Supercorp (Kara/Lena)

undefined Supercorp is the non-canon femslash ship between Kara Danvers and Lena Luthor from the CW television series Supergirl.

Canon
Lena and Kara first meet in episode 1 of season 2 titled The Adventures of Supergirl. They quickly become friends eventually leading to becoming best friends. Kara is Lena's biggest supporter and defender. Lena bought Cat Co for Kara. And Kara flew to Paris, Milan and Dublin to buy her wife her favorite pastries.

Season 2
Kara meets Lena when she tags along Clark Kent to interview Lena about the Venture exploding. Although they don't exchange many words Kara is quick to consider Lena different from her brother Lex. Kara becomes the go-to CatCo reporter to cover the Lena Luthor and LCorp stories. Kara and Lena become friends with Kara defending and supporting Lena at every which way. Their friendship blooms into a best friendship; they have an easy chemistry and bond as two strong women in their working and personal lives.

Lena's relationship with the Luthors is antagonistic at best. With Kara's constant support Lena makes a quip that she's never had family like Kara before (i.e. people who love and support her), and Kara replies that she does now. When Lena faces the death of her ex Jack Spheer, Kara comforts her saying, "I will always be your friend. And I will always protect you. I promise."

When Lena is kidnapped by Rhea the Daxamite Queen, she is beside herself. She does everything in her power to rescue her best friend, including working with Lillian Luthor, Lena's adoptive mother. Lillian warns Supergirl that when Lena finds out her identity, it isn't going to end well for Kara; Lillian claims that Lena will hate Kara for having lied to her all this time. While aboard the Daxamite ship, Lena's smarts and technical prowess helps Kara board the ship to save her. When faced with the Daxamite invasion, Lena works with Supergirl (and Superman) to rid the Earth of the invaders. When face to face with Supergirl, Lena asks Supergirl if she knew that Kara Danvers was dating the Daxamite Prince seemingly worried that Kara would be hurt if he didnt survive. The question is brushed off as they fight to save Earth. In the end the Earth is saved with the help of Lena.

Season 3
In the beginning of the third season we see Lena reaching out to her best friend who has been keeping everyone at a distance after the forced departure of her boyfriend. We also see Lena presenting National City with a giant Supergirl statue in honor of the Super's heroics. When CatCo is at risk of being bought by tycoon Morgan Edge, Kara runs to Lena to tell her what's going on. Lena, being a go-getter, purchases the company out from under Edge. Kara is visibly shocked and amazed when Lena tells her that she bought it. Kara goes on to tell Lena that she quit her reporter job but Lena is quick to scold her telling her to unquit. Lena's plea for Kara to return to CatCo works as we then see Kara texting Lena that she'll "see you tomorrow boss" to which Lena replies back with a heart emoji thus gaining our first true Kara smile of the season.

With Lena now owning CatCo we find her being Kara's boss, something both she and Kara have to adapt to. The line between their friendship and work relationship is thin which leads to conflict when Kara rebuffs Lena's concern over Kara's wellbeing while also neglecting her work. Lena quickly puts Kara in her place as Lena's employee claiming that her buying CatCo was more than just helping her friend, that "I'm a business woman. And this is an investment. I plan to get out of it everything I can." Kara later realizes she was out of line and apologizes to Lena, telling her best friend about what's really going on with her; they make up and share a hug.

Lena supports Kara through her heartbreak and the best friends become closer than ever, all while balancing a new work relationship on top of their friendship. We see Lena once again becoming overly worried about being a Luthor; she belives that she is destined for evil or — at the very least — to always carry the burden of her family's nefarious history in both her work and personal life. Lena confides her worries and doubts in Kara to which Kara adamantly thwarts. Following Lena's accusation of poisoning children by Edge, Lena finds herself in something of a family unit with Kara, Sam and Alex, always standing by each other and supporting each other to no end.

The relationship between Kara and Lena becomes a bit strained during Sam's time as Reign. After discovering that Lena has been hiding Reign in the LCorp labs and subduing her with kryptonite, Kara becomes wary and suspicious of Lena. Kara asks James to break into LCorp to find out if Lena in fact no longer had kryptonite to which James doesn't do but lies to Kara saying he checked; James then tells Lena what Supergirl asked him to do. Learning that Supergirl did this, Lena becomes increasingly distrustful of Supergirl and tells her so. Supergirl tries to make amends and apologizes for doing such a thing claiming she hopes it doesn't hurt their friendship to which Lena says they have no friendship. Supergirl is crushed. Lena also tells off Supergirl for her double standards regarding trust. The strain on Lena and Supergirl's relationship takes its toll on Kara who remains adamant in hiding her identity from Lena to protect her.

