With noticeable references to classic ‘70s and ‘80s action and sci-fi films, Supergirl joins a growing trend of making everything old new again while setting up a nostalgic time-traveling two-parter. Iconic moments and notable lines from such successful films as Ghostbusters, Jaws, and Alien featured prominently in the tautly-paced season 6, episode 4, “Lost Souls.” These tributes set the stage for the show’s biggest throwback event, the highly anticipated duology of Midvale episodes that will carry numerous parallels to Back to the Future, another of the ‘80s’ biggest hits.
Television and film have been leaning into nostalgia for a while, and, recently, superhero works are no exception. The Flash just aired an entertaining episode that trapped Cisco and Chester in the ’90s, which let the show highlight some great ‘90s fashion throwbacks as the rest of Team Flash were briefly transported to that time. On the big screen, Wonder Woman 1984 reunited Diana Prince and Steve Trevor in a visual valentine to the turbulent yet colorful ‘80s.
The Arrowverse’s Supergirl has been deftly using pop culture to illustrate how Brainiac 5, the man from the future, was acclimating to living in the past. Brainy often quotes favorite philosophies from iconic films and television shows such as Star Wars, Star Trek, and The Matrix. In “Lost Souls,” he and Lena, Brainy’s new best friend, debate a Ghostbusters reference, which Brainy follows up with his version of a classic Roy Scheider line from Jaws.
Lena’s new prototrap for the Phantoms resembles the specialized traps the Ghostbusters used. When activated the gold stream from the device was almost a duplicate of the streams from the Ghostbusters’ guns. As Brainy and Nia used their respective weapons side by side in the final battle with the Phantoms with her powers in a tight blue stream and his device in gold, any Ghostbusters fan might have called out to warn them to not cross the streams. Brainy was also responsible for putting his take on one of Jaws’ most quoted lines of dialogue when the team first confronts the giant Prime Phantom during the coffee shop battle. Saying “we’re gonna need a bigger gun” when seeing the size of their adversary was an obvious throwback to Roy Scheider’s famous line “We’re gonna need a bigger boat” after seeing the size of the shark they were up against. Supergirl’s final season shares a common theme with these film classics by focusing on the importance of working together as a team.
“Lost Souls” also pays homage to the absolute best of ‘80s horror, Ridley Scott’s Alien. In the classic film, warrant officer Ellen Ripley witnesses her teammates gradually die and disappear until she is the ship’s lone human survivor. One of the film’s most recognized images was the lone alien egg featured prominently on posters and in the film’s promotion. Supergirl, in essence, recreated that Alien atmosphere and cast Alex’s Sentinel into the role of Ellen Ripley. As Sentinel navigated a creepy, foggy sewer in search of the Phantoms Chrysalis to free the trapped souls, her friends were picked off one by one. The show’s art department is to be commended for making the giant Phantom sphere closely resemble the recognizable Alien egg on a much larger scale. Down to the creepy vines and eerie lighting, the entire sequence was an homage to the classic sci-fi horror movie.
Supergirl’s reverence for the films of the ’70s and ’80s will continue in the coming weeks with a time-traveling adventure to Midvale that echoes one of the ‘80s’ biggest movie franchises, Back to the Future. Just as Marty McFly’s initial adventure did, Supergirl episodes “Prom Night” and “Prom Again,” as their titles suggest, are set to unfold dramatic events at the most consequential of teen classic settings, the high school dance.
