Arrow – The Complete First Season: Blu-ray Review
Season Overview:
After being marooned for five years on a remote island, billionaire Oliver Queen returns home with a mysterious agenda and a lethal set of new skills that he uses in a war on crime in this hard-hitting action series. Reinventing the DC Comics character for a modern day audience, Arrow is not a super hero…but a hero, every bit as dangerous as the criminals he’s hunting.
When Smallville was going to end people realized that there would be a void on network TV in the superhero department then Arrow was announced. I don’t think I was the only one that was a little disappointed when it was revealed that there would be a new actor playing Arrow and wouldn’t be a continuation from the character that was in Smallville. After watching the show itself you soon realize what the creators were going for. Since the popularity of the Nolan Batman films DC Entertainment has been looking at their superhero film and TV properties different with a point of view. They are going for more reality based kind of heroes rather than the overly campy stuff we’ve seen in the past and that’s exactly what we saw with this series. The season starts out exactly how I would’ve wanted it. Instead of going for your typical origin story they started the it with Queen basically already becoming Arrow and throughout the season they would flashback here and there giving small clues to how he decided to become the marksman he is. To me that was a fantastic idea because it allows the show to hit the ground running and jump right in to all the action. I have to say, I’m pretty impressed with Stephen Amell and his portrayal of Green Arrow. He almost reminded me of Bruce Wayne in a sense. He has this “ladies man” personality and has this mysterious presence about him that makes you intrigued to see what’s going to happen next. I thought this was a really solid first season with TONS of potential for it to tell some really great stories. I think one of the things about the season and the show so far is that the villains weren’t cheesy. They were modernized and given the appropriate introductions in to the series. I REALLY can’t wait to see this show grow and hopefully have the longevity that Smallville had. If you haven’t seen this show then picking up this season would be the perfect opportunity to get started and have a marathon.
Special Features:
Arrow Comes Alive! – A great documentary regarding the update and re-imagining of the character with insight from the cast and crew.
Arrow: Fight School/Stunt School – This feature gives you a look at the effort that goes into choreographing the fights and stunts on the show.
Arrow At Paley Fest 2013 – Highlights from their panel at the festival.
Deleted Scenes – A really good bunch of scenes that (at least some) should’ve made it in the series but probably couldn’t due to time constraints.
Gag Reel – A pretty hilarious reel that shows that actors mess up just like everyone else.
