TV REVIEW: The Cape

I've been languishing in vile illness all week and what didn't make me feel better was the pilot for NBC's 'The Cape'.

I cannot recall a superhero pilot I hated SO much, SO fast. Mindless drivel. Really dumb. It moves so slowly that 2 hours felt like 9. Keep in mind I still watch 'Smallville'(!)

First, I don't like most hundred-year old pulp heroes anyway: from the era when having super-powers meant owning a GUN! And a MASK!

Our brave hero has the powers of 2 carnys and a cape that can do 37 things. (Get caught in a revolving door, get caught in a jet engine... the list probably goes on.)

The performances were fine, slightly over the top but that's for the best. Because the writing was dog vomit. (SPOILERS.)

The terrorist villain Chess frames our hero Vince 'the only good cop in Palm City' by tightly affixing the Chess mask to his head and sending him out to be framed and exploded on camera. Clever move, right? All blame deflected forever... so WHY does the villain continue to dress as Chess? Wouldn't that ruin the whole point of the frame-up?

And why are we meant to trust the carny folk Vince falls in with so quickly? They go from literally threatening to CUT HIS HEAD OFF and dump him in the desert to training him in the Carny Arts in about 20 seconds. The hell?

Finally, and no offense to Cameron the Terminator/River Tam, but the computer genius girl Oracle (sorry, ORWELL) looks pretty foolish fighting the French poisoner Cain.

Not physically, I'm sure the point of the scene was to show us how bad-ass Orwell is: it's that she shouldn't have been goaded into the kitchen to fight this knob in the first place!

Sigh.

2011 will see the end of 'Stargate Universe', but I have a feeling crap like 'The Cape' will run for 10 years.

In the words of Edna Mode: NO CAPES!