I've pretty much dropped everything but Flash. Supergirl is good, but the obvious political overtones are too much even for me. And Arrow is just one damn fight sequence after another.
Legends is goofy, but i just lost track of whatever the hell it is they are trying to accomplish.
I'm slightly behind on Gotham (about 2 episodes.) I'm about that behind on LoT and Flash, a bit more on Arrow, about a season on Black Lightning, and more on Supergirl. I'm probably going to just give up on that last one. The others, I watch when I catch up on one thing or another. (We watch Flash and LoT together.) I'm not happy BBT will end, but it has to end sometime, so that's that.
A slight diversion, but it doesn't deserve its own thread: an old friend of mine pointed out that in neither "Shazam" nor "Captain Marvel" is the name "Captain Marvel" actually said. In fact, it only appears in the credits of the latter movie.
A slight diversion, but it doesn't deserve its own thread: an old friend of mine pointed out that in neither "Shazam" nor "Captain Marvel" is the name "Captain Marvel" actually said. In fact, it only appears in the credits of the latter movie.
George
History lesson as to why (which you probably know):
Fawcett Comics made a kid who became a superhero. DC Comics made a superhero who became an adult man. Kids made Captain Marvel more popular than Superman. So DC hit Fawcett with nuisance lawsuits until Fawcett went bankrupt.
Marvel Comics discovered that the trademark on "Captain Marvel" had lapsed, so they made their own (Kree Captain Mar-Vell, aka "Captain Marvel.") He later became the first superhero to die of cancer, and was first of several "Captain Marvels" of DC (Monica Rambeau, Genis- Vell, later Linda Danvers went from Ms Marvel to Binary to Warbird to Captain Marvel.)
Later, DC bought up all the Fawcett characters like they did Charlton (Blue Beetle, etc.) They could no longer call the comic "Captain Marvel", so the title became "with a magic word- SHAZAM!" Which also became the title on the live TV show with the Winnebago. As a small child, I had no trouble keeping track of the hero's name. However, plenty of people DID have that problem. So, a lot of people have thought of the superhero (not just the old wizard Shazam) as "Shazam", Especially with the "Captain Marvel" movie out, DC's given up on calling the Marvel Family "the Marvel Family", and made them all Shazams.
In a collection of essays called "All in Color for a Dime," published about 40 years ago, one of the essays was about the Marvel Family. Of course, back in the day, Freddy Freeman became Captain Marvel, Jr., not by saying, "Shazam" but by saying, "Captain Marvel." The author pointed out that Junior was the only super-hero who lost his powers if he said his name. Now, apparently, that can be said of Shazam.
In the already-retconned "Trials of Shazam", we got Billy as "Marvel", the guardian of the Rock of Eternity who replaced the wizard Shazam, and Freddy Freeman, who completed some mixed-quality challenges by "the gods of magic" to get their powers. Freddy ended up dressed as a traditional Captain Marvel and called "Shazam", but able to determine whether or not he was calling the lightning with a change of intent when saying the name.
Then came the "Black Lantern" fiasco. The old wizard returned from the dead. This should have meant NOTHING since his office/authority was now held by "Marvel" (who was able to change Black Adam's magic word to one Adam didn't know) and his powers were no longer granted by his own 6 patrons (he no longer had access to the magic lightning with the power of Vlarem which made HIM a superhero,) The writers disregarded that, and he immediately took away the powers and office of Billy and Mary. He planned to "deal with" Freddy- but had no ability to remove HIS powers since the Trials ended with them bestowing the powers directly and not through Shazam.) Should have been useless. I mean, if, say, George Washington rose from his grave and told the Secret Service to put the current sitting President into custody, they wouldn't do it because they obey the current sitting President. Washington no longer holds that office. (And so on.)
The comics also have 2 villains that can't say their name- IBAC and SABBAC. (Although I had a comic where the writers forgot, and Ibac said his own name and didn't change that time.
