‘Gotham’ and the ‘Smallville’ problem

It’s no surprise, but “Gotham” – the recently announced Fox series about the early, pre-Batman series of Bruce Wayne – would appear to have a “Smallville” problem.

Now, I watched “Smallville,” on and off, and enjoyed some of it. I faded during the seasons when the show seemed to revolve around Clark’s girlfriend, Lana Lang, but always enjoyed the show’s treatment of young Clark and Lex and the Kent family.

Having said that, we now know it’s not impossible to do a good TV series about a superhero on a TV budget. “Arrow,” in its second season, has brought to the small screen more comic book authenticity, more characters, more action, than “Smallville” did in its entire run.

So here’s my concern about “Gotham.” It’s utterly and completely based on the “Smallville” model.

The premise of the series is that the stories will begin with the killing of Thomas and Martha Wayne and the investigation – and police career – of Jim Gordon, who begins the series as a young cop and, presumably, ends up as the police commissioner we know.

Along the way, we’ll meet younger versions of the Penguin and other characters, including good-cop-gone-bad Harvey Bullock.

And we’ve already seen the young actors playing Bruce Wayne and Selina Kyle, who will grow up to be Catwoman.

The two look right for the part and look to have charisma.

But here are my fears for “Gotham”:

The stories might go nowhere. With eight or ten years to burn through before the ultimate moment when Bruce puts on the mask, will we see 19 or 20 episodes a season acting as filler before those “aha” moments like Bruce seeing a bat and realizing it has some strange role in his destiny? (I think I just wrote the first season finale’s last scene.)

The acting – particularly that of the young actors – could be awful. Remember how wooden the guy who played Aquaman was on “Smallville?” I really, really hope they vet all the players.

The foreshadowing and Easter eggs could be fun or they could be painful. How many Halloween costumes are we going to see that suggest the ultimate look of the characters? Even “Arrow” had a thudding moment in its first season with a reference to Black Canary’s fishnet stockings.

Will it compel us to care about young Bruce? The idea of prequels – curse you, George Lucas – just leaves me cold. An extended look at a character before he or she gets interesting? Sure, sign me up.

The ending might fizzle like “Smallville.” This is what I worry about the most. In its final seasons, “Smallville” was actually building to a compelling climax for Clark’s story. But the series seemed so averse to showing Clark in the Superman outfit that … well, it never really did. We got a quick shot of Clark’s face with some red and blue below his chin and a long shot of Superman flying. That’s it.

It’ll be a while before we know if “Gotham” is more like “Arrow” than “Smallville.” In the meantime, we can only hope.

‘Agents of SHIELD,’ ‘Winter Soldier’ building to … ?

It shouldn’t be surprising that Disney/ABC/Marvel is practicing synergy in how it’s handling ABC’s Tuesday-night series “Agents of SHIELD” and the April 4 release of “Captain America: The Winter Soldier,” the second Marvel movie – after “Thor: The Dark World” – released since “SHIELD” debuted last fall.

There was a “SHIELD” episode earlier in the season that tied in, in a minimal way, to the “Thor” sequel. And Jaimie Alexander guest-starred this week as Sif on “SHIELD,” tracking down fellow Asgardian Lorelei.

But it’s increasingly obvious, as I noted in an earlier piece, that both “SHIELD” and “Winter Soldier” seem to be building to something.

On “SHIELD,” Agent Phil Coulson (Clark Gregg) has had a season-long arc of discovery as he tries to determine how and why he was brought back from the dead after Loki inflicted a fatal goring in “The Avengers.” So far, we’ve learned that Coulson – and SHIELD team member Skye – were saved by a mysterious liquid that appears to be generated from the half-missing corpse of a blue alien bottled up in a remote SHIELD facility. In last week’s episode, Coulson asks Sif about “blue aliens” and she mentions several, from frost giants (obviously not the answer in this case) to the Kree, the longtime Marvel alien race that spawned not only the original Captain Marvel but also is the mortal enemy of the Skrulls (or the Chitauri, as they were depicted in “The Avengers.”)

By episode’s end, Coulson – frustrated that alien biologics were used in his resurrection and to save Skye – is seeking answers and demanding to speak to Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson, who’s already appeared on the series).

