…because apparently the recording heads on my VCR needed cleaning and I didn’t realize it. So when I came home from my bowling league and kicked back with the tape my loving wife made for me, I got regular snow on the screen every five seconds. It was like trying to watch it through a blizzard. Tracking adjustments didn’t help and switching decks didn’t help; it was in the tape. I tried to push past it, but after three minutes I couldn’t take it anymore because it was just so dámņëd distracting.
So I’m interested in what you all thought of it, but me…I got nothin’.
PAD
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Without spoiling it, I actually enjoyed Birds of Prey. Felt it was a good introduction into a series that really needed a good deal of explaination to the viewers.
So how’d you bowl?
I’m kind of in the same boat, but not as bad (I’m in the boat, you’re hanging onto the gunnels?). I was out seeing Red Dragon, and my wife taped Birds of Prey for me. But in my case it was a good tape, I just haven’t watched all of it yet. I saw the last 15 minutes, and then the first 5 or so. What I saw wasn’t painful, and my wife actually thought it was pretty good. A little cheesy maybe, but good. It definitely has potential.
BTW, I quite enjoyed Red Dragon, but I’m not sure it’s better than Manhunter. Manhunter had a better director, and Red Dragon has a better cast (but both William Peterson and Edward Norton are great in the role).
BIRDS OF PREY…
I enjoyed it but had a few bones. 1) PLEASE, WB, stop with the soundtracks!!! The ending was ruined by the song. I have nothing against the song, and though the words fit, the music did not. 2) I understand that when you have a beautiful cast, you want them to be seen. But why is Huntress walking around without a mask? It’s not as though she wears glasses during the day or anything. 3) The metahuman thing didn’t appeal to me. I always liked Batman because the characters (most of them) were ordinary people who worked their áššëš off to achieve their “super” abilities. With Huntress having cat powers, which I assume she got from Mom, it takes away the “I can do that if I work hard” that younger viewers might say and replace it with “well, I can’t be good like her, I’m only human.”
Otherwise, I liked it well enough. And the revelation at the end shocked me.
Bill
I liked it, the 10 minute or so intro to give the backstory was nice for those that didn’t know anything of the characters and pointed out the changes for the people that do know thier basis in comics.
I agree that the song at the end just doesn’t fit, musically. I think it needs to have a little heavier/darker tone to it, like the Batman TAS music possibly.
Little cheeze, a few good one-liners, overall a good intro to the series. I’ll tune in next week again, and fight the wife about watching “Amazing Race” again…..
jeff
Maybe your VCR was just trying to save from wasting your time. I watched it and I really wanted to like it, but I just didn’t. It was a bunch of bad acting wrapped up in bunch of corn. Huntress’s costume was nothing but lingerie, and while that’s really nothing different from some comic-book heroines, is she supposed to be protecting a secret identity? If not, then why didn’t she just tell the guy that she was there to protect him? The saving graces? Oracle and Huntress were hot; the scenes with the Batman, Batgirl and Catwoman in costume, the quick reference to Smallville. They aren’t enough to get me to watch next week, though.
Rob R.
Birds of Prey is my favorite non-pad comic book [i’m not sucking up]
I enjoyed the show. Unlike everyone i know, i don’t mind the differences in the characters. There’s comic book “universe” and “tv land” universe.
I too feel that the soundtrack is “less than perfect” but can i blame WB! for trying to promote artists on their label?
Were we all watching the same show? I thought it was awful – one of the worst programs I’ve ever seen. Huntress, who’s now the lead instead of Black Canaray, doesn’t wear a mask (so why doesn’t the cop who sees her just put out an APB for someone fitting that description?) and is now a “metahuman” a point brought up but never explained in the show. How does a supposedly normal Batman and Catwoman produce a superpowered offspring who has cat eyes and can jump halfway up buildings? (Besides I hate that pre-Crisis origin of Huntress. She’s much more interesting as the mobster’s daughter.) Let’s not forget that Dinah Lance is now the token WB teenager with psychic powers! Even if you ignore the variations and focus on the show’s own merits, it’s pretty bad. The villain was generic and poorly explained. The only highpoint was seeing a filmed version of The Killing Joke Batgirl scene.
