so i finally caught up on the supergirl episodes before crisis and will be giving my thoughts and feelings on how the whole supercorp situation was handled
first of all, i keep thinking about how it took lena months to tell kara she knew about supergirl, which she justified a number of times throughout the season: she wanted to make kara hurt like she hurt, she was able to use kara this way, yadda yadda. but if you watch her interactions with the superfriends during that time, you see her smile so often. like she’s treasuring every little moment with her whole heart. almost like she’s trying memorize every bit, preparing for a goodbye that she keeps postponing.
because yeah, kara may have lied to her, but deep down, lena knows kara loves her. she can’t trust kara, but she can trust her love and it’s shown time and time again by how comfortable she is with putting herself in harm’s way (literally jumping off a cliff a second after she used the watch, for example). and that’s already so different from anything she’s ever known, because even with relationships that mattered to lena, she used to be the protector (i.e with andrea or pre-supergirl kara). so hell yeah she wanted to enjoy some of that. she had the opportunity to feel kara’s love at 100% for the first time, and she took it. to actually feel like a hero when her best friend in the world chose to work with her to take down bad guys.
lena could tell herself whatever she wanted about how strategically beneficial it would be to pretend like nothing had changed (and she definitely took advantage of that), but i think her driving force was way simpler: she wasn’t ready to let kara go.
even in the fortress, you see her trying to take myriad behind kara’s back - which is so damn stupid because obviously kara would notice, but she tried. because i think a part of her still was putting off the inevitability of what was going to happen once kara found out the truth. lena was living in denial for way longer than just s5, and i think she wasn’t ready to give that up.
another thought: the episode showing the source of lena’s distrust was very eye-opening, but my favorite part is the fact that she used to have another very intense female friendship before kara. sapphic women know how this is: monogamic intense friendships whose end always break you. lena had a boyfriend, but she didn’t hesitate to say that andrea was the person she’d loved most, the one she would have done anything for. and don’t get me wrong, i’m all for girl power and friendship, but if there’s one thing life has taught me it’s that no matter how intense your friendship is, a straight girl will always end up loving her eventual boyfriend more. not because she’s evil, but because romantic love is just too maddening.
if i’m being honest, i’m not sure what kind of a read to get on kara. but lena, that’s a girl in love.
a girl in love with the person who gave her everything when she had nothing, who gave her a family, who gave her hope, who gave her the chance to be blindingly loyal once again. and who took that all away because once again, it seemed like lena cared more about her than she did about lena. and there’s not much that’s more heartbreaking than that.
let me make myself clear: this is a theory and basically a rambling trip i have gone on based on what i’ve seen in the sapphic community and what i have experienced. it means nothing more than that, so if you don’t agree, feel free to just ignore it, because i don’t feel like arguing with anyone over a television series.