Promos for the series – using the subtitle (“Uprising”) – would lead us to believe that Coulson’s quest for knowledge may shake up the prevailing image of SHIELD.

As I’ve stated before, SHIELD’s been the subject of sinister undertones in the big-screen Marvel movies, most notably “The Avengers,” when our heroes discovered that SHIELD was experimenting with Hydra weaponry.

I have a feeling this will tie in, more or less, to “Winter Soldier” when it comes out on April 4. The promos for the movie indicate Cap, Black Widow and new partner Sam (aka The Falcon) Wilson might find themselves pitted against SHIELD itself or at least leader figures like the one Robert Redford plays. I’ve previously speculated the role Robert Redford’s character plays in all this (spoilers here if you look).

So what can we infer from this?

Marvel is trying to pull off something that’s extremely tricky. It’s making some pretty big changes to SHIELD, the organization that has been, more or less, the glue that’s held its cinematic universe together from the start.

And it’s doing some while it’s producing a weekly TV series about that organization.

Is the series going to turn its “good guy” into a “bad guy,” with the rank-and-file agents on the outside? Or even on the run?

We’re still friends, ‘Veronica Mars’

As sure as “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” was a drama about high school filtered through horror movie trappings like vampires and demons, “Veronica Mars” was a drama about real-life horror show elements – murder, rape, STDs and, most of all, betrayal – filtered through the high-school experience.

“Buffy” and “Veronica Mars” were sisters of the same mother – as a throw-away line in the “Veronica Mars” movie that debuted just this weekend testifies – and are, ultimately, stories about surviving not just people with murderous intentions but the people who love you and the people you love. Betrayal hurts a hell of a lot worse than a stake to the heart or the zap of a Taser.

As TV shows, “Buffy” and “Veronica Mars” ended before their time. Sure, it can be argued that “Buffy” had more weak moments than strong ones in its last couple of seasons, but the most bitter pill for fans is that the show ended before pop culture’s full-on fixation with vampire stories began, with far lesser tales like “Twilight” hogging the spotlight that should have gone to the show that started it all.

And while “Veronica Mars” had the benefit of an online Kickstarter campaign that brought it back as the big-screen incarnation that debuted this weekend, its three seasons – again, admittedly, with some uneven stories late in its run – just missed out on the shared online community of Facebook, Twitter and name-your-social-media that generates – or at least proves to the world – the dedication of fans.

So we come to the new “Veronica Mars,” a big-screen movie that follows up, seven years later, on the heroine who gave the series and movie their names.

Director Rob Thomas, creator of the series, duplicates the success of the series in creating an unlikely protagonist in Veronica: A female protagonist who acts and talks like the tough-guy hero of a hard-boiled detective story but is still, realistically, a young woman trying to navigate the caste system of a small California town.

Neptune – “It really was built on a Hellmouth,” as one character says in the movie, in a nod to “Buffy” – is still a town full of haves and have nots. Thanks to the corruption that rules the town, the haves – politicians and software makers and movie actors and the police who do their bidding – push the have-nots down and keep them down.

Veronica – the former high-school outcast-turned private investigator, still played with toughness and vulnerability by Kristen Bell – returns to Neptune when former antagonist, former boyfriend Logan (charming, as always, Jason Dohring) is accused of killing his girlfriend, a former classmate who’s become a pop celebrity.

The trip means leaving boyfriend Piz (Chris Lowell) and a promising job at a law firm behind in New York. And it means a reunion with friends like Wallace (Percy Daggs III), Mac (Tina Majorino) and Weevil (Francis Capra). There’s also that most dreaded function of “all these years later” plots – an actual high school reunion.

Much more welcome is the reunion between Veronica and her dad, private investigator Keith Mars (Enrico Colantoni). It’s the relationship between Veronica and Keith – heartfelt and quippy, with the warmest and sometimes thorniest parent-child dynamic on TV – that made the show more than a rehash of Nancy and Carson Drew.

Well, that and the more-than-a-little caustic look at a town that seems more relevant today, frankly, than it did in the comparative boom days of the early 2000s. Neptune feels like a jaundiced and corrupt town from the best noir, full of biker gangs, seedy motels and people with either too much to lose or nothing at all.

