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Birds of Prey

Episode 1.01, "Pilot"
Written by Laeta Kalogridis
Directed by Brian Robbins
Starring: Dina Meyer (Barbara Gordon/Oracle), Ashley Scott (Helena/The Huntress), Rachel Skarsten (Dinah), Shemar Moore (Detective Jesse Reese), Mia Sara (Dr. Harleen Quinzel) Guest Stars: Chris Ellis (Larry Ketterly), Ian Abercrombie (Alfred)
Air Date: October 9, 2002

Going into Birds of Prey, I kept low expectations. By not expecting much, I hoped to be pleasantly surprised. I'm not a big fan of the comic, having only read a handful of issues ever, but I figured that might make me a bit more objective about the subject matter than the average raving lunatic. Maybe I was wrong. My expectations were low, but I still hated pretty much every minute of the pilot.

We start off with a somewhat retarded opening narration. Alfred "has a story to tell", which is great because I was expecting to watch the CNN. The short of it is that the Joker basically had Catwoman killed and shot Barbara. According to Alfred, the Joker suffered a horrible defeat at the hands of Batman, and this was his revenge. Explain to me exactly how a defeated Joker gets away and sets all of this up so quickly. It didn't make sense to me either.

Catching up seven years later, we find Huntress is prowling the streets of New Gotham with Oracle handing out instructions over her headset. Batman went missing shortly after Catwoman died, but we're given no real timeline on that. Huntress is seeing a shrink for "anger management" and that shrink is none other than Harleen Quinzel, AKA Harley Quinn. So the Joker's main squeeze just went back to being a psychiatrist after all that shit she pulled with the Joker? Okay.

I lost interest in the main thrust of the plot about ten minutes into the episode. It had something to do with a guy named Ketterly using people's fears to kill them. He's doing all of this on the orders of Harley Quinn, and it has something to do with future plans of hers. He's a meta-human who can enter people's minds, only he didn't really do that at all. He drugs Helena and makes some hypnotic suggestions. How does that translate into entering a person's mind? And if he was conscious when he did this, how did killing him in Helena's mind make him a vegetable in the real world? Was it feedback? Whatever it was, it didn't make much sense.

The producers tried very hard to make this show sexy, and it completely turned me off. Though I do find the leads attractive, it's not enough to keep my interest. In fact, I got tired of looking at them after about 30 minutes. T&Aamp; does not a quality show make, just look at Dark Angel*. There was a passing attempt at grit thrown out, but it was half-baked. A show like this needs to be more visceral. The action wasn't even worth it.

The writing, acting, directing, and effects, none of it worked for me. I didn't care for Dinah one bit. Some moments played for laughs fell completely flat, and there was little chemistry to go around. Dinah's powers were nothing more than a silly means of getting her into the show. In short order, I detest this show and I don't plan on watching it again. The good news, I guess, is that Birds of Prey has plenty of potential for growth and improvement. It can't possibly get any worse. The Pilot gets:

Episode Rating: 4 out of 10

* Ashley Scott also starred on Dark Angel so I guess BoP is in good company.

- Steven Dougherty thinks BoP would be more interesting if it had lesbians in it. At least then it would hold his attention.

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