Yes, one and two. At least John Wick (one) had a plot. Two, I thought was not that good. I'll probably end up watching JW3 next week for the franchise sake. I was told that the decimation bar was raised and that the violence had gone up to another level. Can you imagine how upsurd it will be when John Wick 4 comes out? It is already being drawn up.
The Monitor appears in all of the final episodes, obviously preparing for next season's crossover (which, I'm guessing, will start the season).
LoT continues its tongue-in-cheek humor. Steel wants Supergirl, Green Arrow, and Flash to help him out; but they give him a "hard pass," which is what he did to them in skipping THIS year's crossover. FYI, Caty Lotz looks pretty fine in a Supergirl outfit!
It appears that all of the shows will have at least some cast changes.
Apparently, "Batwoman" is coming. I think I'm about as excited about that as WW is.
On the Marvel (broadcast) front, Agents of SHIELD is back. All the familiar faces, but not all the familiar roles...
I haven't started SHIELD yet and don't know if I want to. I think I'm just going to wait for Netflix or the new Disney service for that.
I skipped to the finales of all the shows except Flash, and (sad to say) I do not feel like I missed anything. Legends has entered and passed the "Superman: Quest for Peace" phase in terms of quality. I did enjoy the Monitor's cameos, though. Looking forward to Crisis and the end of Arrow.
Flash was okay. Not great. But the only show where I actually care about each character.
We saw the end of the Flash season. We had a few gripes.
1) Several episodes ago, Cicada 1 gave consent for treatment to the kid. Since then, we complained how nobody administered it. Morally and legally, they fulfilled the requirements for treatment.
2) Mrs Wolf is a Whovian, and thinks a lot about time travel. We both blame the writers for bad writing. If a timeline is changed, then it changes from the point of divergence, So, it should have changed from the present forward, with the new timeline overwriting it. Come on. Thawne was in prison for decades, without the CD to help imprison him. In THAT timeline, there would be different measures to hold him. (I knew they wouldn't do it, but I was hoping for someone to be waiting to inject "the cure" in the new future.) Instead, in the new future, there was nothing whatsoever that should have held him at all. I can accept "their new measures weren't enough" but not "and the prison had no measures in place to hold him, but he was there anyway."
3) Joe seems to be the only one who's aware that they may encounter XS again, in some other way. In the meantime, how about starting her existence in the present? Take a weekend off with some takeout food and Barry White albums, Barry and Iris!
4) If there was a Monitor in that episode, I missed them. What scene should I check?
5) I think I'll jump ahead and just watch the Supergirl season finale. We'll probably watch the LOT one this weekend, and I'll watch the Arrow one during the hiatus, before returning to Black Lightning.
my mistake. no monitor in flash finale. just an obvious crisis setup
Right. Considering the end of Arrow, I suspect that Oliver will disappear during the Crisis, rather than Barry.
9 hours ago, WordWolf said:
We saw the end of the Flash season. We had a few gripes.
2) Mrs Wolf is a Whovian, and thinks a lot about time travel. We both blame the writers for bad writing. If a timeline is changed, then it changes from the point of divergence, So, it should have changed from the present forward, with the new timeline overwriting it. Come on. Thawne was in prison for decades, without the CD to help imprison him. In THAT timeline, there would be different measures to hold him. (I knew they wouldn't do it, but I was hoping for someone to be waiting to inject "the cure" in the new future.) Instead, in the new future, there was nothing whatsoever that should have held him at all. I can accept "their new measures weren't enough" but not "and the prison had no measures in place to hold him, but he was there anyway."
We had the same problem when Barry gave himself amnesia to stop his future self from learning his plans, but when Barry got his memory back, so did Savitar. It's as if the timelines were linked exactly X years apart, which as WW points out, makes no sense.
Are we going to ignore how bleeping awful Legends has gotten?
I'm trying to.
I mean, really, bringing back Vandal Savage as Ray's buddy in hell?
Last year's season finale was cute. This one was just silly.
And how much play can we get out of Gary's nipple?
I DO like the idea that Rory is fairly successful romance novelist. Completely different from the comics, but an entertaining twist. Does he ALWAYS have a beer in his hand?
