Season Two Review: Vixen

Vixen’s future in the Arrowverse is looking bright, but is Mari’s?

Spoilers for Vixen and other Arrowverse shows ahead!

The second season of CW Seed’s Vixen has come to a close, and as we recover from the battered and bloodied bodies of Black Friday and truly enter the holiday season, we should also look back the past handful of weeks and see where it started, what it did right, what it did wrong, and what this means for this version of the animalistic African heroine.

Being confined to only six episodes of about six minutes each, it should be expected to find that the writers had their work cut out for them to craft a coherent story that fit in that time frame. And I can safely say that there wasn’t a moment where I wasn’t more or less aware of what was going on or where we were headed. However, there are still some gaps in how certain plots play out that seem to assume everyone will just go along with it, like Mari finding Eshu in Ep 2 with next to no info on him, or Eshu somehow knowing Mari was the daughter of the women he fought, amongst other things. Most of the major bones of the plot skeleton are there, but there are some key joints missing which make its movements sudden, sloppy, and a bit erratic.

The introduction of the four other totems to battle it out with Mari is a bit of been-there MacGuffin plot for people familiar with these types of stories, but it did do the job of expanding Mari’s world and mythos, as well as lay ground work for future stories beyond the one they were introduced in. Unfortunately, two of the totems are destroyed by the end of the season, cutting short their potential for finding other users like Mari’s did. One can only hope the remaining two have a bit more staying power.

And now to mix up the metaphor even further, let’s talk about how Vixen fits into its own shared universe. This isn’t a solid visual, but what I’ve noticed about shared superhero universes (and possible shared fictional universes in general), it’s sort of like stitching together a bunch of quilts (the main pillars of the universe’s content, in this case being Arrow and Flash)and then stretching them as fast as you can stitch new patterns on. But as the fabric is stretched further and further (adding sequels, spin-offs, new elements and creative directions, etc) and at a faster rate, threads begin to snap, breaking the immersion of a shared universe because the connections seem to be no longer there. Of the major attempts at this like the MCU, DCEU, and here, I have yet to find one that didn’t fall victim to this at one point. Not that it can necessarily be blamed on them because a fully functioning story universe, especially one on TV and across movies, is hard to maintain and eventually stumbles.

Similarly, while this and last season almost seemed to go out of their way to place existing characters around it as cameos, the live action Arrowverse seems to have all but forgotten about Vixen, or at least the show with that title and Mari McCabe specifically. Being animated, as well as being written and taking place during events that have already passed on the live action shows, it can be easy to see it as the odd one out and ignore it. This isn’t helped by the most underwhelming of the live shows, Legends of Tomorrow, introducing one of Mari’s predecessors, Amaya, as a more prominently featured version of the character. In just a handful of appearances, she’s already surpassed Mari’s total screentime at least twice over. But while I’m not exactly its biggest fan, I AM a masochistic completionist for franchises I follow, and so would ideally like this show to find a functioning place in its own universe.

Amongst the characters that weren’t just guest cameos, the three main driving characters would be those who held the totems, namely Mari, Kuasa, and Eshu. Since she’s passed the origin story phase, Mari is shown to be a lot more willing to put herself into situations at her own expense, as well as interacting with other heroes to fight bigger threats. One could say that she already did that at the end of her first season, considering the final part took place in Africa, but it could be argued that was still a personal battle against family and for her heritage. That said, this willingness to expand her borders is good progress for her character, but odd when it seems (at least according to the BTS videos) like this is what her arc for the season is supposed to be. If you pay much attention to the dialogue, that there’s supposed to be the air of some character growth for Mari regarding her opening up to being a hero with greater scope than just Detroit, and that the events of this season were supposed to help her realize that. But watching and rewatching the episodes shows that she’s already ready and willing to go that extra mile, and nothing occurring in this season really did much to contribute.

In fact, the majority of Mari’s development really seems to be around her relationship with Kuasa, the antagonist of the previous season. Kuasa’s backstory is finally given some spotlight here, which doesn’t fully make her sympathetic with how she became the villain she is, but at least makes her a bit more understandable. Giving her a redemption arc, however brief, as well as giving her use of a totem separate from Mari’s, helped her to grow from simply being the flat villain she was introduced as. But however much turn around she got from that, that doesn’t seem to change that her involvement in the story is pretty benign. Given how her addition to the fight added nothing in the long run, and that she isn’t even so much as mentioned in the final episode, it’s possible that lifting her scenes might not have changed anything. Which is pretty sad, considering she’s the most grown character this season.

Eshu certainly separates him Kuasa as the next seasonal antagonist, being physically imposing and intimidating along with a distinct power. Sadly, beyond that, he’s far more shallow a character, being a (former?) general for a warlord and only looking for the totems as a means of obtaining power. He does serve the story by being a nemesis of Mari and Kuasa’s mother, but this doesn’t come of much in present day aside from a cryptic line. After that, he just kind of sits around while Mari and company go get the Water totem, and then begins lighting everything in sight on fire trying to get to Mari. There’s just nothing to his plans, which is not what I’d expect from a military leader. His end is pretty unceremonious and confusing. First water doesn’t work, and then it does? I really hope the owners of the other totems aren’t so one note.

And then there’s Chuck and Macalester. Chuck is still passable dad character and Macalester is still the Felicity/Cisco of Mari’s team without the charm or reference humor.

Chronologically, Mari’s next appearance is in the 15th episode of Arrow’s fourth season, which doesn’t take place very long after this season. In it, she helps Oliver rescue his illegitimate son from that season’s villain with her newfound knowledge about spirit energy and magical artifacts…which are things that this season could have taken the time to show her learning, but whatever. At the time of this writing, Arrow (along with Flash, Legends of Tomorrow, and Supergirl) are about to enter a four night crossover event to celebrate Arrow’s 100th episode. Vixen will be amongst the dozen or so heroes present, but it will be the Amaya version, with no confirmed reappearance of Mari past this show. There are at least a few places Vixen could go, such as finding the last two totems or elaborating on what happened to Mari’s mother, but we might very well be saying goodbye to this version with the end of this season. Either way, it’s been an alright ride, and hopefully won’t be forgotten in the shuffle as the Arrowverse continues to grow. This universe has become something else, done the impossible, and surrounded itself with legends, and I’d gladly count one Detroit-based fashion designed in a brown leotard amongst them.

SCORE
7/10