The heart of the movie is Logan’s dilemma and Veronica’s puzzling out a solution, but there are a lot of nice moments with most of the cast. And there are some nice surprise appearances for fans of the show – mostly along the lines of glimpses of favorite supporting characters, with the notable exception of one who was written out of the story when it was on TV – and a fun and unexpected cameo or two.

The surprises emphasize, in a way, just how focused the movie is on fans – including those tens of thousands who helped fund it through Kickstarter  but also those who fondly remembered the series, its plucky and wry heroine and its jaded look at relationships and a town’s caste system.

The movie’s clubby anti-club slant probably limits its appeal to people who never watched the series. The point of rebooting an old TV show or movie is to bring in new fans, but like the “Serenity” follow-up to Joss Whedon’s “Firefly” series, “Veronica Mars” isn’t likely to engage new followers.

But for the faithful, the fans of the young sleuth and her world, “Veronica Mars” is a welcome reunion.

First look at the full ‘Flash’ costume

The CW/Warner Bros. has released the first full look (sorta; he is hunched over) at the costume Grant Gustin will wear in the upcoming “Flash” pilot that will likely lead to a spinoff series of the network’s “Arrow” series.

Looks pretty good. It’s not any darker than the costume from the old “Flash” series.

And they aren’t afraid to go full Flash, obviously. No more red hoodies.

 

Oscars: I’ll catch up tomorrow

I doubt I’ll be watching much, if any, of the Oscars tonight.

It’s not a protest of anything, or a statement about anything, including Ellen, the host.

I just feel more disconnect with the Academy Awards than I ever have.

For one thing, I haven’t seen a single one of the nine Best Picture nominees. I want to see at least three or four of them, but my schedule doesn’t encourage a lot of movie-going. And when it does, frankly, I really like escapist fare. Not that I didn’t see, and enjoy, movies like last year’s “Silver Linings Playbook.” But – and if you’re a reader of this blog, I don’t have to tell you this – I’m more likely to see the latest big-screen comic book adventure or action movie or comedy.

So other than tuning in to see what could be some funny stuff from Ellen at the opening, I’ll probably do other things until “The Walking Dead” comes on and then I’ll be watching it.

One reason I’m startled by my disconnect with the Oscars and movies in general is that I was a movie reviewer from 1978 to 1990. I saw two or three movies every week – during a period that was pretty good for movies of a certain type – and wrote about them. I loved Oscar night. I did my own predictions and sometimes the winners even coincided with my picks.

But tonight I’ll check out Ellen and undoubtedly enjoy Twitter comments by people who are watching. I’ll be amused, as always, by people who complain that the Oscar telecast runs long, like it doesn’t every year.

And if the show seems too long to you, why are you watching? There’s room alongside me on the couch for someone with an actual excuse as to why they’re not watching.

But I’ll catch up tomorrow.

The new ‘Flash’ sneak peek

Yeah, that looks pretty good.

The CW has released a picture of Grant Gustin in the headpiece he’ll wear in the upcoming CW series “The Flash,” a spin0ff of “Arrow.”

It’s dark-ish, but so was the costume for the 1990 “Flash” series starring John Wesley Shipp as Barry Allen.

Shipp, by the way, has been cast in a recurring role on the new series. Here’s hoping for Jay Garrick.

Some other notable looks for the Flash:

The evolution of the character and costume in the DC comics.

The best presentation of the Flash, in the person of Wally West, from “Justice League” and “Justice League Unlimited” animated series.

And, just for fun, the failed “Justice League” TV pilot.

‘Dallas’ – Five things we want to see

The third-season premiere of TNT’s continuation of “Dallas” aired last night and I was missing Larry Hagman.

Although Hagman’s illness reduced his presence on the first two seasons of the new take on the classic nighttime soap, I have to say I wish that, before his death, producer Cynthia Cidre had shot several hours of Hagman talking on the phone, riding in the back of a limo and just walking across the room that she could generously salt through upcoming seasons.

But I guess that wouldn’t be right.

Anyway, in this, its first season without the venerable J.R. Ewing, “Dallas” will have to make its way on its own soapy power. I think it can do this … if it gives us a few things we want to see.

