent, bringing warmth and charm to the title role. The problem is that we’ve seen all of this before. Superpowered heroes simply don’t inspire the same wonder they once did.
Krypto, however, remains a very good dog.
2 STARS
SUPERGIRL SOARS INTO THEATERS EVERYWHERE THIS FRIDAY, JUNE 26TH, 2026.
Written by: Leo Brady