Season Four
In the beginning of season four, Lena returns from Metropolis, after visiting Sam. Lena helps Supergirl find Mercy and Otis Graves. Lena also betrays her adoptive mother. Supercorp scenes decline, but we do get a gym class with Lena and Kara. It doesn't last long though because Kara is pulled away to be Supergirl. Lex Luthor fakes being sick to get Lena's attention. At the end of the episode, he leaves her unconscious. The red daughter reads and meets Lena, but Lena thinks it is Kara. During the scene, Eve gets Lena to leave and then forces the Red Daughter to leave as well. Lena also finds out about how Eve LOVES Lex. To get more information, Alex, Supergirl and Lena go to Eve's aunts house. Eve's cousin was there and told them that she hadn't seen her for "months". Supergirl could hear her heartbeat and they all detected the lie. It was revealed that Eve's cousin had cancer and was in hospice. Lena and Supergirl argue about Lena's research and studies per usual. Supergirl apologized and per usual Lena was right.

Fandom Reaction
The ship quickly grew in popularity among fans. The fandom has produced hundreds of pieces of fan art as well as thousands of fanfiction stories. In December 2017, the fandom began work on a fan zine. More than 30 artists took part in contributing to the zine and over 270 copies of the zine were ordered. Over four thousand dollars in proceeds were donated to the Trevor Project.

Fanfiction
Supergirl in Training

The Fifth Wall

My Youth is Yours

Let Me Be Your Ruler

Stay the Night

Fan Art
Tumblr tag

Achievements
Most popular femslash ship on Tumblr 2017

6th most popular ship on Tumblr 2017

Featured in the New York Times

Hypable's 2017 Ship of the Year

CarterMatt's 2017 Ship of the Year

Runners-Up of Zimbio's 2018 TV Couples March Madness Challenge

Katie McGrath
"Who did I hear it from…? I couldn’t even tell you…. I think it was Melissa, actually, who first told me. I’ve played quite a few characters that have either been gay or they’ve had, you know, some very obvious gay undertones, and to be completely honest, this was the first time I was like, “Well, this role doesn’t have any!” You’re laughing now — how naive was I? And then after the first episode… I go back and I watch and I was like, “Oh, yeah, now I can see it. That makes sense to me.”"

- Katie McGrath, TVLine

"“The great thing about what we do is, like any art, anybody can read into it what they want and take from it, so you can see anything and take from it what you like. And that’s what’s great about this show. There are so many different ways to see everything. And if that’s what you see in it, you know, take it away. It’s art.”"

- Katie McGrath, SDCC 2017

Melissa Benoist
"“I think Luthor and Super relationships are always the most interesting stories in a Super comic,” Benoist shared. “I think, especially with Lena and Kara and how close they are, how they relate to each other as women, what they’ve been through with their families, what they’ve lost, is a really strong foundation for that connection. So I’m excited to see where it goes. It’s precarious, too. It’s kind of teetering on a really small ledge.”"

- Melissa Benoist, SDCC 2017 "“Lena and Kara have such an awesome relationship. I love the scenes with Katie McGrath, she is awesome and perfect in that part... — There is a true friendship there and a mutual respect.”"

- Melissa Benoist, TV Line

SDCC 2017
In 2017, an MTV video titled "The CW's 'Supergirl' Cast Musical Recap of Season 2" gained controversy in the Supergirl fandom due to the cast's disregard for the Supercorp ship. At one point during the video, Jeremy Jordan, who portrays Winn Schott, sang about how Kara met Lena Luthor, a "new friend". Melissa Benoist, who portrays Supergirl, immediately chimed in by singing "her girlfriend", that is until she heard Jordan singing "They’re only friends! They’re only friends! They’re not gonna get together! They’re only friends". The cast quickly laughed it off and continued on with their song.

Katie McGrath, who portrays Lena Luthor, went on to vocally show her support for the ship (and ships in general) right after the song ended: "“The great thing about what we do is, like any art, anybody can read into it what they want and take from it, so you can see anything and take from it what you like. And that’s what’s great about this show. There are so many different ways to see everything. And if that’s what you see in it, you know, take it away. It’s art.”"The video gained largely negative reactions from fans and media outlets alike. Many of them stated that the song and some of the casts' actions in playing along was "homophobic" as it purposely targeted the femslash fanbase and LGBTQ+ representation. In response, Jeremy Jordan posted a 2-part apology on his Instagram. "'I'm going to try and be better. I'm gonna make mistakes. I want to tell every one of you I'm sorry [that] I hurt you. I would go back in time and redo my recap if I could... I realize the issue of homophobia is bigger than any note I could ever write... All I can do is be better.' - Jeremy Jordan"

Ship name
The most popular ship name for the pairing is Supercorp. It is a portmanteau of the word Super from Supergirl and Corp from Luthor Corp. To a lesser extent, the portmanteau Karlena is also used as a ship name.