Plenty of the young’uns. I’m really growing to like the new generation of Ewings. Josh Henderson (John Ross) and Jesse Metcalfe (Christopher) are getting to be pretty good antagonists and I’ve already fallen for Julie Gonzalo as Pamela and Jordana Brewster as Elena.

But plenty of the original Ewings too. Patrick Duffy is stalwart as Bobby and Linda Gray is plainly filling the Hagman role in some scenes with their son John Ross this season. I’m enjoying both. And even though I’m wincing at the thought they’re going to have Sue Ellen fall off the wagon and begin drinking again, it would give Gray, a wonderful soap opera actress, a juicy season.

Faces from the original “Dallas.” We’re seeing plenty of Ken Kercheval (who is 78!) as Cliff Barnes, but I want to see more of Gary Ewing and Lucy Ewing and Val Ewing and Ray Krebbs. I’d really enjoy seeing Ted Shackelford in several episodes, clashing with nephew John Ross over the fate of Southfork.

More of Judith Light. Last season, the “Who’s the Boss” star made a big impression as the mother of Mitch Pileggi’s character … despite the fact that Light is, at 65, just four years older than her on-screen son. I didn’t like Light much when she first appeared, but she’s just the right kind of looney character the show could use.

The drama. The drama. Not just drama from the Ewing Global boardroom, but from Southfork, where it looks like most of the characters will be in residence this season. We need more dinner scenes with all the Ewings staring daggers at each other from their spots around the bar.

Here’s to another good season.

Get off my lawn: Geekery is wasted on the young

Here’s the latest irregular installment of my view from the perspective of a longtime fan. So if you don’t want to hear it, you’re welcome to come back for the next entry. No hard feelings.

Back in my day (and ohmygod yes I did just write that, but mostly for the ironic effect) young fans or geeks or indoor kids or whatever we wanted to call ourselves appreciated classic books, movies and TV.

I mean, what choice did we have? We could slip back into the past with classic Universal monster movies or we could thrill to “Island at the Top of the World.” We could delight in “The Twilight Zone’s” dated pleasures or stay rooted in the present-day of “Manimal.”

I loved the TV and movies of my time, like “Star Trek” and “Star Wars,” but also loved the classics, like the aforementioned Universal movies featuring Frankenstein or the Wolf Man as well as the films of W.C. Fields, the Marx Brothers and Abbott and Costello.

I like to think of myself as living in the present day. I love the online world, from my ability to blog here to Twitter (two accounts). I can enjoy the treasure trove of information and entertainment available now thanks to the Internet that I couldn’t have imagined when I was young.

But …

Really, there’s no excuse for being ignorant of what’s come before.

Two things I’ve read recently bring this to mind.

With the release of the “Robocop” remake, a writer on io9 “discovered” the original 1987 movie and wrote, in pretty funny terms, about how awesome the movie is. It was pretty amusing and I didn’t really mind it, but I was thinking, “Really? You can watch any movie or TV show you want now, on several devices, and you seem shocked by your initial exposure to a very high-profile satirical science fiction movie from less than 30 years ago?”

Far more egregious was a recent AV Club roundtable about the 1970s series “WKRP in Cincinnati.” The series, about a radio station, was an MTM production and ran for several years. It’s not like nobody remembers it.

But one writer for the AV Club, who almost certainly wasn’t born when the series originally aired, was very dismissive of the show. She said the look and feel of the show and the characters were so dated she couldn’t get into the story.

Again I’m wondering how this person had never seen a bit of, or even heard of, the series before … and how that qualified her to take part in a roundtable discussion of the series.

Yes, I know. It’s a different world now. The young shall inherit the earth and all that.

But can’t they educate themselves on their way to the throne?

‘The Walking Dead’ – Six things we want to see

When “The Walking Dead” returns tonight for the final eight episodes of season four, your guess is as good as mine as far as what we’ll see.

But I know a few things that we want to see.

