SERIES SATURDAY: Stargirl TV series

This is a series about … well, series. I do so love stories that continue across volumes, in whatever form: linked short stories, novels, novellas, television, movies. I’ve already got a list of series I’ve recently read, re-read, watched, or re-watched that I plan to blog about. I might even, down the line, open myself up to letting other people suggest titles I should read/watch and then comment on.

Stargirl season 1 poster.jpg


I think that Stargirl has become my favorite of the current live-action super-hero television offerings. (This being said, as I’ve also noted on social media, in light of not having seen any of Doom Patrol, Titans, Swamp Thing or Umbrella Academy, and having fallen way behind on Black Lightning, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., and Gotham.) So I’m here to talk about why in more depth than my Facebook post.  IN CASE IT NEEDS TO BE SAID – FROM THIS POINT ON, EXPECT SPOILERS! BOW OUT NOW IF YOU HAVEN’T WATCHED THE ENTIRE SEASON AND CARE ABOUT BEING SURPRISED!

I only became familiar with the Courtney Whitmore Stargirl character after her solo comics series had ended and she’d become a full member of the Justice Society of America. In fact, I still haven’t read her solo series, although I’ve picked up the trade paperback collections and mean to get around to them real soon. So my impressions of the show are based on what I know of the character from her appearances in various JSA runs, and on the show itself.

I’m a firm believer in not expecting live-action versions of comic books to hew too closely to the material on which they’re based. It’s less disappointing when they make wholesale changes if you just go in expecting there to be egregious differences. But StargirlStargirl seems intent on capturing the feel, if not the word-for-word storyline, of the comics. I don’t know how closely anything in season one maps onto the original Stargirl comics (other than Courtney’s step-dad being former sidekick Stripesy and building a giant robot) but they certainly seem to be embracing the legacy aspect of JSA comics going back to the 70s (when Robin, Power Girl, and a time-tossed Star-Spangled Kid joined the team). Okay, so this is not the Beth Chapel, Rick Tyler, Henry King Junior or Yolanda Montez I met back in the late 80s (most obviously, the show’s versions aren’t adults) … but they capture the spirit of each of those characters really well: Henry fighting his father’s evil influence, Rick trying to live up to his father’s legacy but still be his own man, Yolanda trying to decide if she even wants to do this superhero thing at all. Beth is the only one I feel doesn’t have much of the original comics version in her portrayal, but this version of the character is endearing and works as the brainier side of a very brawn-heavy team. I also wasn’t sure how I’d feel about the pilot episode’s biggest departure from the comics: killing off most of the JSA. I have to say I think they gave it all the poignancy it deserved, given that show is not about those characters, but rather the legacy they leave behind.

The show is also embracing the giddiness of super-hero fight scenes that many of the current CW shows eschew for more “realistic” (grittier, darker-filmed) fight choreography. It’s not unusual, in a Stargirl fight scene, to see a character get kicked in the chest and fly across the room. It’s also not unusual to actually be able to see who is hitting who and how hard, and what happens to them after they get hit. With the exception of the opening battle of the pilot, in which the Injustice Society kills most of the JSA, even the night-time and subterranean scenes are well-lit enough to see whose doing what. (Arrow’s fight choreography was mostly spectacular – but how often could you actually see the details of what was going on?) I loved pretty much every fight scene from the pilot on, but the fights in the finale had me cheering for just how well-done they were.

The costumes are also really faithful to the comics, and look almost nothing like what you’d find on any of the other Berlanti-led super-hero shows to date. Gone are the realistic heavy leather outfits of Arrow, Flash, etc.; in are cloaks and cowls and form-fitting spandex and outfits that shouldn’t work in real life but do anyway because COMIC BOOKS. It gives the show a more traditional comic-book look, which I think is part of what frees them to be a little over-the-top in the fight choreography. The only outfits I didn’t really like were those in the snapshot of Pat’s former team, the Seven Soldiers of Victory. They looked a little too much like Halloween costumes. Especially Shining Knight’s, which looked like something you’d pick up at a Ren Faire (but maybe I’m being picky on that because he’s one of my favorite super-heroes?).

The details in the costumes are matched by little set details throughout the season. I particularly loved the movies playing at the theater in Blue Valley: the Unknown Soldier, The Haunted Tank, GI Robot (get the feeling that the people of Blue Valley love their war movies?), and Prez. And I’m sure I missed some other easter eggs, because I can’t imagine Geoff Johns and James Robinson not throwing in more and more obscure stuff as production went along.

