Supergirl: Why Dreamer Should Join the Legends of Tomorrow

On Tuesday, The CW announced that Supergirl would end its run with its upcoming sixth season set to air sometime in 2021. For those who love the Arrowverse series, it’s bittersweet news. While knowing that a beloved show is ending is always a difficult there is the silver lining that Supergirl, like Arrow before it, will go into the season knowing it’s the last, something that allows for Supergirl to have a planned ending play out over its final 20 episodes. But there’s another silver lining that many fans are hoping for — that Nicole Maines‘ fan-favorite character Nia Nal/Dreamer may make the leap from Supergirl to another Arrowverse series, DC’s Legends of Tomorrow. And it’s honestly something that could be a good fit, both for the character and the series.

Almost from Nia’s first appearance on Supergirl, the character was popular with fans. First appearing in the Season 4 premiere, “American Alien,” Nia was introduced as a new reporter at CatCo Worldwide Media who quickly becomes a friend and protege of Kara Danvers (Melissa Benoist). Over the course of the season, it’s revealed that Nia is a human-Naltorian hybrid, but more than that she’s also a transgender woman and inherited her mother’s dream powers — powers that are passed only to the women of her family. Upon gaining and embracing her powers, Nia becomes the hero Dreamer — a valuable member of Supergirl’s team and the first transgender superhero on television, one played authentically as Maines is herself trans.

With Dreamer becoming such favorite as well as significant character for fans, the idea that the character could move elsewhere in the Arrowverse is actually not a bad one — and there is some precedent for it. At their core, the Legends are comprised of heroes largely from other shows, at least initially. The first season of the series saw the Legends team assembled from the heroes of other shows: Martin Stein and Jax Jackson/Firestorm, Mick Rory/Heatwave, and Leonard Snart/Captain Cold from The Flash along with Ray Palmer/Atom and Sara Lance/White Canary from Arrow just to hit the major ones. While the cast of heroes has shifted since then, Legends has continued to be a “home” of sorts for characters first appearing elsewhere in the Arrowverse with even villains becoming part of the series as well.

There’s also the precedent of the Legends team being one that shifts and changes as the characters all go through their own journeys. In Legends‘ fifth season, Ray Palmer (Brandon Routh) departed the series, his character having married Nora Darhk (Courtney Ford). The season finale also saw the departure of series regular Maisie Richardson-Sellers after her character, Charlie, decided to live her own life after the team once again saved the world.

It’s a lot of words to ultimately say this: the Legends definitely have a history of being a welcoming Arrowverse team, one with something of an open-door (and revolving door) policy. But what about fitting Dreamer into a team that is known more for making plenty of mistakes than its serious heroics? One of the beautiful things about Nia Nal as a character is that, for as much as she is confident in herself, she’s still learning about what it means to be a hero. She also certainly has a huge heart for wanting to protect those who need protecting as well as righting wrongs along the way.

She’s also still learning how to fully use her powers, something that offers a lot of opportunity for the hijinks and humor Legends is known for while her devotion to doing the right thing lends a bit of gravity to the team. It’s something that feels very much like a fit with what co-showrunner Keto Shimizu said during Legends‘ panel during the second part of DC FanDome: characters have to earn their spot in the Legends family.

“If everyone who joins the ship is our best friends immediately, I mean, where’s the story?” Shimizu said. “You’ve got to earn your spot in the family.”

What becomes of the characters that help fill out Supergirl‘s world is something that obviously remains to be seen, but there’s a lot of promise with Nia Nal. Her story, her trajectory could be a really beautiful balance of heart and humor for Legends, one that would allow for Nia/Dreamer’s story to continue far beyond National City.

Both DC’s Legends of Tomorrow and Supergirl will return with new episodes in 2021.