In “The Fury of Firestorm,” the fourth episode of The Flash‘s second season, Barry Allen (Grant Gustin) has a brief run in with the famously grotesque DC Comics villain King Shark. A humanoid shark sent by Zoom from Earth-2 to kill the Flash, King Shark attacks Allen in the final moments of the episode — only to be stunned by Earth-2’s Dr. Harrison Wells (Tom Cavanagh). Scarlet speedsters and flying Kryptonians? Sure, but a giant shark with arms, legs and a crude ability to speak? In the pages of a comic book or at the end of an arcade game, maybe, but not during prime time.
Yet this scene was just another example of executive producer Greg Berlanti giving his growing fanbase something they desired but never would have expected to see on broadcast television. Fan service like King Shark keeps happening on The Flash and Arrow, and now that Berlanti has Supergirl over at CBS, the superhero television wünderkid has found more nuggets to add to the pile. For example, the appearance of a White Martian in the latter show’s latest episode, “Strange Visitor From Another Planet,” which results in a climactic final battle between the villainous creature, Hank Henshaw/J’onn J’onzz (David Harewood) and Kara Danvers (Melissa Benoist).
“Strange Visitor” picks up the pace early with an anti-alien rally headlined by Senator Miranda Crane (Tawny Cypress). With hammy dialogue adapted from the mouths of the 2016 election season’s more eyebrow-raising presidential candidates, writers Michael Grassi and Caitlin Parrish craft a scenario in which the citizens of National City (and, presumably, the United States) are tired of Supergirl, Superman, and other super-powered immigrants. Crane’s language is equal parts Donald Trump (“We need to stop them from landing in our country. If it takes a dome, let’s build a dome!”) and Batman v Superman (Holly Hunter’s Senator Finch character), but Cypress chews through her lines with relish.
As soon as the senator drops a particularly fear-mongering phrase (“Monsters are coming for your families”), one of her guards is launched into the air by an unseen force. The soundtrack turns moody and percussive (like in the Man of Steel film and Batman v Superman‘s trailers), the camerawork gets shaky, and Henshaw and Alex Danvers (Chyler Leigh) find themselves unable to see or stop whatever it is that’s attacking the rally. At least, until it pauses long enough to reveal itself to Henshaw, himself a more peaceful Green Martian.
Unlike King Shark’s cameo in The Flash, the White Martian of “Strange Visitor” provides the episode with its primary catalyst. It’s attack on the rally isn’t a one-off scene meant to appease comic-book fans who may or may not be watching Supergirl regularly. Rather, it’s all part of the episode’s (and the series’) central focus — that aliens are among us, either out and about or in hiding, and some humans don’t want them around. Kara is one of the aforementioned “monsters” that the public knows about, but Henshaw? Other than Kara and Alex, no one else at the Department of Extranormal Affairs knows that its director is actually an alien, that which the DEO is tasked with policing.
So between the senator’s vitriolic rhetoric and the White Martian’s malicious attacks, “Strange Visitor” puts J’onzz under an incredibly bright spotlight he doesn’t want shining down on him. This presents Harewood ample material with which to develop his character, and the actor pushes Grassi and Parrish’s script to its limits with ease and comfort. When the White Martian finally sits still long enough for the DEO director to get a good look at it, he stops in his tracks and slowly lowers his gun. The pause forces Alex to try to get his attention while the creature terrorizes Crane’s remaining guards and whisks her away into a parking garage.
J’onzz, meanwhile, finds himself lost in an all-CGI flashback that briefly depicts some kind of conflict between the Green and White Martians. The effects aren’t perfect but considering what Berlanti’s team accomplished with King Shark, it’s no surprise that the graphics in “Strange Visitor” are passable — both here and later on when the White Martian adopts the senator’s form at the DEO, and during the final battle. (Kudos are also in order for the design team’s decision to pay homage to, but not directly copy, the creature’s look in the comics.) Plus, as cool as CGI special effects can be, their main purpose here is to advance J’onzz’s personal arc within the larger world being constructed by Supergirl.
It works, because for the first time in 11 episodes, the Martian Manhunter is no longer the senior superhero Kara and Alex thought him to be. Instead, J’onzz becomes a remorseful, confused and sometimes vengeful figure who desires revenge against the White Martian for the atrocities he witnessed. The murders of his friends and family at the hands of his Martian cousins, a race that — unlike the peaceful Green Martians of whom J’onzz is the last — desires only to wipe out any and all inferior beings.