BIRDS OF NAY
I don’t understand why a show like this can’t just follow the source material (i.e., be just like the comic). Oh, wait. I just figured it out. Because it WOULDN’T WORK if they made it just like the comic book. Who would care about the Huntress if she wasn’t Batman’s daughter and wasn’t a meta-human (gag)? Nobody would. There wouldn’t be a reason to. So, you gotta change everything to make it work.
I also agree that the Huntress should be wearing a mask. The presence of a mask and the lack of “meta-human” powers would make this show “feel” more like Batman. The way it is now, only makes it feel like a cheap knockoff. I’m not very familiar with the Black Canary’s powers, but I’m pretty sure they changed Dinah’s character up a bit, too. Is the Canary telepathic? Are they ever going to call this character Black Canary? If they do, what would be their reasoning for it? Which brings me back to my original point. If you have to radically change a comic (like they did this one) to make a tv show, what’s the point?
The only things that would make this show watchable for me (besides the babe factor involved) would be the continued use of Mark Hamill as the Joker’s voice, and the fact that I totally bought Dina Meyer as Oracle. Two fabulous casting choices. Unfortunately, I don’t expect to be seeing much of the Joker in the future.
Oh. One more criticism. Batman leaving Gotham. Temporarily, to re-group? Sure. We’ve seen it happen a few times. But leave for 7 years with no sign of coming back? Please… Batman is Gotham.
I look forward to having one less hour of television to watch a week.
I enjoyed BoP, even though I don’t necessarily agree with some of the changes they made to the characters, outside of Oracle. The toughest thing for me was Mia Sara…she’s gotten so mature..
When i saw the title of the post, I thought that’s what you thought of the show and I was harsher than I thought but yeah didn’t like it.
SPOILERS for those whop don’t want to know what happened
The alfred narration in the beginning was clunky and what made it worse is that it was totally unnneccesary by the plot of the story. Helena explains part of it to her psychiatrist, and Oracle explains the rest to Dinah. So we got part of the backstory repeated three times. very annoying.
I also realise that they are expanding the audience past those who are familiar with batman, but the very first villain out of the box was seemed to have the power to make people see what they most fear. (the first two victims dived out of building and ran in front of a bus respectively trying to get away from their biggest fear.) Anyway Oracle looks through her database to find a metahuman who has that power and she comes up with NOTHING. Iactually yelled at the TV at this point ‘Hello Scarecrow!” even if they just added a toss away line that it couldn’t be him, at least acknowledge the history.
of course that power seems to change slightly, beccause the 3rd hangs himself. (of course he must have used an invisible stepladder because he was hanging 5 feet abov
PAD: If you don’t know anyone locally who taped the show I would be glad to make a copy and send it to you.
SPOILER ALERT!
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AS for what I thought of the show, I didn’t think that it sucked like so many people were afraid that it would. It still needs a lot of work though.
First thing that has to change is the Huntress’ costume. Yikes! She looked like a cross between a Fredericks of Hollywood model and Ziggy Stardust. I liked the corset but the “cape” either needs work or has to go.
Secondly, I did have a little trouble disassociating Dinah Lance from her comic book predecessor. I kept waiting for her to do a martial kick or open up with her canary cry. I think that with time and a little effort I can get past this issue.
Thirdly, Barbara and Helena made an issue of them having secret ids and then Helena goes and lets the cop see her face. Judging from the preview for next week she doesn’t seem too concerned about it though. If she’s trying to maintain a secret ID she needs a mask!
Mia Sara looked HORRIBLE with the chopped blonde hair. She seemed to do ok with what little parts she had in the episode so I’ll have to wait and see how she handles the mania of Harley Quinn in future episodes.
I liked Alfred. Since they didn’t mess with his character he was easy to connect with. The look and feel of New Gotham was well done. Not quite the art deco style of TAS and not the gothic feel of the comics and movies but still gritty enough to be a little scary.
I also didn’t understand how “the scarecrow’s” mind was destroyed in the final battle when his fear was chemically induced. At least I assume they were. They kind of insinuated as much when they zoomed in on the coffee cup in Helena’s hand.
