Last week, Supergirl decided to step back from her role as National City’s hero due to the public believing that she had become a terrorist. With the efforts to clear her name now shifting to exposing Lex Luthor — and finding him — there’s a bit of a void when it comes to those looking out for the greater good. As Ben Lockwood’s violent anti-alien stance gains official credibility, the people need hero now more than ever and it’s up to Dreamer to stand up for what’s right.
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Read on for our spoiler-filled recap of this week’s episode of Supergirl, “American Dreamer”, below.
At CatCo, Kara is hard at work on her journalistic efforts to expose Lex while in an alley elsewhere in National City, Dreamer deals with a group of men harassing an alien. After, Brainy tries to convince Dreamer that she needs to be more careful so as to avoid apprehension themselves. At LCorp in Lena’s lab, Lena is working to reverse side effects of the Harun-El but they discover that every panic attack James has brings out more superpowers. Brainy suggests they use a “mind palace” to help him control things because solving James’ core trauma will resolve his panic.
While working, Kara knocks over a pile of files and in doing so is able to suddenly see things in a different way. She also overhears an alien coworker talking to his sister on the phone. She happens to work for Amertek and wants him to connect her to the sister. The coworker also reveals how bad things have become for aliens as Lockwood is now raiding homes. Nia tries to convince Kara to suit up, but Kara refuses. Speaking of Lockwood, he and his gang aggressively remove an alien from his home and family. It doesn’t sit well with Ben’s son who is starting to recognize that aliens are people with families and lives, too.
Kara meets up with Franklin’s sister, Edna, near Amertek. She admits that things are bad there but that she’s hiding alien personnel files because she works in HR. However, she’s reluctant to help for fear of her own exposure. At LCorp, Brainy enters James’ mind and they discover that his trauma isn’t Lex-related. They’re connected to his father’s funeral. However, his sister says he wasn’t at the funeral, so something is not right.
Back at Amertek, Edna gets Kara into the files she needs but when guards show up and start looking around while the ladies narrowly escape it’s enough to spook Edna into no longer wanting to help. Elsewhere, Lena continues to try to solve the Harun-El extraction situation by using the tech she found in Lex’s cell, but it keeps failing, much in the same way it seems like Brainy’s “mind palace” is failing James. At CatCo, Kara figures out the connection between someone at Amertek and the black budget from LCorp. She goes to ask Lena for help, but Lena sends her away, upset that her friend hasn’t been there for her.
Dreamer discovers that the alien bar is being used as a refuge for aliens, but the Children of Liberty show up. Lockwood’s son discovers that his best friend is an alien as Dreamer drives the Children away, but the aliens tell her that nowhere is safe for them and that they will be back. At home, George Lockwood tries to talk to his mom about his concerns, but she only maintains his father’s same bigoted rhetoric. Later, Nia and Kara talk about things and Kara realizes that what they need to do is have Nia, as Dreamer, be interviewed because she’s both alien and human.
In the mind palace, James discovers the truth of his trauma. The day of his dad’s funeral bullies imprisoned him in a coffin. With Brainy kicked out of James’ mind, his sister goes in instead and helps him process through the experience. Now that she understands how ashamed he was of the experience; she helps him move past it. Kara then carries out her interview with Dreamer, broadcasting the interview everywhere. Dreamer explains that she is both human and alien and that she was born in America, making her as much human and a citizen as she is alien.
Post interview, Lockwood shows up at CatCo to arrest Dreamer, but with the help of Alex and Brainy and even Franklin, the Children are driven back, especially once an in-control and super powered James tells him to get out, invoking the First Amendment. The next day, an inspired Edna shows up and gives Kara the information she needs. Lena, also inspired, shows up and confesses to Kara she helped Lex by trying to cure him. Kara forgives her and then, Lena solves the code as to where the military base is — Kasnia. George, no longer on his father’s side, reaches out to his friend. Then, the violence that Ben Lockwood has been fostering hits home as he discovers that the wife of the alien he tore from his family has murdered his own wife. And, on Mars, J’onn returns the cymbals his father gave him to the Desert of T’ozz, finally moving on.
Supergirl airs Sundays at 8 p.m. ET on The CW.
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