So, Young Justice Outsiders
It’s been a while since I’ve been able to talk about this
show, the last time being way back in 2016, when I did an editorial one what I
wanted to see from this show… and I’ll say I got 1/5.
My thoughts have shifted a little on Young Justice. It did
an exemplary job in season one balancing the overarching storyline with its
cast of main characters. By majorly expanding the team in season 2, it also
really torpedoed the balance in favour of plot as opposed to character
development, making certain characters feel like pieces on a chessboard.
Outsiders, as I’ll explain, suffers from a similar problem, but I’ll get to
that later.
What’s interesting is that fan demand and the launch of a DC
streaming service lead to the announcement of YJ Outsiders in 2016, the show
would ultimately be released in 2019, which is quite extensive gap, DC
announced the show’s renewal literally days after the creators found out.
So minor changes before we get into it, James Arnold Taylor has taken over from Tim Curry as G Gordon Godfrey, who has also permanently taken over the role as the Flash from George Eads after voicing him in the season 2 finale. Could be a cost saving measure, voice actors are portraying multiple characters across the board this season, and there are other budget-saving measures as we’ll get into.
According to a source I can’t seem to find now, Logan Grove was likely off in the military at the time of Outsiders’ production, so Beast Boy has been recast with Greg Cipes reprising his role from Teen Titans (and TTG). And for what it’s worth he does a decent job.
I’ll be covering the first 13 episodes of the series now, with the hopes of doing the other half in the later half of the year. Part of the problem is that there’s no series purchase option on Amazon for the second half, if I wanted to buy the second half at present, I’d have to buy every episode individually and at £2.49 an episode (I live in the UK so HBOMax isn’t an option), I am not doing that.
Princes All
We open with the scene where Dick takes his leave of absence
from the team after the death of Wally West. And something weird I noticed
watching it this time, Kaldur’s eyes are little white dots, they forgot to add
the detail. It looks weird.
2 years later in a hospital in the Marokovian capital of Markovburg,
because subtlety is for losers who don’t wear bright costumes. Anyway, a boy
named Otto is told that his sister didn’t make it as they never found a
transplant for her, in truth she’s being shuffled away to undergo meta-surgery.
This involves being drowned in ‘tar’ and fitted with a control chip.
Just over a month later we see Parademons and a monster, the
meta-genetic version of the girl, who’s credited as Plasma attacking the planet
Rann, the Parademons are able to heal themselves and repair their weapons using
father-boxes. As well as Adam Strange and Alana, league members Ice, Superman,
Martian Manhunter, Green Lantern John Stuart, Wonder Woman and Black Lightning
are out fighting. Black Lightning strikes Plasma with a lightning blast
intending to knock her out, but that’s not all it does. Superman soon confirms
that Plasma is dead. And Alana’s analysis confirms that this was initially a
child.
And we can already that this is very much making use of not
having a the moniker of ‘children’s show’ we’re 3 minutes in and a child has
been abducted, tortured and killed, we saw corpses, albeit covered ones and we
saw a Rannian soldier melted.
This leads us into our opening credits and honestly they’re
nothing special. At least they’re short. We cut to the Watchtower a few days
later as Jefferson Pierce, now not wearing his Black Lightning attire is
attending a meeting of the League. Aquaman, now a tile held by Kaldur as the
League’s leader and asks the Leader of the team, Miss Martian, to observe the meeting
and provide him moral support.
Wonder Woman is leading the teams in space and confirms that
Metahuman trafficking has bled out into the galaxy, the enemy are deploying
metahumans as weapons of mass destruction. It’s not helping their efforts to
try and restore peace with the galaxy after what happened on Rimbor.
The league’s efforts to try and end metahuman trafficking
have fallen short, Batman calls the situation a global pandemic, oh if only
they knew. The expositional dialogue in this scene is a little clunky, but it
leads nicely to the main problem they have. Lex Luthor successfully became the
UN Secretary General and is using his position to place restrictions on the
League that have mitigated their efforts.
Batman decides it’s time to try a new approach and
officially resigns from the League. He’s followed in suit by Green Arrow, Plastic
Man, Batwoman, Katana and Hardware. If you have no idea who any of these guys
are, I wouldn’t worry, Batwoman and Plastic Man don’t show up again and Green
Arrow and Hardware appear as cameos in 1 more episode.
Anyway, it’s obvious to everyone that this wasn’t just a
decision made now and they planned this ahead of time, which drives a wedge
between Green Arrow and Black Canary that’s never explored. Jefferson also
chooses this time to resign, still feeling the shock from what he did. Whatever
Batman’s planning, Aqualad’s gonna have disown them so the League won’t be held
accountable for them.
