A TV Birds of Prey challenge.

[Toreador]

I've been d/ling the BOP episodes and even though it needed work it wasn't that bad. The producers/creators didn't do such a bad job considering that Batgirl (Barbara Gordon) was probably the only character known to the general public and no idea who were Huntress or Black Canary. I think the biggest problems were:

Why did Batman/Bruce leave Gotham and Helena?
or
How did Helena get her cat powers?
and
Who was bankrolling Babs crimefighting mission?

Maybe this was explained in a later episode I haven't seen yet but the challenge here for you to create a backstory/'bible' that would make the BOP storyline work. How would you resolve the plotholes the series had?

Here's some of ideas I came up with:

The reason Bruce left Gotham City was that after the Joker lost in the all-out war against Batman not only did he shoot Barbara Gordon he had death squads/death traps set against Robin (Tim Drake) and Nightwing (Dick Grayson). Robin barely survived but was put out of action for a few months and eventually retired from crimefighting. Nightwing was seriously injured and fell into a coma with little hope of reviving. Bruce left Gotham to take Dick to the best doctors/hospitals in the world looking for medical procedures/cures to wake Dick out of his coma (this is the only reason I could come up with Bruce leaving Gotham City). Leaving Helena in Babs care back in Gotham City, re-named New Gotham after the re-building of the city following the Joker War. This solves plothole #1.

Helena's meta-human abilities come from the DNA tampering done to Selina Kyle when she was turned into a real cat-woman in 'Tyger, tyger' (yes it happened in TAS but the plotline could be borrowed to fit in this DCU time-line). Selina was cured but her DNA was permanently altered passing the 'cat-gene' to Helena. Plothole #2 plugged.

As for Babs equiptment and the Watchtower, these are essentially funded by Wayne Technology through Alfred.

What are your ideas? And what other plotholes did the series have and how would you solve them?

[Jaye]

Hey Toreador. I liked BoP on TV but it was sooooo long ago since I've seen it that your questions are hard to answer. I'm glad your'e enjoying the series. The one thing I do remember is that the finale was ... pretty bad, obviously rushed. The shows in the middle of the season were prety good though.

[Toreador]

I'm only up to episode 3 so far.

[Sharcque]

IIRC, Batman left Gotham to protect his loved ones. It seems like Joker found out he was Bruce Wayne, and went after everyone close to him....

Not sure how Babs funded her crimefighting operation.

They referred to Helena's mom (Catwoman) as having powers of her own, so, evidently, Helena inherited her cat powers from her mom.

[Jaye]

Cool, I think the best ones are still ahead of you, so there's that.

Its too bad the boards got wiped out last year, there were a ton of threads about this show, both on this Batman Board and the TV/Film board. People had a lot to say about it, but memories faded right now.

[Captain Jim]

Heh, what I remember are my own feeble attempts to defend the show against almost universal jeers.

[roguespirit]

I loyally watched every episode of that show and still to this day feel stirrings of saddened dissapointment every time I think about it.

The principal actors were good but the storylines were weak and the writing weaker.

Taking all that aside, I still wonder why it was called Birds of Prey when the main characters bore so little resemblance to the BoP

If I recall correctly the director of the show contacted Gail to say that because of corporate interference the show was far from what she intended

[The Xenos]

Ugh. Thinks of this show hurts. Save for Dina Meyer trying to save ehr character, was there anything good there?

As for Helena Kyle's catpowers, she was a mutant from the X-Men universe, plain and simple. They didn't make a damn Batman or BoP show here, they make a stupid Mutant X knock off which itself was a X-Men knockoff. They turned the DC words metahuman and metas into the Marvel idea of mutant. It was beyond pathetic. I remember some confusing pseudo science as to how powers are passed on, but it was crap and most comics have more sound sci fi ideas than it. Same goes for this crappy Dinah character and her Dead Zone powers.

Don't even get me started about how they had no *$@(#ing clear excuse on why Batman left Gotham. Ugh. That was the most sickening of all. He calls up Alfred in the last ep and he assures him his daughter was doing well. Ugh. I almost wish they left thigns unsaid. It made no sense to me who has read the comics, how is this crap supposed to make sense to the general viewer?!

Same goes for most of the crap they invented in it to make it more marketable and mainstream. They just made things more confusing. New Gotham, Catwoman's powers, and crap like that. If it confuses fans, how the hell are regular TV views supposed to make sense of it?

-Xenos

[Astonishing X-Fan]

I loved how they were like "um, Batman just...sort of...left...and stuff. Oh, and Catwoman had powers."

Then we get Harley Quinn as the big mastermind. Ugh. I LOVE Harley, but I love her as the dimwitted sidekick lovestruck with the Joker and as Ivy's gal pal. I don't want to see her as queen of the underworld.

Then we get Clayface, who instead of a deadly, shapeshifting living pile of mud, was a...gangster. Okay then.

[Captain Jim]

I still wonder why it was called Birds of Prey when the main characters bore so little resemblance to the BoP

Actually, I thought Oracle bore a *lot* of resemblance. And Black Canary I (mother of Black Canary II), in her one episode, bore a lot of resemblance to our Dinah. Furthermore, Huntress was very close to the original, earth 2 Huntress who existed before "Crisis on Infinite Earths".

[roguespirit]

Actually, I thought Oracle bore a *lot* of resemblance. And Black Canary I (mother of Black Canary II), in her one episode, bore a lot of resemblance to our Dinah. Furthermore, Huntress was very close to the original, earth 2 Huntress who existed before "Crisis on Infinite Earths".

Ok I'll give you Oracle, but regardless of her mother Canary was not Canary and pre crisis Huntress is not in BoP

[Gaz]

Ok I'll give you Oracle, but regardless of her mother Canary was not Canary and pre crisis Huntress is not in BoP
And she had a lot of Helena Berinelli's anger in the character.

[Superboy Sr]

The problem with the TV BOP was they were trying for Charlie's Angel when they should of shot for Mission Impossible,Alias,and MI5. Oracle's team rarely worked in Gotham that's what makes the book so great. I liked the homage to Earth 2 with Helena being the prodigy of a Batman/Catwoman union.

[Lorendiac]

Taking all that aside, I still wonder why it was called Birds of Prey when the main characters bore so little resemblance to the BoP


It has occurred to me before that non-comics-readers who viewed the show may have wondered why it was called Birds of Prey at all. I can imagine the conversation here:

"Why is it called Birds of Prey, honey? Shouldn't there be, you know, some birds in it? Or people named after birds? Instead, there's Barbara, codenamed Oracle, and Helena, codenamed Huntress with 'cat' powers, and there's Dinah, the cute blond teenage psychic with no special codename that I've noticed . . ."

"Well, because - um, because - I mean . . . you know, come to think of it, there's nothing particularly birdlike about any of them, not even about their codenames. I wonder just what the heck the 'birds of prey' in this series are actually supposed to be? What a stupid title!"

[sikkbones]

a thought on BOP as relates to JSA #72:

isn't the huntress from BOP:TV the secret daughter of bruce and selina?
what better way to reintorduce her into the comics...

[Luigi]

It was an ok show. Acting kinda blew I thought but all the actresses were hot. I saw all the episodes except the last one.

Another plothole....maybe, I haven't see the show in a while so this one might be explained but what happened to the Joker?