Krypton
“Light-Years From Home” (Episode 201)
June 12, 2019

Welcome to a new season of the fantastic Syfy original series, Krypton. A quick catch-up on what happened last year.  Last Season, on Krypton …

Brainiac and the Basic Plot. Adam Strange (Shaun Sipos), a time-traveling Earthling and friend of Kal-El (better known to us as Superman), arrives on the planet Krypton with Superman’s iconic red cape in hand. Adam finds Seg-El (Cameron Cuffe), Superman’s grandfather, and tells Seg that Superman is in danger and he has to save him.  How is he in danger? Brainiac (Blake Ritson), the Collector of Worlds y’all. Brainiac is a gruesome, green, mean dude who has set his sights on Krypton and wants to change events as to ensure Superman is never born.  Seg manages to trap Brainiac in the Phantom Zone, but, whoopsies, he is sucked in as well.

Family Life Is Hard. Seg loves Lyta-Zod (Georgina Campbell) but is in an arranged marriage sitch with Nyssa-Vex (Wallis Day). Family politics and all that. Seg and Nyssa learn their child will be named Cor-Vex. Jax-Ur (Hannah Waddingham) tells Nyssa that she is a clone! *Gasp*

General Zod (Colin Salmon), yes THAT General Zod, arrives from the future with a plan to save Krypton by ruling it. Lyta has a confused how this grown man is her son but, time travel! Seg learns that General Dru-Zod is his son (and Superman’s uncle!).  After Seg and Brainiac are trapped in the Phantom Zone, Zod destroys the mechanism that controls the entrance to the Phantom Zone, thus preserving this new timeline from being tinkered with.  Sensing the power vacuum, Zod assumes rule of Krypton. The emblem on the cape Adam brought to Krypton changes from the House of El to the crest for the House of Zod.

“Kneel before Zod.”

Now, the Season 2 premiere of Krypton, “Light-Years From Home” … BEWARE OF SPOILERS!

Six Months Later. Adam pops back to Krypton in the middle of Zod giving his six months State of the Union speech. It’s all very rah rah, I am leading you to the perfection of Krypton, dictator-esque. Zod mentions a rebellion that needs to be crushed.  The Sagitari are charged with rounding up rebels and dissenters. When they spot Adam skedaddles. He manages to avoid the Sagitari but gets tranq’d by Jax-Ur.

Opening Credits.

Adam awakens in pain and falls out of bed as a reminder of how much he hates Krypton. Jax-Ur greets him with a warning that someone is always listening. Adam approaches her, talking about how they should make introductions and “establish safe words.” He’s clearly both in awe of and frightened by Jax. He asks her why he was brought here … and how?  He has in image of being carried like a sack of potatoes over Jax’s shoulder.

Mama Zed (Shobu Kapoor), Kem’s mom, comes in and tells Adam that Jax had help from some friends. She’s accompanied by Val-El and Nyssa … with baby in tow. She introduces the baby, Cor-Vex, to Adam. Val-El claps Adam on the shoulder and Adam damn near jumps out of his skin. He didn’t get the memo that Val is out of the Phantom Zone and is very real. It takes him a few moments to compose himself, but not without feeling Val’s face and commenting that it feels like leathery skin and old man smell. Val humors him, but wants to put an end to this.

“I am real, not the hologram you knew from the Fortress. I’m back from the Phantom Zone.”

Adam explains that he went back to the future but it was different from the one he left. He found Zod ruling Earth (we see a huge statue of Zod on Earth), and Brainiac had conquered his hometown. They hypothesize that if Brainiac made it out of the Phantom Zone, then there’s a possibility that Seg made it out too. Adam is psyched to hear that Seg may be alive.

Phantom Zone.  Seg is trapped in the Phantom Zone. It’s a glowy, ethereal place. Racing past him are all these scenes and he hears echoes of conversations from different times. He hears “my grandfather was no traitor” and “I was told we’d have a future.” He hears Lyta call for help and this gets his full attention. He sees Zod choking her. Seg yells for Zod to stop and starts pounding on the edge of the Phantom Zone. The scene shifts and now Seg is holding Lyta in front of him as she slips away and disappears. A sad faced Seg pleads for someone to help him.

