Comic Book TV season opening reviews

Had a good summer? I didn't. I mean, I still had to work and all. Summers mean less post-30. Except for OzCon. That was awesome.

I'm not going to be doing these blogs weekly like last year. Instead, I'll write reviews when I wish. Most likely if there's anything I want to say in the midseason finale. I'll certainly be reviewing more than one episode of The Flash this year over at my new blog, Dibny Diaries.

The Defenders - The culmination of the Netflix and Marvel shows sees Luke Cage, Jessica Jones, Matt Murdock and Danny Rand unite to defend New York City from the machinations of The Hand.

The eight-episode format nearly makes this one of the better Netflix and Marvel shows, except for the sheer number of characters included. Not only do we have the four main characters, but their supporting casts also showing up and getting involved, and while this is done well, it can be a bit much on first time viewing.

The plot is not the same high-stakes adventure that we saw in The Avengers, the first live action Marvel team up property. A good reason for this is right in the titles: The Defenders. Defense is preventative, while avenging means something bad has already happened. When viewed that way, the series is more satisfying.

DuckTales - Disney XD revives the classic 80s show for the 21st century with a new voice cast (except for Donald Duck, who is still voiced by Tony Anselmo), a new look, and a brand new continuity. The original DuckTales was inspired by the comic book stories of Carl Barks, and while the new version is still proud of the original series, it takes a lot of inspiration from the Barks comics.

The double-length season/series opener features Donald Duck leaving his nephews Huey, Dewey and Louie with his Uncle Scrooge McDuck while he has a job interview. Meeting Webby Vanderquack—granddaughter of Mrs. Beakley, Scrooge's housekeeper—the boys get into trouble with Scrooge's treasures, which Scrooge helps them set right, reawakening his sense of adventure. After an adventure in Atlantis, Scrooge invites Donald and the boys to move in with him.

The new series so far has introduced many elements of DuckTales lore around fun and exciting plots that are written so well that adults without kids should enjoy it as well. As of the fifth episode aired, we have Flintheart Glomgold, the Number One Dime, the Beagle Boys, Gyro Gearloose and his helper robot, and Magica DeSpell. New to the series is a running plot addressing what happened to the mother of Huey, Dewey and Louie, Della Duck.

Fans of fun adventure of all ages should find quite a bit to like about this new DuckTales, so I recommend it.

Inhumans - Marvel's third show for ABC was a collaboration between them and IMAX theaters, who ran an edited down version of the first two episodes in theaters for a couple weeks in early September. Now the first five episodes have finished airing.

Running into a coup on the moon by his brother Maximus, Black Bolt and the other members of the royal family are forced to flee the city of Atillan to Hawaii, where they must reunite before returning to take back the throne from Maximus.

The royal Inhumans can be compelling characters, but their in-character snobbery can make them off-putting. In the comics, the royal family was introduced in the pages of Fantastic Four, allowing a familiar and likeable team to be the conduit to meeting these characters. Inhumans doesn't have this luxury, with the Agents of SHIELD no longer on Earth and no other teams at the TV department's disposal. The series attempts to find ways to make them appealing, but considering this show is only going to have eight episodes and we've finished three and have only five left, this might be asking a lot from the audience to stick with it.

Inhumans was originally announced to be a film before it was quietly pushed back indefinitely. This series was announced, and the television budget, despite being high thanks to funding from IMAX, begins to show, particularly on Atillan. Nowhere does it feel majestic or imposing. Lockjaw, the giant telepathic teleporting bulldog looks great, but the budget means we only get a few scenes with him.

Inhumans seems doomed to get only one season at the moment. Aside from Lockjaw, there's not a lot that I'm excited about for it. The "give it a few episodes" advice doesn't help when we're looking at a small number of episodes. If you wanted the royal Inhumans in live action, check it out. Otherwise, take it as you will.

The Gifted - The Strucker family discovers that their children are mutants. In a world where the X-Men and the Brotherhood of Mutants have vanished, the only chance they have is to join with a desperate band of on the run mutants.

The pilot sets up a lot and while fine, doesn't quite have enough time to make us totally get into the multiple protagonists. Thankfully, the second and third episodes gives us more of an idea where the showis going and gives us a much better idea of this world. Perhaps this isn't going to be quite as well crafted as Legion, but this seems to be a worthy X-Men TV series so far.

Gotham - This season finds young Bruce Wayne beginning to master the double life of playboy socialite and vigilante he will become famous for in his years as Batman as the villains continue to rise. Gotham finally feels on track as "the Batman show without Batman" finally has Batman.

