Ahead of its time, Birds of Prey goes full costume and character – some of the time.
What They Say:
Who will stand up to villains now that a heartbroken Dark Knight has mysteriously vanished? Never fear, New Gothamites, a trio of champions is ready to take wing – and Helena, the daughter of Batman and Catwoman, is among them. She calls herself Huntress and crime is her prey. Teenaged Dinah is the youngest of the group, learning as she goes and gifted in clairvoyance. And overseeing the awesome threesome’s high-tech nerve center is Batgirl. Left wheelchair-bound by The Joker, she has reinvented herself as Oracle, the team’s cyber expert. Huntress, Dinah, Oracle: They are the Birds of Prey. Fighting together. Living together. And soaring into adventure together in 13 breathtaking live-action episodes.
The Review:
Audio:
The audio presentation for this series is rather straightforward as we get the English language mix only encoded at 192kbps in Dolby Digital. The series is one that is fairly standard TV material here in that it uses the forward soundstage well enough with both action and dialogue as we get characters flitting about from time to time and coming into the scene from unexpected directions. That helps to keep things a bit more involved, though it’s got nothing thrown to the rears for obvious reasons which minimizes the effect a little bit. Dialogue has some solid placement throughout with the way the cast tends to be together but spread across the screen and the action side of the series has a decent little bit of impact in some scenes and some decent directionality, but it’s also limited by the time and design of the show.
Video:
Originally airing in 2002 and 2003, the transfer for this TV series is presented in its original aspect ratio of 1.78:1, but it’s not anamorphic so we get a full screen presentation with the non-anamorphic widescreen presentation in the middle of it. The series certainly doesn’t look bad, but it’s mild-budget early 2000’s fare that handles detail and design about as well as you’d expect. There’s softness to be had in a number of the backgrounds which leads to noise in quite a few places and some of the “old school” technology pieces shows off a good bit of crossoloration in the text and other areas. The main thrust of the show does look decent though, but you can imagine it being sharper, more detailed and richer, if it was given a proper anamorphic transfer or a high definition transfer to really show off its assets. It’s definitely serviceable for those that simply want to see and own the show.
Packaging:
The packaging for this release is decent, though frustrating in some way. What we get is a standard sized clear DVD keepcase that holds the four discs inside on hinges, which works well and is problem free. THe front cover is given over exclusively to Ashley Scott as Helena Kyle, where we see her in her usual attire of trenchcoat, low top, boots and all black material all around as she looks out from the rooftops. It’s not that far different from some Batman poses, though those tend to have him looking across or up. But where are the other two main characters? We get them on the back cover as part of a group shot along the right while in the Clocktower, which is decent. THere are a few shots from the show that gives us a look at the Batgirl costume and that of Reese and the kind of weirdly out of place shot of Helena holding a baby. The premise is kept simple but effective and we get a good breakdown of the special features with the release. There isn’t any easy to read technical grid to find out what languages are here, encoding or anything else useful. We do get artwork on the reverse side, which is again a full length two panel shot of Helena. There’s a nice little foldout booklet that’s included, which offers the trio on the front of it, which opens to a cast listing and a welcome letter from Paul Levitz, who at the time was the president and publisher of DC Comics, where he talks about the whole mythology of it all and some of the origins. The booklet opens up to show us the episodes breakdown with writing and directing credits alongside the original air dates and a little premise summary. The location of the extras are also covered here.
Menu:
The menu design does a nice job of going to the comic book origins here as we basically get a couple of pages of an issue here spread out where different stills from the series are spread across it that lets the main cast get their block of space to stand out. Not surprising is that Helena takes center stage here with her piece from the front cover, but it has a bit more color and vibrancy here that works nicely. Navigation is kept to the narration boxes in a cute way and the layout in general is quick and easy to use and language setup options, minimal as they are, work well and are clear in what’s set and what isn’t.