Commercials.

Kandor.  Adam is with Jax, Nyssa and Val. They’re trying to figure out how to get Seg out of the Phantom Zone. Val fills Adam in on the developments while he was back on Earth:

Zod destroyed the Projector for the Phantom Zone, which controlled access in and out. Attempts to repair it were interrupted by Zod seizing the Fortress.

Nyssa informs Adam that they have a plan and it’s Wegthor. Adam, never one to miss a quip, leans over to Jax …

“Is that the safe word?”

Wegthor is a moon orbiting Krypton and home to the resistance against Zod.  It’s the only city state not under Zod’s rule. The sentiment is that Zod is creating misdirection from what he’s really doing vis-à-vis his power grab on Krypton. He took control of the Sagitari (the law enforcement division of the city of Kandor) and he freed the Rankless, who are treated like second class citizens. He’s making those who defy him disappear.

The resistance is capitalizing on that level of discontent. Zod wants to conquer Wegthor because it’s a mining colony that houses a compound, Stellarium, which can be used for warp fuel for an interstellar fleet. Adam is confused that Zod is building his fleet now because when he returned to Earth, things had changed. Zod is conquering planets and eradicating populations. He’s terra-forming whole worlds to make them compatible with Kryptonian physiology.

“If Zod has his fleet, it may already be too late.”

Cut to Raika (Sonita Henry) being tortured by Lyta-Zod. Lyta is trying to get the 411 on Doomsday’s location. She threatens Raika, telling her they are repairing her “anti-social tendencies.” When Raika merely begs for release, Lyta turns up the pressure. She asks Raika where Jayna-Zod is, last seen entering the catacombs and badly hurt but her body has not turned up yet. (This is Lyta’s mother, mind you.)  Lyta presses Raika about her previous assistance to Seg and her likelihood to continue to help and cover up.

Lyta walks around to the control board and asks for the operator’s recommendation. He thinks Raika is telling the truth and recommends Full Somatic Reconditioning to help her. Lyta walks back over to Raika and warns her that she will experience a great deal of pain. Lyta assures her she’ll survive, but will be a different person when they’re done. Lyta initiates the reconditioning as Raika screams. Lyta leaves.

Damn Gurl.

Lyta stands next to Zod, who inquires if the prisoner gave her anything? She’s frustrated that they haven’t been able to locate Doomsday in the last six months when the focus, in her opinion, should be on shutting down the conflict on Wegthor. Zod says that he’s recovering from Brainiac’s attack and he wants an insurance policy against similar problems in the future. That insurance policy is Doomsday. With the creature under his control, he’ll be able to bring more worlds under his rule without the loss of any Kryptonian life and give any enemy a choice to, “capitulate or face total annihilation.”

Lyta requests that he give her the Resistance assignment as she has new intel that suggests the leaders of the Resistance, Val-El, Jax-Ur, and Nyssa-Vex are in position and ready to launch their campaign against them. Zod asks if she has any conflict doing this seeing as they all you used to be allies. Lyta is cold as fuck as she’s all, “that’s how I know this will work.”

Damn Gurl!

Phantom Zone. Seg sees Val-El, appearing as a projection from Seg’s mind. He explains to Seg that in the Phantom Zone, Seg is surrounded by wormholes linking separate points in space-time. Val tells Seg that the Sunstone, which Seg has on him, has the power of a 10 billion year old sun that will open up the right vortex leading him back to Krypton.

“Pierce the veil.”

Seg stabs the edge of the wall of the Phantom Zone, while Val cheers him on. As Seg is just about through, Val transforms into Brainiac.

“Well done … Seg-El.”

Both men are sucked into the vortex.  Whelp!

Commercials.

Colu. The Vortex pops Seg and Brainiac out on Colu, Brainiac‘s home planet. Brainiac admits he tricked Seg in the Phantom Zone because he needed the Sunstone. Seg asks if Brainiac manipulated the scene of Zod choking Lyta?  Brainiac tells Seg that was a vision of the future and not of Brainiac’s doing. That being said, he was totally able to capitalize on Seg’s emotional weakness as it made it easier to manipulate him.

