On this chapter of The Queerest Things I Watched Last Week, after months of waiting, we finally met Kate Kane on Elseworlds, and where the crossover fell short on queer content, the Legends delivered on Legends of To-Meow-Meow.
- Arrow – Season 7 Episode 9 “Elseworlds, Part 2” [Live]
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I love the Arrowverse crossover. This is the first year I watched it while completely caught up on all the Arrowverse shows. I loved the first night with the Barry/Oliver switch-a-roo and thought it was pretty hilarious, but what I was really looking forward to was going to Gotham.
After what felt like a year of waiting, we finally got to meet Kate Kane and Batwoman.
I think Ruby Rose did a good job as Kate Kane, and she was most natural when flirting with Kara.
I imagine that to be similar to her actual personality.
The suit reveal was pretty cool, too.
I was disappointed Batwoman didn’t have a bigger role in the crossover and was mostly only in this episode. I also wanted to see her interact with Alex, but unfortunately, Alex was only in the Supergirl episode.
We did get to see Kara x-ray her suit to see all her tattoos.
That was fun.
I have my fingers crossed the Batwoman series will go through because I want to see more!
- Supergirl – Season 4 Episode 9 “Elseworlds, Part 3” [Live]
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While I was entertained by Barry and Oliver this crossover, I was annoyed by how much they and their casts dominated all three nights. There was so little Supergirl, even on this night which was the Supergirl episode. She wasn’t even in the intro.
Supergirl is stuck in a DEO cell on an Earth where an evil Superman is at the DEO instead of her, and everything is backwards.
Alex has a sidebraid, and she’s in the closet.
I thought an alternative universe where Alex was closeted was interesting, especially when Kara uses it to break through to her.
Alex does come around to helping Kara, but it’s her same helper support lesbian role she usually has on Supergirl. Last crossover Alex got to have sex and ass-kicking adventures with Sara Lance; on this one she was just there helping Kara as usual.
The episode was disappointing. Superman (who I could care less about) got the most attention and the episode ended on Barry and Oliver with a few seconds of Batwoman.
I give this crossover a C. Next year I want more of the Supergirl cast in every episode and some actual plot for Alex.
- Legends of Tomorrow – Season 4 Episode 8 “Legends of To-Meow-Meow” [Live]
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What the crossover lacked in queer content, the Legends gave us on this mini meta crossover of itself.
On the last episode, Constantine completely messed up the timeline. Charlie investigated to see what happened to the Legends and discovers Sara Lance has died, and the rest of the gang are out to kill every magical creature with a vengeance.
Also, instead of the Legends of Tomorrow, they are called the Custodians of Chronology.
The Custodians made this hilarious dig at the Crossover.
Charlie goes to Time Bureau headquarters with Zari Cat in a super cute pink backpack and shapeshifts into Gary to investigate what the heck is going on. She finds out Sara was killed by the evil unicorn from episode 1 of this season, and Constantine is in a holding cell.
Constantine un-catifies Zari for a moment, and she tells them Constantine broke time by breaking up with Dez. They need to undo that in order for the murdering Custodians to become the Legends once again. Constantine wants to protect Dez and Charlie wants to keep her powers, so they ignore Zari and choose to go back in time and protect Sara from the evil unicorn instead.
The fact that I am typing these words in a recap is reason number 61,874,651 I love this show.
The Custodians arrive at the Time Bureau and are after Charlie because their number one goal is to kill a shapeshifter. Charlie, Constantine, Mona, and Zari Cat duck into Ava’s office to hide and find her sitting there all in black and listening to the Indigo Girls in the dark.
Only Legends can make an alternative universe where a lesbian character’s girlfriend dying can be funny.
Ava grabs a big gun and helps Charlie, Constantine and Zari Cat escape to the jump ship. The 3 of them fly back to Woodstock to save Sara.
After Charlie kills the unicorn, things are still messed up, so she goes back to the Bureau to figure out their next step.
In this iteration, the boys are the ones who got killed, and Charlie needs to figure out who the Legends are now.
I could write an entire post dedicated to the Sirens of Space Time, but I’ll sum it up with: that was amazing, and I want a spin-off!
