Arrow S03 E12: "Uprising"

Brick is now in control of The Glades, which is no longer under police surveillance. We open on Arsenal trying to rescue a diner from paying protection to the crime boss. We have two great references here as a baddie mistakes Roy for the red blur seen over in "The Flash," then we have the oh so rare use of the word 'superhero' in this series. The spandex set is catching on in the Arrowverse.

The baddies get the better of Arsenal and Laurel as the Black Canary/Canary comes to the rescue. She's fighting considerably better than she was in the last episode, and Ted Grant is even given props. It's nice to see Bex Taylor-Klaus as Sin again, but unbelievable that she mistakes Laurel for Sara. And Quentin knows Roy immediately but can't tell his daughters apart?? Seriously I know I ranted about this before, but this is getting ridiculous.

Sara and Laurel are two completely different body types, one short and curvy with believable blonde hair, and the other tall and lean with a bad wig. No one, unless at a major distance, would mistake one for the other, especially family and friends. If this situation of the two Canaries was always intended to happen, which it's been indicated it was, the two actresses cast in the sisters' roles should have resembled each other more. This confusion of the two is stretching my suspension of belief a bit. And yes, I see the irony. I'm okay with a man who can run at the speed of sound, but this is too much. Sue me.

I know that John Barrowman has signed on as a cast regular but more and more it feels like the writers are having a hard time finding things for him to do. Having Brick be the murderer of his wife seems like a stretch to have him team up with Team Arrow in Oliver's absence. And when is Felicity going to beef up security so Merlyn can't keep walking into the Arrowcave? Maybe she could find his bug as well. Too much Atom and not enough Arrow in her life I suspect.

In line with giving Barrowman more of a spotlight, we get the secret origin of Merlyn the Magician, Flashback Island style. I'm sorry, I love Captain Jack as much as the next fanboy, but I'm not sympathizing. Keep the villains villains, and Merlyn works much better as a super-villain adversary than a sympathetic anti-hero. I love him, but it might be time for my favorite Time Agent to take a powder.

The street fight revolution suggested by the episode's title is just absurd. Team Arrow rallies the citizens of The Glades, including Sin and Wildcat (!), to rise up and take back their neighborhood from Brick. First, why would Team Arrow do something as irresponsible as endanger the lives of innocents? And we see people on both sides of the fight with guns, so why is no one shooting? It's all brawling. I could swear some on Brick's side had machine guns - why aren't they mowing people down?

Things have been sloppy on this show for a while, and they don't seem to be getting better. The back and forth state of Ollicity is only a symptom of the real problem. The powers that be are being sloppy with the characters, the stories, and the details. I really hope it gets better before it gets worse.

Questions brought up by this episode - When is Thea going to just stop believing everyone at face value? Why don't both Roy and Thea question the knowledge that they know the other really shouldn't have? Wouldn't Felicity already have everything the police have on Brick, and more? And as much as I love Vinnie Jones, why wasn't an African-American actor chosen to play African-American super-villain Brick?

Next: Vertigo, and Canary vs. Canary.



And if you'd like to discuss this episode and anything else in the Arrowverse, please join the Arrow discussion group on Facebook.

Arrow S03 E10: "Left Behind"

Oliver Queen is dead.

Yes, the Arrow is dead, and while this is new for television, in the comics, Green Arrow has been dead before. More than once. He's always gotten better. And seeing how Stephen Amell and his bare chest are the stars of this show, he won't be dead for long on TV either.

Here's the situation, quick and mostly painless, as I'll be glossing over the weak plot points and cliches as we go. While under Malcolm's mind control, Thea killed Sara. To keep the League of Assassins from killing Thea, Oliver takes the blame and is brought before R'as Al Ghul. In lieu of execution, Oliver challenges R'as to a duel, a trial by combat. It's a good fight for a moment or two until R'as stops toying with Oliver, puts his sword through his chest, and kicks him off a cliff. Yeah, baby, dead us dead. Or is it?

Meanwhile as we open on a chase scene in Starling City, Team Arrow is making the best of it without their leader. Diggle is in the Arrow suit (no mask) and Arsenal is taking point. I love the one bad guy's reaction to the young man in red, "I thought he was supposed to be green," and at Dig's bad aim, "I thought he was supposed to be good." Felicity is the only one of the three who believes Oliver is still alive. The bad news is that this Arrow-less Team Arrow is going up against Brick.

Brick is a 21st century Green Arrow foe from the comics. Danny Brickwell was a low level thug and enforcer who rose to crime lord status with his powers of super-strength and invulnerability. Played here by charismatic but typecast villain actor Vinnie Jones, Brick might not be a metahuman (jury is still out on that, did he take a bullet to the head?), but he's strong, resilient, and very intimidating. And he's killing or threatening witnesses, and stealing evidence from the police, giving him a sort of invulnerability.

