Vixen: The Movie

• August 25, 2015 to November 18, 2016
• CW Seed
• Based on Vixen created by Gerry Conway and Bob Oksner

Voice Cast

• Mari McCabe/Vixen-Megalyn Echikunwoke
• Esi (Mari’s deceased biological mother)-Toks Olagundoye
• Chuck McCabe (Mari’s foster father)-Neil Flynn
• Patty McCabe (Mari’s deceased foster mother)-Kari Wuhrer
• Professor Macalester-Sean Patrick Thomas
• Kuasa Anika-Noni Rose
• Cisco Ramon-Carlos Valdes
• Barry Allen/Flash-Grant Gustin
• Oliver Queen/Arrow/Green Arrow-Stephen Amell
• Felicity Smoak-Emily Bett Rickards
• Benatu Eshu-Hakeem Kae-Kazim
• Laurel Lance/Black Canary-Katie Cassidy
• Ray Palmer/Atom-Brandon Routh
• Jefferson Jackson/Firestorm-Franz Drameh
• Martin Stein/Firestorm-Victor Garber

A mysterious necklace leads a woman to her magical heritage and into conflict with those that desire her power for themselves.

Calling Vixen: The Movie a movie might be a bit erroneous. Not because it’s a series of shorts that first appeared on the CW Seed strung together into a movie but well, yeah, that is exactly why. There are definite breaks in between each narrative arc of this short form streaming show as well as breaks in the narrative of each story. You can tell how it was broken down for streaming.

That doesn’t make it a bad series, but it does make it clearly not a pure movie in a mold similar to Deathstroke: Knights & Dragons: The Movie. Unfortunately being as it is only 70 something minutes long it means it runs very fast. We go through the characters origin to her first meeting with the rest of the Arrowverse characters to Vixen confronting her sister Kuasa, who is the villain of the first story, to confronting Benatu Eshu who is the man that wiped out her family’s village and the villain of the second story to her finally joining in with the Arrowverse Justice League to take on the Weather Wizard. That is a lot to cram into a 70 something minute movie or even a short form animated streaming series.

In my opinion Vixen would’ve worked much better as an animated series with longer run times per episode or just even a much longer movie. There is a great deal here but it’s just all thrown at you and you barely have time to process anything before they move onto the next element. The time to take it all in is far too brief.

There’s enough action and superhero stuff that goes on that it holds you. The problem is that it has two separate stories and a couple of subplots to work through. And it goes through that fast. This probably should’ve been stretched out longer if they were going to do it releases as a movie in much the same fashion as either The Dark Knight Returns or Batman: The Long Halloween.

While it does move briskly, it is entertaining. They manage to flesh out the main character and make her somebody who’s a reluctant hero, which is a bit of a cliché these days as all heroes become reluctant heroes. In the movie she’s trying to find clues about her past and the only clue she can find is a necklace that she believes to be a family heirloom of some type. Turns out that’s the that’s a magical Tantu Totem which her family used to protect their native village.

But because of the speed of things you might miss a character that shows up in the story. They come and go that fast. The CW’s Firestorm shows up here and at the time he was an important player in the Arrowverse but I am hard pressed to remember him here. That is just one example.

The animation is great. DC generally does very good direct to video animated features. There’s been maybe three missteps in their whole catalogue. This takes its cues from Justice League and the Superman/Batman shows but with a bit of a softened edge to that.

The jokes are witty and the characters generally don’t blur together despite the rush of the narrative. There’s at least enough to differentiate Vixen from her sister or the lady at the zoo from Professor Macalester. I am a little confused how Vixen got on friendly terms with Professor Macalester since he sold her out to get funding for his particular dig. She’s not just cool with him. They end the movie as pals.

Vixen: The Movie while rushed is a good addition to the DC animation catalog. Not great but good. Despite the speed of things it does entertain well enough.