I haven't really watched much of The Cape yet...

[alexandraerin]

...but after viewing the first episode, I'm struck by a fierce desire to call Summer Glau's character "Orwecle" how much the part of the title character's gimmick that isn't tied up in the cape matches the original concept behind my character of Ray Vallenzio/The Fire-Eater. I didn't play it up so much in any version of the Star Harbor stories that actually got written, but the idea that someone had the whole package of crimefighting skills packaged as circus/carnival performer training is where the character came from.

I can't claim credit for the idea (and I certainly wouldn't claim that they got the idea from me), because I didn't come up with it. I lifted it wholesale from The Phantom of the Opera. I mean, Erik wasn't a superhero, but that's where I got the idea of using that particular battery of skills to simulate/replace superhuman abilities.

I'm glad I didn't start watching The Cape before I started writing Gift of the Bad Guy, but I'm glad I'm aware of it now... they're two very different takes on the genre/milieu of superheroic fantasy, but the themes of showmanship underlying things in The Cape could be fertile ground for inspiration as the GotBG storyline moves forward.