She's here

Woodclaw wrote: Well, she's finally here. I admit I only watched Arrow's pilot and I wasn't too impressed with the result, there was something in how they handled the character that looked definitly not Green Arrow to me. Now Laurel is finally donning the leather of Black Canary and I can't shake off the feeling that something isn't right here.

I am going to guess the comicbook style drawing they where working from in designing the costume looked spectacular here. There is a lot going, lots of busy details, with no color that really emphasizes her hair(Which is striking). Yet....the problem is thats once you take it from a comic book to an actual actress its diffrent. People have a little more color in faces, light reflects off leather in odd ways, her proportions are different then a comic-it wants to highlight curves she doesn't quite have.

Its an interesting design, but thats often i think how i i react to Arrows costumes. Its intresting, never actually quite all the way to good.. This is in contrast to Flash, which genuinly i think has pretty great costuming.

I don't like the costume on first pass. I guess I'll have to see it in the show (in actual use) before I know for sure.

It also seems very early for her to be taking on this mantle (not enough training yet). It's already had to believe that 5 years turned Ollie into the bad ass he is (so far he's not been shown to have had enough training), and we're now supposed to take that Thea with Super-expert training is a reasonable fighter after only a few months. I'm willing to let it slide as her teacher is a demonstrated Bad-Ass, and he might be able to make the training super-effective, and it was shown to be pretty dedicated and concentrated. A bit "comic book world" but, letting it slide, as she's also not being shown as being able to hang with the big dogs yet (she "beat" her father, but she believes he threw the fight, and it's the best explanation. She's also avoided going toe to toe with anyone yet.)

But Laurel's had some self defense training (that she's never demonstrated as having any value) and a few lessons from a boxer. She should get her ass handed to her the first time she steps out (which already happened on the show, and nothing has changed since then, so it should just happen again). If she puts on a costume and suddenly can fight -- it'll just be silly.

I also don't really like her character much on the show, so was glad that "canary" was played by another actress who seemed to fill the part. If they'd wanted to show her across a season or so, gaining training and skill and being a stronger character -- that would be good. At least Thea has been shown to have a backbone now (the real change on her road to being a badass is knowing what she wants and standing up for it).