As Batman and the others leave Tim holds Cassie’s hand
before he, Spoiler and Arrowette leave (btw, Spoiler and Arrowette were part of
the team, if you no idea who they are, they never bother actually telling us
so…) Batman makes an offer to Jefferson but he turns them down. Jefferson says
his goodbyes to Static and zetas away.
Where’s Dick Grayson amongst this mess, he’s been doing some
digging on his own, he’s found a metahuman trafficking lab linked to an
organisation known as Bedlam, they use a substance known as Tar to activate the
metagene. Dick rescues some kids, gets a sample of the tar, destroys the lab,
has a conversation with Oracle and most importantly wears a mask covering his
mouth so the animators don’t have to animate his lip movements.
Dick has special contact lenses that allow him to analyse
data, send and receive messages, etc. Oracle has analysed the tar data he sent
and realises that the tar contains a clay only found in Markovia.
In Markovia, we see Cat Grant reporting as the King and
Queen are about to hold a press conference. Why? It seems that in the last 2
years, Bialya has invaded Qurac and fully taken it over, the combined state is
referred to as Greater Bialya. I’m guessing Lex Luthor
provided legitimacy to the takeover in the United Nations, as there is a
representative for Greater Bialya in the UN now.
But the result is refugees and the King and Queen are giving
a statement on how Markovia will respond to this. It’s also been 2 years since
their daughter Tara was kidnapped, with no ransom demand ever made. Cat is
speaking to Prince Brion Markov, who had been studying abroad since she was
taken. But he’s now in line for the throne as his Paternal Twin, Gregor has
that privilege. Born a full 16 minutes earlier
We’re introduced to Baron Frederick DeLamb, the head of
security and vocal soundalike to Stoick the Vast from Dragons: Race to the Edge
(not the films, just the show) of course, it’s Nolan North (who voices both
Superman and Superboy) doing the voice.
The King and Queen are going to allow refugees from Qurac to
stay in Markovia. But they’re also promising more resources to help fight
against metahuman trafficking. I guess 2 years late is better than never. Brion
speaks to a Doctor Jace and she confirms that he has tested positive for the
metagene, and that Tara would’ve likely tested positive also, providing a
potential motive for her abduction.
Brion asks if Markovia has the technology to create
metahumans and Dr Jace promises to look into it.
Oracle’s analysis of Markovia has drummed up some leads, a
Children’s hospital that is using substantially more power than it should be
and a Doctor known as Simon Ecks who is there as an intern, well below his paygrade. Dick’s not gonna be
able to do this alone so he’s gonna stop and make a few calls. First off is
Artemis, who is now living with Lian and clone Roy who now goes by Will. That’s
a great way to avoid confusion. Dick arrives to recruit Artemis
We see a servant at the palace stealing some
silver-wear. She opens a locked door and a metahuman with super-speed abilities
races through. The servant is quickly knocked out. The speedster goes in and
kills the King and Queen, we don’t see him do this, but we hear them scream and
see the blood on his hands in the aftermath. He fights off the guards but
DeLamb manages to shoot him dead. But of course, not in time to save them.
With security to be tightened in the wake of this, Dick is
gonna need some extra muscle, which is why he’s coming to recruit Superboy. Superboy’s
feeling the need to step up more in the wake of Superman being out in space.
Dick recruits Superboy quickly but it has M’Gann a bit on edge, given that
she’s already lost 3 members of the team to Batman’s squad. Her team is also
missing several of the s2 cast, it seems Mal and Karen, Beast Boy and Lagoon
Boy left the team. They all appear in the show at some point. Anyway, Superboy
responds to her concern by proposing.
Time for G Gordon Godfrey to make an appearance as he talks
with now Regent Frederick DeLamb about declaring martial law and suspending
access to Quraci refugees following the assassination. They plan to test all
the refugees for the metagene, just in case.
Jefferson is helping his ex-wife Lynn put their kids to bed.
He tells her he’s quitting and Lynn, being both his ex-wife and the sister of
John Stuart, knows this is a promise he can’t keep. Dick approaches but he
tells them his powers haven’t been working since the incident. Dick says that
doesn’t matter and despite Jeff being dismissive at first, he ultimately
concedes and joins the group as they head out on the mission.
Much like the first episodes of a lot of shows, it has a lot
to compact into a single episode. But for the most part it does a solid job of
said compaction. It’s clearly more mature than the other seasons but they hold
themselves to a degree of restraint shows like Titans should learn from.
