Warning: SPOILERS for the My Adventures with Superman episode “Olsen’s Eleven” are ahead!
Supergirl’s debut on My Adventures with Superman ended with her pummeling her cousin Kal-El/Clark Kent and delivering him to Brainiac, whom she referred to as her “father.” Then in “The Machine Who Would Be Empire,” we learned what Brainiac has planned for the Man of Steel, and while the episode as a whole was pretty dour, it ended on a hopeful note when Kara Zor-El finally learned that the antagonistic AI had brainwashed an manipulated her. Additionally, a portal opened up in front of her, and out of it came a spaceship with Lois Lane, Jimmy Olsen, Monsieur Mallah and The Brain aboard.
Wondering how this quartet ended up in front of Kara? That’s what “Olsen’s Eleven” delves into, with Lois and Jimmy embarking on a heist to obtain a ship so that they could embark into outer space, find Clark and rescue him. Although they were successful achieving that first goal, the aftermath of this episode that can be streamed with a Max subscription has me more worried about Lex Luthor, as if damaging his reputation wasn’t bad enough.
Lois And Jimmy Broke Into S.T.A.R. Labs
After seeing Kara take Superman away, Lois and Jimmy agreed to break into S.T.A.R. Labs to steal one of their ships. Obviously, though, this isn’t something they could accomplish on their own, so in addition to calling Mallah and Brain for help (which worked out since they’d realized exploring the multiverse wasn’t all it was cracked up to be), they convinced Leslie Willis, a.k.a. Livewire to lend her thieving talents, though it required Jimmy to pay the electric woman the remaining money he had left from selling Flamebird to The Daily Planet. Jimmy also managed to convince Lois to give Kara a chance to redeem herself rather than incapacitate her with Kryptonite.
As far as heists go, this one was pretty standard. The group made a plan, things went wrong with the plan, there was perceived betrayal, lost hope over the plan failing, a secret plan being revealed and, as already mentioned, ultimate victory. During that course of events, arguably the biggest surprise came when it looked as though Livewire abandoned Lois and Jimmy when the heist became too complicated, but that didn’t end up being the case at all.
After she and her girlfriend Heat Wave faked breaking to make Lois and Jimmy the latter was no longer in the picture, the two of them and some of their other crew members planned a different heist to steal from the S.T.A.R. Labs armory. They knew Amanda Waller learning about the ship heist would be the perfect distraction for their own objective.
They’d planned to get away scot free and have Lois, Jimmy, Mallah and Brain take the fall, but when Livewire overheard Lois on the comms channel express remorse over how things ended between her and Clark when they last saw each other, she and her crew changed their minds and helped them escape Task Force X’s Metallo robots. Mallah and Brain were also able to get the ship running and build a portal machine, so now we’re caught up to speed on how they ended up in front of Kara.
Amanda Waller Has Given Lex Luthor Even More Resources
“Olsen’s Eleven” got off to a bleak start, as Amanda Waller used the fight between Superman and Supergirl as “evidence” that the former was a threat to Earth after all, and used her Human Defense Corps to impose martial law and cut off the press. Then, one of the things that went wrong with Lois and Jimmy’s heist was Waller and Slade Wilson being on site at S.T.A.R. Labs to check on Lex Luthor’s progress with Project M, i.e. the customization of the Metallo robots obtained from Amertek.
As mentioned earlier, Waller figured out the heist was underway, so she ordered Luthor to send the robots despite them only being at 10% efficiency. They came close to stopping the shuttle from taking off and capturing the intruders, but Livewire and her crew held them off. Slade, who’s no fan of Luthor’s, took pleasure in the robots failing, but Waller saw this as a success, as these machines were able to stand up to alien tech weapons and superpowers off such little power. Waller now considers Project M to be top priority and has given Luthor al the resources he requires to complete it, much to Slade’s chagrin.
It was bad enough when Amanda Waller recruited Lex Luthor to Task Force X, but now he’s leading the charge on the organization’s most valued project. Whether he simply finishes out Season 2 carrying out Waller’s wishes or eventually decides to implement his own scheme and betrays her, this Luthor is now primed to cause even more trouble. However things shape out with Brainiac in the final three episodes of this season, whenever Superman makes it back to Earth, no doubt it won’t be long until those improved Metallos are sicced on him, along with anything else Luthor has whipped up in his lab.
My Adventures with Superman drops new episodes onto the 2024 TV schedule Sunday nights on Adult Swim. Season 3 has already been greenlit, so at least fans don’t have to worry about grappling with an unresolved cliffhanger when Season 2 finishes in a few weeks.
