Supergirl Season 5 Has Already Aged Badly

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https://screenrant.com/supergirl-sea...d-coronavirus/

The anti-technology message of Supergirl season 5 seems short-sighted in the age of Coronavirus, where social media is helping save lives.

The anti-technology message at the heart of Supergirl season 5 seems horribly tone-deaf and out of date in the wake of the Coronavirus. The recent real-world crisis has highlighted the fatal flaw of the season's thesis - that emerging technologies are responsible for most of society's ills.

The spread of the Coronavirus has been a major setback for Supergirl and most of the other Arrowverse series. Production on the shows halted with the final few episodes of The Flash and Batwoman that still haven't been filmed, along with the Supergirl season 5 finale. Yet the most adverse effect the Coronavirus may have had on Supergirl was showcasing the flawed the premise of the current season.

The central theme of Supergirl season 5 has been that reliance on technology is causing people to lose touch with their basic humanity and all of the series' new villains have been used to push this idea - but those ideas are simply wrong. Consider Gamemnae - the current leader of the alien group Leviathan, who used advanced technology to secretly rule the world for thousands of years. Her pawn, Andrea Rojas, runs the Obsidian North tech firm that created the world's most advanced virtual reality community, Obsidian Platinum, allowing people to literally live in their own little world. Lena Luthor, though not quite a full-fledged villain yet, has been portrayed as losing perspective as she developed technology that would alter people's minds, making them unable to hurt one another physically or emotionally.

Even the season's most minor villains have pushed this anti-tech ideology. "Back From The Future" introduced a new Toyman, who menaced people with advanced drones before transforming himself into a killer artificial intelligence. "The Bodyguard" saw Andrea Rojas threatened by a woman whose husband committed suicide after becoming addicted to Obsidian Platinum during its beta testing. The chief villain of "Reality Bytes" was an transphobic bigot, who used a dating app to stalk and assault trans women. "Alex In Wonderland" showed every person using Obsidian Platinum (including the iron-willed Alex Danvers) losing touch with reality after only a few hours.

While video game addiction and trans-bashing are serious issues, Supergirl's handling of said issues within the context of the season's larger message has been misguided, at best. This has become particularly apparent in the wake of the measures taken to prevent the spread of the Coronavirus, where technology has been more of a help than a hindrance. Ignoring how streaming sites and online games help to stave off cabin fever, the Internet has proven invaluable in helping people work from home and students continue their studies. And in defiance of Supergirl season 5's message, it is technology that is enabling people to make connections to friends and family and reach out to the real world in this difficult time.

The truth is that evil dwells in the heart of humanity; not in an external machine. And it is poor communication rather than technology that allows evil to flourish. Most of the villains of Supergirl season 5 were created because of a failure to communicate or empathize with others; not because of the technology they used to lash out at the world and there is a cruel irony that Supergirl, usually the most emphatic of heroes, seems to be missing that point in her current crusade.