Hope you enjoyed the last 3 episodes with the Outsiders, they do not have another mission until episode 24, in the meantime, we need to catch up with everyone else as we dive into episodes 20-22 of Outsiders.
Quiet Conversations
It’s New Year’s Day and you might’ve noticed this season
spans a bit more than the usual 6 months. Vic answers a call and it’s his
father, he reads him the riot act and hangs up before screaming in an alleyway.
The next day, Fred Bugg manages to find him and takes him back to the Tower. It
seems Fatherbox has decided to screw trying to take over the flesh and instead
convert the whole body. Superboy summons Dreamer of the forever people. It’s
okay if you don’t know who she is, she was last seen in season 1. Anyway,
according to Motherbox, his only hope is to be placed in Metron’s Mobius chair.
In an interesting retcon to usual comic lore, it’s Metron
who created Mother and Fatherboxes, and boomtubes and just about anything you’d
associate with New God tech. She leaves them the motherbox but isn’t coming.
The last time she met Metron, Bear punched him. Oh and Jefferson’s here for
some reason...
In a subplot, and we’re getting a few of them this episode,
Violet has run away. Tara admits her and Brion’s potential part in it but Jace
continues to be quiet about her revelations, hmmm. Artemis heads off after her
with Tara whilst Forager joins Superboy and Jefferson to search for Metron.
They boomtube to the source wall and call out for Metron but he flies off.
Harper has come to school, sporting a nasty injury. She’s
being talked to by Megan Morse regarding the incident that got her arrested.
Artemis and Tara head Connor and Megan’s house to get Sphere, who is able to
track Violet. As for Violet themself, they’re in Dhabar and talking with
Gabrielle’s parents.
And in case this episode didn’t feel full enough, we cut to
the metahuman Youth Centre and Aquaman taking the water-breather metahuman to
Atlantis. He uses translation magic to allow her to speak Atlantean. Silas
managed to find his way to the tower, much to Vic’s annoyance, his anger
further allows Fatherbox to transform his body.
Metron boomtubes elsewhere and the crew follow, right into
the Minosyss Ring, where parademons are fighting against Superman. Silas puts
Vic into a medically induced coma, since it’s his anger that aids the
transformation whilst he’s under he’ll lose no more ground. Superboy, Black
Lightning and Forrager aid Superman in the battle. Apparently Parademons staged
the raid, drawing in the league but whilst they were busy rescuing minors, the
Female Furies got away with the minerals. Superman is confident they’ll be
caught next time but Metron remarks that this was the last mineral required for
the device. They tell Metron what’s going on and he agrees to go with them.
Back with Megan and Harper, Megan noticed Cullen, Harper’s
brother is also sporting some injuries, but whilst it’s common for Harper, this
is a first for him. Harper claims they were roughhousing, and says afterwards
that she knows if she says anything Megan has to report it and they could end
up separated.
Back with Violet and they have confessed to their parents
that they’re dying. Aquaman and the metahuman meet up with King Orin, the
former Aquaman. The metahuman still doesn’t want to tell us her name, but for
the ease of talking about her any further, her name is Dolphin, as we find out
in the next episode. Orin had decided to hand over being Aquaman to Kaldur so
he could attend to his responsibilities as King of Atlantis, and this was always this intent.
He mentions how encouraged he is to hear about the
Outsiders’ defeat of Professor Ivo, to which Kaldur has a slight pause in his
reaction that Dolphin notices. Jace tries to talk with Brion but I get the
feeling they couldn’t afford his voice actor for this episode, which has a lot
of characters in it, so he says nothing.
Metron arrives, but we find out he’s not hear to save Vic, he’s here to watch him die as this is a fairly unique circumstance that’s worthy of study. Jefferson tells Connor that Dreamer only said they needed his chair, so Connor throws Metron off the chair, and they put Vic in it.
Kaldur
introduces Dolphin to his parents, or ‘parents’ as I should say. Calvin Durham
comes from the surface world himself, guess he was surgically altered to
survive in Atlantis… I don’t know. Dolphin will be staying with them for the
time being.