Rating 8/10
Royal We
We open with Garfield Logan, who is now an actor playing the
Hero “Tork” in a Star Trek like show called Space Trek 3016, wearing it’s
influence on its sleeve, I see. He’s doing a PSA on metahuman trafficking.
Cat Grant’s back in the US as there is a summit at the
United Nations with Catherine Cobert, the League’s public liaison announces the
departure of the leaguers from the last episode. Luthor takes the stage to
formally slam them but gets some kicking from Garth, Ambassador of Atlantis, he
was briefly a member of the team too, but unless you played the video game, you
wouldn’t have seen him since season 1. We’re almost formally introduced to
Ambassador Troia of Themyscira, another former member of the team we never
actually saw.
We’re also introduced to Zviad Baazovi, the Markovian
Ambassador who we will later find out in a much more important player. For the
moment, he tells the assembly that Markovia forbids the entrance of Superheroes
and Vigilantes without prior permission, this is juxtaposed with our team from
before entering the country, Tigress and Nightwing by chartered flight and
Superboy and Black Lightning via Supercycle.
Prince Gregor’s pre-coronation reception is their first
chance to assess who the key players are so Artemis and Nightwing have got
themselves hacked invitations to it. Superboy and Black Lightning are for the
moment to stay quiet as they fly over the border with the suits. For some
reason, Oracle’s communications are for Dick alone and that leads to an amusing
moment where Dick responds to Oracle, and Artemis thinks it’s a response to
her.
Still, they are talking about suspects in public, it’s not
even a large crowd and they almost certainly can be heard. Brion talks to
Gregor, neither of them trust DeLamb but Gregor is willing to let him become
regent, not seeing another option, Brion warns that he can do a lot of damage in
the year before Gregor turns 18.
They find out their gear’s been dropped off in the cemetery,
Superboy and Black Lightning are heading to check out the hospital. Dr Jace,
pursuant to their talk about activating Brion’s metagene, guides Brion over to
Dr Simon Ecks, something Dick takes notice of and follows them.
Black Lightning and Superboy are wearing stealth suits with face coverings so they don't have to animate lip movement. They find a secret door in the morgue, and set
up some hidden cameras, unfortunately the place is shielded from
communications. Superboy comes across a mother-box in pieces, and is saddened
as Mother-boxes are living beings so this to him counts as murder. They find 4
children in tarred pods, but before they can act, they’re stunned by Count
Vertigo.
We’re also introduced to Plasmus who looks suspiciously like
Plasma from the opening, leaving Black Lightning too traumatised to act.
Plasmus is able to grab Superboy without killing him, Superboy escapes his grip
and smashes his way into a sewer tunnel. Plasmus is tasked with dealing with
it.
Artemis heads to the cemetery to get the gear but spots a
weird purple light, a girl who was among a pile of bodies some goons were
burying comes back to life, they try and bury her faster but Artemis takes them
out. One of the goons tries to use an energy whip, but the girl manages to
projects a shield that blocks it. With Artemis’ bike not built for two, they
both make a run for it, Artemis calling in Sphere to provide extraction.
Superboy and Jefferson reach the end of the sewer pipe,
Jefferson makes the jump into the river below but his back on a rock, Superboy
is caught by Plasmus before he gets the chance to jump. Nightwing sends Artemis
to pick up Black Lightning as he sends a beetle drone. Artemis is trying to get
answers out of the girl she found but she remembers essentially nothing before
she was found. And as we find out, this isn’t a simple case of amnesia but
we’ll get to that later.
Superboy is brought to Vertigo who uncovers him, he says he
thinks the UN will find his presence here interesting, this is never actually
followed up on. Unfortunately for Dick, the moment it enters the secret
facility, Nightwing loses contact with the drone. Brion is taken into the lab,
and sees the pods, filled with children and puts 2 and 2 together. Maybe you
shouldn’t have had him walk in here conscious. Just because he’s interested in
meta-activating, doesn’t mean he’ll be okay with meta-traffickers.
Before Brion can make a run for it, Vertigo knocks him out,
he’s royally pissed off that Ecks thinks this would be okay. Yeah, it was
pretty dumb. Nightwing decides to move in through the hospital whilst sending
Tigress and a recovered Black Lightning to regroup through the sewers. Brion is
podded but Ecks is told to do nothing as Vertigo confirms that he was ordered
to do so. Dr Jace enters and activates the pod.