This time it’s the Fairy Godmother from episode 2 who killed Ray, Rory and Nate. Charlie goes back, prevents the Fairy Godmother from killing the boys, and they think they fixed it until they see Zari has turned from a cat into a puppet.
On this timeline, instead of the Custodians or the Sirens, they are The Puppets of Tomorrow.
I f*cking love this show.
After that, Charile goes back repeatedly to fix events until all the Legends are alive and Zari is human again. But when they think everything is back to normal, Constantine gets a nosebleed and passes out. If he doesn’t go back and put his and Desmond’s relationship the way it was, this timeline is going to kill him.
Charlie is still fixated on keeping her shapeshifting powers, so she shifts into Ava and gets the Legends to go back to New Orleans to stop Constantine from putting things back to the original timeline.
The Legends are on the job, but Charlie learns they still have a shoot to kill policy when it comes to magical creatures. She comes to the realization that she’s the missing piece in each one of the timelines. The Legends never meet her, and they never get to understand that not all magical creatures are evil. While Charlie slows down their attack, Constantine un-breaks up with Dez, and they have a cute kiss that fixes the timeline.
All is well — Ava and Rory made up, and Charile has resigned to giving up her shapeshifting powers.
But the best thing that happened at the end was this exchange:
I love Zari’s eyeroll and Charlie’s big grin.
Holy shit, are they going to make Zarlie canon? If any show has the guts to do it, it’s this one.
Oh my goodness, that was one amazing hour of television, and now we have to wait FOUR MONTHS for the show to continue. I can’t wait to see what the writers come up with for the second half of the season.
- Riverdale – Season 3 Episode 8 “Chapter Forty-Three: Outbreak” [Live]
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Last week on Riverdale, all the cheerleaders dropped to the ground with seizures, except Cheryl. Cheryl brings Toni to her house, and while she’s taking care of her, asks her to move in.
That’s cute and all, but it would have been nice to see their relationship evolve to the moving-in point.
The Choni content is so sparse, a big move in proposal seems out of nowhere. I hope they can steer this Choni ship in the right direction in the second half of this season.
- The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel – Season 2 [Binge-Watch]
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My wife and I love Mrs. Maisel and we binged all of season 2 in a few days. It was easier to watch without wasting time holding out hope for Susie getting any love interest at all. Fortunately, Lynn Sternberger let us know it wasn’t happening for Susie in season 2.
I watch so much canon queer content these days that it seems like such a throwback to the 90s to have this obvious queer character with no explicit queer story lines. At the same time, Susie’s obvious queerness is the subject of many jokes.
A muff joke.
A beaver joke.
A closet joke.
Fair enough, those 3 were pretty funny, and I don’t mind gay jokes when I feel like the show is on the character’s side. However, one joke that’s getting old and should be put to rest is the repeated “people think Suzie’s a man” joke.
The first three times were a little funny, but after two seasons of this joke in almost every episode, it’s starting to piss me off.
I would be less critical if Susie wasn’t portrayed as a lonely, damaged lesbian with no personal life of her own who instead throws herself into making Midge a success. This makes all the “man” jokes told at her expense no longer funny.
Joel made a comment in season one proving he knows Susie’s not straight, and he tried used that fact to hurt her.
In this season, Midge made this comment showing Susie has never been with anyone which perpetuates the lonely lesbian trope.
An argument to keep Susie romance-free is this was the 50s, and gay people were sad and lonely then. I don’t buy this, because Edie Windsor was gettin’ some in the 50s, and author Sarah Waters has proven there have been queer folks throughout history. I don’t think Susie should be falling in love and getting married, but she could have gotten some action in the Catskills.
All that said, I do love this show. It’s clever, hilarious, and the budget upgrade made the sets even more spectacular. I’m half decedent of New York Jews (my aunt lives on the Upper West Side), and no other show portrays this culture like Mrs. Maisel does.
I adore this show, but every other main character has romance in their story lines except for Susie. In season 3 give her a girl or four that are compatible her character, and if not, stop it with the man jokes.
This week all the usual shows are on mid-season hiatus and I get a bit of a break. Also, for my wife’s birthday, the two of us and The Kid saw The Prom on Broadway.
Folks, THIS IS THE QUEER ROMCOM WE’VE ALL BEEN ASKING FOR! I know not everyone can make it to Broadway, but if you can, please go!