Extras:
This release is sort of light on extras in a sense, but just in the traditional sense of behind the scenes materials and the like. What we do get is a real treat as all of the Flash based Gotham Girls material is here, which is three “seasons” worth of material spread across thirty episodes of varying lengths. I had missed these when they were originally introduced, but it’s classic comic book/cartoon material with the usual array of Gotham girls as they go through their fun and silliness. It’s an utter treat, though I do wish it had gotten subtitles for those that are hard of hearing to enjoy. The other extra we get is the original unaired pilot, which clocks in at just under fifty minutes. What this provides is for some extended scenes, especially early on, which helps to reinforce the bonds and connections of the core trio, but it also features Sherilynn Fenn as Harley Quinn as opposed to Mia Sara, who took over the role and reshot the scenes for the pilot. So a lot of what we get here is familiar, or identical, but there’s some neat twists to see too.
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers)
When Smallville really managed to find an audience and its standing, it wasn’t a surprise to try and see if another comic book based series could do the same or better. Birds of Prey came out in late 2002 and was canceled after just thirteen episodes on The WB – with ratings that The CW would kill for now – and was developed by Laeta Kalogridis with some of the producers behind Once Upon A Time cutting their teeth early on here producing and doing a lot of the writing. Unlike a whole lot of comic book TV series from this time and before – and a few since – this one really made it clear it was based on comics. In a way, it feels like it’s trying to find a middle ground between the Batman ‘66 world and Smallville while also struggling with how broadcast TV was on the cusp of changing its own narrative and structure.
The big thing for me is that it doesn’t disown the whole capes and cowl thing – sometimes – but it also doesn’t play coy with its true origins. We see in the intro to each episode that shows the overall setup in the series that Batman was a mythical figure that operated in the night for many years in Gotham, dealing with a host of criminals (and metahuman criminals as well) before things went south and he left. That leaving happened after a battle with the Joker, who we also see here, that spiraled out of control with a nod to the Killing Joke as he cripples Batgirl, which turned her into Oracle, the behind the scenes crimefighter. In this timeline, we also learn that Batman and Catwoman were intense of contentious lovers which led to the birth of a daughter named Helena. Selina took Helena away and never let Bruce know (though of course, the world’s greatest detective likely knew) and she’s grown up into quite the young woman herself, being half human and half metahuman.
While Barbara retired from Batgirl and took up the Oracle name, setting up in the Clocktower and focusing on crime with Helena in New Gotham, the rebuilt city over the ruins of Old Gotham from the earthquake years prior, the two are close as Barbara has largely mentored her after someone killed Helena’s mother seven years prior. That gives Helena her motivation, one similar to her father’s when it came to her own mother, and Barbara is trying to keep what Bruce brought to Gotham alive in some form, getting a little help from Alfred from time to time who visits the Clocktower bringing food, sage advice and more. The story is ostensibly told from his perspective in a way as he narrates the openings and he gets the final word of the series towards the end which makes it all rather neat and tidy.
Metahumans are largely unheard of in this world, though they have an underground society of sorts and operate in the shadows both as good and evil types like normal people. Barbara is able to walk between these worlds because of her connections while Helena does as well, though she’s more welcome in a sense since she has some heritage because of her mother. What provides the impetus for change in the series is the arrival of a young woman named Dinah, the daughter of Black Canary who saw the tragic events of both Helena and Barbara as a young child and has wanted to come and be with them ever since. She’s full on metahuman and is discovering her own powers and heritage, which is different from the more traditional Black Canary as Dinah has mild telepathy, telekinesis and a growing range of physical skills that can be sharpened with Helena and Barbara giving her guidance.
The series works this obvious and expected angle as you’d guess where you have high school student Dinah learning from twenty-three year old Helena, who is grappling with being an adult and her own identity, alongside Barbara, who looks to be in her early thirties and does her secret identity day job of being a high school teacher. There’s a villain of the week aspect that’s worked well here as we get some interpretations of somewhat familiar characters, though Clayface is really the most name worthy in the end, and an exploration of the metahuman community and how people deal with them upon learning about them. There’s also an overarching storyline involving Helena’s psychiatrist, Harleen Quinzel, who we know is Harly Quinn and has come to New Gotham to get revenge for Mr. J. for all that’s been done to her puddin’. She’s the behind the scenes big bad that dominates this season, which is overall well handled.