When news about the girl also reaches Vertigo, he asks for
the complex to be locked down and makes a call to someone he calls “your
highness.”
It’s a solid continuation to the Bedlam plotline, no real
complaints
Rating 8.5/10
Eminent Threat
Our little opening stinger introduces 2 new little tit-bits.
First the Goode Googles, which will be important for later and also the
web-cast show Star Girl, hosted by Courtney Whitmore. She’s interviewing
Garfield Logan and conversation shifts to him now dating Queen Perdita of
Vlatava, they met at Wally’s funeral.
Artemis and Black Lighting head up the cliff, leaving the
girl with the Supercycle. Nightwing enters the lab and is warned he’ll lose
communication with Oracle when the door closes but will still have it with
Lightning and Artemis providing they’re in the facility. Dick is quickly
startled by the drone.
Vertigo is moving operations out of the hospital and the
pods are being loaded up, they’re on a railroad so Nightwing thinks they’re
being transported by rail, and prioritises Superboy, he finds him, Jace and the
tarred Prince Brion, as Vertigo comes in and says he just spoke with ‘His
Highness’ and he gave no so such instructions.
Jace claims she did this so they’d have someone capable of
fighting back against ‘his highness’ and it’s more complicated than that but
that’s something we’ll see way further down the line. And we find out that ‘his
highness’ or Baron Bedlam as they call him here is in fact Frederick DeLamb.
There was a clue hidden in plain sight that Bedlam is an anagram of DeLamb, I
like details like that, though I suspect he was already the obvious suspect to
most people at this point.
Plasmus sneaks up on them and they’re only saved thanks to
Halo arriving with the super-cycle. Vertigo heads to finish the relocation of
the pods as Nightwing knocks out Ecks. Jace gets Brion out of the pod, whilst
Nightwing rescues Superboy. With things going south, Vertigo uses a fatherbox
to send the kids away via boom-tube, much to Black Lightning’s horror.
Nightwing and Jace work to destroy all the tar.
Nightwing’s evidence would ultimately bring down DeLamb,
they hope, but DeLamb gathered some of the security footage from the attack and
is now using it to brand Brion a criminal. Brion wakes up and his meta-powers
begin to activate, with him slowly sinking into the ground. It’s Superboy who
helps him through and we’ll see a bit more of that in coming episodes.
Back to DeLamb’s slander campaign, Oracle has brought it to
Nightwing’s attention, so now Brion can see it. Not only is he calling him a
criminal, he’s blaming him for the abduction of Tara and the death of his
parents. Brion heads to the palace, with Superboy following, but before the
others can follow, Simon Ecks, Count Vertigo and Plasmus track them down and
attack, Ecks showing he can duplicate himself. Nightwing uses a smokescreen to
even the playing field. Brion attacks DeLamb who shows off his own metahuman
abilities.
Superboy tries to calm Brion down but it fails miserably and
a fight ensues. Artemis successfully knocks out Vertigo with an electrified
net, but they score a victory knocking down super-cycle, and another when
Plasmus grabs the girl. Black Lightning is horrified seeing another dead girl
and this regains his power in what I feel is this story’s major misstep. Black
Lightning has a substantial role this season, it wouldn’t have been problematic
to extend him getting his powers back over a few more episodes and have the trigger not be basically the same thing that set it off in the first place.
Despite that, the girl is somehow still alive, healing the
damage. Superboy gets the civilians out of harm’s way as DeLamb is able to
pound Brion for a bit. But Gregor isn’t a fool. He sees that DeLamb must have
had business with the meta-traffickers, and comments that DeLamb’s skill means
he’s likely been meta for much longer than Brion, pointing the finger for the
rest at him. Of course whilst he can handle Brion he isn’t a match for Superboy
who knocks him out. But that doesn’t mean Brion’s problems are over, with him
being a meta in such a dangerous time for Markovia, he’s officially kicked out
of the country.
A guy sees the fight and Plasmus in particular. Lightning
spots the control chip and zaps it off, it’s Otto from the opening. Eck’s told
him the condition that ‘killed’ his sister was genetic and they can save him
with an operation, before tarring him and turning him into Plasmus. Nightwing
manages to knock out Ecks, dispatching his clones, so Vertigo and his minion
retreat. Plasmus is about to stop him but is shot dead by the civilian from a
few seconds ago.
The first 3 episodes serve as a singular story, it’s sadly
not something they do all that often but this is a really strong story. There
are some hiccups such as Black Lightning’s powers returning for reasons that
aren’t properly explained but all in all it’s a solid start.
Rating 8/10
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