In the wake of the last episode’s surprising claim by Seg’s mysterious captor, Seg and Lyta struggle to choose the best way forward. Meanwhile Jayna and Daron must set aside personal animosity to set their plans in motion to topple the Voice of Rao.

Occasionally, critiquing a show forces one to admit when one has been wrong. I’m happy to admit here and now that Krypton is one such show, and I only wish I could have seen what was coming more clearly before. This week, as several pieces fell into place with an almost audible click, I came to really respect this show.

Last week, I was complaining that the part of the show dealing with Seg was dull and pointless compared to the far more interesting stuff involving the Zod family and the plot to overthrow the Voice of Rao and all of the attendant political intrigue that brought. Adam Strange? Well he was just a damned annoyance, and as for the claim by Seg’s erstwhile captor of being Lyta’s son? Well, the word ‘desperate’ crossed my mind when that one came out.

But this week, all those concerns vanished as the show started in on the fundamental questions that frankly hadn’t even occurred to me when the show started out. Adam Strange has travelled to the past to make sure that something isn’t done that changes things so fundamentally that Superman is never born and doesn’t become Earth’s (and the Universe’s) saviour. But at what cost? Thinking through logically what we know about Superman’s back story, Earth becomes his home for a reason, that reason being that Krypton is no longer there – a small detail that Lyta’s newly revealed ‘son’ brings into the open and which Strange has conscientiously avoided mentioning.

Additionally, it starts to become clear that Strange has assumed an awful lot. Certain fundamental guesses that he has taken may, it turns out, have been very wrong, and now all bets are off. Seg and Lyta have an idea which of the two men they trust more, and as an audience member, it’s genuinely difficult to know which way to drop. On the one hand, you’ve got what we know, on the other you’ve got what Strange says will happen if things are altered. One thing’s for sure – the main plot line just got a whole lot more captivating.

Elsewhere, Jayna is trying to organise a coup which goes against everything she believes in and has striven for her entire life. But even as the Primus, she can’t do it alone and needs to bring in others to help achieve the goal. The sparks that fly between her and Daron are real, and there’s a little truth in the opinion of each about the other, which makes the barbs land all the more effectively.

Meanwhile, the object of their planning, the Voice of Rao, is acting a little oddly. Of course we saw the reason for that last week, but those around him are not so blessed. His interactions with Ohnna are particularly creepy from an audience perspective, as the little girl does her best to serve the will of her chosen god.

The course of a coup never runs smoothly: Jayna is forced to do even more distasteful things, as are those she has brought with her, and all the while everyone involved in this intrigue – which seemed oh so important last week – is unaware of the literally world-changing stuff that’s going on beneath their feet. As the episode closes, the whole game has been significantly changed, and it’s really not clear what might happen next.

Verdict: A barnstormer of an episode that blindsided me completely and suddenly makes sense of all the groundwork that the show has done up to this point. This one just shot way up in my estimation. 9/10

Greg D. Smith