I don't mind some light humor, but I do hope that they bring back a more serious tone, next season. I'm reminded of the series Star Trek:Enterpise, which really lost its way in seasons 2 and 3. It came back to good stories about the early Federation in season 4, but by that time, no one was watching.
Ok, finished LoT and now I can read this thread again without (many) spoilers. Some thoughts....
Mrs Wolf was delighted that "the garden gnome" was among the monsters that needed a jailbreak. We've been waiting for that thing to appear since "Legends of To-meow-meow", when one timeline showed both Henshaws murdered by a garden gnome. If that thing took down both of them, it's a lot tougher than it looks. It's also neat that the Stein puppet is still possessed. I was really curious what it was going to do in the show, especially since it looks nothing like a monster. (Which, I imagine, kept it warming the bench.)
I imagine being stuck in a cell with Ray could end up brainwashing VS or anyone else truly trapped with him. I was SO glad that wasn't a ploy to ride his escape. Looks like the brother is now a Legend, replacing the sister in the present. BTW, I called the "swap their appearances" as a legit plan as soon as it was clear Nate had to be snuffed. I was rather shocked that the team was neither trying CPR nor waking up Gary. Nora's new job has some discretion and leeway, and she needs to explore that more. Glad Tabitha's gone for good.
I have to say, for a place so many were scared to be sent, "hell" seemed pretty watered-down. People there held down jobs and had entertainment. It didn't even seem to qualify as standard Purgatory. Frankly, I've been in scarier places. Then again, I used to ride the subway through the South Bronx every night, and I've seen Bea Arthur sing. The 3 bosses seemed rather blase and casual about somebody shoving all of them aside. They had NO plan to prevent that at all, and were fine with it? As an aside, as a DC fan, with 3 demons mentioned together, I was hoping for Abnegazar, Rath and Ghast.
The Demons Three appeared in JLA just before I started buying comics. (My first was JLA 14, "Menace of the Atom Bomb.") Their stories were reprinted in an early 80-Page Giant, which was my first actual contact with them. I always thought they were back-benchers, like Kanjar Ro.
The Demons Three appeared in JLA just before I started buying comics. (My first was JLA 14, "Menace of the Atom Bomb.") Their stories were reprinted in an early 80-Page Giant, which was my first actual contact with them. I always thought they were back-benchers, like Kanjar Ro.
Bea Arthur singing???? HORRORS!!!
George
Hey- in "Crisis in the 30th Century/Crisis in Triplicate", Mordru was shoved aside as the big bad by the Demons Three!
Krypton has come and gone (this season). Nice use of Brainiac, Lobo, and Doomsday (and Black Mercy). Zod as Seg-El's son (and, therefore, Superman's uncle) is bizarre. We DID see a VERY young Jor-El. The moon (Wegthor) blows up. Other than some fragment impacts, not much effect on Krypton (which seems unrealistic, even with suspension of disbelief).
All in all, it's not a bad show, but I don't think it's great. At least, it's not much fun to watch. Like Riverdale, in that respect.
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WordWolf
It was a direct quote of the LoT "Invasion!" episode,.at 6:20. "Darmok and Jalad at Tenagra!" "I'll take that as 'have fun storming the castle." "Oh. For real? You're gonna use Princess Bride
GeorgeStGeorge
That's what happens with Ralph Dibny in the mix. (Of course, Gypsy's dad was a hoot, too.) George
GeorgeStGeorge
So, Gotham comes to an end. I thought the final episode was pretty good. I wish Gordon kept the moustache, though, and added glasses.
George
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Raf
I've pretty much dropped everything but Flash. Supergirl is good, but the obvious political overtones are too much even for me. And Arrow is just one damn fight sequence after another.
Legends is goofy, but i just lost track of whatever the hell it is they are trying to accomplish.
