Art of the Day: Black Canary and Huntress

Artwork: Black Canary and Huntress by Evgeniy Bornyakov

Art of the Day: Birds of Prey

Artwork: Birds of Prey by Patty Arroyo

Art of the Day: Black Canary (Birds of Prey)

Artwork: Black Canary by Annie Wu

Art of the Day: Black Canary and Harley Quinn (Birds of Prey)

Artwork: Black Canary and Harley Quinn by Datrinti (Tiago Ribeiro)

Weekend Film: Birds of Prey

This movie looks like it's going to be absolutely wild. I can't wait to see it. As excited as I am to see Birds of Prey, I do hope they will eventually get costumes. This is the first time Black Canary and Huntress will appear on the big screen and I would just love to see the costumes for this version of the characters. Well if it doesn't happen in this move, maybe in the sequel.

Alright, raise your hands, whose going to see Birds of Prey? I really can't wait to see this movie. If you've seen it, let us know what you think but please no spoilers.

Starring: Margot Robbie, Rosie Perez, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Jurnee Smollett-Bell, Ewan McGregor, Ella Jay Basco, Chris Messina and more

Director: Cathy Yan

Description:

You ever hear the one about the cop, the songbird, the psycho and the mafia princess? “Birds of Prey (And the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn)” is a twisted tale told by Harley herself, as only Harley can tell it. When Gotham’s most nefariously narcissistic villain, Roman Sionis, and his zealous right-hand, Zsasz, put a target on a young girl named Cass, the city is turned upside down looking for her. Harley, Huntress, Black Canary and Renee Montoya’s paths collide, and the unlikely foursome have no choice but to team up to take Roman down.

Beauty: Birds of Prey Nail Polish Set

Birds of Prey out in theatres tomorrow, I'm so excited, I can't wait to see the movie. Something I have seen, is a lot of cool merchandise for the movie like this ORLY nail polish set. Wow, it full of color especial the pink and yellow, I have a question for anyone who already has this, are the shades as bright and colorful as they appear in the promo picture?

I so want to get this especially since ORLY is cruelty free. Is anyone else planning on getting this?

Birds of Prey Limited Edition Kit                             $28.00                      ORLY (orlybeauty.com)

KIT CONTAINS:

- Mind Over Mayheim, Bright Pink Creme (.6FL OZ)

- Freaking Fantabulous, Pink/Blue Glitter (.6FL OZ)

- Emancipate This, Bright Yellow Creme (.6FL OZ)

Trailer for the "Birds of Prey" movie

I had mixed feelings before about seeing the Birds of Prey movie which is in theatres February 7, 2020. However, I think my opinion is starting to change because this trailer looks really good. It looks like it's going to be a zany mess and I can't wait to see it. In all honesty, why wasn't this movie called Harley Quinn? This feels like a solo movie for the character because she certainly is the focus of not only this first trailer but also the newly released promos and posters for the film.

Meanwhile, the Birds of Prey (Black Canary and Huntress) and Renee Montoya and Cassandra Cain feel like nothing more than supporting characters. Maybe when more trailers are released there will be more attention shown towards the other characters because so far this truly feels like a Harley movie.

What do you think of trailer? Does it make you want to see the movie?

Poison Ivy Week: Confession: Poison Ivy and the Birds of Prey

I'm starting this Poison Ivy week with a Confession. Are you ready for it? Well, here it goes, I hated Poison Ivy being a member of the Birds of Prey during the New 52. That seemed so out of character with her being placed in a team book especially since she really doesn't like people that much, with the exception of Harley Quinn (her love) and to some extent Catwoman (her some what friend). With her not exactly being a people person, having Ivy try and work with all those different heroes didn't turn out too well especially since she ended up trying to force the team to help her stop several companies she felt were destroying the environment.

Dr. Pamela Isley is smart, powerful and perfectly happy being solitary, it's how she thrives. I still feel like it was a mistake making Ivy a member of the Birds of Prey because with her strong desire to protect nature and the environment at the cost of everything else, I did not see it meshing well with the motivation of the team. Although, Poison Ivy might not be the villain she once was, there is no way I see her adhering to all the rules that come with being a hero.

Even though, I need to finish reading the New 52 Birds of Prey, I still think Ivy should not have been a member of the team.

Birds of Prey issue #11 cover by Stanley 'Artgerm' Lau

"Birds of Prey" Teaser Trailer

Here's the teaser trailer for the upcoming Birds of Prey movie which is scheduled to be in theaters February 7, 2020.

I'm a big Birds of Prey fan, I love the comics that featured Oracle, Black Canary, Huntress and Lady Blackhawk as the four main characters and on occasion they would receive a little help from other heroes. With that said you would think I would be over the moon excited for this movie. However, so far I don't have any interest in wanting to see it. Maybe by the time a full length trailer and promotion materials are released, I will have changed my mind and gained some kind of interest.

Whether I find interest in the movie or not, I do hope is that it will lead to a Gotham City Sirens movie because that's something I'm really interested in seeing. I would rather see Harley Quinn is a movie with Catwoman and Poison Ivy teaming up and causing a lot of trouble than pairing up with heroes.

Art of the Day: Birds of Prey

Artwork: Batgirl and the Birds of Prey #20 cover by Adam Hughes

I love this cover but I never liked the title for this comic book series. It was as if the Birds of Prey were Batgirl's sidekick instead of all of them being a team. Why couldn't the series simply have been titled Birds of Prey especially since Batgirl has her own solo series, she didn't need to headline this one as well.