The acting on the show is top-notch. Brec Bassinger pulls off the neat trick of letting Courtney be pretty unlikeable at the start (she may be justified in being upset about the move to Blue Valley, but we don’t have to like the way she treats Pat or Mike) and even partway through the season (her grandstanding in the training session with “her” JSA) and still getting us to feel for her. Her best episode was the one in which she finds out her father isn’t who she thought he was and all of her insecurities and heartbreak tumble out. The actors playing the rest of the JSA are excellent as well; while some of what they’re given to play is standard “high school angst,” they don’t overplay it like a lot of high school-set shows do. Of the adult characters, I think Neil Jackson steals the show as Jordan Mahkent/Icicle – his character certainly shows the most depth and nuance (especially as compared to the very one-note “sadistic lunkhead” portrayals of Sportsmaster and Tigress), with Christopher James Baker’s Henry King/Brainwave a close second. And I have to give props to Nelson Lee, who spends the whole season acting under a hood through which we’re barely able to see even his eyes and yet sells every scene perfectly. Amy Smart is terrific as Courtney’s mother, and although I’m not a huge Luke Wilson fan I think he gets Pat Dugan’s mix of sincerity and insecurity just right.

I think the tightness of the season – 13 episodes – helped the actors as well. There was no room for one-off episodes exploring side-quests or a “day in the life at Blue Valley High.” Every scene needed to further the narrative or enhance character, and for the most part they did. Even the scenes of Mike Dugan’s school science fair were necessary – we had to care about the kid if we were going to worry about his safety in the finale. The only scenes I felt didn’t contribute to the overall arc were the scenes in the two-part finale focused on Isaac Bowin (The Fiddler’s son); if they’re not a set-up for the character having a bigger role in season two, then they really were extraneous.

The final episode was one of the most satisfying season finales I’ve seen in a long time, super-hero show or otherwise. The writing staff wrapped up all the major plots for the season while still giving us plenty of hooks into season two. And most of the finale was action, action, action. Which made the quieter Christmas scenes at the end more powerful.

But let’s talk about season two before we go.

With DC Universe and the decision to move most of the original live-action and animated content to HBO Max, there’s a lot of trepidation therefore that Stargirl moving to the CW instead will cause it to fall victim to the things that people dislike about the Arrowverse shows: increased romantic soap—opera elements and too many “filler” episodes, and a move to filming in Vancouver instead of Georgia. I’m hoping that Greg Berlanti will stick to the formula that made season one of Stargirl successful: 13 episodes (15, at most) and a focus on one major problem for the heroes to overcome (and that filming will remain in Georgia as Black Lightning has).

The concern I have is that the season finale set up a ton of possible main storylines for season two. We got set-ups for The Shade (one of my favorite DC characters ever), Eclipso, the search for the Seven Soldiers, the return of Sylvester Pemberton, the whereabouts/survival of the remaining ISA members who aren’t clearly dead, and perhaps even some who were … and left somewhat unspoken was what will happen when the ISA’s kids find out their parents are dead or incarcerated (we didn’t see Artemis Crock or Cameron Mahkent in any meaningful capacity in the season finale, but we did see Isaac Bowin take a tuba to a bully’s head) and who is responsible for those deaths/incarcerations. That’s a lot to juggle in a short 13-15 episode season. I’m afraid that the writers are going to try to go bigger in season two, which will not necessarily be better, and I’m hoping that this prolonged pandemic-induced hiatus will give Johns and company time to decide what story they want to tell in season two and what can wait until a probably season three or longer.

But even with that concern firmly in place, I’m excited and hopeful for a second season of Stargirl. It’s nice to see a brightly-lit, hopeful, less-angst-driven superhero show on television right now.

Series Saturday: The CW Crisis on Infinite Earths

This is a series about … well, series. I do so love stories that continue across volumes, in whatever form: linked short stories, novels, novellas, television, movies. I’ve already got a list of series I’ve recently read, re-read, watched, or re-watched that I plan to blog about. I might even, down the line, open myself up to letting other people suggest titles I should read/watch and then comment on.

Crisis_on_Infinite_Earths_(Arrowverse)_poster.jpg

 

For this Series Saturday, instead of looking back at a series I’ve enjoyed, I thought I’d make some predictions about a series that starts tomorrow night (Sunday, December 8, 2019): this year’s big “Arrowverse” crossover on the CW. I’m doing this because quite a few friends have asked what I think will happen, so I thought instead of a dozen text messages I’d just post my thoughts here.

AND YES, IF YOU’RE BEHIND ON THE ARROWVERSE SHOWS, THERE BE SPOILERS AHEAD!!!!!!!