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WordWolf
I'm slightly behind on Gotham (about 2 episodes.) I'm about that behind on LoT and Flash, a bit more on Arrow, about a season on Black Lightning, and more on Supergirl. I'm probably going to just give up on that last one. The others, I watch when I catch up on one thing or another. (We watch Flash and LoT together.) I'm not happy BBT will end, but it has to end sometime, so that's that.
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GeorgeStGeorge
A slight diversion, but it doesn't deserve its own thread: an old friend of mine pointed out that in neither "Shazam" nor "Captain Marvel" is the name "Captain Marvel" actually said. In fact, it only appears in the credits of the latter movie.
George
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WordWolf
History lesson as to why (which you probably know):
Fawcett Comics made a kid who became a superhero. DC Comics made a superhero who became an adult man. Kids made Captain Marvel more popular than Superman. So DC hit Fawcett with nuisance lawsuits until Fawcett went bankrupt.
Marvel Comics discovered that the trademark on "Captain Marvel" had lapsed, so they made their own (Kree Captain Mar-Vell, aka "Captain Marvel.") He later became the first superhero to die of cancer, and was first of several "Captain Marvels" of DC (Monica Rambeau, Genis- Vell, later Linda Danvers went from Ms Marvel to Binary to Warbird to Captain Marvel.)
Later, DC bought up all the Fawcett characters like they did Charlton (Blue Beetle, etc.) They could no longer call the comic "Captain Marvel", so the title became "with a magic word- SHAZAM!" Which also became the title on the live TV show with the Winnebago. As a small child, I had no trouble keeping track of the hero's name. However, plenty of people DID have that problem. So, a lot of people have thought of the superhero (not just the old wizard Shazam) as "Shazam", Especially with the "Captain Marvel" movie out, DC's given up on calling the Marvel Family "the Marvel Family", and made them all Shazams.
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GeorgeStGeorge
In a collection of essays called "All in Color for a Dime," published about 40 years ago, one of the essays was about the Marvel Family. Of course, back in the day, Freddy Freeman became Captain Marvel, Jr., not by saying, "Shazam" but by saying, "Captain Marvel." The author pointed out that Junior was the only super-hero who lost his powers if he said his name. Now, apparently, that can be said of Shazam.
George
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WordWolf
In the already-retconned "Trials of Shazam", we got Billy as "Marvel", the guardian of the Rock of Eternity who replaced the wizard Shazam, and Freddy Freeman, who completed some mixed-quality challenges by "the gods of magic" to get their powers. Freddy ended up dressed as a traditional Captain Marvel and called "Shazam", but able to determine whether or not he was calling the lightning with a change of intent when saying the name.
Then came the "Black Lantern" fiasco. The old wizard returned from the dead. This should have meant NOTHING since his office/authority was now held by "Marvel" (who was able to change Black Adam's magic word to one Adam didn't know) and his powers were no longer granted by his own 6 patrons (he no longer had access to the magic lightning with the power of Vlarem which made HIM a superhero,) The writers disregarded that, and he immediately took away the powers and office of Billy and Mary. He planned to "deal with" Freddy- but had no ability to remove HIS powers since the Trials ended with them bestowing the powers directly and not through Shazam.) Should have been useless. I mean, if, say, George Washington rose from his grave and told the Secret Service to put the current sitting President into custody, they wouldn't do it because they obey the current sitting President. Washington no longer holds that office. (And so on.)
The comics also have 2 villains that can't say their name- IBAC and SABBAC. (Although I had a comic where the writers forgot, and Ibac said his own name and didn't change that time.
Shazam vol 1 Number 29, "Ibac Meets Aunt Minerva." https://comicvine.gamespot.com/shazam-29-ibac-meets-aunt-minerva/4000-17408/
Great splash page. Ibac and Cap fightning. AM cheers them on and says she'll marry the winner. Both: "I LOSE!" )
Spy Smasher once tricked IBAC into losing. SS flipped Ibac, and said he had no hope of winning. "Back down!"
Ibac: "NEVER! I BACK DOWN FOR NO ONE!"