All in all I liked the show. Probably a 6 or 6.5. It showed enough promise to bring me back next week.
Fazhoul
Fazhoul
All in all not a bad start for the show. It needs a little work here and there.
You know when your biggest criticisms of a show come down to things like, it doesn’t follow the same history as the comicbook or “I don’t like metahumans” well you’re really picking at nits.
Though they do seem to be digging themselves in a little with the lack of mask given that they clearly indicated Huntress is supposed to have a secret identity.
Still considering what the show had to do, it hits most of the basis. The fights need a little more work, but they set up the scenario, gave us a major villain, established basic personalities for the three leads and gave us at least a moderately interesting villain for the first episode. Not too shabby really.
Here’s another No vote. Even if we discount all the things that “purists” will say the writers got wrong with the Bat-mythos, it was still a poorly acted, poorly written show. By comparision, the premiere of “Smallville” was merely OK to me but had Michael Rosenbaum and made me want to see if the potential inherent in the premise would become real. Here, I feel like the potential is already buried.
Most of my criticism is the same as above, but I will just ask why TPTB on this show couldn’t have stuck with the comic book version of Canary instead of creating this weird Huntress/Canary/Dark Angel/Buffy hybrid?
Odds are, though, that it gets one more wekk to grab. Blind loyalty to comic book adaptations, I guess. But after Smallville and Spider-Man (not to mention B:TAS and Batman Beyond and even the first two Bat-films), we can do better than this.
Okay, you may be sorry you asked…
Overall: It was better than I thought it would be, and I noticed some of the stuff which annoyed me from the promo was absent, yay!
The Good: Dina Meyer and Rachel Skarsden as Oracle and Canary. Bab’s chair. Dayum that’s cool! Mia Sara as Harleen rocks my socks. She even got a bit of Arleen Sorkin going in that last scene, and was way creepier than Sherilyn Fenn was in the same scene. Ashley as Helena was nowhere near as bad as I remembered her being from the promotional materials. Yay Ashley for being a better actress than the promotional materials made her out to be.
The Bad: The re-shoots were kinda obvious due to differing hair lengths. Reese is 2-dimensional and boring–we’ve already seen characters exactly like him before and NOTHING made him stand out for me from the legion of cop love interests/sidekicks on shows like the dreaded “Charmed” or “Highlander: The Raven.”
The Ugly: No more klunky Alfred-narrated saga cells EVER. I almost turned the dámņ thing off before Act I got going. That made the narration at the beginning of “Dark City” look like graceful storytelling by comparison. Huntress in motorcycle leathers makes more sense than Huntress in Fredericks of Hollywood. They need to change her look fast, or I shall be PÍSSÊÐ (tho the promo for next week gives me much hope. Fighting crime in a bustier is stupid). And Helena has known Babs all her life, but never knew Brucie/Bats was daddy? Hello, continuity? Wherefore art thou? His name is BRUCE. If you’re allowed to say “Batman” thanks to licensing, then let Barbara call him Bruce for pete’s sake, because the voice over over her flashback was awkward, melodramatic, and stuck out like a sore thumb. Not to mention, made my brain hurt. They need to lose the cat growl sound effect RIGHT NOW because it is lame, lame, lame. I can handle Selina in the BoP-verse being a meta-human, even tho that takes away the very thing that made her (and Bats) cool–namely, that she was a normal non-superpowered human doing all this stuff. Fine. Wanna cash in on the popularity of Marvel mutants? Fine. But the sound effect? Lame. And also? Lame. And I feel the need to add… Lame.
Why does everyone assume that because Helena is a meta-human that Selena had to be one? Did I miss something?
Well, the official WB website does say Huntress inherited her mother’s metahuman powers. I’m assuming that’s something of a lift from the Burton movies.
Peter:
I’ve got a screener copy of BOP from the network I can send you (along with that other stuff you wanted)… just let me know…
I personally enjoyed the show… it’s got definite potential…
Fenn
I know this is giving the show the gift od slack, but I want to like it, so:
If I were a really accomplished cat burgler (pun unavoidable) AND I lived in a world in which secret scientific bases routinely worked on projects designed to give people meta-human powers AND I had fought people with that sort of edge, then… I suppose I might sneak around and see what I could find to give myself (or my daughter) that edge. Especially if I (and the secret father) had legions of enemies.