Dolphin tells Kaldur that though he feels like he’s a bad
person for lying, she’s known bad people, and bad people don’t feel bad about
lying. OK, back to Megan and Harper, Harper reveals she took the gun to get it
out of the house away from their alcoholic father, making it all the more
tragic that she was drinking and using the gun too. Harper’s prepared to leave
but Megan begins putting the pieces together, Harper had been the rock Cullen
could hide behind and her being in jail is what lead to Cullen’s injury. Her
silence is only shielding her father, Megan promises she will be there for
whatever happens next and Harper eventually breaks down and says that their dad
hits them.
Back with Violet, her mannerisms and vocals have made Gabrielle’s parents question who she truly is, Violet decides to tell them everything.
They get Vic in the chair, which successfully purges Fatherbox from
him, the soul from Fatherbox returns to the source. Vic is now entirely
Mobius tech. Metron is disappointed, though not exactly annoyed that Jefferson
zapped him. Jefferson asks if the Granny he referred to as the person using the
stolen minerals is the same as Gretchen Good, Metron responds. “No, and yes”
before boomtubing away. Silas is about to leave but Vic decides it’s time to
reconcile.
OK, time for some still frames to wrap the episode up.
Violet does successfully give the closure she sought to before Artemis and Tara
arrive to pick her up, Tara showing forgiveness by hugging her. Megan takes
Harper and Cullen to Child Protective Services. Dolphin enjoys her time
swimming and we see Kaldur meet up with his partner, Wyndd, who we saw briefly
guarding the Reach Ship with Lagaan.
Jackson Hyde, the counterpart to Kaldur in the main DCU was
revealed to be gay in DC Rebirth, it seems Greg Weisman decided to take Kaldur
down a similar path, in interviews he called Kaldur pansexual. The reunion
between Violet and Brion is still a little cold. Tara tells Slade it’s been
quiet around.
The episode ends with the number of the US National Domestic
Violence Hotline, one drawback of it not being televised, is that regional
changes like this could have been implemented to appeal to more people. But it’s
still million times better than Heroes in Crisis.
This episode crams a lot in, even if it’s one of the
season’s longer episodes. It feels very busy and once again, some things get no
time to breathe. Still, we get resolution for Vic and that’s satisfying if
nothing else and the Harper subplot is handled well and tastefully.
Rating 7/10
Unknown Factors
We open with Cat Grant, as Goode World Studios is premiering
a film called “The Great Khan” a nice little touch is the Goode World logo
looks like a shrunk version of the WB logo. Gretchen is there in person so
Jefferson Pierce and Dick Grayson, making his return after a 7-episode absence,
are about to raid her house. Whilst it was supposed to be a recon mission, Dick
has taken a motherbox, instructing it to ping on detecting Apokoliptan tech and
it pings. Dick leads him and Jefferson inside, Oracle remotely disabling the
security cameras. However, it all seems too easy, which turns out to be the
case they fall through a boomtube to location unknown.
We cut to Atlantis where Dolphin has officially adopted the
named. Kaldur and his partner Wyndde are having a moment but it’s interrupted
by Oracle. Wyndde had made a prior appearance in the Young Justice tie-in
comic, he was working for Ocean Master in that comic. Guess plenty can change
in 7 years. Anyway, the League can’t intervene because the mission was illegal
but the team and Batman Inc are on other missions. Yeah, all of Batman Inc are
in Africa, seriously? There’s a good chunk of Batman Inc who do absolutely
nothing all season including mainstays like Green Arrow. They made a thing of
this putting him at odds with Black Canary and it’s never followed up on, at
least things between Cassie and Tim happen off-screen.
Wynnde decides to come along with him and I’m glad seeing as
I want to see as more of a character than just a love-interest. We cut to Ivy
Town where a B-plot involving Karen Beechen and Mal Duncan begins. They’ve both
tested negative for the meta-gene, though it’s remarked how it’d be interesting
if their child was meta, and by dramatic convenience her water breaks.
Victor and Silas say their goodbyes now on good terms as
Garfield and Brion return from an Outsiders mission, against the Condiment
King. A villain I can’t believe they’re still using. The joke was done in
Batman: The Animated Series, leave this concept alone, there’s no more joke to
tell. Things are still a little cold between Brion and Violet, but Jace stops
her from telling Brion about her condition. Hmmm…
Oracle has control of a beetle drone outside as Aquaman
decides to forego subterfuge and talk to Gretchen directly. Gretchen looks at
the bug directly, but agrees to take Kaldur and Wyndde straight to Dick and
Jefferson. Oracle decides they need a backup plan and begins preparations. We
see Karen giving birth with all the screaming that entails, no screaming from any
contractions earlier though. They have a lovely baby girl, but the doctors
quickly find a problem.