And Ibac's transformation began as soon as he said "I back" ' :) Very clever, Armstrong!
https://comicvine.gamespot.com/justice-league-of-america-135-crisis-in-eternity/4000-16742/
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GeorgeStGeorge
Have you seen any John Wick films? I saw the third, because my date wanted to.
100 minutes of fight scenes, about two minutes of plot.
George
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Human without the bean
Yes, one and two. At least John Wick (one) had a plot. Two, I thought was not that good. I'll probably end up watching JW3 next week for the franchise sake. I was told that the decimation bar was raised and that the violence had gone up to another level. Can you imagine how upsurd it will be when John Wick 4 comes out? It is already being drawn up.
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GeorgeStGeorge
So, all DC shows done for the season.
The Monitor appears in all of the final episodes, obviously preparing for next season's crossover (which, I'm guessing, will start the season).
LoT continues its tongue-in-cheek humor. Steel wants Supergirl, Green Arrow, and Flash to help him out; but they give him a "hard pass," which is what he did to them in skipping THIS year's crossover. FYI, Caty Lotz looks pretty fine in a Supergirl outfit!
It appears that all of the shows will have at least some cast changes.
Apparently, "Batwoman" is coming. I think I'm about as excited about that as WW is.
On the Marvel (broadcast) front, Agents of SHIELD is back. All the familiar faces, but not all the familiar roles...
George
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Raf
I haven't started SHIELD yet and don't know if I want to. I think I'm just going to wait for Netflix or the new Disney service for that.
I skipped to the finales of all the shows except Flash, and (sad to say) I do not feel like I missed anything. Legends has entered and passed the "Superman: Quest for Peace" phase in terms of quality. I did enjoy the Monitor's cameos, though. Looking forward to Crisis and the end of Arrow.
Flash was okay. Not great. But the only show where I actually care about each character.
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WordWolf
We saw the end of the Flash season. We had a few gripes.
1) Several episodes ago, Cicada 1 gave consent for treatment to the kid. Since then, we complained how nobody administered it. Morally and legally, they fulfilled the requirements for treatment.
2) Mrs Wolf is a Whovian, and thinks a lot about time travel. We both blame the writers for bad writing. If a timeline is changed, then it changes from the point of divergence, So, it should have changed from the present forward, with the new timeline overwriting it. Come on. Thawne was in prison for decades, without the CD to help imprison him. In THAT timeline, there would be different measures to hold him. (I knew they wouldn't do it, but I was hoping for someone to be waiting to inject "the cure" in the new future.) Instead, in the new future, there was nothing whatsoever that should have held him at all. I can accept "their new measures weren't enough" but not "and the prison had no measures in place to hold him, but he was there anyway."
3) Joe seems to be the only one who's aware that they may encounter XS again, in some other way. In the meantime, how about starting her existence in the present? Take a weekend off with some takeout food and Barry White albums, Barry and Iris!
4) If there was a Monitor in that episode, I missed them. What scene should I check?
5) I think I'll jump ahead and just watch the Supergirl season finale. We'll probably watch the LOT one this weekend, and I'll watch the Arrow one during the hiatus, before returning to Black Lightning.
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Raf
my mistake. no monitor in flash finale. just an obvious crisis setup
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GeorgeStGeorge
Right. Considering the end of Arrow, I suspect that Oliver will disappear during the Crisis, rather than Barry.
We had the same problem when Barry gave himself amnesia to stop his future self from learning his plans, but when Barry got his memory back, so did Savitar. It's as if the timelines were linked exactly X years apart, which as WW points out, makes no sense.
George
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Raf
Are we going to ignore how bleeping awful Legends has gotten?
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GeorgeStGeorge
I'm trying to.
I mean, really, bringing back Vandal Savage as Ray's buddy in hell?
Last year's season finale was cute. This one was just silly.
And how much play can we get out of Gary's nipple?
I DO like the idea that Rory is fairly successful romance novelist. Completely different from the comics, but an entertaining twist. Does he ALWAYS have a beer in his hand?