For those who haven’t heard, Crisis on Infinite Earths will span 5 hours, taking up episodes of 5 out of the CW’s 6 DC Comics-based shows: Supergirl, Batwoman and The Flash on December 8-10, and then Arrow and DC’s Legends of Tomorrow in mid-January. (Black Lightning will also be appearing, but only as a guest-star; the series has always stayed separate from the rest of the DCCW shows.)

The tagline for the television event, as it was for the original DC Comics maxi-series in the mid-80s, is “Worlds Will Live. Worlds Will Die. And nothing will ever be the same.” For better or worse (and I’ll save my detailed thoughts on this for a different post), the maxi-series irrevocably changed the DC Universe. Pretty much every world but one did die; so did a lot of tertiary and secondary and several notable major DC characters (don’t worry; as is standard in comics now, most of them got better over the intervening decades).

I’m looking forward to seeing what beats and moments from the original comics Greg Berlanti, Marc Guggenheim and the individual show runners were able to adapt/incorporate and what they chose to leave out (either because characters have not yet debuted in the Arrowverse shows, or because the moments would make no sense in the context of that universe versus the original comics). I have absolutely NO expectations that five hours of television will rival twelve monthly comic issues, even with the half-season of set-ups done on The Flash and Arrow this fall. But I do have some thoughts and predictions.


WHO WILL LIVE, WHO WILL DIE?

Oliver Queen and Barry Allen: We’ve been told repeatedly over the past several months that in order for anyone else to survive the Crisis, Oliver Queen and Barry Allen must die. Interestingly, it’s The Monitor telling them this, and he hasn’t told either one about the fate of the other. (Ollie thinks he prevented both Barry and Kara’s deaths at the end of the Elseworlds crossover by striking a deal with The Monitor; I don’t think he’s been told Barry is destined to die anyway.) The fact that the other characters on each show only know Ollie and Barry are destined to die because Barry and Ollie have told them leads me to believe that neither one is actually going to die. Also, it’s pretty standard that if a show beats you over the head with a character’s destiny, they will in fact not experience that destiny without some kind of twist.

Arrow is ending for good two weeks after Crisis is over (and one of those episodes is an embedded pilot for a spin-off), but I’m predicting (as I’m sure many others have) that Oliver and Felicity will be given the same send-off that the comic gave to the Golden Age Superman and Lois Lane: living happily ever after (theoretically) in a pocket dimension from which they can never (or so they think) leave. I can’t imagine them outright killing “the one that started it all.”

And The Flash, of course, is not going off the air after Crisis. Barry’s been preparing his team for a “world without Flash,” but I don’t for a minute believe Grant Gustin is hanging up the cowl for more than a few episodes. He may, as they’ve done in a previous season, appear to be lost, but he will be back. I’m going to go out on a limb and predict that some other speedster will take Barry’s place at the last minute: and since we’ve seen no evidence that Keiynan Lonsdale (Wally) or Violet Beane (Jessie Quick) will be appearing in Crisis, I’m going to say it will be one of John Wesley Shipp’s characters: either the Flash from Earth-90 or a re-powered Jay Garrick. (This will give Shipp the notoriety of having died on the Flash more times than Tom Cavanagh.)

Prior Minor Characters/Guest Stars: The original comic was well-known for the wholesale slaughter of secondary and lesser characters. Depending on when you started reading DC Comics and/or when you came to read Crisis for the first time, some of those deaths hit harder than others. (For me? The death of the original Dove, Don Hall, made me cry. The death of Mark Merlin / Prince Ra-Man? Not so much.) On the current Arrowverse shows, there aren’t quite as many “blink and you miss them” level characters to be slaughtered by the Anti-Monitor’s Shadow Demons. And the ones that are out there? Well, those actors would cost money to bring back in, if they were even available to reprise their roles. However, I can imagine scenes of carnage like the one that lead off last year’s “Elseworlds” crossover: dead costumed characters strewn across Earth-1’s landscape, with faces not visible so we can’t tell these are just extras. I won’t be surprised to see characters like The Pied Piper, Huntress, Red Tornado, The Ray, Hawkman, and Hawkgirl dead in the background of a shot since at this point those characters/actors are not likely to be brought back. Still, as recently as yesterday showrunner Mark Guggenheim said there were at least 6 cameos/guest-star appearances who had not yet been revealed/spoiled, so there is the possibility of an on-screen death for a former guest-star or two.