Back at the tower, Victor is discovering his new abilities,
he can create a cannon and has considerable strength. Jace talks to Brion,
who’s feeling a bit regretful about how he’s been treating Violet, she tells
her to be open, which is not bad advice considering what he ultimate agenda is,
more on that in the next episode. She also encourages him to respond to the
Outsider’s social media feed, in particular patrons from Markovia.
Hey, we get a reference to Ryan Choi, if a brief one.
Anyway, the baby has a hole in her heart, which is normally not a difficult
procedure but the doctors are unable to get there because of the blizzard.
Karen decides to shrink down and perform the procedure herself.
Dick and Jefferson have been sent to the X-pit, a ghost
dimension that tortures and brainwashes inmates. Running the dimension is
Overlord, another comic deep-cut reference. The X-pit is generally associated
with Mister Miracle and given all the Fourth World stuff they’ve introduced
this season, it’s amazing Mister Miracle got left out.
Kaldur and Wynnde are allowed to enter the ghost dimension
to save them. I don’t know if Gretchen knew but their skin icons are able to
somewhat counter the dimensions effects. They rescue Dick and Jefferson, with
Wynnde also taking the motherbox. Gretchen objects to this and has Dick and
Jefferson attack, they’ve been brainwashed by the pit.
Karen has successfully patched her daughter’s heart but
decides to do something rash that will certainly come back to haunt her, she
shrinks further into her daughter’s DNA and implements a serum that alters her
genes, enhancing her strength among other things. She created it for her
dissertation but not with the intent of it being used.
The fight between Kaldur and Wynnde against Jefferson and
Dick is kinda disappointing, Kaldur and Wynde are able to destroy them easily,
but Overlord begins blasting the motherbox. Both Violet and Vic can feel it,
and Vic is able to open a boomtube to their location. Violet uses their healing
aura to help Motherbox, then rescues Dick and Jefferson. Gretchen remarks that
she used the tongue of the old gods. Before she can drop them all into the
x-pit, a diversionary flash bang is fired into the room by a bat-drone piloted
by Oracle, Jefferson takes note of that as they all take their leave.
Jefferson recovered nicely but Dick is in a bad shape.
Violet and Brion reconcile, but Jace makes contact with her ‘mentor’ saying
that there are complication, and that she needs to ‘get her kids out’ we see
that her mentor is in fact the Ultra Humanite. We get a post-credits scene, the
only one the show has, Gretchen talks to Darkseid saying she found the
anti-life equation.
This is one of the show’s stronger episodes, but the action
is both disappointing and lacking.
Rating 8/10
Antisocial Pathologies
We open with the Light having a meeting. Gretchen gets
everyone up to speed on what happened, believing it proves that Earth’s heroes
are still co-ordinating more than they say they were. Halo’s capture is on the
mind of the Ultra-Humanite, and has plans for her beyond that. Gretchen is also
interested but per the Light’s tradition, the Ultra-Humanite gets dibs.
Tara is taken aside by Deathstroke, who tells her he knows
that she hasn’t revealed everything about Halo or Vic. Not sure what she hasn’t
told them about Halo but... Deathstroke thinks she’s gone soft and tries to
convince her that the good guys will betray her the moment they feel she’s out
of line, whilst he is always honest with her. It’s a decent lie. He gives Tara
something.
Dick’s still in bad shape after his stint in the x-pit.
Bruce, Tim, Alfred, Barbara, Megan, Connor, Kaldur, Jefferson and Jace are
there with him. Infinity Inc, a new young superhero team are making the news,
Brion thinks they’re encroaching on the Outsiders’ turf but inspiring young
heroes was the entire point of the Outsiders, so Beast Boy tells him to take it
as a compliment, though quickly changes the subject to Gretchen.
Dick’s stabilising for now, but Bruce decides, in one of his
dumber choices, decides to convene a meeting of the other members of the Anti-light in
plain view, as the Outsiders arrive too. With this, Jefferson has an epiphany,
and he’s pissed about it. He even works out that Aqualad threw the fight in
Brooklyn to make the Outsiders look good. Whilst he’s having his rant, Jace
slips a control chip on Tara.