Art of the Day: Poison Ivy and the Birds of Prey (New 52)

Artwork: Birds of Prey issue #11 cover by Stanley 'Artgerm' Lau

Art of the Day: Birds of Prey

Artwork: Birds of Prey by Astro

Art of the Day: Birds of Prey

Artwork: variant cover art for Bird of Prey issue #1 by Cliff Chiang

Book Review: Birds of Prey vol #2 (New 52)

Book: Birds of Prey volume #2: Your Kiss Might Kill (issues #8-12 and 0) by Duane Swierczynski

Illustrations by Jesus Saiz (issue #8), Travel Foreman (issues #9-11), Timothy Green II (issue #11), Cliff Richards (issue #12) and Romano Molenaar (issue #0)

Color by Javier Pina (issue #8), Gabe Eltaeb (issues #9-12) and Chris Sotomayor (issue #0)


Edition: Single Print Issues

Publisher: DC Comics

Description:

Black Canary, Starling, Poison Ivy and Batgirl. Together, as Gotham City's covert ops team, they're taking down the villains other heroes can't touch. They are the Birds of Prey. The Birds face a multitude of threats from outside and in! A dangerous new villains threatens to expose Black Canary's dark secret, and the Court of Owls sets its sight on everyone in Gotham for a "Night of the Owls" tie-in. Plus, the ladies bring a gravely injured POISON IVY to the Amazon hoping to help rejuvenate her, but they're going to need her help more to stay alive!


Rating: 2 stars

Review:

I would have given this higher ratings if the stories in these issues didn't feel as if everything was happening somewhere off page because what was presented wasn't bad it just felt disjointed. However, the writing was flat with stories that were going no where.

Issue #8 focused on Black Canary being sought for the murder of her husband, she along with Batgirl and Katana were being attacked by a mysterious group who were there to bring Dinah in. Meanwhile, Starling was sneaking around trying to find out more information about Dinah but she ended up finding out more than she was looking for after she broke into a secret hideout. This issue raised so many questions for me such as who were these guys that were attacking them? Because I have no idea who they were and the story certainly didn't tell me.

Issue #9 was a tie-in to the Court of Owls storyline, and had the Birds taking on one of the Owls' talons, a trained assassin. There was no real point to this story other than the Birds going from one location to the next fighting the Owls' trained assassin with Poison Ivy setting the focus for the next arc.

Issues #10-12 had the Birds heading to the rainforest to help revive Poison Ivy who sacrificed herself to help put talon in a deep freeze. While heading there, their plane was shot down and they were soon being attacked by these plant creatures. It all turned out to be some kind of trap/insurance of Poison Ivy's to get the team to help her stop several companies from destroying the environment. Some time later in the story after the team was fighting on a burning oil rig the scene then cut to Ivy in some sort of restorative tank. Next, the team was attacking Ivy after refusing to continue to go along with her eco-terrorist plans. This ends with a cliffhanger, was Ivy killed and will her plan continue even if she's dead?

Issue #0 told of how Black Canary first met Starling and Batgirl. She had gone undercover at Penguin's nightclub where Starling was also working to try to track down a bomb seller. However, her plan to stop the sell was nearly ruined when Batgirl showed up. With everything over with, it gave Dinah time to reflect, she was tired of being out there on her own and wanted to form a team. This was the start of that team, the reader also finds out something interesting about Starling and why she really joined the team.

Out of all of these issues the best one was issue #0 it was the only one with a complete story even though the writing was still flat. Similar to the first volume, Katana and Starling are still the only two characters that continue to be interesting. Despite issue #0 showing how the team was created, the Birds of Prey still do not feel like a team. They each have their own agenda and there is no real reason why they are even a part of this team. 

The art stands to be the best thing about this volume despite the multitude of artists. I don't understand why all the humor and fun was taken out of the New 52 comics. Most of the stories are drab and so are most of the characters. Birds of Prey used to be an amazing series but the New 52 version is truly a pale comparison.

Illustration of the Day: Birds of Prey

Illustration: Birds of Prey issue #122

Throwback Thursday: Birds of Prey TV Series

The Birds of Prey TV series was short lived and never quite lived up to the comic book series that it was unfortunately loosely based on. Birds of Prey premiered October 2002 with the show focusing on Oracle a.k.a. Barbara Gordon (played by Dina Meyer), Huntress a.k.a. Helena Kyle (played by Ashley Scott) and Dinah Redmond (played by Rachel Skarsten) as they go after villains in New Gotham City.

In an older post, I gave 10 reasons why the show didn't work for me but there are a few things I did like about this show which are:


1) It featured Oracle in a prominent role, even though in the episodes near the end of this 13 episode series you can tell that the production team (or perhaps interference from Warner Bros./DC Comics) was doing their best to have Barbara out of her wheelchair and walking around. Side note, Dina Meyer did an awesome job as Oracle.

2) The scenes with Alfred Pennyworth (played by the late Ian Abercrombie) were good.

3) The teamwork and friendship, despite the initial hiccups the Birds eventually became a well meshed team.

Happy National Teacher Appreciation Week!

Illustration: Birds of Prey issue #68

National Teacher Appreciation Week started on May 4th and ends on May 8th. I have a couple of friends who are teachers and they really enjoy their jobs.

I would like to thank all the teachers for their service especially the ones who make learning interesting.

Also in honor of teachers, I included this illustration of one of the best fictional teachers, Helena Bertinelli.

Illustration of the Day: Lady Blackhawk and Huntress (Helena Bertinelli)

Illustration: Lady Blackhawk and Huntress: Hat Swap by hildebabble

Art of the Day: Birds of Prey

Artwork: cover art for Birds of Prey issue #8 by Stanley 'Artgerm' Lau 

The Birds of Prey with their two new members Hawk and Dove, I thought it was interesting having Hawk on the team. His approach to crime fighting was similar to Huntress but with even less finesse.

Art of the Day: Birds of Prey

Artwork: Birds of Prey by Marcus To