Arrowverse: Every Version Of Supergirl Melissa Benoist Has Played

Throughout her time on Supergirl, Melissa Benoist has gotten to play multiple different versions of the Girl of Steel in the Arrowverse. In 2015, Kara Zor-El was given new life in the world of live-action, with Benoist being the latest actor to portray the iconic DC heroine. While Supergirl is ending with season 6, it doesn’t change the fact that the Arrowverse drama has elevated the Girl of Steel to the mainstream audience. Ever since Supergirl moved from CBS to The CW, Kara has been one of the Arrowverse’s central figures, joining heroes like Green Arrow and The Flash.

But one of the Arrowverse’s most significant benefits is the DC Multiverse that it has established over the last few years. By having an infinite amount of Earths to play with, it allowed any of the actors to play alternative versions of their characters. But with other storytelling methods like cloning and time-travel, the Arrowverse shows have been able to let their actors have a variety of roles to portray. That also includes Supergirl, with Benoist being one of The CW’s actors to play more than just her titular character. Even before joining the larger Arrowverse, Benoist had gotten the opportunity to play a few other iterations of Supergirl.

When an actor is on a series that has run for as long as Supergirl has, it’s always good to have stories every once in a while where a lead gets to change things up a bit. Even shows like Smallville, which ran for 10 seasons, had Tom Welling getting to play different sides of Clark over the series. While Benoist didn’t have to play as many alternative characters as The Flash’s Tom Cavanagh has with all the versions of Harrison Wells, she has still gotten to play heroic and villainous iterations of Supergirl.

Supergirl

Since 2015, Benoist has played Kara Zor-El/Kara Danvers, Superman’s cousin. Kara was also sent away in a pod when Krypton blew up, but hers got stuck in the Phantom Zone for several years, until eventually getting out and crashing on Earth. As an adult, Kara decided to become her own hero by coming out to the world as Supergirl, National City’s personal protector. Throughout her six-year run, Supergirl has gone up various threats, from Kryptonians, Worldkillers, as well as human threats like Lex Luthor. Like most Arrowverse shows, Kara has a team around her, consisting of her adoptive sister Alex Danvers, Martian Manhunter, Brainiac 5, Dreamer, and many more.

While Benoist has played evil versions of Supergirl, her Earth-38/Earth-Prime Kara did go temporarily bad in the first season. In the sixteenth episode, “Falling,” Kara gets exposed to red kryptonite, which messed with Supergirl’s inhibitions. It takes Kara down a problematic spiral as she becomes crueler and crueler, going as far as almost getting Cat Grant killed by pushing her down a balcony as a warning. While Kara eventually gets the red kryptonite’s effects out of her system, it still overwhelmed Supergirl because of all the harm she had caused. That was the only time that Supergirl used red kryptonite as it hasn’t been used in later stories. But this was just the first time Benoist got to test playing a wicked Girl of Steel.

Bizarrogirl

Just like Superman has a Bizarro in the mythology, Supergirl also has a Bizarrogirl in her comics. However, the Arrowverse iteration of Bizarrogirl, which was co-played by Benoist and Hope Lauren, was significantly different in Supergirl season 1. One of the recurring foes that season was Maxwell Lord, who had taken a female brain trauma patient that looked similar to Supergirl. After having been in a coma for over two years, Maxwell took the Jane Doe and began transforming her into a Supergirl-clone. Through Maxwell Lord’s inhuman experiments, he brainwashed the clone into having utter hatred for Supergirl, while also programming her to murder the Girl of Steel.

The way Supergirl incorporates Bizarrogirl’s white-damaged face is through exposure to green kryptonite. But it also damages Bizarrogirl’s mental state as she and Supergirl go at it. Interestingly enough, blue kryptonite had a different effect on Bizarrogirl as it somehow calmed her when exposed to it. However, Arrowverse’s Bizarrogirl doesn’t last for long as the team manages to find a way to undo the damage Maxwell had caused her. While they never show it, the episode indicates that they found a solution to restore Jane Doe, who is presumably still alive on Earth-Prime.

Overgirl

One evil version of Supergirl that fans probably didn’t expect to see in the Arrowverse is a Nazi iteration of Krypton’s last daughter. In the Arrowverse’s fourth big annual crossover, Crisis on Earth-X, Benoist is one of the actors who got to play a Nazi version of themselves. On Earth-X, Kara’s pod landed on Earth, but was never raised by the Danvers. Instead, Kara’s upbringing led her to follow Nazism beliefs, followed by her becoming Overgirl, a Nazi general that led the New Reichsmen. On Earth-X, Kara was one of the most powerful and feared beings on the planet. Overgirl was married to the Earth-X version of Oliver Queen, known as the Dark Arrow in this reality.

During the Arrowverse crossover, Overgirl comes to Earth-1 with her allies as they crash Iris West and Barry Allen’s wedding. The reason they target Earth-1 is that Overgirl is dying from excessive solar radiation due to Kara literally flying too close to the sun. Because of that, Overgirl needed a heart transplant and targeted Earth-38’s Supergirl to take her heart. At one point, Supergirl is taken by the Earth-X villains, as Reverse-Flash was close to getting Overgirl what she wanted. Despite almost succeeding with it, the team rescues Supergirl, leading to one final showdown in the crossover. But because of Overgirl’s condition, Kara’s Earth-X doppelganger eventually dies as she literally explores.

Red Daughter

In Supergirl season 4, the Arrowverse did its own version of the Elseworlds comic Superman: Red Son, with Benoist playing another alternative Supergirl. At the end of Supergirl season 3, Kara accidentally creates a clone of herself when using black kryptonite to stop Reign. But by doing so, a bit of Supergirl and Reign caused Kara to get split, with the other half getting sent to Kaznia. While she was Kara’s other half, Red Daughter had no memories, thus the Russian Minister of Defense began having the country’s military train her, so she could become their weapon. Eventually, Lex Luthor gets his claws into Red Daughter and manipulates her even further.

As part of Lex’s master plan, he uses the Red Daughter to pose as Supergirl, who attacks the White House and also commits murder, to frame the real Girl of Steel. Eventually, the Red Daughter and Supergirl have a massive showdown that almost gets Kara killed. But in the end, Red Daughter finds out Lex’s true nature as he was massively using her. By the end of the season, Red Daughter “dies” and merges with Kara again, becoming the last alternative version of Kara that Benoist played in the Arrowverse. While Red Daughter technically still lives, she hasn’t been seen since the end of Supergirl season 4.

It must have been fun for Benoist to get to play so many unique evil takes on Supergirl, throughout her time in the Arrowverse. While Overgirl was obviously the evilest one, Bizarrogirl and Red Daughter began as antagonists but were ultimately victims. Supergirl has proven a lot as an Arrowverse show, and one of them is that Melissa Benoist plays heroes just as well as she plays villains.

About The Author

Andy Behbakht
(1043 Articles Published)

See also  MCU's Black Knight Is A Vampire Hunter Like Blade - Eternals Theory Explained

Andy is a senior writer at Screen Rant as he has covered the world of entertainment journalism since 2010, including superhero/comic book media. In addition to his work as a reporter, Andy co-hosts The Flash Podcast while running and producing the entire DC TV Podcasts network. He is also the founder/editor-in-chief of The Marvel Report since Fall 2015. Andy has previously written for sites such as FanSided, KSiteTV, TV Fanatic, It’s Just Movies, Heroic Hollywood, TV Overmind, and more.

More From Andy Behbakht