So much justification, I know…
All in all, it was okay. Not nearly as bad as it could have been (but, of course, not nearly as GOOD as it could have been). Losing the cat sounds and the cat eyes would give it an immediate boost in my eyes. Someone over there really likes Mutant-X…
I liked some of the look, took the narration as a necessary evil (not everyone knows the back story like I do), look forward to more of Mia Sara and am thrilled to see Oracle (a great character) on television. I’d like a little less attitude, and a mask for the Huntress, as well as more appropriate dress for crime-fighting (though I am not opposed to revealing clothing in all the other scenes).
I will give it a few more weeks (which seems to be a theme for me this season).
>>How does a supposedly normal Batman and Catwoman produce a superpowered offspring who has cat eyes and can jump halfway up buildings?<<
Well, Batman is and always will be Batman, but Catwoman is elastic enough that one can always claim that, in this continuity, she had cat eyes and could jump halfway up buildings.
PAD
What? Miss The West Wing for “The DC T&A Hour”? I don’t think so.
JSM
Warning: Contains Some Spoilers…
As I watched, I cringed more at scenes I figured would rile the comic community than those scenes on their own merit. Suppose it’s my being tired of the returning “why do they have to do that/change that, etc” moans that always plague adaptations. As a program, I thought it worked in more areas than it did not, in some cases improving on a quality comic.
Improvements:
BoP TV is more tightly woven in Gotham, whereas the comic seems to wander across time and country. BoP TV has created nice mood and atmosphere for Gotham, and has taken a good character concept and wrapped it with a powerful setting. The comic by comparison has always lacked a playground for its characters.
Using the Huntress. DC’s recent Huntress incarnation is a fairly solid character screaming for more use (Huntress/Batman is an excellent miniseries). BoP is a perfect place for Huntress to grow. Although the meta-power was occassionally distracting, it does provide some nice scenes of Huntress leaping around the city (Joe Six-Pack viewer may have an easier time suspending belief to allow her to leap off a balcony 10 stories if she is SUPER powered rather than simply really, really, really athletic).
Of course, I could see the problems with using the Huntress: the comics version is not as easy a sell to general audiences. Batman’s daughter adds come immediate depth, and helps for MTV-quick understanding. Further, Dinah Lance (not yet named Black Canary in BoP TV) would be too similar to Huntress in many respects. The mental part gives Dinah a unique quality, so I don’t mind that power so much with Huntess present. And the character is young, so the writers COULD evolve her to be the comic-fan Canary. I just hope she avoids the name Black Canary in the incarnation – unless Canaries are known for the psi-skills.
The greatest problem I see is the BoP TV trying to respect character history. The villain’s ties to Helena’s history was as much plot device as plot hole, as was the Bat-mythos. The villain’s change in villainous “power” was also abrupt (was he Scarecrow, mostly Scarecrow, just not thought out, or did I bring too much comic fan info with me?). Batman’s non-presence presiding over the show. He is so not present to the point of distraction (the itch you can’t find).
For any of its failing on comic lore, it seems to have the foundation built to gain the same degree of acceptance as a Buffy or Angel, presuming WB gives BoP enough time to fly. That said, I hope the wives and girlfriends of us males found understanding an enjoyment enough to watch the series, even it doesn’t mean they’ll be comic converts. The first post in this thread suggested that type of acceptance – and that is good to hear.
I’ve seen some comments, I think over at tvguide.com, from Ashley Scott that indicate they’ll be changing her outfit within a few episodes; apparently there were real problems in terms of doing the acrobatic moves in it.
As for skipping the West Wing for BoP, my take is that West Wing is sure to last the season and have reruns. BoP doesn’t have that assurance yet (although I certainly wish that the same week reruns on Sunday at 5-7pm block that the WB is doing this year paired Smallville and BoP rather than Smallville and Everwood. Heck, I’d rather it was the all estrogen block with Gilmore Girls and BoP, since nothing I’m interested in is up against Smallville while Buffy trumps Gilmore Girls for me).
