History YMMV / TheCrowStairwayToHeaven

* SoOkayItsAverage: As noted below, the show was seen as a step or several down from [[Film/TheCrow the film]] and [[ComicBook/TheCrow the original comic]]. On the other hand, it did garner decent ratings and reviews, and is looked upon more favorably than subsequent ''[[Franchise/TheCrow Crow]]'' media like ''[[Film/TheCrowWickedPrayer Wicked Prayer]]''.

* IdiotPlot: No one apparently ever considered simply destroying Rasputin's cursed manuscript. While the document did have historical and monetary value, since Rasputin's death it was kept safe by an order of holy men; they were perfectly aware of what it could do, yet they for some reason chose not to dispose of it even though they presumably didn't care about what it was worth.

* AnticlimaxBoss:

* CompleteMonster:
** [[BigBad Top Dollar]], real name Jason Danko, is a gang leader who kills [[PsychoForHire for fun and profit]], with his signature being to take a [[CreepySouvenir souvenir]] from every victim to add to the extensive "museum" that he has dedicated to his crimes. Hired to kill Eric Draven, Top delegates the job to his minions, who throw Eric out a window before raping and shooting his fiancée Shelly. While Top chastises his lackeys over how they killed the couple, it is only because of how much police attention that it has attracted; he is otherwise fine with the double homicide, a tape of which he keeps as a memento, watching it over and over again. When Eric returns seeking vengeance as a Crow, Top resorts to trying to destroy him by [[ThereIsNoKillLikeOverkill blowing his own crowded nightclub up with C4]]. Placed in an asylum after this, Top escapes and goes on a rampage, assaulting and killing Eric's friends and total strangers alike [[StrikeMeDownWithAllOfYourHatred in order to goad Eric into killing him]] so that he can resurrect as a [[EvilCounterpart Snake]]. Top and his servant Soleil then use a [[MindControlMusic mystical melody]] to enthrall both Eric and Top's rehabilitated former henchman Funboy, intending to force Eric to murder Funboy; Funboy will resurrect as a Snake like Top did, but since his repentance qualifies him as an innocent, his death will also corrupt Eric into becoming a Snake. When the plan falls apart, [[YouHaveFailedMe Top kills Soleil]].
** "Get a Life": [[CorruptCorporateExecutive John T. Franklin]] is a crooked hotel magnate who killed dozens when he burned his own office building down, getting away with it by [[FrameUp framing]] his own four-year old daughter, Elise. When Elise's RepressedMemories of what really happened resurface decades later, she attempts to blackmail her father into donating most of his fortune to charity as a form of penance. Franklin responds by having Elise and her psychiatrist [[OffingTheOffspring killed]], pinning Elise's murder on her boyfriend, Gil. When Eric breaks Gil out of custody, Franklin captures them both and decides to personally kill the pair while making it look like self-defense. Even after Eric psychically forces him to feel all of the pain and suffering that he has caused, Franklin [[LackOfEmpathy displays no remorse]], instead merely whining that he had to get rid of Elise because she was going to separate him from his money.
** "Through a Dark Circle": [[PsychoElectro Richard Lee Wil(l)banks]] was a prolific SerialKiller who kidnapped and torture-murdered anyone who he believed had somehow "disrespected" him, becoming known as "The Circle Killer" due to his [[CallingCard habit]] of marking the scene of every abduction with a bloody circle as his way of saying, "What goes around, comes around!" After being caught and sentenced to death, an unrepentant Wilbanks spat at and taunted all of the witnesses to his execution, calling them "nothing" and sneering, "[[SeeYouInHell I'll see you all in Hell!]]" Lingering in the [[DarkWorld Land of the Damned]] after dying, Wilbanks is accidentally brought back to the mortal plane as an electrokinetic entity by Eric, who he beats and electrocutes before running amok through the streets of Port Columbia. Gathering up everyone who was present for his death while viciously attacking anyone who gets in his way, Wilbanks straps all of his captives into homemade electric chairs that will slowly fry all of them as he sardonically quips, "Don't worry, it only hurts for...an eternity."
** "Lazarus Rising" & the finale "A Gathering Storm": [[ImmortalityImmorality Frederick Balsam]] is the current chairman of the [[SecretCircleOfSecrets Lazarus Group]], an ancient secret society dedicating to unlocking the secret of immortality. To that end, Balsam uses criminals and other "trash" as guinea pigs for his soul transference experiments, forcibly ejecting the victims' minds from their bodies and [[AndIMustScream trapping them in another plane of existence]] in order to create {{empty shell}}s that someone else can have their consciousness placed in. All of the test subjects have so far died, but Balsam is convinced that a Crow's body could survive the trauma of an upload, so he manipulates Eric's friend Doctor Dorsett into bringing Eric to him, and removes Eric's mind from his body so that he can take it over, making it clear to Dorsett and everyone else involved in the procedure that he will have them killed if they refuse to cooperate. After Eric and Dorsett escape, Balsam manages to successfully [[GrandTheftMe bodyjack]] a man named James Horton, and begins systematically eliminating every other member of the Lazarus Group so that he alone will know their life-prolonging secret. To stop Eric from interfering, Balsam performs a ritual that [[EnemyWithout separates Eric from his Crow half]], which Balsam forces to help with his killing spree before leaving it to murder the now powerless and vulnerable Eric.

