Night of the Awful Slavery/Zombie Episode.....

So, you’ll notice one comic related show I never talk about is Legends of Tomorrow. It’s not because I don’t find time to watch it or because I ration out my television time among select shows. It’s because, last I checked, Legends of Tomorrow was a generally terrible show. Of all the shows that make up CW’s Arrowverse, Legends is the one that most resembles Fox’s approach towards the X-Men movies. Take a few fan favorite characters, some good looking actors, a nerdy premise, shake well and the result is….well...a fucking mess.

For those of you that had the good sense to skip the show up to now, there are people out there fucking up space and time for various and sometimes, undefined reasons. So, the Doctor Rip Hunter went against the wishes of the Time Masters Lords came to the present day to ask Oliver Queen and Barry Allen to vouch for him so he could recruit a team of misfits including Firestorm, Heatwave and Not Quite Tony Stark the Atom. They call themselves the Legends (despite this being among the silliest team names of all time). So, this is the part where I go into a recap of the worst episode of anything I've watched in at least the past two months. There are spoilers, so if you're brave enough to still watch this horseshit after said recap, just know that there are spoilers after the jump.

The Week in Geek: 5/25/16 or My Breakup With Arrow

So, This Week in Superhero Television.....I think I'm done with Arrow. For those of you that don't follow me on Twitter, I do the weekly livetweet for Flash and Arrow under the Black Nerd Problems account. One of my editors, Omar Holmon, used to do it, but I think his neighbors found out he was stealing cable and he had to shut that shit down. Anyway, I'd usually be honored by the opportunity, but Arrow's redemption season has been a painful trudge to the middle of the road. I mean, the show has maintained a steady standard of "not as good as The Flash but better than Legends of Tomorrow" but let's be honest; that's not a high bar to clear in the first place.

When this season started, there seemed to be some light at the end of the tunnel, an attempt to right some of the creative wrongs committed in the previous season. But the writers seemed to make an almost deliberate attempt to solve those problems by either highlighting everything that's been wrong with the show or stepping over said problems altogether. Case in point, the Black Canary II. There has been no one more against Laurel Lance taking her sister's mantle than me. They choreographed her fight choreography terribly and she spent the past two seasons being unnecessarily unlikeable. So, you would think I would be happy they killed her off. But then, her Earth 2 doppelganger shows up on The Flash and she stole the whole episode. She was an amazingly fun villain as the Black Siren, it brought into realization that the writers just plain squandered her on Arrow as opposed to the thought that she'd fallen so hard, she couldn't be written back into glory again. It was just a waste, retrospectively.

The finale was like a window display of everything that's been wrong with this show. Much of this show has been about Oliver Queen's fight against his darker nature and the killer instincts that he picked up during his time on The Island From LOST. For a few episodes, they telegraphed to viewers that the way to combat Damian Dahrk's Sith Lord Magic was for him to expel the darkness in his own heart and embrace the light. But in the end....after Dahrk's magic was nullified by the people of Star City using The Third Act In Dark Knight Rises against him...Oliver ended up succumbing to the darkness by killing Dahrk after he was clearly beaten. Even Diggle, the Arrow's moral compass ended up giving into his dark side by murdering the older brother whose soul he'd been trying to save all season because Andy trolled him a little in defeat. I mean, really, Diggle had turned to the dark side when he tried to kidnap his enemy's wife and pistol whipped her in broad daylight, but hey....who's counting at this point? It's just strange that the show has spent all this time cloning Batman (more blatantly in the finale than ever before) and yet picked the strangest time to step out of Batman's shadow. One of the big problems with American shows like this is that they go on past their structural shelf life. In a perfect world, Arrow would have ended after Season Two when he defeated Slade Wilson and conquered the darkness within the second time (he's gone back and forth about killing no less than four times not including his useless flashbacks to The Island From LOST). But because the endgame is to monopolize CW with entire blocks of the Arrowverse (as is more evident by the inclusion of Supergirl), these shows have to go on being built far away from the foundations they were built on and the past season is the resulting category 4 shit storm. Rest In Peace, Arrow. We will never forget. But we will try.

My comic reviews for the week on Star Wars and The Mighty Thor are available on Black Nerd Problems. And don't forget my ongoing webcomic series with Katie Coats, Neverland: The Untold.

The Week In Geek 3/9/2016

It's been a while since I've done This Week In Superhero Television and it's seems like good time to catch up now that most of the shows worth talking about are on break at the moment.