Overall, BoP gets an “eh” from the first episode. I think how the show will go is going to be very heavily dependent on the “big bad” uberplot and whether it affects the lead characters more than just a Joker minion of the week being introed and defeated.
Spoilers….
OK, I also have a problem with Batman leaving Gotham…particularly since from what we were told/shown, the Joker is still at large. And if Batman and Mr. J’s “final, climactic battle” resulted in Batman winning, I’d hate to see what would’ve happened if he lost. I mean, he won, and the result *immediately after the battle* is that Catwoman is assassinated, the Joker cripples Batgirl, and the Joker apparently escapes completely. Um, yeah, that was a major victory all right…
I put the over/under for a guest appearance by a former Robin (note Babs comment about Batman having had “many” proteges allowing for multiple Robins) at 13 episodes.
As mentioned, I think where the show goes with the Harley big bad uberplot will determine if the show’s a Buffy or a Charmed. What I see as having some potential would be for Harley to know that Helena is Batman’s daughter and the Huntress, and be manipulating her to move her over to Harley’s side, creating some real conflict between Helena and Babs. Problem there is that Helena knows the Joker was responsible for her mother’s death, and so is unlikely to join his side; “Helena, I killed your mother” works a lot worse that “Luke, I am your father” in that regard.
Hey, how about those commercials for the upcoming epiosde of Charmed? The Charmed Ones sure look yummy in their ‘super-hero’ costumes, huh?
Oh, as for BoP show, I thought it was so-so at best. They need to lose the cheesey cat’s growl sound effect when the Huntress starts to fight. (Or maybe that part of her meta-human ability?)
I’d like to say all to all the those people that didn’t like Birds of Prey. Get a life. Its not the comic book. All they did was take and the name and the characters and made them their own. I for one i liked it. I thought it was really good show. I think if the Wb knows whats good for them they will Move Birds of Prey to Tuesdays before Smallville it would a great lean in. I thought the story was good the characters good. Yes I get the whole Secret Id thing with Huntress. I think she really doesn’t care about the whole secret id thing personally whats why she has no mask.
With the same production team as Smallville, you would think that Birds of Prey would live up to the standards. It doesn’t. Who came up with the telepathic teen as a replacement for Black Canary? I’m a fan of the comic and to radically change a character with the history of BC is wrong. Despite that personal note the acting was ham fisted, the story had holes the size of the cool billboards promoting the show. It’s the Scarecrow, duh.
I don’t know if it will hold my interest, but I’ll watch next week to see if the bad episode was done just to get new fans on board.
to Chuck above:
While you may think that it would be a great lead-in to Smallville, I doubt the network programmers would think so… GILMORE GIRLS is a ratings powerhouse there… bad pun intended, it slays Buffy in the ratings on a regular basis, and is usually HIGHER-rated than Smallville…
Add in the fact that GG is also a great show, and it won’t be moved… besides, any network would prefer a proven performers as a lead-in… BOP is still an untested commodity, even though last nights overnight ratings were pretty good…
Fenn
There are many comments about Birds of Prey not being a true comicbook adaptation. I’m thankful for that. How many years of back history would have to be condenced to make it feasable- and for how many charaters. Take Scarecrow and Harliquen, for a small example.
What the show did was introduce an alternative universe setting for Birds of Prey, including maybe a new member. It got in there, showed us who these people were in broad strokes, introduced us to Gotham, and maybe a villianess and then got out. It’s goal was to attract the Smallville type viewers, people who really don’t know that much about the comic book itself such as my brother in law and myself. It did it’s job.
On a scale of writer talent, be very grateful they didn’t pull in people from Charmed (the real T & A show on WB) or 7th Heaven.
I think I’m like most posters, it wasn’t bad, but could use a bit of tweeking. Dina Meyer is bang on as Batgirl/Oracle, the chick who played Huntress was good, but the Black Canary character sucked big time! Why on earth the producers decided to make the Canary so far removed from her comic roots is beyond me. I want see the sonic scream, the martial arts, the blonde wig, and of course the fishnet stockings!
