There’s only one problem in the otherwise superb Season 3 finale of My Adventures with Superman: it could have been longer. Deserved to be longer. Because there is a lot of plot crammed into “The Return.” It’s effective, but, as was the case in the penultimate, we can’t help but start to wonder just how Jake Wyatt and co. are going to wrap everything up. The answer? With a Bang!, a Boom!, the scorch marks of a sun, and a proposal.
Directed by Jen Bennett and written by Karen Graci, My Adventures with Superman Season 3 Episode 10 pulls off the impossible and neatly wraps up the overarching storylines with enough closure so that, if Season 4 isn’t on the table, the conclusion will work as a series finale. Meanwhile, “The Return” also threads in enough teases of greater lore that we want the show to continue past the sweet, wholesome image of its finale.
The bulk of My Adventures with Superman Season 3 Episode 10 takes place in the fight against the evolved Eradicator (Steve Blum). This version of the character can split off clones of itself, and heals itself at will even after Superboy drives his sword through him, splitting him in two. He’s a fantastic, imposing villain who could have afforded more time, if only to up the ante on the already dramatic stakes.
My Adventures with Superman Season 3 Episode 10 hits all the right emotional and epic beats.
The animation of the fight finds the right balance between epic, aerial combat victory and ground level sensations of dread. While these superhumans take to the skies to fight against Eradicator, characters like Lois and Jimmy are land locked, unable to fully escape the carnage. Lois (Alice Lee) in particular is drawn to the battlefield, even after Amanda Waller (Debra Wilson) tries to force a retreat. She won’t leave her children behind to fight in a battle a future version of herself ordered them to.
“The Return” manages to find beats that speak to their integrity or their personal motives. Despite the 23-minute runtime, each major character have moments that speak directly to what makes them tick or challenges others. For Lois, hers is her refusal to leave her kids behind even if it means launching herself into a space riddled with danger and threat of death. This is the woman who launched herself off a skyscraper to prove a point.
Supergirl (Kiana Madeira) continues to be a series MVP in her moment of defiance against the Eradicator whose entire existence acts as an afront to who Kara is. In one of the better lines in the finale, she says “I came here to destroy the world, but my friends gave me a home. They chose me, they changed me, and I will not let you take them.”
The fight against Eradicator highlights Supergirl’s warrior instincts.
This has been her entire arc since she first appeared and My Adventures with Superman Season 3 Episode 10 operates it. She too was a warrior corrupted by her “creator,” a force meant to destroy on the basis of hatred. That she found love and acceptance is, in her mind, a miracle worth cherishing. Her protectiveness and the way the series continually draws connection between her and Jon/Superboy (Darren Criss) hits all of the right emotional beats. She is a fully transformed character who has become the defender of Metropolis and, more to the point, the soul of her family.
Even Luthor (Max Mittelman) gets to demonstrate his increased state of transformation, continually challenged by Jimmy (Ishmel Sahid) to be better than who he was before. But his efforts are in vain as he tries to take control of Eradicators mind. Still, it’s a nice moment to see an iconic villain have a change of faith when the world faces imminent disaster of his own making.
By the time Superman (Jack Quaid) arrives, decked in Kryptonian armor, everything is about to be lost. The Eradicator has created more clones, Supergirl, Superboy, and Lara (Jolie Hoang-Rappaport) are all nearing their limits despite their – Supergirl in particular – exhaustive strength. But rather than just let it be a moment of pure victory, My Adventures with Superman Season 3 Episode 10 smartly ensures we know that this triumph came with a major, alluded to cost.
Superman undergoes a necessary but agonizing transformation.
Because when we first see Clark at the start of the Season 3 finale, he’s still at the Fortress of Solitude. Having earned the trust of Brainiac, he’s brought to see the offspring of Krypton’s sun, which is how Clark can get his powers back. After that, it cuts to the fighting, and we don’t see the how’s of him getting his powers. We just see the result.
It’s only in the ending moments of the “The Return” where we see the pain Clark endures to ensure he’s able to regain his powers and save his family. What he was willing to bear if it meant he could protect those he loves. It’s a brief moment, as we see his scream while engulfed in the sun, but the effect is immediate and transforms the entire back half of the episode. And it’s a reminder, just like the moment with Supergirl, who Superman is. He’s not a born fighter, but a saviour—someone who will shoulder it all in an effort to protect those who don’t have his strength.
And it makes his final stand with Eradicator, backed by the entire House of El (including Bizarro Superman), all the more impactful. The animation has fun in the slight switch as it volleys between each fighter, as Jon and Lara now smile through their attacks, rallied by Clark’s optimism and his apology to Jon for his future self having left him alone. He’s hope incarnate, and it’s moments like these that will forever and always remind us why Superman’s fictional legacy is such an outstanding one. When he’s written well he acts both as a larger-than-life figure and a beacon of humanities best efforts. Human and born from the stars.
My Adventures with Superman Season 3 Episode 10 brings it all back to hope.
The fun of the fight comes alive through the animation, especially in the contrast of the battle against the gorgeous colors of the backdrops. And there’s some truly inventive bits of action, such as when Jon and Lara assist in letting Supergirl get her Dragon Fist moment as she blows a hole through Eradicator’s chest. But there’s no more potent moment then when Superman speaks to a dying Eradicator, itself an oddly morose parallel to his last words to Hank Henshaw.
He asks Eradicator to stop fighting. Eradicator says he’d rather die. Through time and universes, this is a creature born to destroy, and in his evolution, he’s only ever done just that. “I’m sorry no one taught you how to live,” Superman says, and it hits. Not just because it underlines the tragedy of the villain but it again highlights Clark’s immense empathy. Eradicator works as the antithesis to Season 3, a creature who was unable to change or set his own path, doomed to destroy or doomed to die at the hands of the person he was meant to defeat.
My Adventures with Superman Season 3 Episode 10 ends by looking to the future. The Super kids return to their future, Jimmy and Kara remain friends though their feelings are all out on the table now, and Krypto even makes an appearance. But the big moment comes when Lois proposes to Clark.
The Season 3 finale is a success but we want more.
It’s an earned moment that lets her be the driver of her future. She might not know what tomorrow holds or how to conquer any personal or universal threats, but she knows she wants to do it with Clark at her side and that she is ready to make the choice herself. It’s such a glorious in character beat and speaks to just how well the series blends existing traits of her personality with it’s own vision.
Wyatt’s version of Clark, Lois, Jimmy, and Kara are so tremendous, so lovable and so well developed, and it would be a shame if this is the last we see of them, especially with Luthor’s warning to Waller at the end. But if it is, at least the talent behind the series can rest assured that their versions of these characters stand tall against the long history of the franchise as some of the best versions.
My Adventures with Superman Season 3 Episode 10 would have excelled as a two-parter but that doesn’t diminish the feat the series pulls off in the finale. “The Return” is a sweeping conclusion that brings together all of the characters in a chill-inducing finale that speaks to the optimism that works as the core heart of the story. All of these characters are strong on their own but stronger together, able to push through to the very end, knows their family stands in the wings and on the battlefield as a united front. Silly, sweet, and bursting with compassion and playfulness, fortified by voice acting excellence, the finale hits all the right notes.
My Adventures with Superman Season 3 Episode 10 is out now on HBO Max.
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My Adventures with Superman Season 3 Episode 10
9/10
TL;DR
“The Return” is a sweeping conclusion that brings together all of the characters in a chill-inducing finale that speaks to the optimism that works as the core heart of the story.