* "Get a Life": [[CorruptCorporateExecutive John T. Franklin]] is a crooked hotel magnate who killed dozens when he burned his own office building down, getting away with it by [[FrameUp framing]] his own four-year old daughter, Elise. When Elise's RepressedMemories of what really happened resurface decades later, she attempts to blackmail her father into donating most of his fortune to charity as a form of penance. Franklin responds by having Elise and her psychiatrist [[OffingTheOffspring killed]], pinning Elise's murder on her boyfriend, Gil. When Eric breaks Gil out of custody, Franklin captures them both and decides to personally kill the pair while making it look like self-defense. Even after Eric psychically forces him to feel all of the pain and suffering that he has caused, Franklin [[LackOfEmpathy displays no remorse]], instead merely whining that he had to get rid of Elise because she was going to separate him from his money.
* "Through a Dark Circle": [[PsychoElectro Richard Lee Wil(l)banks]] was a prolific SerialKiller who kidnapped and torture-murdered anyone who he believed had somehow "disrespected" him, becoming known as "The Circle Killer" due to his [[CallingCard habit]] of marking the scene of every abduction with a bloody circle as his way of saying, "What goes around, comes around!" After being caught and sentenced to death, an unrepentant Wilbanks spat at and taunted all of the witnesses to his execution, calling them "nothing" and sneering, "[[SeeYouInHell I'll see you all in Hell!]]" Lingering in the [[DarkWorld Land of the Damned]] after dying, Wilbanks is accidentally brought back to the mortal plane as an electrokinetic entity by Eric, who he beats and electrocutes before running amok through the streets of Port Columbia. Gathering up everyone who was present for his death while viciously attacking anyone who gets in his way, Wilbanks straps all of his captives into homemade electric chairs that will slowly fry all of them as he sardonically quips, "Don't worry, it only hurts for...an eternity."
* "Lazarus Rising" & the finale "A Gathering Storm": [[ImmortalityImmorality Frederick Balsam]] is the current chairman of the [[SecretCircleOfSecrets Lazarus Group]], an ancient secret society dedicating to unlocking the secret of immortality. To that end, Balsam uses criminals and other "trash" as guinea pigs for his soul transference experiments, forcibly ejecting the victims' minds from their bodies and [[AndIMustScream trapping them in another plane of existence]] in order to create {{empty shell}}s that someone else can have their consciousness placed in. All of the test subjects have so far died, but Balsam is convinced that a Crow's body could survive the trauma of an upload, so he manipulates Eric's friend Doctor Dorsett into bringing Eric to him, and removes Eric's mind from his body so that he can take it over, making it clear to Dorsett and everyone else involved in the procedure that he will have them killed if they refuse to cooperate. After Eric and Dorsett escape, Balsam manages to successfully [[GrandTheftMe bodyjack]] a man named James Horton, and begins systematically eliminating every other member of the Lazarus Group so that he alone will know their life-prolonging secret. To stop Eric from interfering, Balsam performs a ritual that [[EnemyWithout separates Eric from his Crow half]], which Balsam forces to help with his killing spree before leaving it to murder the now powerless and vulnerable Eric.