By the way, one poster had wonder why the producers changed the Huntress to Batman’s daughter, and again drastically changed the TV character from the comics. The truth is that the producers returned the Huntress to her TRUE comic roots. Before the 1986 Crisis on Infinite Earths, the Huntress was indeed the daughter of the Earth 2 Batman and Catwoman. She was also an active member of the JSA, and later Infinity Inc. She was part of the next generation of superheroes, which makes for interesting comics.
The new mafia daughter Huntress that’s in the comics these days makes me ill. She is a generic character within the current Batman mythos who is not even a tenth interesting as the 70’s Huntress.
I applaud the producers for this bit a retro-continuity restoration and knod to us longtime comic readers. I guess the trade off is that we get a Black Canary that resembles the Legion’s Dream Girl more than Green Arrow’s girlfriend.
Well, I thought it was okay. There was definitely some cheese there, but less than I expected.
I’ll give it a few weeks before I pass judgement.
Hopefully this show will find it’s wings, uh, no pun intended.
Bobby
Well, I liked it. For the most part. The flashback sequences were very nice, especially the “Batman and Batgirl vs. the Joker” sequence near the end. Dina Meyer is good as Barbara/Batgirl/Oracle, but I’m not sure I like the teacher-bit. It’s been made clear in the comics that Barbara “acquired” her ability to be Oracle pretty much full-time by hacking into criminals’ bank accounts, so I’m not sure where the teacher-bit fits–outside of giving her a way to keep tabs on Dinah. I like Ashley Scott as the Huntress, but like most posters here, I don’t like the costume (which will be changing) and I think she needs to hide her identity a bit better. According to the Gotham Clocktower website, Dinah may not be the Black Canary, and her mother will be showing up later in the season with a secret. So, I liked it, but like most pilot episodes, it has some room for improvement.
I hated the narration, and while Mia Sara does look more the part of Harley Quinn, I’m too big a fan of Sherilyn Fenn to prefer Mia.
I preferred the unaired version without Alfred’s awful narration, and with Fenn as Quinzel. I also thought the choice of music for the beginning and end was poor, and Huntress not wearing a mask was stupid.
Peter, if you want a copy of the unaired version, let me know. If you have AIM, I can transfer it to you, or I can mail a copy of it on disc.
I like Birds of Prey. Was it perfect, no. Is there room for improvement, yes. I and willing to continue watching and see what developes. I think the story needed to be a two hour one. There was to much information that needed to given in for a first episode.
This is only the first episode. I sure the producers will make changes to make the show better. I recently purchased Star Trek: The Next Generation, season 1 on DVD. Watching it I realized how bad that season was. In later seasons changes were made and the show was better for it.
It was pretty good. I don’t know why everyone was disturbed by the changes. It was pretty well known that all these changes were coming.
The cat growl from Huntress has got to go.
Mia Sara looks terrible, and I’m not really sold on the idea of Harley Quinn as “The Big Bad.”
Dina Meyer was spot on as Oracle.
Ashley Scott was fine as Huntress, though the costume was pretty lame.
I like the idea of the Dinah character, but if you think about it, minus the psychic powers, she’s more Spoiler than Dinah Lance.
I think the show has potential, I’ll be checking out the show as it continues its run.
I thought the show was mediocre at best. Dina Meyer was good as Batgirl/Oracle. However For this show to work, You have to accept that Batman and Green Arrow would be dumb enough not to know they have daughters. Also why not just have Mark Hamill play the Joker instead of just his voice?
While this is as subject to change as the sales rankings of a comic’s #1 issue to its #2 issue, here’s what tvguide.com had to say about the Wednesday 9pm ratings for this week:
“…among adults 18-49, ABC’s match-making reality series The Bachelor beat West Wing by 31 percent. (WW prevailed among total viewers 15.7 million to 12.8 million, but still.) The WB’s new drama Birds of Prey, meanwhile, had a rockin’ debut. The show attracted 7.6 million viewers and helped the network finish second for the night among adults 18-34.”
Hmm. Maybe there could be a trade between West Wing and BoP such that we end up with a show starring Oracle, CJ, and Donna, under the direction of Dr. Abby Bartlet? At least from this male’s perspective, that’d beat the eye candy of The Bachelor and the lesser Birds all hollow. 🙂
I endorse most of the negative comments about BoP. Even discounting the “it’s not true to the comic!” faults I found it pretty unwatchable, reaching for something to read several times during the program.
