So Mari has been left to die on the plains by her eeeeevil sister. And this is the point at which you’d figure that she’d be experiencing a fever dream as her organs shut down. But no.Voices tell her that her sister is corrupt and that she is the rightful bearer of the totem. Mufasa shows up and tells her that everything the light touches is their kingdom her mother ran with her and the totem to avoid the corrupting influence of her sister. Then all of the other identifiable animals in Africa show up, and I’m guessing they do that thing like when Goku fought Broly and gave her a bit of their ki or something, because she gets up totally fine and ready to kick some sisterly ass.
Kuasa’s surprised that Mari’s still alive when she shows up at the little ritual she’s leading back in the village. Mari tells her it’s a shit move for the older sister to steal from the younger, and also that the animal spirits said she was the chosen one, and that Kuasa is too corrupt for them and also is a poo head. Kuasa decides to just outright try to kill her younger sister, but there’s just one problem.
Honestly, the fight here clearly got most of the animation budget for this pilot, because it looks damn good. And like any good wielder of the powers of a trickster god, Mari outwits her opponent. She manages to lightly wound Kuasa before jamming said wound with spider.
Mari delivers a crushing right to Kuasa’s skull, then takes the totem from her now very badly poisoned and probably dying (haha yeah right, no one ever dies in these things, they’ve got some magic amulet or something) sister and returns to Detroit to talk it all over with Chuck. You know, after beating the shit out of some of Detroit’s finest muggers.
Chuck asks her what her plans are, and Mari tells him that she plans to keep on with the fashion design, especially now that she knows who she is and where she came from. But at night, she’ll fight crime, since Detroit is technically her village, and that is the purpose of the totem, to protect. She finally calls him Dad, and they hug. They get interrupted by the totem glowing.
The Arrow tells her it’s sort of foolhardy to take on Detroit’s criminal element in a brown leotard with no training. She gives the snarky response, and asks them to let her figure things out for herself. Barry reminds her that they’re just a phone call away if she needs help. She remembers that she’s supposed to have a cool name, and Barry lets her know that Cisco dubbed her Vixen, with plenty of waffle about there not being anyone named Cisco affiliated with him or anything.
Final Thoughts:
- Zambesi has a much lower crime rate than Detroit. Just sayin’.
- Total honesty? I don’t think any of the guest stars got any real direction in the recording booth.
- Their biggest mistake was probably putting this on CW Seed. That’s a boner that rivals that of the Joker’s.
- It may seem that I’ve been hard on the series, but it was obviously meant to be one big pilot. And pilots usually suck because they have the burden of establishing a whole buch of backstory so that they can get to the good stuff. Vixen isn’t all that bad off, considering.
Overall Series Rating: 3.5/5
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