Arrow Season 2 Episode 1 (TV Show Review)

After several months of intense anticipation and speculation, the new season of CW’s Arrow premiered this week on Wednesday to much fanfare. Despite the 10 season success of Smallville, Arrow still proved to be a surprise hit and for most of its first season it enjoyed some really high ratings, although that had begun to head downwards by the time the season finale rolled around. Not so bad really though since the show had already been confirmed for a season 2 and from all that I was seeing, the marketing was fairly intense.

One of the things that characterised the first season was that the show had a dark, edgy feel to it, quite apart from the rather sunny disposition that was the norm with Smallville. It helped set the new show apart, especially since there was a distinct lack of any comic-y villains. With the new season, that’s obviously changing, since we’ve heard that Flash and Black Canary are going to guest star significantly, so really, even while the show is maintaining its dominant feel, it is going to reach out to the other side and give fans something… light-hearted. I’m all for that.

Coffin Hill #1 by Caitlin Kittredge (Comics Review)

Its October, so its pretty much a given that this is the month for reading horror stuff, especially in comics since the format lends itself very well to horror stories I find. Of course, that works much better if you have a bunch of comics in the same series to plow through back-to-back rather than reading one-offs, but sometimes that can work just fine. Which was the case for me this week with one of Vertigo’s latest series, launching with an (appropriately) extra-sized issue.

Coffin Hill seems to be a good comic to add to my monthly piles, and I have to say that it continues the Vertigo tradition of telling stories that are completely separate from the rest of the industry (for the most part). This is something I’ve remarked on before, and its really great to see all these new titles that Vertigo is putting out. Lots of diversity, lots of fun. No duds.