Valentina Dangi Mabika

                    Supergirl is a television series that follows a story of Superman’s cousin – Kara Zor - El and her earthly sister Alex Danvers - the main focus of this paper. Prior to Supergirl’s arrival to planet Earth and her settlement in the Danvers house, Alex was the only child in the family. The girls grow up to become very close. Alex works as a top special agent at the DEO (the Department of Extranormal Operations), a government agency that tracks alien activity, and Kara becomes the Supergirl. The sisters team up to fight against extraterrestrial invaders. Later in the series, Alex comes out as lesbian. The show was created by Greg Berlanti, Andrew Kreisberg, and Allison Adler, who is openly gay. Supergirl is produced by Warner Brothers and airs weekly on the CW as a part of the Arrow-verse - a superhero series, known for the inclusion of non-normative mainstream television characters.
                   I chose Alex Danvers as my main focus for this queer media critique because of her character development path. Here, we are shown a journey of a young gay woman, who works in a male dominant field and, who is not only fighting to save the world, but also to save herself. Alex’s character is especially interesting to our analysis as she is an example of overcoming the controversial trend in television and film commonly known as the dead lesbian syndrome. 
Alex Danders – Supergirl’s Sidekick
                  We are introduced to Alex Danvers in season one. Her character is not standing out to us just yet, as she is hidden in Supergirl’s shadow. All we know is that she is a hard-working female operative at the DEO. In season one the creators introduce us to a male character, who seems like a great fit for Alex - he is white, young, handsome, fit, and rich - a perfect representation of hegemonic masculinity - so we, naturally, expect a romantic story to unveil between the two. Surprisingly, after few episodes, he disappears, and we are left to wonder why it did not work out. Later we start to realize that Alex’s non-existent personal life is more than just her being a picky woman and a workaholic. We learn that she has been going through an internal battle all along. In striving to be perfect in everything she did (being a perfect daughter, sister, student, agent), Alex looked at the inability to sustain relationships with opposite sex as her personal failure. At the end of the first season, Alex expresses her feelings for Maggie Sawyer (a police officer, who triggered Alex’s never-felt-before emotions) and comes out to her sister Kara in a sincere heart-to-heart.
Alex Danvers, Coming Out of The Shadows
                  Unlike the first season, season two shifts its focus on Supergirl’s closest circle, which includes her adoptive sister Alex. This is an important milestone for Alex’s character, as she comes out of Supergirl’s shadow and becomes a stand-alone character - Alex Danvers – the DEO agent who likes women. This revelation, although a bit unexpected, does not seem to surprise us, as her non-normative behavior displayed throughout the first season gave us hints on her possibly being queer. We can associate these characteristics to what the book calls “coded signs”, which are defined as ways or certain traits through which cinema “speaks” to viewers (Ross, 2014, p. 279). Alex’s athleticism, somewhat masculine appearance and her actions in Supergirl are juxtaposed to the heteronormative female representational practices that currently exist in mainstream television. As the show progresses, Alex’s positionality becomes much more salient. It is interesting to see the symbolism that the show creators placed behind the reveal - Alex comes out of Supergirl’s shadow the moment she decides to come out as lesbian.  
                  The uniqueness of Alex’s character depiction is primarily shown through her process of coming out, as it is, as many viewers pointed out via Twitter, very realistic, unlike it has been shown before in mainstream LGBT-inclusive television stories.
Overcoming The Dead Lesbian Syndrome
                  Statistics indicate that representations of homosexuality on television have increased in the past 7 years alone. (Moroni, 2014, p. 4) Although the lesbian response to queer media has almost unanimously been that it has not served lesbians well (Wilton, 1995, p. 8), Supergirl has been called one of the best shows representing LGBT to date by viewers. We can directly connect it to the fact that one of the show creators is openly gay. As Larry Gross’ model of sexual minority production demonstrates, media images created by members of the LGBT community for mainstream and minority audiences tend to paint more accurate portraits of gays, lesbians, and others, identifying themselves as members of sexual minorities. (Ross, 2014, p. 208)
                  Supergirl is notable for its departure from the controversial television phenomenon commonly known as the dead lesbian syndrome, which happens when lesbian characters are written off shows through violent death. Negative portrayals of queer women have been prevalent in the media for some years now. Aside from lesbian characters being depicted as overly promiscuous, they often end up dead. A study conducted on deaths of television characters in 2015-16 season revealed that about 10 percent of deaths in television shows were queer female characters, which is quite high, considering that LGBT female characters made up just about 2% of all television characters in the past year (Vanity Fair, 2016).
                  Alex Danvers breaks this cycle by becoming a salient lesbian character in a mainstream television show. When interviewed, the creators of Supergirl made it clear that Alex’s character is here to stay. The show overall can be considered inclusive as it has a mix of strong male and female characters of different races, ages, and sexualities. It even represents creatures from other planets! It cannot get any more inclusive than that. Supergirl also shows intersectionality with characters like Maggie Sawyer, who is a lesbian Latina police officer on the show.
Conclusion
                  Ross mentions that activists and academics have criticized the lack of mainstream images of sexual minorities as well as their stereotypical and negative nature (Ross, 2014, p. 232), so Supergirl indeed brings a fresh perspective into mainstream LGBT television storytelling. The show is important to LGBT audience because it draws a more realistic portrait of a queer female, her experiences, inner battles and relationships to which many LGBT fans can relate. It also helps battle limited and overly stereotypical perceptions in the mainstream audience.
                  The uniqueness of the show is that it is inclusive and defies the all-too-common known trope of killing off lesbian characters and instead chooses to assign Alex, a queer female character, one of the key roles in a mainstream television show. Even though it is still widely uncommon, Supergirl is considered a step toward more positive representations of queer characters on mainstream television. 

 
References
 
Bradley, L. (2016, November 03). TV Is Better for L.G.B.T.Q. Characters than Ever-Except for Lesbians. Retrieved April 12, 2017
 
Moroni, S. (2014) America's closet door: an investigation of television and its effects on perceptions of homosexuality”. (pp. 4-6)
 
Ross, K. (2014). The handbook of gender, sex, and media. Chichester: Wiley Blackwell,      207-234.
 
Wilton, T. (1995). Immortal, invisible: lesbians and the moving image. London: Routledge, 6-13.
 
 

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