The Arrowverse keeps expanding, proving that what Marvel can do on the big screen, DC can do on the small screen even better. In the recently concluded “Crisis On Infinite Earths” crossover event, the superhero Jefferson Pierce aka Black Lightning teamed up with Supergirl, Flash, Arrow, Batgirl, and Superman to defeat the Anti-Monitor.
Black Lightning—who has the ability to produce and manipulate electricity—has been saving his hometown of Freeland for three seasons now. The Black Lightning TV series, which premiered on the CW in January 2018, has gone on to introduce plenty of interesting supporting characters who have been instrumental in the development of the plot. However, some are simply annoying. Here are the ones fans dislike the most.
Dr. Helga Jace
Call her a mad scientist, Jace is an intelligent biochemist from the fictional Eastern European nation of Markovia who conducted plenty of illegal experiments that led to her being jailed. When she got out of jail, she was brought in to help the A.S.A. in managing the pod children. However, she kept frustrating Lynn and, as a result, several of the pod children died.
Jace is also responsible for creating the anti-aging serum that made the ruthless Tobias Whale immortal. She is thus indirectly responsible for the havoc he has caused in Freeland for decades. Her mischievous schemes never end. When her stint with the A.S.A ended, Jace teamed up with the Markovian army and informed them about Lynn’s ability to manage the meta-gene.
Jennifer Pierce
Always complaining and getting angry, Jefferson Pierce’s youngest daughter Jennifer is quite stubborn for no logical reason. She is also a hopeless romantic who can’t see a life without Khalil. She even ran away from home and went into hiding with him at some point. Unlike her sister Annissa who chose to help her father as soon as she discovered she had the powers of electrical manipulation, Jennifer has remained undecided.
After going through metahuman therapy to stabilize her electrical powers, Jennifer finally agreed to be a superhero going by the name Lightning (where’s the creativity?). However, she was still manipulated by Agent Odell and used as a human weapon to take out his enemies.
Khalil Payne/Painkiller
Khalil is annoying because he rarely has his own agenda and is often used as a pawn by villains. And while doing their deeds, he tends to be mindless and ruthless. At first, he was Tobias Whale’s errand boy. The supervillain gave Khalil enhanced powers after he had lost the ability to use his legs. However, after they fell apart, Tobias ripped his spine apart, leaving him dead.
Khalil was later brought back to life by the A.S.A. under the command of Agent Odell. They also gave him enhanced powers and controlled him using a brain chip. The saddest moment was when Khalil was made to kill his own mother without even realizing what he was doing.
Giselle Cutter
Giselle Cutter is a deadly British mercenary who uses poison blades to kill people. She always throws them with precision, just as Batman does with his batarangs. Cutter also has telekinetic abilities, though it is unclear where she acquired them from. In Season Two, she was hired by Tobias Whale to capture Painkiller after he had gone rogue.
Despite being far superior and stronger, Cutter does Tobias’ bidding without asking any questions. She also ends up falling in love with him yet it is clear that he is only using her. In one instance when Cutter tries to stick around, Tobias rudely asks her to leave.
Mike Lowry
It’s quite interesting that this character shares a name with Will Smith’s character in the Bad Boys Trilogy. Unlike Smith’s amazing character, this Mike Lowry got on everyone’s nerves. This was mostly because he took Jefferson’s job at Garfield High School. Jefferson was everyone’s favorite principal so the introduction of Mike didn’t go down well.
Mike was brought in to improve school safety since it had apparently gotten worse under Jefferson. His “Zero Tolerance” policy led to plenty of student unrest. At the moment, he is still the principal though the focus of the show has recently shifted away from Garfield High School. It’s highly unlikely that Mike will remain at the helm for a long time.
Carson Williams
Carson Williams, an A.S.A. Meta Force commander, is annoying due to his need to confront Jefferson and show him who is more powerful. He also keeps referring to Jefferson as “Meta” and Jefferson thinks this is quite offensive.
Carson is able to mimic the abilities of any metahuman because he is a “meta” too, having received the vaccine when he was a child. He works as one of Agent Odell’s henchmen and oversees the Freeland curfew. In one instance, Carson tries to copy Jefferson’s powers but the side effects overwhelm him because he doesn’t have the suit. This causes him to collapse and become badly wounded.
Kara Fowdy
Kara was vice-principal when Jefferson was still the principal of Garfield High. The two appeared to have a great working relationship and Kara even looked like she had feelings for Jefferson, who was a divorcee at the time. Later on, there was a major twist when it was revealed that Kara worked with the A.S.A. and was responsible for reporting students with metahuman abilities.
However, her undercover job as a teacher didn’t last for long. When Kara tried to recover a briefcase that Tobias lost, she ended up dead. It was a moment of relief because the problem had been solved for Jefferson. Due to his conscience, it is unlikely that he would have done any harm to harm. Now, thanks to a favorable turn of events, Jefferson no longer had to deal with a colleague who is scheming behind his back.
Instant
A villain who is impossible to catch or punch? Now that’s annoying. Instant is simply unbeatable and that makes him almost boring. He is a metahuman assassin with the ability to teleport. Any attempt to contain him normally fails because he vanishes into thin air.
After Helga Jace gets jailed, Instant manages to kill some police officers and teleports with her back to Markovia. In the third season, he also sneaks Markovian general Mosin into Freeland to steal information from the A.S.A. When Black Lightning is about to capture Mosin, Instant vanishes with him, leading to another frustrating moment.
Lala
Lala is the ‘King Of Ressurection.’ Every time it appears he’s gone to the afterlife for good, he just keeps coming back. However, other than trying to look tough and killing a few people, Lala achieves little of real importance on the show.
Lala was first killed by Tobias Whale in a jail cell in Season One. He’s gone on to die and return several times. Every time he reappears from the afterlife, Lala tends to have newfound abilities. One of his most interesting powers is that he is able to communicate with people he has murdered.
Agent Percy Odell
Bill Duke has been in numerous supporting roles throughout his four-decade career, the most iconic being Sgt. Mac Elliot in 1987’s The Predator. However, it is in Black Lightning that the actor has given arguably his best performance of all time. In The CW series, he is an evil A.S.A agent called Percy Odell who doesn’t mind using the metahumans as weapons and slaves.
Odell was also one of the first people to discover that Jefferson Pierce and his family have special abilities. Not only did he ruin the big family secret but he also got Jefferson Pierce and his wife into A.S.A captivity in the name of evading the Markovians. Odell would, later on, use Pierce’s wife Lynn to conduct more deadly experiments while continuing to manipulate Pierce’s daughters on the outside.
