Superhero series are all the rage, but sometimes we need a touch of reality to ground the fantastic. Supergirl on CBS is one of the most fun superhero shows, and it’s hard not to enjoy watching Kara and Co. on their adventures in National City. Still, there’s a big question that’s been hanging over the first season, and it has nothing to do with aliens or freeze breath or how Kara’s hair never looks too windswept. No, the question has been of just how Supergirl has been able to afford such a super sweet apartment. Fortunately, executive producer Ali Adler has an answer.
It’s very big. So we wonder, as Cat Grant’s employee, how she’s able to afford, I don’t know, 1,700 square feet? In my mind, Mrs. Needleberg, who lives next door, is older and she got the apartment in the building a lot time ago. She gives Kara a break in the rent in return for being super. But also, Kara doesn’t need to be worried about the area she lives in. If she’s looking over her shoulder for the guy following her, it doesn’t really matter.
Ali Adler’s explanation in her recent interview with The Hollywood Reporter explains a lot. There’s been a great deal of emphasis in the early episodes of Supergirl on how Kara doesn’t have much influence on anything other than Cat Grant’s lunch order at CatCo Media. In fact, Cat has even come out and admitted that she doesn’t pay Kara very much. It’s been easy to accept that Kara can fly and shoot lasers out of her eyes, but affording that apartment on her salary as an assistant was just hard to believe.
Of course, Kara was already living in her super sweet apartment before she ever started doing super deeds, but perhaps Mrs. Needleberg is fond of Kara for being domestically super. The latest episode made the point that Kara is a hero for her heart rather than her abilities. Maybe Mrs. Needleberg cuts her a break in rent for having a super personality.
It’s certainly more fun to imagine an indulgent Mrs. Needleberg than Kara living in a seedy neighborhood that just happens to feature a posh apartment. Her non-superpowered friends visit an awful lot, and sweet old Mrs. Needleberg probably deserves a safe place to live.
Kara’s high-end apartment didn’t just come from creative set designers who went overboard. The apartment set is a replica of an actual apartment in L.A., just modified to include a better bathroom facility. Even Kryptonians need their creature comforts every once in a while, and Ali Adler giving us a reasonable explanation for Kara’s posh pad makes it a whole lot easier to suspend our disbelief and enjoy the domestic life of Kara Danvers for what it is.