I had originally caught the pilot for this way back in the day but never actually saw the series itself. Coming into it now over a decade later, it certainly has a quaint kind of feeling for what The WB was like at the time and it’s certainly interesting to compare to how The CW now handles these kinds of properties with Arrow and the Flash out there, never mind Gotham and all the others. It really is a show that feels like it’s trying to find its place but not really being sure what it wants to be. There’s a near-campy feeling to it that’s amusing and works sometimes but not others. It has a lot going on with metahumans, but it has to deal with a low budget to really do it and it’s stuck in this whole weird Gotham/New Gotham thing that isn’t really explained until about ten episodes in. Largely, it just doesn’t feel like it established its foundations and “series bible” well enough or shown it well enough.
But I also really liked that they owned up to the costumes side of it. Helena doesn’t really have one, going for the black leather and other black clothes, and we see Dinah doing the same as she really gets field ready. And admittedly we don’t get an Oracle costume. But we get some really good flashbacks of her in a great looking Batgirl suit and she does it a couple of times in the present as well. Even that feels like it’s gone further than Arrow has in its first couple of seasons. It’s also a series that, somehow, managed to get Batman and the Joker visualized in TV live action form, along with Catwoman. It’s kept to the pilot piece, which is recycled as part of the intro/setting for each episode, and it’s fantastic just to see Batman and Joker going at it, the Catwoman romance and the nods to the Batgirl outfit. It’s small things, but it’s what I wanted to see come to life.
Birds of Prey does involve a few other characters along the way, notably with Reese as the police officer that starts to find out about the metahumans and gets drawn into a relationship – of sorts – with Helena along the way. He actually has a decent back story to him that gets explored later on that makes things more complicated, but it works nicely to get her to realize that everyone has complications. Barbara has a bit of a romance as well with another teacher, and that’s really nice to see how it plays out for the most part. Though nobody gives a second thought to her wheelchair bound status, we see his parents really unnerved by it and how that impacts both her and the relationship. Add in a few other characters along the way, including a guest appearance by Lori Laughlin as the original Black Canary, and they flesh out the cast overall well enough to enrich the thing as a whole.
In Summary:
During the second season of Arrow, one of my favorite moments was the Birds of Prey episode. Having long been a fan of the trio from the comics and an even older Batgirl and Oracle fan, revisiting this series after all these years and finally seeing all of it definitely was an experience. There’s flaws to be had here, areas where they hedged, but other areas where they went further than shows today do in a lot of ways. It’s the epitome of a mixed bag as it pulls from different ideas within the comics and tries to make something functional and you can see how it would be both a draw and something that would turn away comics fans. With what they do here, I’d really wish they’d figure out a way to try and revive it fresh and new under the current style of how these shows are made since we could get something truly amazing and fun. With The CW exploring a number of properties, this is one that they really need to fast track and figure out more than anything else. Fun, smart, sexy and just plain full of interesting ideas, Birds of Prey was ahead of its time and hamstrung by its own ideas. But it’s one of the better failed experiments out there.
Features:
English 2.0 Language, English Subtitles, Gotham Girls, Unaired Pilot
Content Grade: B
Audio Grade: B
Video Grade: C+
Packaging Grade: B-
Menu Grade: B
Extras Grade: B+
Released By: Warner Home Video
Release Date: July 15th, 2008
MSRP: $29.98
Running Time: 737 Minutes
Video Encoding: 480i/p MPEG-2
Aspect Ratio: 1.78:1 Non-Anamorphic Widescreen
Review Equipment:
Sony KDL70R550A 70″ LED 1080P HDTV, Sony PlayStation3 Blu-ray player via HDMI set to 1080p, Onkyo TX-SR605 Receiver and Panasonic SB-TP20S Multi-Channel Speaker System With 100-Watt Subwoofer.