Lucifer - Discovering that his wings have come back, Lucifer tries to remove them permanently while continuing to assist (loosely) with detective Chloe Decker's investigations. Tom Welling joins the cast as Lieutenant Marcus Pierce, who seems to be hiding a few things.

Supergirl - While Kara misses Mon-El, life continues in National City, for her, Lena Luthor who has bought Cat Co., and Alex and Maggie who are getting married. Reports are that this season will introduce this generation of superhero TV's Legion of Super-Heroes.

The Flash - Cisco manages to break Barry out of the Speed Force, revealing him to now be faster than ever before. Caitlin—hiding her Killer Frost identity—rejoins Team Flash as Cisco and Gypsy work on their relationship, as do Barry and Iris as they prepare to get married. Meanwhile, a new villain—the Thinker—watches the pieces of his plot come into place.

Legends of Tomorrow - Finding various anomalies through time, the Legends have the Waverider taken from them by Rip Hunter's new time correction force. After getting it back from him, they convince him that they can help him correct anomalies through time. Meanwhile, a mysterious threat rises.

Arrow - With Thea in a coma and Oliver now having to care for his son, things take a turn as a photo revealing Oliver as the Green Arrow is exposed to public, putting him under the eye of the FBI.

Riverdale - As Archie's dad recovers from being shot at Pop's, the killer begins to target other people in Archie's life.

That's what we've been able to tell from the shows so far. Frankly, I'm enjoying this season. Even Inhumans, though I'd say it's quite the weakest show.

Here's some quick reviews of comic book movies that came out since the last blog.

Wonder Woman - The first truly impressive DCEU movie features the story of Wonder Woman as depicted by Gal Gadot as Steve Trevor (Chris Pine) arrives on the island of Themyscira and tells the Amazons about World War I. Diana returns with him to find and defeat Ares, the God of War.

Wonder Woman finally gives the DCEU an inspirational hero. Henry Cavill's Superman and Ben Affleck's Batman are promising, but their outings so far have rendered them as flawed without really having a victory without a major downside. In Man of Steel, while saving the world, about half of Metropolis is destroyed. In Batman v Superman, Batman makes the wrong judgement call and Superman is killed. Diana sets out to destroy Ares and even though she makes mistakes, she learns and emerges victorious. And it's done with a very good pace and amazing visuals. And furthermore, the message the movie makes is pretty welcome.

Spider-Man: Homecoming - The first MCU Spider-Man solo film embraces the high school setting of Peter Parker's (Tom Holland) early years in his career as Spider-Man, being secretly assisted/monitored by Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) and Happy Hogan (Jon Favreau). Peter comes across the weapons-running gang of the Vulture (Michael Keaton). Tony and Happy tell him to let someone else handle it, but Peter wants to prove himself. Just he needs to do that and balance his school life, especially if he wants to impress Liz (Laura Harrier).

Homecoming is a lot of fun, but also uses some good intrigue to the proceedings with a worthy plot twist. The film clearly links to the larger MCU, but manages to create a world specifically for Spider-Man to exist in on the streets and neighborhoods of Queens. Giving Spider-Man a benefactor and a confidant (who is not a romantic interest) gives us something new that we haven't seen in any of the five previous Spider-Man films from the past twenty years. For once, Spider-Man feels like a young kid. He screws up, but he gets up and tries again. That's really what the character is about and Homecoming nails it.

Batman and Harley Quinn - One of this year's DC animated movies finds Batman (Kevin Conroy) and Nightwing (Loren Lester) teaming up with a reformed Harley Quinn (Melissa Rauch) to foil the plots of Poison Ivy (Padget Brewster) and the Floronic Man (Kevin Michael Richardson).

It goes for a bit more of a comedic take on Batman mythos while not betraying the characterizations. Some of the humor is a bit more raunchy, including a scene where Nightwing and Harley have sex. Overall, I had fun, but some fans have expressed displeasure.

Batman vs. Two-Face - The follow up to The Return of the Caped Crusaders finds Harvey Dent (William Shatner) entering the world of the Batman 1966 TV show. After an attempt to drain Gotham's worst of their evil goes awry, Harvey is transformed into the villainous Two-Face, with Batman (Adam West) and Robin (Burt Ward) going after him. Both Julie Newmar and Lee Meriweather do voice work for the movie as well.

Although still campy, the film feels a bit more serious than the old TV show, but it's all right as the audience for the show has changed and is more open to it. It has a good story, fairly good animation (it's still direct to video), and a spectacular voice cast.