Rick and Carl together and strong. The father and son left together, after the devastating loss (?) of Baby Judith, aka “Little Asskicker,” during the Governor’s raid on the prison in the first half of the season. The Grimes boys will probably take a leading role in tonight’s episode and the next couple of episodes. But despite their loss, I want Rick and Carl to pull themselves out of their misery and start making a new life for themselves as quickly as possible. We don’t want Rick, wandering, hallucinating and mumbling to himself, times two for the rest of the season.

Reunions. Daryl is that-a-way and Tyreese is that-a-way and Michonne … well, the only thing we know about Michonne, apparently, is that she ends up – based on a publicity photo – with a couple of zombies on leashes again. We want the core cast reassembled as quickly as possible and moving on to the next big confluence of plot and setting. I’m not sure we’ll get that, however.

Carol. Just when Carol became tough and complex and controversial, Rick cast her out. We want her back, on her own terms.

Some plot points resolved. Who was feeding rats to the walkers at the prison fence?

A good villain. The Governor (David Morrisey) was a great psychopath. We need his equal, someone charming and dangerous.

The big picture. When AMC announced that it was planning a “Walking Dead” spinoff series, I wondered if it would be one set in another part of the world, or if it would be in a remaining center of power. It’s been a long time since the survivors got a few answers at the CDC. It would be great to get some again. What’s the rest of the world like? Who’s working on the problem? What’s happened somewhere besides this little corner of Georgia?

One thing we don’t have to wish for, apparently, is surprises. Cast members speaking cryptically in advance of tonight’s return say the upcoming episodes are dark and eventful, with plot points that will blow our minds.

What a week: ‘Sherlock,’ ‘Arrow,’ ‘SHIELD,’ ‘Walking Dead’

Like some kind of aligning of planets, the seven or eight days we’re in the middle of here is a heck of a week for episodic TV.

And that doesn’t even count “The Black List,” which didn’t have a new episode this week, but entertained the heck out of me with the episode from last week I finally got around to watching.

Quick impressions (and spoilers if you haven’t seen):

“Sherlock” finished up this year’s three-episode run on “Masterpiece Mystery” with “His Last Vow,” a quirky finale to a quirky season. Over the past three weeks we’ve seen Holmes return from the dead after his rooftop encounter with Moriarty last season, John and Mary get married and Mary exposed as a rather deadly former government operative. In “His Last Vow,” Holmes and Watson run up against a loathsome news magnate who can blackmail Mary. With no other way to save his friend’s wife, Holmes kills the man and Mycroft prepares to send Sherlock off on a nearly-certain-to-be-fatal mission. But then … images of Moriarty appear all over London and Sherlock is called back to investigate. And we wait until next year to see what happens next.

“The Black List” – last week at least – gave us “The Cyprus Agency,” in which the federal agents – with the help of James Spaders’ Red – broke an insidious group that kidnapped women and kept them in comas as well as pregnant to provide babies for adoption. Didn’t we see something like this – with organs instead of babies – in the movie “Coma” 40 years ago? Yeah, but that didn’t have James Spader in it.

“Agents of SHIELD” raised its somewhat low bar again this week with “TRACKS,” a high-stakes adventure that found the agents on – or thrown from – a train as they try to foil the plot of a villain. More good scenes with the agents – even Ward and especially May – some good Marvel movie references (Blonsky’s cryogenic cell is obviously now the holding place for the monster from “The Incredible Hulk”) and the return of Mike Peterson (J. August Richards) as the comic book character Deathlok.

“Justified” upped the stakes also this week with more peril and more bad-assery for Art (Nick Searcy), more misery for Boyd and Ava and more danger from those scumbag bad guys the Crowes. But we gotta have the return of Constable Bob soon.

“Arrow” might have tied “Justified” for my favorite episode of the week. “Heir to the Demon” brought Nyssa, the daughter of Ras al Ghul, to town, seeking … well, not revenge on Black Canary. As a matter of fact, I totally did not see the true nature of their relationship coming. And neither did Oliver Queen. This series, the true TV embodiment of comic book adventure like “Batman,” just gets better all the time.

And then there’s “The Walking Dead,” which returns for the second half of its season this coming Sunday. With the destruction of the prison, the survivors are split up. We want to know what happened to Rick, Carl, Michonne, Daryl and Tyrese as soon as possible. And tell me Carol is coming back. I’ll be watching Sunday.

Heck of a week.