The case against Brick is made even more difficult by a couple visits by Malcolm Merlyn to the Arrowcave (they gotta change the locks). He first suggests, then brings proof that Oliver is dead, finally shaking Felicity's faith. Not just shaken, broken. Felicity is of course playing double duty super-assistant to Ray Palmer as well. She brings her poopie party to that job as well and tries to shatter Ray's confidence, not maliciously, but possibly effectively.

Things do not go well. It was nice to Diggle go one on one with Brick, but hated to see him lose. Felicity loses her cool and second guesses herself, opting for the safety of the team over catching the bad guys. Brick now has a force of men to take over the Glades. This is not the ending any of us hoped for. Team Arrow in shambles and everyone they've caught since Deathstroke is now back on the street and under Brick's thumb.

The story in Flashback Hong Kong continues as Amanda Waller insists Oliver and Maseo go after China White and the bomb components as opposed to Tatsu/Katana. Of course it perhaps only serves to keep Stephen Amell on the screen in his own show that he's the star of. There may of course be a payoff in the flashback story this episode however.

We knew from advance press and Amell's own words that Oliver would not be resurrected via Lazarus Pit, which of course would be the first option when a character dies in a R'as Al Ghul story. So something else would have to happen. We had seen Tatsu's healing abilities earlier in the season, and as Oliver helped Maseo find her in Hong Kong - he is owed a debt. The debt is paid when we find that Maseo has stolen Oliver's body and Tatsu has revived him.

And then there's the new Black Canary. I guess we have to take what we get. I have never liked the casting of Katie Cassidy, and I like my Black Canaries curvy and in fishnets as opposed to lean and leathered. And the wig is so obviously a wig - I hate it - did she rob China White's closet? Perhaps I'm being too rash from a brief cameo, but we'll see. Time will tell.

Next: More of the new Black Canary, and the return of the Arrow in "Midnight City."



You can read all of my "Arrow" reviews here, and my Biff Bam Pop! reviews of "The Flash" here.

Swordfish

Swordfish ~ I never saw Swordfish in the theaters, or even on tape or disc since. I knew it only for its legendary topless scene with Halle Berry, and that was it. Flipping through the channels the other day I caught John Travolta's monologue on Dog Day Afternoon and cinema in the beginning, and just from that, knew I had to see this. I checked the next time it was on (so I could see it in its entirety) and DVRred it.

When I sat down to watch, that intriguing opening scene became a tense hostage situation and then into an explosive conclusion. I liked it and wanted more - only to be hit with the caption "4 DAYS EARLIER" - sigh. Now don't get me wrong, I like in media res when it's done well, but when I have to watch a lot if boring bits to get back to the interesting scene we started with? I'm not a fan of that. I think I would have much rather started at "4 DAYS EARLIER."

That is not to say what came after was not good, it is. Hugh Jackman and Halle Berry, both fresh from the first X-Men movie, are really good, as is Don Cheadle, but then again Don is always good. Travolta is still feeding off his crazy cool vibe from Pulp Fiction and Broken Arrow, and Vinnie Jones exudes appropriate subtle menace. The problem is, the opening never leaves my mind. I know what's coming and it sours the set-up.

Here's the gist. Travolta is a mad anti-terrorist terrorist who wants to rob a bank to finance war, yeah, just war, to protect the freedoms Americans take for granted. To do this he recruits super hacker Jackman, and Berry, who unknown to him is a DEA agent. Beyond that it gets cloudy. There are lots of gunfights, car chases, and explosions - all the good stuff that makes for a good heist thriller. It's good if you don't think about it too much.

Another problem of Swordfish is the same that shows up in any hacking movie from WarGames to Hackers, the technology and the methodology are usually outdated by the time the flick hits the theaters, and in the case of old men like me watching it fourteen years later, it's positively ancient and unbelievable. And when the film comes full circle back to the present of the opening, it's very sloppy. Not worth it at all.

The anti-Dog Day Afternoon ending is intriguing, and makes me wonder if what writer Skip Woods and director Domenic Sena really wanted to do was remake that movie. Or Sugarland Express. The airborne bus sequence is freaking amazing, and unbelievable, but it's so cool and visually stunning, you just roll with it.

At the end of the film Travolta says, "not everything ends the way you think it should, besides, audiences love happy endings," and earlier he praises the work of Harry Houdini with misdirection. Is it any wonder this movie has an alternate ending? In Swordfish's alternate ending, depending on your perspective everyone gets a happy ending, or the good guys win. You pick. I kinda like it.

And yes, Halle Berry's all too brief topless scene is spectacular and worth the price of admission.