In addition to the other criticisms, did anyone find Dinah’s “power” too similar to that exhibited in The Dead Zone? I thought it was quite a ripoff, myself.
Brad
Well, I taped Birds of Prey while I was in the midst of other household chores. I haven’t had time to really sit down and watch it yet.
One thing that strikes me as odd, though. I’d say Oracle, Huntress and Black Canary are about three of the easiest characters to translate from comics to TV.
They don’t look strange… they don’t have superpowers requiring expensive special effects… each one is a character with a well defined down-to-earth background…
The costumes are also pretty easy. Maybe some minor modifications would be necessary — say, swapping Dinah’s fishnets or bare legs for tight pants, swapping Huntress’ mask for night goggles — that sort of thing.
So why didn’t the production company use any of those background or character traits? At what point do you make so many changes that it’s no longer the same character? And if you’re dancing so close to that point anyway, why not just make up your own characters and do your own show?
I’m not calling for anyone’s head or anything. It just seems to me that adding extra layers of complication to characters that are already fully-formed is kind of an odd way to approach a show like this.
While I thought the show had some pacing problems I really enjoyed it. I thought Dina Meyer was fantastic and really nailed the Oracel role. The Huntress was not as over-the-top as some of the ads made her seem. Alfred was a fine addition.
My main problem was with Dinah and it and nothing to do with performance. It actually had to do with that evil of evils; my own preconceived notions of what the characters would be like before actually watching the show. I try to not do that because it bothers me when a television show or movie is trashed before a single frame airs. I thought Dinah was going to be a brooding teenager. Go figure, it’s the WB. Her light and somewhat flaky air was a bit of a shock, but did well to balance the cast. I thought the writing was a bit forced to get her into the group, but this was a pilot and a lot had to be done in a small amount of time. By the time the show ended I had warmed up to the idea and found her to be quite charming.
The pilot had some problems, but I think the show has great potential. I mean we have a psychopath for a villain. (Hard to believe that was the same Mia Sara who was in LEGEND. A hair cut and color change does wonders for changing an appearence.) We have martial arts fight scenes. We have Dina Meyer. Most of all we havereally smart writing and acting that bodes well for the coming weeks and months. Also they have the Batman card to play and draw out for as long as the series continues. It will be interesting if the RETURN OF BATMAN becomes a plot line or not. A fanboy can dream.
Overall I have very high hopes not just for the future of the show but for the future of live-action comic book related media on the WB. It started with SMALLVILLE (I enjoyed the reference in BIRDS OF PREY to the meteor shower), where the network got people used to the concept of people with powers and abilities beyond those of mortal men. Now with BIRDS OF PREY they seem to be building on that and adding costumes and super-villains. Maybe we’ll actually get an out and out super hero show complete with costume and powers and super-villains. A man can dream.
By the way, am I the only one who thinks that the WB is missing the boat by not doing a SPECTRE series?
PAD, I didn’t see it, but I have a question for you: Why not just get Tivo? It’s much better than relying on a jittery VCR.
‘Not a whole lot posted so far with which I’d disagree. Dina Meyer: Hgrr-rr-rr-rr-rr!! The ‘Earth-2’ Huntress: Fine. But why no mask? Teenage ‘Dead Zone’ Dinah Lance: I’ll wait and see. Mia Sara as Harley Quinn: Again, wait and see. Frankly, I think her looks are maturing well (she’s about my age!), but I saw her in a movie on HBO Family a month or so ago (think ‘Splash’ with fairies), and picked my jaw up off the floor when her name scrolled by on the credits!! She has grown out of her Sloane days, that’s for sure!! As for this whole ‘Huntress is a meta-human on her mother’s side’ thing: I think the producers of BoP are going with Selena/Catwoman in “Batman Returns” apparently having….literally….nine lives as their rationale. Who knows?? Mebbe those were radioactive kitties that swarmed around Selena in her ‘origin’ from “…Returns”!!
Birds of Prey, as a TV show, was pretty good for a first episode.
Give it time everyone!
But villian wise, I was thinking more along the lines of the Psycho-pirate than the Scarecrow.