** [[CorruptCorporateExecutive John T. Franklin]], from "Get a Life", is a crooked hotel magnate who killed dozens when he burned his own office building down, getting away with it by [[FrameUp framing]] his own four-year old daughter, Elise. When Elise's RepressedMemories of what really happened resurface decades later, she attempts to blackmail her father into donating most of his fortune to charity as a form of penance. Franklin responds by having Elise and her psychiatrist [[OffingTheOffspring killed]], pinning Elise's murder on her boyfriend, Gil. When Eric breaks Gil out of custody, Franklin captures them both and decides to personally kill the pair while making it look like self-defense. Even after Eric psychically forces him to feel all of the pain and suffering that he has caused, Franklin [[LackOfEmpathy displays no remorse]], instead merely whining that he had to get rid of Elise because she was going to separate him from his money.
** [[PsychoElectro Richard Lee Wil(l)banks]], from "Through a Dark Circle", was a prolific SerialKiller who kidnapped and torture-murdered anyone who he believed had somehow "disrespected" him, becoming known as "The Circle Killer" due to his [[CallingCard habit]] of marking the scene of every abduction with a bloody circle as his way of saying, "What goes around, comes around!" After being caught and sentenced to death, an unrepentant Wilbanks spat at and taunted all of the witnesses to his execution, calling them "nothing" and sneering, "[[SeeYouInHell I'll see you all in Hell!]]" Lingering in the [[DarkWorld Land of the Damned]] after dying, Wilbanks is accidentally brought back to the mortal plane as an electrokinetic entity by Eric, who he beats and electrocutes before running amok through the streets of Port Columbia. Gathering up everyone who was present for his death while viciously attacking anyone who gets in his way, Wilbanks straps all of his captives into homemade electric chairs that will slowly fry all of them as he sardonically quips, "Don't worry, it only hurts for...an eternity."
** [[ImmortalityImmorality Frederick Balsam]], from "Lazarus Rising" and the finale "A Gathering Storm", is the current chairman of the [[SecretCircleOfSecrets Lazarus Group]], an ancient secret society dedicating to unlocking the secret of immortality. To that end, Balsam uses criminals and other "trash" as guinea pigs for his soul transference experiments, forcibly ejecting the victims' minds from their bodies and [[AndIMustScream trapping them in another plane of existence]] in order to create {{empty shell}}s that someone else can have their consciousness placed in. All of the test subjects have so far died, but Balsam is convinced that a Crow's body could survive the trauma of an upload, so he manipulates Eric's friend Doctor Dorsett into bringing Eric to him, and removes Eric's mind from his body so that he can take it over, making it clear to Dorsett and everyone else involved in the procedure that he will have them killed if they refuse to cooperate. After Eric and Dorsett escape, Balsam manages to successfully [[GrandTheftMe bodyjack]] a man named James Horton, and begins systematically eliminating every other member of the Lazarus Group so that he alone will know their life-prolonging secret. To stop Eric from interfering, Balsam performs a ritual that [[EnemyWithout separates Eric from his Crow half]], which Balsam forces to help with his killing spree before leaving it to murder the now powerless and vulnerable Eric.

