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Constantine hit the moron bar last week by having John Constantine say “there’s nothing blacker than gypsy magic”. That’s lamentable, not so much for the Romani slur as for gypsy magic being a writer’s crutch. For instance, a ‘fortune teller’s’ curse is the justification for spinning off Frog Thor into his own character (yes, Marvel; work with me here), as opposed to a temporarily transformed Thunder God. Keep in mind, that’s canon introduced by Walter Simonson in 1986, and expanded on by Chris Eliopoulos in 2009. No one’s retconned the gypsy as being a Norse god in disguise, which is simple enough to do.

My big worry for Constantine is that it has a more fun tone than The Flash (2014) right now. How does that even work? I realize The Flash is in his share of more ‘dramatic’ stories, but when The Flash (2014) is more weighty (and angsty – it’s not a Berlanti series if it lacks suitable soul-scraping) than a television show based on Hellblazer, that’s just odd. It’s like Shazam wanting to grow up as quickly as possible, and Dr. Sivana becoming a muscular gu…wait. DC likes to screw with its properties sometimes.

In my opinion, the current DC live-action television universe has its share of problems. The chief culprit is the shows blending into a well-made, if largely surprise-free, whole. I still prefer this scenario to the early 1990s, when shows based on DC Comics characters went for an episodic low-budget feel (aside from, weirdly enough, the 1990-91 version of The Flash), while the comics ran the gamut from typical 1990s fare to well-written Vertigo series. Right now, Constantine needs to differentiate itself from Supernatural, Grimm and Doctor Who; I’m not sure if it will accomplish that feat right now, given how American network television works. Constantine could be cancelled before it really cooks.


C. Archer
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