“but the Black Canary character sucked big time! Why on earth the producers decided to make the Canary so far removed from her comic roots is beyond me. I want see the sonic scream, the martial arts, the blonde wig, and of course the fishnet stockings!”
Ahh but as I hear it, young Dinah is NOT the black canary, and….
*spoilers*
…in the third of fourth episode, Dinah’s mum is going to come to gotham, she knows Babs, and Babs refers to her as…”Canary”.
Does this solve your dilemma?
🙂
cheers,
Arian
Originally posted by Chuck: <>
Y’know, I’ve got a life, I’ve never read the comic, and I still didn’t like the show. I disliked it because I thought it was a poor story and bad acting. Simple as that.
Rob R.
I’ll add my two cents here, just ’cause everyone else did.
This was the most poorly written, badly directed, clumsily acted, show-I-wanted-to-be-decent-but-instead-sucked-chunks show I’ve had the ill fortune to watch since …
… well, since the pilot of B5. And we know how that worked out.
But unless there’s a JMS lurking in the wings (or a PAD to write ’em a few episodes), I don’t see much hope for BoP.
And it wasn’t non-canonical stuff. That could be forgiven and understood. It was the execution. Obtrusive soundtrack, lines that Meryl Streep couldn’t have worked with (and these weren’t Meryl Streeps we were working with), and an overall sense of a shoestring budget.
If I happen to have the TV tuned that direction on Wednesday nights, fine; there’s a lot worse on. But there’s a lot better, too.
Jeff! What, Mary-Elizabeth isn’t watching it? Or does her love of live-action DC only extend to Wonder Woman and Smallville?
Leave it to me to get my Jeffs mixed up. make that “Jeff! Mary isn’t watching it? Not quite Gargoyles enough for her?”
I’m not allowed to surf blogs on 4 hours sleep, apparently. But hey, at least I mixed up two jeffs I actually know, as opposed to, you know.. strange and new Jeffs…
Your VCR did you a favor. Don’t tune in next week.
Smallville: Superman.
Birds of Prey: Batman.
Gotta wonder if the WB has a Wonder Woman-based show in the offing. Or will we have to settle for an exotic, possibly Greek girl showing up in Smallville to cheer on the Crows?
Regarding BOP, saw a review in a local paper that is worth quoting. But first – my two cents worth. I liked it; well enough to give it time to see if I’ll love it or merely tolerate it (still something – there’s little enough on that I find tolerable…). And it is a pilot, and later episodes are almost always completely different anyway. Maybe better, maybe worse, often a bit o’ both. My objections are mainly personal esthetics – the “pounding percussion battery from Hëll during chase scenes” thing, f’rinstance – didn’t that go out with, like, “Miami Vice” or something? (And if not – why the holy hëll NOT?!?) But the reviewer had a more Man-In-The-Street take on the whole show. Aside from a few lines like “comely come-uppance” and such, the only remotely continuity-oriented remark was along the lines of “Why doesn’t Dinah get a cute knickname? Barbara Gordon gets Two! Lack of balance, eh?” But the main thing I would (finally!) pass along is a remark on the show in general, suggesting that “The plot might be a bit too convoluted for Joe Channel-Surfer to easily get into. If they can avoid that, the show might make it.” A bit different from what has been getting said here. I would submit that if the people with the comicbook esoterica “They CHANGED things! Catwoman’s ears didn’t look right! I must go lay down…!” type of, er, stuff could get around to a point of view more like the general audience – you know, the folks who will ultimately determine whether the show will stay on the air or not – the discussion might be improved a bit. And, finally, any movie/tv adaptation of a comicbook or anything else is going to take exactly what they want – the names, some general features that they think they can use – and then go where they wish. And maybe they would be better off if they changed the names If They Must Change Everything Else. But, they probably would hate to lose ANY built-in audience they can get. And, hey, we could be watching, uh, Nerd-ette and The Lingerie-Liquidator (could use a little work, that) and, I don’t know, mebbe TeenVision! (That almost sounds like a pørņ website, doesn’t it?) (Postscript: I just checked, and – Jeez! – there IS a pørņ site with that name. And, umm, maybe I’ll finish this communique…later…)