As it stands, The Flash might still be some of the most compelling comic based television right now. The absolute best thing about this show is that it's not about to embrace its own hamfisted insanity. Usually, shows go to absolute shit when they start fucking with time travel and parallel dimensions, but Flash full on owns it in a way reminiscent of the strong points of Lost (the strong points it actually had). Delving into Earth 2 has been major fun and Zoom has been enigmatic to the point of ridiculousness and hilarity. Also, I feel obligated to point out that Jesse L. Martin has been a powerhouse as Joe West, superhero father of the decade. The way he doesn't allow himself to be overwhelmed with all the sensational superpowers and whatnot is refreshingly human almost in a Jim Gordon sort of way. I also have to applaud the writers for at least TRYING

Meanwhile, Arrow is still trying to atone for the sins of last season but it's a long way back to the top. For one thing, the Arrowverse is trying its damnedest to make Diggle a relevant character again by introducing his evil brother Itachi...I mean Andy. John trying to make what's left of his family whole again is a noble effort to re-establish him as the moral compass of thais show. And, MY GOD, does Arrow ever need a moral compass? Because TV Oliver Queen, being a Batman surrogate and all, is a great superhero but a dreadful man. And to my great dismay, Felicity Smoak has become just as bad thanks to the writing team. She used to be such a steadfast, grounded figure, but now her plotlines have mainly devolved into her crying over things that really don't deserve the tears. When Oliver admitted that the only way he was allowed to see his son was to keep him a secret, Felicity was fully aware that her fiance was placed in an impossible situation and walked out on him as he sent his son away for his own safety (since he'd been kidnapped by his nemesis and all). Now, sure, he could have told Felicity without anyone knowing, but a person trying to be a better man openly lying to the mother of his only child for his girlfriend is still asking a lot. It's the entire problem they keep creating with her character: "I know you were faced with an impossible, no-win situation where anyone else would have folded, but goddamnit, what about ME?" It borderlines on the stereotypical nagging wife of an old 50's sitcom.

As for Legends of Tomorrow, I actually haven't watched the show since the pilot episode and I'm not entirely sure if I intend to try. It's great that the Arrowverse is stretching its legs and trying things, but this particular attempt is just too much. The strong points are all there. The show is basically going to live and die off of the return of Sarah Lance, The Doct....I mean, Rip Hunter and Wentworth Miller's amazingly ridiculous performance as Captain Cold. But there were just too many problems to ignore right from the start. For one thing, I'm used to Hawkman being characterized as an asshole. But for fuck's sake, he proposed beating Hawkgirl up to settle a dispute. Also, he's supposed to be Egyptian and is as lily white as Ron Howard (as is Vandal Savage). Also, there's the matter of Professor Martin Stein giving his other half of the Firestorm matrix a date rape roofie to make him come on the trip to stop Savage. I won't even touch that.

"Where's the black guy, though?"

My comic review for The Mighty Thor is available on Black Nerd Problems for viewing enjoyment. Feel free to like, comment and share as you see fit.

The Week In Geek 5/14/15

It's sort of hard to explain how exactly CW is getting The Flash so right. This week's episode sort of brought back into focus a). Flash's standing as "the Superman of the Arrowverse" as well as b). the villainy sort of resembles professional wrestling. Captain Cold is admittedly part of the bad guy game specifically because he loves it. And probably because he's better at it than he ever was at being a small time crook. The implication of destiny being as much a factor for villains as it is for heroes is one of the major building blocks of superhero lore and shines through clear as day on this show. The only major problem I have with the show is its handling of Iris West. It made sense at first to keep her out of the loop of Barry Allen's identity, but in the meantime, in delaying the inevitable, the show has to find side plots for character development. It just so happens that these particular side plots have made her sort of intolerable not unlike Lana Lang on Smallville. Cockblocking Linda Park, making the Reverse Flash thing all about her, pulling Barry in and out of the Friend Zone at her leisure...not very endearing.

Meanwhile, the CW also dropped a first look at their next spinoff, Legends of Tomorrow. The best thing they could have done is bring back Caity Lotz as the White Canary or Canary Original or whatever they're going with. She was always the more entertaining opposite to the Arrow because Laurel is the WORST and has been for two seasons straight, suffering from a little more of Iris West Syndrome. The best I can figure is that this spinoff is in response to Marvel/Netflix setting up The Defenders starting with Daredevil. With the turnout Daredevil had, I doubt LoT is going to compete with that, but it shows that DC is at least trying to give fans what they want.

Also, my review for this week's issue of Thor is up and available on Black Nerd Problems for your viewing pleasure. Feel free to read, share, comment at your leisure.