Seg goes to attack Brainiac but is frozen in place. Brainiac tells him that this is not a wise decision seeing as Seg is already malnourished and dehydrated from his time in the Phantom Zone. Seg’s going to need his strength to survive. Brainiac’s survival is dependent on Seg’s survival.

“If I am to survive … you must be preserved, Seg-El.”

There’s a literal shithead detector on the ground detecting a shithead and transmitting the location. They’re on my radar, too. Although I’m not always as quick to detect them.

Kandor. There’s a method of direct transport between Krypton and Wegthor that can be used to move people there safely. An “hypersonic orbital tether” if you will. Adam is reluctant to follow the plan and Val loses his patience, exclaiming they’ve got to stop Zod on Wegthor before they have run out of opportunities.  Adam insists they need Seg to proceed. Val is all, “without the Projector, Seg is gone baby gone” but Adam doesn’t think they need the Phantom Projector. Adam thinks that his Zeta-Beam Device might be able to teleport him into the Phantom Zone and back out. Val is skeptical it will work due to the physics of the Phantom Zone. Adam gets sassy with Val.

“Did the meaning of this symbol that you wear change while I was away? We can’t just give up on him.”

What more, Adam gets Val to agree that he’s not even sure if Seg is still in the Phantom Zone. In any case, Adam says, the risk is his to take.

Colu.  As the unlikely duo walk through the forest, Brainiac detects elevated cortisol levels in Seg and warns Seg that he needs to pace himself … increased thirst and more frequent urination and all that. Seg is skeptical as to why Brainiac would care about his well-being and Brainiac replies it’s because he needs Seg’s help.

The radiation from Seg’s Sunstone caused a deterioration in some of Brainiac’s neuromorphic chips. Brainiac backstory time, people! The Big B explains that Colu was once a technological marvel. When his progenitors sought to elevate their consciousness, they fused the planet with artificial intelligence and Brainiac was born. After 1.3 seconds of being alive, Brainiac realized he could increase his chances of survival by distributing himself across the universe. The downside? The extinction of the entire race of Coluans.

Why are you telling Seg this, Brainiac?

Brainiac explains that there is still Coluan technology on the planet and with it, he can construct a ship to bring them back to Krypton. He needs Seg’s help to find this tech. Seg knows the minute he’s outlived his usefulness, Brainiac will betray him. Brainiac doesn’t deny this at all but calmly asks Seg to put aside their logical differences to mutually assist each other. And let the inevitable betrayal play out down the road. Seg, not feeling very rational, would like to get to the fighting now. He jumps at Brainiac as we head to commercials.

Commercials.

Kandor. Jax and Nyssa are talking in frantic tones. Nyssa has gotten a lead she has to follow to find out the truth about her family and her past. Jax is skeptical and feels this is dangerous. The person Nyssa is looking for is on Bokos and that jives with what Jax has told Nyssa to date. She’s insistent that she has to go to find out what she needs to, for herself. When Mama Zed pops up and makes it clear she’s coming with Nyssa (to watch the baby), Jax is horrified that Nyssa would take Cor Vex. No bueno.

Bokos. We see a guy in a Haz Mat-type suit, wheezing and coughing as he scrubs/mines a wall for some mineral. When he stops to take a big puff on an inhaler like device, we see it’s Daron-Vex (Elliot Cowan). A gun cocks behind him and he’s greeted by his daughter, Nyssa. He was curious how she found his hiding place after 6 months of searching? She’d received a tip about him being on Bokos, a place he always said he’s hated, so she had originally dismissed the possibility of him being there. Nessa’s also learned he was from Bokos from the information she received from Jax-Ur.