Major Characters From Other DC Shows/Movies: We already know we’re going to be seeing, in cameos and/or key scenes, Robert Wuhl (from the Tim Burton Batman), Burt Ward (Batman ’66), Ashley Scott (Birds of Prey tv show), Tom Welling and Erica Durance (Smallville), Kevin Conroy (a Kingdome Come-ish Bruce Wayne) and Brandon Routh (the Donnerverse/Kingdom Come Superman). There was a rumor Tom Ellis (Lucifer) was on set during filming, and I’m holding out hope that some of the unleaked cameos are Lynda Carter and Lyle Waggoner (Wonder Woman), Helen Slater (Supergirl), Dina Meyer (Oracle on Birds of Prey), David Mazouz or Sean Pertwee (Gotham) and/or Michael Grey/Jackson Bostwick/Garrett Craig (Billy Batson/Captain Marvel from the Shazam tv show). Showing any of these characters dying would have huge emotional impact on those of us who grew up on/watched those shows but possibly less-so on viewers only familiar with the current Arrowverse shows.

Major Characters from the Arrowverse Shows: Of course, what would pack the most emotional punch would be the deaths of one or more of the main casts. The title characters on each show are safe. The Flash, Supergirl, Black Lightning, and Batwoman are not suddenly going to become Frost and Friends, Adventures of The DEO, Thunder and Lightning, or Batwing. But if the producers want us to feel, after the fact, that this crossover actually resulted in a real shake-up of the status quo … somebody major is going to have to be killed off from one or more of the Big Three shows. My thoughts/expectations on who:

·         The Flash: Cisco Ramon. It’s fairly common on drama shows that if a character gets a happy ending and/or closure, they’re probably going to be written out or die (Lost took this to the level of an artform). Cisco has his happy ending: he got rid of the powers he didn’t really want to have, got closure on his relationship with Gypsy (and by extension, Breacher), and has a solid relationship with an understanding and loving girlfriend. But the show has also introduced another super-hacker/scientist type in Chester Runk. And there were rumors last season after Cisco was de-powered that he was leaving. His death would certainly pack the requisite punch for both viewers and fans – more so than Katie/Frost and Ralph, who have their powers and on-going sub-plots. Second Place Guess: Joe West.  There’s no indication Jesse L. Martin is ready to leave the show, and killing yet another of Barry’s father-figures (especially if Jay Garrick takes his place as The Flash Who Must Die) would just be cruel. But after two emotional “I’m not ready to say goodbye to my son” scenes in recent weeks, Joe’s death would be an even bigger gut-punch that Cisco.

·         Supergirl: J’Onn J’Onzz.  Here’s that closure thing again: in the past season or so, J’Onn has moved on from the DEO, gotten closure with the father he thought was dead and the brother he’d forgotten existed, and is in a good place. But we also saw The Monitor tell him that freeing himself of his past is what would make him a valuable part of the team fighting The Crisis. If that’s not a set-up for a heroic, self-sacrificing death, nothing is. Second Place Guess: Brainiac 5. He still has both romantic and a “am I man or machine” storylines going on, but we also know Jeremy Jordan is set to return for a few episodes as Win, which makes me think Brainy could be sacrificed.  Honestly, when it was announced Mechad Brooks was leaving the show, I was confident James Olsen would die during Crisis, but they wrote him out earlier.

·         Arrow: Wild Dog. We already know Black Canary and Black Siren are locked into the back-door pilot, so they’re not being killed off, while Rene has not been mentioned as part of that cast. Since the show seems intent this season on subverting their own future timeline (by having Roy come back to the fold sooner and lose an arm in the process, as well as having Dig and Lyla learn about their sons’ futures and work to prevent that), it would make sense for them to write out Rene before he has a chance to become Mayor and screw up Star City and the Glades. Second Place Guess: Roy Harper. It would be cruel, having Roy willingly lose an arm for the team only to then die for them as well, but they could go this route as a way to even further subvert the future timeline.

·         Legends of Tomorrow: I honestly don’t think they’re going to kill off any of the major cast. We already know Ray Palmer and Nora Darkh are being written out later in the season, so they’re safe. And most of the returning lead cast have on-going sub-plots. However, if they really want to start the new season off with a change in the status quo, killing Nate Heywood off would do it. Yeah, he’s got that whole “I don’t remember the woman I fell in love with” sub-plot brewing, but plots like that have been dropped on shows before when the showrunners wanted to shake things up (remember Ruby being promoted to series regular on Once Upon A Time only to appear in a handful of episodes and then virtually disappear because other storylines took precedent?). Second Place Guesses: either Gary or Mona, since fan reaction to both supporting characters has been less than favorable.

