Superman on Television

Legion of Super Heroes: Episode Reviews

Season 2 - Episode 7: "Unnatural Alliances"

Rating - 3 (out of 5): There was good character stuff here for Kell-El, being uncomfortable around kids and then overcoming that and his frosty exterior. And we finally get some history on Imperiex, which was great... except that it amounted to him saying "eventually I became the conqueror of galaxies" (I paraphrase) and everyone feared him.

There's still absolutely no hint of a reason as to WHY he conquered galaxies. Are we to believe there is really nothing more to his desires than he just wants to fight people? If so, that's barely a shred away from the worst walking plot device non-character ever, Doomsday.

Imperiex still isn't a character, he's a plot device (now with history). He needs motivation here, folks, and he still doesn't have any.

It was nice to see Star Boy included as I always enjoy when they give more Legion members a chance to shine, especially one that is arguably one of the most powerful. And I very much enjoyed Duo Damsel's new 60s-inspired costume.

Alas the episode tried far too hard to be witty and quotable in the dialogue, as it was filled with one-liners that missed the mark more often than not.

I admit, Kell-El's line of "I'm no good with kids. I stepped on one once" was funny and made me chuckle, but Kell-El and Star Boy telling Terra-Man to give up because he was surrounded (he was surrounded? By two people? Who were both on the same side of him?) was simply so Terra-Man could say, "Just WHO is surrounded now? OH HO! See what I did there?" when his fellow androids showed up was just forced and trite, and a lot of the dialogue came off that way.

There's other issues as well, like when Star Boy informs the Legion that Abel was living on the farm with a robot caretaker... who looked perfectly human and who Star Boy had no way to know was actually a robot.

Certainly not all bad and good character moments for Superman X, but the dialogue was often forced and not using the back story and information on Imperiex to give him an actual motivation and character borders on criminal. It ended up adding nothing at all to his character and just being a time filler, and that makes it a horribly wasted opportunity.

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