* [[PsychoElectro Richard Lee Wil(l)banks]], from "Through a Dark Circle", was a prolific SerialKiller who kidnapped and torture-murdered anyone who he believed had somehow "disrespected" him, becoming known as "The Circle Killer" due to his [[CallingCard habit]] of marking the scene of every abduction with a bloody circle as his way of saying, "What goes around, comes around!" After being caught and sentenced to death, an unrepentant Wilbanks spat at and taunted all of the witnesses to his execution, calling them "nothing" and sneering, "[[SeeYouInHell I'll see you all in Hell!]]" Lingering in the [[DarkWorld Land of the Damned]] after dying, Wilbanks is accidentally brought back to the mortal plane as an electrokinetic entity by Eric, who he beats and electrocutes before running amok through the streets of Port Columbia. Gathering up everyone who was present for his death while viciously attacking anyone who gets in his way, Wilbanks straps all of his captives into homemade electric chairs that will slowly fry all of them as he sardonically quips, "Don't worry, it only hurts for...an eternity."

* BigLippedAlligatorMoment: Eric's weird vision of himself and Shelly dancing in Victorian attire to "My Bonnie" by The Painkillers in "The Road Not Taken."
--> '''Eric:''' You know where I was, right before I found you?\\

* CompleteMonster: [[BigBad Top Dollar]], real name Jason Danko, is a gang leader who kills [[PsychoForHire for fun and profit]], with his signature being to take a [[CreepySouvenir souvenir]] from every victim to add to the extensive "museum" that he has dedicated to his crimes. Hired to kill Eric Draven, Top delegates the job to his minions, who throw Eric out a window before raping and shooting his fiancée Shelly. While Top chastises his lackeys over how they killed the couple, it is only because of how much police attention that it has attracted; he is otherwise fine with the double homicide, a tape of which he keeps as a memento, watching it over and over again. When Eric returns seeking vengeance as a Crow, Top resorts to trying to destroy him by [[ThereIsNoKillLikeOverkill blowing his own crowded nightclub up with C4]]. Placed in an asylum after this, Top escapes and goes on a rampage, assaulting and killing Eric's friends and total strangers alike [[StrikeMeDownWithAllOfYourHatred in order to goad Eric into killing him]] so that he can resurrect as a [[EvilCounterpart Snake]]. Top and his servant Soleil then use a [[MindControlMusic mystical melody]] to enthrall both Eric and Top's rehabilitated former henchman Funboy, intending to force Eric to murder Funboy; Funboy will resurrect as a Snake like Top did, but since his repentance qualifies him as an innocent, his death will also corrupt Eric into becoming a Snake. When the plan falls apart, [[YouHaveFailedMe Top kills Soleil]].

* TheyChangedItNowItSucks: The LighterAndSofter approach turned Eric into a fairly standard superhero. He has a secret identity complete with a normal civilian life, does "costume changes" into his superhero persona (which is supernatural coloring rather than makeup now), has his [[TagalongKid plucky kid sidekick]] and his buddy in the police force to feed him info, and [[ThouShaltNotKill he's supposed to avoid killing]]. ''This is totally the opposite of everything that happens in the film and comics.''

* TheyChangedItNowItSucks: Without getting into whether it really does suck because of the changes, the LighterAndSofter approach turned Eric into a fairly standard superhero. He has a secret identity complete with a normal civilian life, does "costume changes" into his superhero persona (which is supernatural coloring rather than makeup now), has his [[TagalongKid plucky kid sidekick]] and his buddy in the police force to feed him info, and oh yeah, [[ThouShaltNotKill he's supposed to avoid killing]].

* TheyChangedItNowItSucks: Without getting into whether it really does suck because of the changes, the LighterAndSofter approach turned Eric into a fairly standard superhero. He has a secret identity complete with a normal civilian life, does "costume changes" into his superhero persona (which is supernatural coloring rather than makeup now), has his [[TheScrappy plucky kid sidekick]] and his buddy in the police force to feed him info, and oh yeah, [[ThouShaltNotKill he's supposed to avoid killing]].