In the wake of last week’s failed coup, Daron Vex is forced to make some painful choices. Lyta and Seg arrive back in Kandor to chaos, and news of Nyssa’s imprisonment and Jayna’s part in the coup attempt sends them each on their own rescue missions. Meanwhile, Adam Strange considers his fate as he waits for his way home to be fixed.

Fair to say that the last instalment of Krypton really upped the stakes. The revelation that Kandor’s Most Wanted is none other than General Zod himself, one of Superman’s greatest living enemies, certainly shook things up a bit, and brought screaming into focus the one part of Adam Strange’s plan that he’d forgotten to mention – that the preservation of the status quo and Superman as the universe’s greatest hero would mean the inevitable destruction of Krypton at some point.

This shook things up dramatically, because suddenly from the point of view of our protagonists, who do they believe in? A man who is their kin and blood, telling them he’s there to save the world? Or a stranger from the future who’s deliberately left out the bit where their entire planet is wiped out?

This week, the show wisely doesn’t dwell too much on that sort of philosophical conundrum, having covered it off last time out. Instead, it gets right on with the meat of current events, and what a lot there is to cover.

If you’ve ever wondered exactly what sort of man Daron Vex is (if last time out’s murder of his lover to cover his own tracks didn’t tell you) then this episode leaves you in no doubt. Confronted with the awful power of the thing now in control of the Voice of Rao (and having been apprehended trying to flee) he elects to throw in his lot with Brainiac’s agent, despite the very personal consequences. There’s also a bit of fleshing out of his own history, and while it does nothing to make you sympathise with the man or his choices, it does at least make you understand them, and make him more than a templated scheming villain.

On the other hand, if you think you know Nyssa Vex, this episode will likely surprise you in several ways. Yes, she’s a duplicitous, manipulative schemer (just like Daddy taught her to be) but there’s a lot more in there as well. Tough, resourceful, powerfully self-aware, there’s every chance that Nyssa Vex may well turn out to be one of the show’s standout characters, and not in the ways that I had originally expected.

It’s really an episode with the theme of character development running solidly through it, as various different protagonists find out a little more about one another, with some surprising revelations along the way. Even Adam Strange proves to be slightly less annoying this time out, as it seems less and less like he’s on some righteously appointed mission and more like he’s on some personal crusade, as much to redeem himself as to save the Man of Steel.

This being Krypton, as we hurtle (and I mean hurtle, this is a pacey instalment) it keeps throwing up surprises, and the ending is spectacular to say the least. Last week’s restraint in showing but not breaking out Doomsday has me hopeful that this one is racing towards a satisfying conclusion indeed.

Verdict: Slick, action-packed and revealing a surprising amount of depth, this even manages to get an MCU movie reference in without it feeling intrusive. Loving it. 9/10

Greg D. Smith