Pilot Review: The Cape

Finally got to watch this today. As BW readers know I’ve been looking forward to this show for a while. My hope was that this is the superhero series I wished Heroes and Smallville were. For once, Hollywood actually didn’t fail me.

Warning: Spoilers incoming! And I apologize for the lack of images. I didn’t have time to screencap stuff and I can’t find a way to obtain legal promotional pictures.

The Cape follows the story of Vince Faraday, a cop accused of being a killer known as Chess. It turns out that Chess is actually the head of Ark, a corporation looking to privatize the police department. Chess framed Faraday who is now believed to be dead. In fact, Vince is very much alive and, inspired by his son’s favorite comic book, becomes a superhero to clear his name and stop Chess’s master plan.

Vince doesn’t work alone. Trained by a bunch of criminal circus freaks and the mysterious Orwell (who turns out to be a young girl with great hacker skills), the Cape tries to give his son hope while battling Chess and, in the second episode, an assassin he hired to take out the man in charge of the prisons. NBC showed the pilot and the second episode in a TV movie layout. So what did I think?

This show was bloody cool. First let me say that to see a show about superheroes and supervillains that isn’t afraid to be what it is automatically scores points with me. It’s not worried about tropes or parody. It has the gonads to say “hey, we’re a show with guys in costumes running around punching each other” and just does its thing. Chess wears a mask, the Cape wears a mask and a cape–the first cape-wearing superhero I can recall on TV since Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman (unless you count the really short capes some of the characters on Power Rangers Mystic Force or Batgirl’s old costume on Birds of Prey) that isn’t a parody or Halloween costume. This is what I’ve been asking for and I’m sold on that alone.

You also get some light moments to break up the heavy drama and action. Vince’s training sessions are funny (especially the part with the mentalist and women’s clothing), Rollo is probably going to be a fan favorite, and Keith David is awesome as Max Milleni. In other words, he’s Keith David.

The rest of the supporting cast is good as well. Since the kid actors usually take a pounding by reviewers, I’ll start with Vince’s son, Trip. While this show isn’t a kids show, having the innocent child adds something to the show, as Trip is most of Vince’s motivation as the Cape. Ryan Wynott is a good child actor, last seen on TV in ABC’s sci-fi mystery show Fast Forward and he makes a good mark in these two episodes. Jennifer Ferrin is Vince’s wife, Dana, a woman struggling with believing in her husband while trying to raise her son. She’s great in the role.

Then you’ve got the villains. James Frain is Peter Flemming, the head of the Ark Corporation and secretly the villainous Chess. Frain is also great in his role; not the mustache-twirler, and not over the top so much that you wonder how anyone is fooled. He’s right there at the point where the audience believes he’s evil but still not a surprise that nobody notices it. In the same vein, Dorian Missick is the perfect bastard as Marty Voyt. He even seems to be trying to turn Dana against Vince’s memory. They both balance very well, considering how willing the show is to be a live-action comic book.

Obviously we have to talk about the Cape himself. David Lyons plays Vince/the Cape and while he doesn’t have a lot of emotion, I did enjoy his performance. I did feel for him, although not as strongly as I would have liked. As the Cape he’s probably what Christian Bale should have been as Batman, what with Bale’s over-the-top voice. I did believe Lyons’ performance. The cape itself is also a cool idea, and making it the weapon (along with the other tricks Vince learns from the circus folk) allows it to be used in a world (Hollywood) that has seemingly rejected capes. Christopher Nolan found a way to make Batman’s cape work in his two movies and show creator (and pilot writer) Tom Wheeler does the same here.

Not that I’m without my complaints. Besides Lyon’s limited emotion register, once again we have an evil corporation using the same handbook as OCP in the Robocop franchise, and I have trouble believing that a corporation good or evil could take charge of law enforcement. Schools? Maybe. The police and penal system? Not likely. I don’t think Palm City can do that. But back to the eeeeeevil corporation…off the top of my head I can only think of four positive corporations in Hollywood superhero productions: Wayne Enterprises, Stark Industries, Miles Hawkins company in M.A.N.T.I.S. (which had an evil counterpart in Box’s company in the actual series), and a low-budget syndicated series from the 90’s called Super Force, and I’m not sure if anyone else even remembers that show. Can we get some more good businesses in the superHERO game for a change? Also, how can a cape that reaches as far as this one retract so small that he doesn’t even appear to be wearing one at times?

Overall, I’m very happy with this show. This is the superhero hero live-action series I was hoping for (knowing Hollywood’s desire for “darker” stories, this is the best I can hope for) and I really like it. It should be up on Hulu or NBC’s website so if you haven’t seen it, I think you should. The Cape will be airing Monday nights at 9PM ET starting Monday, and I’ll be watching.