Nyssa accuses Daron of using her mother’s name to gain power for himself. Nyssa says she knows what he did to her (i.e., the cloning) and demands to know why he kept the truth from her? Daron looks remorseful, remarking Nyssa was always the best parts of her mother. Nyssa has lots of questions. Like, what happened to her mother? Why was Nyssa in the skimmer with her mother the night she died? How much of Nyssa is really her versus the clone? Daron has sad and begins to open up.  Unfortunately, his head is blasted off. When Nyssa turns around, Lyta is there with her goon squad. Nyssa looks terrified.

Kandor. Mama Zed returns to the resistance hideout and Jax and Val go to freak out mode right away that she’s not with Nyssa and Cor Vex. Mama Z is about the most guilty looking person ever and starts to apologize as she’s blasted in the back. Sagitari rush in. Adam tells Jax to skedaddle and he’ll hold off the badguys. Jax grabs the Codex and makes an exit with Val. Adam presses a button on his Zeta Beam Device, hoping aloud that it works, and it does! Narrowly missing a Sagitari laser beam of death, Adam disappears.

Commercials. 

Kandor. Lyta and Nyssa are walking together. It’s tense between them. Nyssa demands to know where her son is, realizing now that she’d been set up by Lyta regarding the Bokos tip. Nyssa is furious because she thought Daron was going to tell her about her mother and about her secrets. Lyta assures her anything he would have said would have been a lie. Lyta tells Nyssa it’s time to move on from that. Nyssa shoots back that she doesn’t want to be one of her political prisoners or subject to the reconditioning process. The ladies devolve into an argument of who is honoring better, Seg’s sacrifice and ideals. Lyta feels that the rebels are destroying Seg’s legacy, while “we are busy honoring his sacrifice by securing Krypton’s future.”

Nyssa scoffs at Lyta’s use of ‘we.’

“There is never a ‘we’ when it comes to power. There is only the last one standing.”

Lyta gets the last Burn as she tells Nyssa that Zod has the same goodness inside him as resides in his father, Seg.  Nyssa is fuming as Lyta walks ahead. 

Arriving at Zod’s throne room, Nyssa freaks when she sees Zod holding Baby Cor.  Zod tells Nyssa he’ll gladly hand over Cor once she surrenders the Resistance. He reminds Nyssa that Val and he are blood relatives and should not be fighting one another. Nyssa asks what happens if she refuses?

“I will raise young Cor-Vex myself. And be to him the father I never had, in honor of Seg.”

Zod tells Nyssa to sleep on it and she’s dragged away screaming for them to give her back her son.

Val and Jax are in a military base talking about how Nyssa is either captured or dead so it’s up to them now to carry on the plan. Val thinks Zod might be hip to their plans to go to Wegthor. Maybe, Jax says, but there’s no turning back now. 

We get a quick cut to Lyta and Zod walking. Lyta stops when she sees a now reconditioned Raika pass by her. Girlfriend’s eyes are totally blank and without recognition. Lyta’s face falls, perhaps she’s having some kind of realization as to the ramifications of what they are actually doing to people? Zod looks on at his mother with some curiosity.

Colu. Adam blasts through a vortex and crashes face first into a tree on what looks to be Colu. He sees Seg and runs excitedly to him. Seg is standing over a brain-less, bloody Brainiac. Seg looks at Adam and starts to freak out a bit. He’s in some kind of bloodlust trance. Adam talks his friend down off the violent ledge and Seg then has a minor freakout because he was convinced that Adam was killed in the explosion.  Adam replies that he was saved by the Zeta Beam. This finally gets through to Seg and he hugs him, laughing that he likes Adam’s new jacket, particularly the redness of it.  Adam replies that he’s a fan of Seg’s Phantom Zone-inspired beard. Ah, Friends! 

Commercials.

“This is a masterpiece.”

Adam is standing over Brainiac’s body laughing that Seg should sign his work, it’ll be worth something some day. Seg asks why Adam came back for him? In Seg’s mind, this is done, they’ve won. Adam tells him that Seg is the only person who can make the new reality right, the reality where Earth is gone.

“I mean, it’s kind of ironic, you know? I first came to you to save your grandson, the last son of Krypton … And now here I am, the last son of Earth.”

