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Following the introduction of Clark Kent’s (voiced by Jack Quaid) cousin, the newest episode of Jake Wyatt, Brendan Clougher, and Josie Campbell’s My Adventures with Superman Season 2, titled “The Machine Who Would Be Empire”, is written by M. Willis and directed by Jen Bennett. This weekend’s episode gives a deeper look at Kara Zor-El (voiced by Kiana Madeira) and provides some long-awaited answers.
Family Ties
Seeing Clark and Kara finally interact one-on-one is just great. Despite their wildly different upbringings, there are some commonalities between them. At their core, both cousins are kind of goofy and whimsical and care deeply about others. Clark views this as intrinsic to who he is while Kara tries to suppress this. Even in light of all that, they are genuinely eager to reconnect even if they have different approaches to that.
Clark tries to convince Kara to be more human, so to speak. Kara treats Clark as someone who has been corrupted by Earth. This constant push and pull keeps the episode moving at a steady pace. The excellent performances from Jack Quaid and Kiana Madeira help carry this episode. Both of these voices deliver solid performances that help make the heavy emotions in the episode feel authentic while also playing up the comedy of the situation. For example, Kara calling Clark a “soft little Earthling” is one of the funniest things I have watched this week. However, their reunion cannot last forever as we have to meet Kara’s “father”.
Kneel Before Brainiac
Kara’s “father” is not actually her biological father. Rather, he is revealed to be her adopted father, Brainiac (voiced by Michael Emerson). Brainiac is the mysterious figure that audiences have been waiting to learn the identity of since the end of My Adventures with Superman Season 1. This version of Brainiac is… interesting. He has elements of General Zod e.g. asking for Clark to “kneel” and wanting to restore the Kryptonian Empire. It does not quite work, but it certainly does make this Brainiac feel unique. Emerson (James Wan’s Saw) makes Brainiac come across as very threatening and unhinged. Although, it could have been a little more robotic.
There are hints of Brainiac’s comic-book tendencies. Instead of collecting cities, he seems to collect warriors, or at least, copies of the warriors that his robotic legions can emulate. This leads to a great fight between Superman and some of these echoes. The echoes include a Green Lantern, a Parademon, and a Thanagarian (perhaps hinting at a future Hawkman or Hawkgirl appearance). All of these opponents can truly push Clark to his limits. Watching Clark struggle with no clear way out makes for an extremely intense fight and successfully establishes Brainiac as a threat. We also see Clark’s power-up ability from a few episodes back return. It is still not clear what exactly it is, but it seems as if the answers are not too far off.
Final Thoughts
“The Machine Who Would Be Empire” proves again why Kara is such a great addition to My Adventures with Superman and gives us a new credible threat in Brainiac. The one thing missing from this episode was Jimmy Olsen and Lois Lane, but their absence for one episode is understandable.
Score 4/5
My Adventures with Superman Season 2 airs on Sundays at midnight via Adult Swim and the next day on Max!
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This article was edited by John Tangalin.