Vandal Savage has a boomtube open up behind him, he walks
through to Apokolips to have a chat with Darkseid, one we don’t hear because we
have an episode where some characters have no dialogue to save voice money.
This is another problem with having such an expansive cast. Violet brings Halo
into a car, with Brion and Tara already inside. She tells Violet that her
mentor has found a cure for their condition, and that she’s told Brion and
Tara, who are here to support her.
Megan and Connor argue but it’s done entirely in hand
gestures and that’s kinda hilarious. Garfield confronts Tim and Barbara,
telling Tim that this revelation could end Tim and Cassie for good. Oh no, not
Tim and Cassie they had… maybe 2 lines of dialogue together, it’s almost become
a joke how little screentime their relationship gets.
Barbara is legitimately the MVP here, whilst she
acknowledges they may have gone too far on occasion, she also has some
legitimate counters to Garfield. They too hid their involvement with the Team
and the League. They did work behind the scenes and allowed the heroes to
preserve their integrity.
“We are sorry we made you feel this way” anyway else getting
Channel Awesome vibes here? Jefferson is pissed as all hell about it, but Bruce
is stubbornly refusing the apologise. Dick is recovered enough to try and
mediate.
Jace has taken the trio to a lab where Gretchen arrives,
using a cerebral leash on Violet to pacify her. Ultra-Humanite is not exactly
happy about it, but Gretchen promises him Vic in due time. Overlord takes them
into the x-men. Gretchen explains that she uses the x-pit to discipline and
re-orient people Darkseid wants controlled. It works, but it only works long
turn because her charges don’t want to return to the pit.
But she believes Halo may be the answer here, throwing her
out of the containment cube into the ghost dimension. She activates her healing
aura, overlord confirms that her power has been repolarised, and she can now
solve the anti-life equation.
Now I didn’t just give Oracle the MVP for the episode for
her talk with Garfield, her talk with Bruce is just as important. She reminds him that 4/7 of the group are Bat-family members, 2 of them former protegees
accustomed to following his orders and Wonder Woman is in space, only hearing
about their endeavours after the fact, and has also been the most resistant
voice of the group.
The anti-life equation can fully remove free will from a
subject, and she decides to test this on Dr Jace. Because Halo is organic, the
motherbox within them is no longer confined to the safeguards Metron put on
mother and fatherboxes. And the penny drops with Doctor Jace, she sees all
those she transformed in Bedlam, in particular Tara and Brion as her children. She
manipulated Brion to become a metahuman to stop DeLamb, as revenge for him
taking Tara from her.
She was the one who killed Violet with a morphine overdose,
she thought her resurrection might mean they're part of the family but her test
on the hair proved otherwise. She lied and told Halo they were dying [note: she repeatedly misgenders Violet, not sure if that was intentional or not, it almost spilled into this review] and
encouraged them not to tell the others, a deliberate effort to split Violet and
Brion up. And she was seducing Jefferson to keep close to her ‘children.’ She
wants to go back and continue her work, expanding her family which is what the
Ultra-Humanite had promised in exchange for Halo.
Satisfied with the results, Gretchen takes them out of the X-pit. Tara chooses this moment to escape, we see that Deathstroke had given her an antidote chip during the confrontation earlier on. Gretchen escapes with Halo, and the Ultra-Humanite escapes with Doctor Jace.
We get another meeting
with the Light, they were never going to honour Doctor Jace’s terms, because
remember they want Tara as a mole with the heroes, but thanks to the antidote
chip given to Tara they realistically broke free on their own and Jace is none
the wiser.
Still, with Granny having the key to the anti-life equation, none of this may matter. Hearing about the equation, Vandal snaps his tablet. One thing of note, Deathstroke speaks with his mask on, and the Humanite speaks through a vocal box, meaning they save money on lip movements.
Crushed not only
by the revelations about the team and Doctor Jace, Jefferson storms off.
Gretchen drops off Halo at the Orphanage with Granny, implying that they’re
separate people. Tara reaffirms her loyalty to Deathstroke as the episode ends.
This house of cards had to tumble eventually and it’s
interesting in spite of its lack of action. The major problem is a large portion
of players here were silent because the budget didn’t stretch to having all of
their voice actors.
Rating 7.5/10
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