Initial Thoughts on The Cape
Before I go any further, let's get two things straight. One, I'm an unashamed fan of the superhero genre. As a kid, I wanted to be Spider-Man when I grew up. So, yes, I'm more likely to be lenient on superhero genre shows. Two, Summer Glau, possibly the most gorgeous woman in existence, is welcome on my screen anytime, but she is not the sole reason to watch the show. After all, she was in The John Connor Chronicles and that still wasn't enough to get me to watch. Now that that's out of the way, we can venture forward.
The Cape is a 2011 NBC superhero drama. The story centers around Vince Faraday, a good cop in a city of corrupt ones. He's a decorated former soldier, a decorated cop, and a loving family man. Cue the tragic but inevitable turn of events. Vince is tipped off by a blogger known only as Orwell about some shady activities the Ark Corporation is involved in. After being discovered snooping, Vince is framed as the masked killer Chess, who blew up the police chief. After an explosion in the ensuing chase, Vince is presumed dead. In actuality, Chess is Peter Flemming, an Ark corporate executive with plans to privatize city law enforcement. If it works in Palm City, he reasons, he can repeat it across America.
Meanwhile Vince Faraday is not dead, but in hiding. He winds up at "The Circus of Crime", a legitimate circus act who moonlight as bank robbers. In an effort to clear his name, Vince adopts the persona of The Cape, a fictional character in the comics he used to read with his son, Trip. The leader of the circus, Max Malini promises to make Vince "the greatest circus act who ever lived." The circus folk train Vince in the arts of mesmerism, hypnotism, hand-to-hand combat, illusions, and escapology. Max in particular trains Vince to use a one-of-a-kind cloak to emulate the fictitious Cape. In the hands of a trained user, the cape becomes a tool and a weapon. Armed with the cloak and his training, Vince is reborn as The Cape and, with the aid of the Orwell and the circus folk, sets off to bring down Flemming and the Ark corporation, clear his own name, and reunite with his family.
And that's just in the first episode.
As one would expect from such a background-packed pilot, the storytelling is clumsy. Certain scenes run longer than they need to while others are cut shorter than one would expect. The overall effect is a shallow-feeling pilot, tinged with the promise of things to come. I almost stopped watching, but after Painkiller Jane and the Bionic Woman remake, I vowed never to judge a series on the pilot alone.
Without the necessary exposition the second episode livens things up a bit, but storytelling still needs work. However, we do get a delightfully campy, but completely awesome villain-of-the-week by the name of Cain, a member of a highly-secretive society of assassins. In addition to being a master poisoner, he's a trained gourmet chef and the two get mixed a little. In one scene Cain describes his poison in much the same way a chef would describe a dish or a wine critic would analyze a wine. In another, we see Cain cooking the victims' dinner, injecting it with poison, and then rearranging the garnish to improve the presentation.
The third episode brings us Vince's evil counterpart, a former pupil of Max's whose mastery of the cape exceeds Vince's. We see Vince's flaws: impatience, a violent streak that he works to keep in check, and the bull-headed stubbornness common to all men on a mission. We also get some hints that the cape might be more than a mere physical object. It works good as a stand-alone episode but also sets up a future reoccurring villain for Vince to face down. It looks like the series is starting to find its legs and getting into a stride.
There are a number of sub-plots running through the background during Vince's escapades. Vince's wife, Dana, who never believed her husband to be a killer takes a job at a defense attorney's office, hoping to give others the fair shake at justice her husband was denied. On her own time, she pursues an independent investigation into the mystery surrounding Chess and the circumstances of her husband's death.
More importantly, at least in my mind, is Vince's relationship with his son Trip. As stated previously, Vince models his superhero persona on Trip's comic books and states that part of his motivation is to give his son a symbol of hope, a message that good can still triumph over evil. This is especially important to trip who is devastated by the loss of his real-life hero. Vince visits his son under in his superhero persona, telling him not to give up hope, that his father is not a criminal and will come back to him some day. In the wake of a "real" hero, Vince offers his son the closest thing he can, bringing to life the story that inspired them both. With so many other protagonists on TV right now with mommy/daddy issues (the Winchesters on Supernatural, Chuck and Sarah from Chuck, Peter from Fringe, Chance from Human Target, Shawn from Psych, Seely Booth and Temperance Brennan from Bones, Kate Beckett from Castle, 70% of the NCIS cast, everyone on Heroes...), it's refreshing to see a healthy father-son dynamic. It would seem that the relationship dissolves with Vince's supposed death, but he still watches over his son and tries to mentor him as best he can from the shadow. Maybe it's hokey or campy or not dramatic enough for a generation that seems to thrive on dysfunctional relationships, but I, for one, thinks it makes Vince a stronger hero and a more relatable protagonist.
Moving away from the characters to the mechanics of the show, it is blatantly obvious where the show takes its cues from. Starting with the opening credits, to the titled segments, to the camera work, everything about The Cape screams "COMIC BOOK" at the top of its lungs. It lacks the voice-over of Heroes, but it's still as close as you can get to translating the look and feel of a comic book directly onto a TV screen. As has been noted on that wonderful time-sink TVTropes, The Cape has the feel of Silver Age comics, when morally-upstanding-but-troubled heroes, mad science (L9 gas), and somewhat contrived and/or ridiculous plot (the privitization of law enforcement...okay, not so far fetched when you remember Blackwater) were the order of the day. Unfortunately a return to that age means we're going to see some rehashed material. Intrepid reporter? Check. Mentor with a dark past? Check. Evil counterpart? Check. Themed villain? Check. See where I'm going with this? Since Batman is the modern standard of dark and shadowy crime-fighters, many will automatically assume The Cape to be a rip-off of Batman. In actuality, The Cape bears more similarities to Walter Gibson's The Shadow in methods and training, and Will Esiner's The Spirit in back-story. (Interesting note, The Shadow preceded Batman by nine years and The Spirit debuted one year after Batman).
Some segments of The Cape utterly predictable. As an example, in episode 3, we learn Fleming is searching for his missing daughter. Right away, it occurred to me that Orwell has lots of money, lots of paranoia, and no family background previously established. So I thinks to myself, "Self, Orwell is Fleming's daughter." Lo and behold, at the end of the episode, we see Chess staring at a ballerina music box while Orwell performs a silk dance in an overlay shot. Still, the cliche is made interesting by Fleming having a homicidal hatred of Orwell, ignorant that the person he seems to despise the most is the person he's most desparately searching for. It remains to be seen whether or not Orwell knows Fleming is her father. *sigh* Yes, we're going to have yet another TV heroine with daddy issues, I know, but this one does seem more interesting than the others.
But that's really where The Cape shines. It's not original, but it's different. Like the first season of Human Target, it knows where it's coming from and respects that, without descending into something ludicrous. The Cape acknowledges the camp and weirdness of comic books without becoming a comedy a la Mystery Men. I wouldn't go so far as to say it breathes new life into dead ideas, but it does take old, and admittedly cliche, ideas and recycles them into something fun. Some will call it hokey or campy or corny for the premise, the villain-of-the-week format, or the clear good-and-evil delineation between Faraday and Fleming. but I'm okay with that. After the train-wreck that Heroes became, or the wangst of Smallville and Supernatural, The Cape is an optimistic alternative to the pessimistic world view most other superhero shows have. Like Vince's message to Trip, the show functions to remind us that good can still triumph over evil if we're diligent in our work and stand up for what we believe in.