I’m pretty sure that we won’t see a major character death related to Crisis on Black Lightning simply because the show itself is not a part of the crossover. And Batwoman hasn’t been on the air long enough to lose a second main cast member in one season (after the death of Katherine Hamilton in the fall finale), so I think the remaining cast members there are safe.

WORLDS WILL LIVE, WORLDS WILL DIE?

The original comic ended with the Multiverse being destroyed and history being re-written so that there had always been only One Earth. This created a lot of issues for multiple-Earth dopplegangers and characters with the same names but different histories/powers/etc.  The CW shows don’t have that many characters who appear on more than one Earth (and most of those were killed off-camera when Earth-2 bit the dust in the Arrow season premiere) for that to be a storyline problem. (In fact, the only one I can think of that could be a real issue would be the Earth-1 counterpart of Alex Danvers.) But fans have long complained that Supergirl feels way too removed over there on Earth-38 given her great friendship/chemistry with Barry Allen and burgeoning friendship with Kate Kane. We’ve seen in the various trailers that The Monitor decides Earth-38 is where the Heroes need to make their stand, and evidence that first Argo City (home of Supergirl’s birth mother and the few remaining Kryptonians) and then possibly all of Earth-38 get destroyed. There’s also trailer evidence that they manage to evacuate Earth-38 before the anti-matter wave hits.

My prediction is that not all Earths will be destroyed. I think the number of Earths that survive will be small. Most of the Earths that get destroyed will be Earths we’ve either never seen or have only heard mentioned, or will be the Earths for those other DC live action properties outside of the Arrowverse that we know we’re going to be seeing guest-stars from. I’m not even confident Earth-38 will really be destroyed; trailers are notoriously misleading on things like this for dramatic effect. I think we’ll end up with Earth-1 (for Flash, Legends, Batwoman, and the possible Arrow spinoff), Earth-38 (for Supergirl and the possible Superman show), Earth-BL (I don’t think Black Lightning’s Earth has ever been given a numeric designation), possibly Earth-X (just in case they ever want to use evil dopplegangers and The Ray again), and then an Earth-whatever that accounts for the other on-going DC TV shows on other networks (Titans, Doom Patrol, Swamp Thing, the upcoming Stargirl) and maybe one that accounts for the current “Movieverse.” Although I’m willing to second-guess myself about Earth-38’s destruction. It would definitely shake things up if Earth-1 and -38 were combined, but would also be a storyline logistical nightmare.

 

KINGDOM COME

We’ve already been told that Brandon Routh’s “Donnerverse” Superman is the Supes from DC’s mini-series Kingdom Come, and photographic evidence that Kevin Conroy’s Bruce Wayne is from that same Earth. My prediction? With the cameo appearance of Robert Wuhl’s “Burtonverse” Batman character Alexander Knox, I’m betting we’ll get at least a line of dialogue or two telling us that Conroy is the Burton Batman and that those movies (and sequels), the 1970s Wonder Woman and Shazam shows, and maybe the Birds of Prey show all took place on that same Earth, even if we don’t get to see Lynda Carter and Helen Slater in their iconic costumes. And of course, that Earth will go out in spectacular fashion after Bruce and Clark are recruited as two of the “Seven” The Monitor mentions need to be found in a recent trailer.

 

OTHER MINOR PREDICTIONS

·         History will at least slightly be rearranged, through either The Monitor’s doing or the Legends, and after the Crisis is over, Diggle and Lyla (who I predict will both survive) will joyously welcome baby Sara back into the family alongside her twin brother JJ and older adopted brother Connor. And yes, I think Dig and Lyla will remember that they had a daughter, then they didn’t, and now they do again.

·         The Council of Wellses will be completely destroyed, limiting Tom Cavanagh to playing only Reverse Flash, Nash Wells/Pariah (who I think will also survive) and the Earth-2 Wells if he was actually on Earth-3 this whole time, as has been rumored.

·         The West-Allens will find out Iris is pregnant thanks to that little island-hopping vacation they took a few episodes ago – but early next season, they’ll have twins who they’ll name Donald Henry and Dawn Nora. (In the comics, Barry and Iris’s twins were Don and Dawn Allen.)

·         Kevin Conroy will eventually make an appearance as the Earth-1 Bruce Wayne (sans exoskeleton) because like Clark, they can’t avoid the issue of where Bruce has been forever.

 

I could be completely wrong about all of this. But hey, when it was announced before Season 1 of The Flash that John Wesley Shipp would be playing an important mystery character, I predicted it would be Jay Garrick – and I was only two seasons off! I’ll do a “let’s see how I did post” after the final two hours of the crossover air in mid-January.