Things aren’t any better on Krypton than they are on Earth.  Adam informs Seg that Zod has taken over Krypton and has his sights on the galaxy and that Val is leading the Resistance against Zod.  Adam agrees with Seg that Seg should have listened to him about not trusting Zod. But, it’s not all bad …

Adam tells Seg about the birth of Cor-Vex and that he seems pretty cool, you know, for a baby. Seg is adamant that they get moving back into the vortex, but Adam pumps the breaks saying the Zeta Beam was designed for one person, not two. There have been modifications made to hopefully make it work for two people, but the planet’s magnetism is messing with the settings. Adam advises they get to higher ground. Seg is not believing what he’s hearing. Worst rescue plan, ever.  He accuses Adam of always going off with half cocked plans.

“First of all, I am fully cocked.”

He doesn’t actually have a second thing but their argument is interrupted in any case by some howling in the distance. They take off running, unsure of what the animal is. Around a corner, they meet a large, painted man with a snarky sarcastic attitude and a blaster. Kind of like Jason Momoa meets Gene Simmons from KISS. Adam agrees with my pop culture reference.  

“Just you back here or is the rest of the Kiss army over there behind the …”

Adam doesn’t finish his sick burn because he is blasted off his feet and collapses to the ground. Seg charges the crazy looking man with the gun and gets pistol blaster whipped for his troubles. Meet Lobo (Emmett J Scanlan), y’all. He doesn’t seem to realize he’s knocked both men out and proceeds to ask them who they are an what they’re doing on this “shit-hole planet”? Realizing that he probably should have asked them his questions first, he chains them together and drags them off. 

End scene.

Thoughts.

There was a lot going on tonight, setting the table for Season Two. You’ve got the Resistance building with Val, Jax and Nyssa at the helm. Doomsday is out there somewhere. Zod’s plans for coercing more power out of Krypton and setting his sights beyond to the interstellar world (the fleet, THE FLEET). Adam is trying to restore his reality back on Earth. And Lobo. Fucking Lobo. This season feels a lot bigger in scope than Season 1, with the expansion into the Phantom Zone, Colu, Nyssa’s jaunt to Bokos to see her Dad, and the involvement of Wegthor. 

I just love Zod in this series. He’s so larger-than-life and he completely makes the scenes he’s in feel bigger, more momentous. We didn’t see much of him this episode, but there’s more to come from him as he sets out to expand his rule beyond Krypton. With Cor-Vex now in his grasp, he’s really in a position to mess with the world that Kal-El will (maybe?) be born into.  

If Zod is the determined menace, then Adam is the show’s much needed comic relief. His moments of humor have me laughing out loud every time. His awestruck nature in the presence of Jax and asking her for safe words. No other character in the show has this license for funny. It was great to see his reunion with Seg in the forest of Colu; these two play great off of each other. When Seg accuses Adam of showing up half-cocked with no plan to get them out of there and Adam responds with a finger pointed at Seg that he is, in fact, fully cocked and “secondly, I don’t have a second thing yet, just give me a minute.” Comedy gold. Also, this was a great set up for the introduction of Lobo, who enters with his own comic fanfare. And he looks like a snack on top of everything else. 

Don’t rule out Brainiac as completely deceased just yet. He’s just mostly dead. Mostly dead is slightly alive … Remember he said he knew immediately after his creation he needed to ensure his survival by scattering himself across the universe. More to come on Brainiac.  

Nyssa is going to have a meltdown with the information that Zod is Lyta and Seg’s son. I feel an epic tantrum coming on. She’s holding it together now, for the moment. Barely. But, her son is in peril now that he’s in the hands of Zod, so Mama Nyssa might be coming off the rails soon. 

I’m eager to see what Episode 2 has in store as there was a lot to unpack here in laying down the foundation for an action packed season.

Krypton airs on Syfy on Wednesday nights at 10pm (ET/PT) and we can often be found live tweeting along with the episode! 

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Thank you for reading! Follow us on Twitter: @popcultureview and @SheilsMcGangsta. And, for all things pop culture, visit popculturereview.com! See you in a few days for Episode 2 of Krypton!