By: Greg Berlanti, Marc Guggenheim, Andrew Kreisberg (story
The Story: Sure bullets pack more punch, but when was the last time you zip-lined with one?
The Review: Much as anyone loves the idea of getting to watch their favorite superheroes on live-action TV every week, some pretty big obstacles get in the way of that particular dream. As a modern audience, we expect greater realism (read: money) from the stories and special effects than the people who watched Lynda Carter spin into costume on Wonder Woman. And the more extensive a superhero’s powers, the more opportunity there is for a show to disappoint.
If you take all that into consideration, Smallville was a pretty impressive series, balancing both the fulfillment of comic book dreams and budgetary restraints for ten seasons—kind of the Holy Grail of television longevity. I imagine, however, that the folks at the CW weren’t keen on going through that that kind of expense again. While the aborted Aquaman project presented all kinds of watery CGI that made producers’ heads spin, Arrow seems more manageable.
Arrow not only involves less demand on TV-magic than its predecessor, it also has greater grounding in the real world, allowing it to succeed beyond the superhero genre. In many ways, its premise mostly resembles those from any action-drama series on the Big Three networks: hero has life-traumatizing experience; hero swears vengeance on those responsible; hero begins personal vendetta using questionably obtained skills and tools; terse confrontations, fight sequences, and the regular sexual entanglement follows.
Yes, it’s a formula, but at least it’s not nearly as constraining as the “Monster of the Week” format Smallville adopted for years. At least in the pilot, this show has made good use of its chosen formula. The writers have injected Oliver Queen’s origin story with a good deal more personal angst (via the rather grim and well-portrayed deaths of several key characters) and complexity (given the conspiracies and mysteries involved) than comics have done.
I like that the show plans to make Oliver’s time on the island a running plot alongside his current vigilantism in Starling (“Star”) City. Obviously, five years surviving alone against nature involves a great deal of character-building trial, but you wouldn’t want to spill it all at once. Besides, the way Oliver builds himself into a different character during this tribulation also has a distinct Count of Monte Cristo flavor that’s as compelling as ever.
Stephen Arnell brings a brooding intensity to the role, which suits his persona as the hardened survivor well, but which makes any attempt to adopt his former playboy mannerisms completely unconvincing (even “Laurel”—first name Dinah—Lance looks skeptical after he tells her, with very off-putting anger and insincerity, he’s got some debauchery to catch up on). This is a man with a mission, and the show won’t let us forget it, not with all those gross internal monologues we must sit through:
“To live I had to make myself more than what I was, to forge myself into a weapon. I am returning, not the boy who was shipwrecked, but the man who will bring justice to those who have poisoned my city.”
Besides Dinah—I refuse to play into this inexplicable gimmick of calling her by her middle name—we get introduced to a substantial supporting cast: mother Moira (who plays Queen Gertrude to Oliver’s Hamlet), the ever-supportive sister Thea, bodyguard-with-questionable-loyalties John Diggle, motherly maid Joanna de la Vega, and frenemy Tommy Merlyn, who provides the show’s pop culture humor. He tries to catch Oliver up to speed with what’s gone down in the last five years: “…black president—that’s new. Oh, and Lost? They were all dead.”
But my favorite joke has to be his description of a club floozy he points out to Oliver: “The one that looks like the chick from Twilight.”
“What’s Twilight?”
“So better off not knowing.”
Conclusion: A solid debut, with quite a few elements that indicate the show wants to avoid being yet another soap of twenty-somethings with a superhero spin. This could be the start of something memorable.
Grade: B
– Minhquan Nguyen
Some Musings: – I forgot—this involves real humans and that means the obligatory half-naked shots—with scars! Joy.
– Jim MacQuarrie of Wired has strong opinions about the depiction of archery in media. I wonder what he’d have to say about Arnell’s postures?
Grade
Conclusion