The folks at "The CW" have recently posted the first episode of Smallville Legends: The Chronicles of Oliver Queen on their web site. I understand it was originally released for Sprint cell phone users a few weeks earlier, but I haven't heard/seen any comments about it, so I'm not sure how widespread that's been.The story is essentially the origin of Green Arrow. I believe it's more in line with Green Arrow seen in Smallville, not the one from the actual comic books. But I don't really watch Smallville so I can't say how closely it's tied to that show. The webisode is short -- maybe five minutes -- so it's really the barest of introductions. It's hard to get a sense of what's well-done.
What did strike me as interesting was that they're using 3-D computer sprites for all of the animation. I suspect that animation would be cheaper for what they're trying to show -- among other things: large, stately homes -- and that's got to be a big factor for something like this, that won't really be generating ad revenue per se. They also didn't go for a "realistic" approach and have rotoscoped the figures, so they all have black outlines, like those you would find in a comic book. I'm curious how much of that decision stemmed from the choice to "broadcast" the originals via cell phone (with absurdly small screens in which details would be harder to decipher) and how much from the character's roots in comic books.
I didn't see anything so far that has me charged to come back, but I didn't see anything either to push me away. It was an adequate presentation and, for free, I can't really complain much. I'll swing back for subsequent episodes, but I'm not going to be pounding on CW's virtual door to get them.
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