I don't mind some light humor, but I do hope that they bring back a more serious tone, next season. I'm reminded of the series Star Trek:Enterpise, which really lost its way in seasons 2 and 3. It came back to good stories about the early Federation in season 4, but by that time, no one was watching.
George
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WordWolf
Ok, finished LoT and now I can read this thread again without (many) spoilers. Some thoughts....
Mrs Wolf was delighted that "the garden gnome" was among the monsters that needed a jailbreak. We've been waiting for that thing to appear since "Legends of To-meow-meow", when one timeline showed both Henshaws murdered by a garden gnome. If that thing took down both of them, it's a lot tougher than it looks. It's also neat that the Stein puppet is still possessed. I was really curious what it was going to do in the show, especially since it looks nothing like a monster. (Which, I imagine, kept it warming the bench.)
I imagine being stuck in a cell with Ray could end up brainwashing VS or anyone else truly trapped with him. I was SO glad that wasn't a ploy to ride his escape. Looks like the brother is now a Legend, replacing the sister in the present. BTW, I called the "swap their appearances" as a legit plan as soon as it was clear Nate had to be snuffed. I was rather shocked that the team was neither trying CPR nor waking up Gary. Nora's new job has some discretion and leeway, and she needs to explore that more. Glad Tabitha's gone for good.
I have to say, for a place so many were scared to be sent, "hell" seemed pretty watered-down. People there held down jobs and had entertainment. It didn't even seem to qualify as standard Purgatory. Frankly, I've been in scarier places. Then again, I used to ride the subway through the South Bronx every night, and I've seen Bea Arthur sing. The 3 bosses seemed rather blase and casual about somebody shoving all of them aside. They had NO plan to prevent that at all, and were fine with it? As an aside, as a DC fan, with 3 demons mentioned together, I was hoping for Abnegazar, Rath and Ghast.
https://www.retroist.com/2019/04/22/whos-who-abnegazar-rath-and-ghast/
https://dc.fandom.com/wiki/Demons_Three
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GeorgeStGeorge
The Demons Three appeared in JLA just before I started buying comics. (My first was JLA 14, "Menace of the Atom Bomb.") Their stories were reprinted in an early 80-Page Giant, which was my first actual contact with them. I always thought they were back-benchers, like Kanjar Ro.
Bea Arthur singing???? HORRORS!!!
George
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GeorgeStGeorge
Krypton returns tomorrow on SyFy. Apparently, not only will we see Zod and Doomsday, this season, but also Lobo (!).
George
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WordWolf
Hey- in "Crisis in the 30th Century/Crisis in Triplicate", Mordru was shoved aside as the big bad by the Demons Three!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crisis_(DC_Comics)#"Crisis_in_the_30th_Century!"_and_"Crisis_in_Triplicate!"
https://comicvine.gamespot.com/justice-league-of-america-147-crisis-in-the-30th-c/4000-17839/
The JLA, JSA and LSH had to work together to defeat them. All 3 teams TOGETHER? Big villains in a "crisis" Summer crossover? Back benchers?
The singing thing was a reference to seeing "the Star Wars Holiday Special" the one time it aired. (And decades later as a bootleg.)
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GeorgeStGeorge
Apparently all Kryptonians speak with a British accent, so Lobo uses a Scottish one...
George
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GeorgeStGeorge
Krypton has come and gone (this season). Nice use of Brainiac, Lobo, and Doomsday (and Black Mercy). Zod as Seg-El's son (and, therefore, Superman's uncle) is bizarre. We DID see a VERY young Jor-El. The moon (Wegthor) blows up. Other than some fragment impacts, not much effect on Krypton (which seems unrealistic, even with suspension of disbelief).
All in all, it's not a bad show, but I don't think it's great. At least, it's not much fun to watch. Like Riverdale, in that respect.
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GeorgeStGeorge
Well, apparently Krypton has been cancelled.
I guess we'll never know what happens with Brainiac and baby Jor-El.
Lobo spinoff on hold, too.
George
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WordWolf
Oh, well. As always, keep me posted as to when new seasons begin.
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