Thursday, October 11, 2012

Arrow premiere

I watched CW's Arrow, because of all the good buzz about it. I'm not a comic book reader and know nothing about Green Arrow and his history. In fact, I'd probably confuse him with Hawkeye from The Avengers movie, just because they're both skilled archers.


Anyway, the pilot episode was good overall, though I found some moments and characters laughably bad. That security guy named "Drakon" had a ridiculous leather coat and dramatically styled hair; it made him look campy. I also didn't like the fact that Oliver Queen had to constantly give his driver/bodyguard the slip, and even at one point put him in a headlock, so he could disappear to be Green Arrow. I mean, how does Oliver get to attack him without consequences? Wouldn't the bodyguard at least confront him or quit, if not get him into trouble with his mother? In fact I would have preferred it if the bodyguard was the guy who had suspicions about Oliver, instead of the Tommy guy who was the playboy friend. I didn't like the cop character being all skeptical for apparently no reason; then I learned he was the father of the girl who died on the yacht. That made his hostility to Oliver more understandable, but it still makes you wonder why he'd get assigned to a case that was a clear conflict of interest. I hope he'll tone down the attitude later on.

It's too bad this show wasn't paired with Nikita, for they have a similar dark tone with lots of action. I can't tell yet if there will be as much emotional character depth, or a development of a family or crew to help the protagonist save the world. But it's another vigilante show, which is a formula I keep coming back to. I'll keep watching it for now, but if it gets more ridiculous and the annoying stuff doesn't go away, then I'll won't be sad to drop it.

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