With most of the difficult world-establishing work of a pilot out of the way, Krypton can now start to stretch its legs, in episode 2: House of El. (BEWARE! SPOILERS!)
The episode kicks off pretty much where the pilot left off, and so there is still some fleshing out of the main premise and how the show will move forward. Principally, this is seen in the discovery by Seg-El (Cameron Cuffe) that his blood activates the technology in the Fortress of Solitude, revealing a projection of his grandfather Val-El (Ian McElhinney), that he can learn from; this is done in the similar style to how we’ve seen it in Smallville, where Clark is guided by Jor-El, and in Supergirl, where Kara has Alura Zor-El.

KRYPTON — “House of El” Episode 102 — Pictured: (l-r) Cameron Cuffe as Seg-El, Shaun Sipos as Adam Strange, Rasmus Hardiker as Kem — (Photo by: Steffan Hill/Syfy)
Other key elements that begin to fall into place include Adam Strange (Shaun Sipos) working with Seg’s friend Kem (Rasmus Hardiker), in what will no doubt become ‘Team Seg’, and the further explanation of Nyssa-Vex’s (Wallis Day) motivations, showing she is much more political and calculated than previous mentioned. Along with his ‘illicit romance’ with Lyta-Zod (Georgina Campbell), the setup is quite a familiar one and slightly cliché. If you took out the Superman elements and re-set this drama in the modern day setting, it wouldn’t feel too odd; we’ve seen main protagonist setups of: a romance with the enemy, living with the enemy, and fighting back with a secret team, before! What makes some of this palatable, and not seem too formulaic is the familiarity of the Superman mythology overlaid on top.
Some of the initial plot lines in this episode also seem quite ‘stock’; we get a rather half-hearted revenge story for example, which is quickly sidelined, and isn’t very effective anyway, as we know it’s not going to happen. Similarly, there is a duel between Lyta and her squad commander (Gordon Alexander), which is put in there to advance Lyta’s position on the pretext that she’s fighting to protect the rankless, but it comes off as more of a premise/plot building move, than proper character development.

KRYPTON — “House of El” Episode 102 — Pictured: (l-r) Georgina Campbell as Lyta-Zod, Ann Ogbomo as Alura — (Photo by: Steffan Hill/Syfy)
With both Seg’s revenge plotline and Lyta’s duel, it feels like there was more to be explored in the characters, both in terms of their emotion, but also their motivations for their actions. The reasons given for the sequence of events in each case, seemed a little too thin and not portrayed with as much sincerity as they could have been; while I believe that they were genuinely the correct actions for those characters, there wasn’t a true sense of their passion or anguish driving them forward.

KRYPTON — “House of El” Episode 102 — Pictured: Wallis Day as Nyssa-Vex — (Photo by: Steffan Hill/Syfy)
One of the good pairings so far is Kem and Adam, who have quite a good dynamic, and seem to be working well, but we don’t know enough about either character yet to fully assess how well this will work in the long term. They could prove to be a good grounding for Seg, and be a good touchstone to the realism in the rankless areas, after he’s been in the upper echelons of the city. Equally, the character of Nyssa could well prove to be one that can expand and develop into a pivotal role, as after a relatively simple introduction in the pilot, has shown much more depth and complexity. Wallis Day is definitely giving us a bit of a spark in these stages of the series.
Aesthetically, the show is making me think of it as a darker version of 2007s Flash Gordon series (the Eric Johnson one), and it has some of the same tones in terms of characters and action. To me, Seg has the feel of a entitled jock that is suddenly thrust into a strange situation, much like Flash, and there needs to be a bit more depth to him, if we are to believe that he will step into his grandfather’s shoes and save the day.

KRYPTON — “House of El” Episode 102 — Pictured: (l-r) Wallis Day as Nyssa-Vex, Blake Ritson as Brainiac, Elliot Cowan as Daron-Vex — (Photo by: Steffan Hill/Syfy)
While this episode wasn’t as solid as the pilot, and seemed to tread water a little, there is some promise in there. With a couple of characters already showing more depth and the existence of several interesting mysteries to solve, including the background of the ‘Voice of Rao’, there are clear areas of interest where the story could go. It is early days though, and no show (except probably the West Wing) has ever come out of the box firing on all cylinders. It has time to grow, and there is enough there to give it that time.