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ravenswept) wrote2011-02-05 05:20 pm
ravenswept) wrote2011-02-05 05:20 pm
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Young Justice S1E05: Schooled
Addressing Superboy's anger problem, flying monkeys, and the biggest shocker of all, Superman is a dick.
Episode Recap
"Schooled", Ep 5. I wonder if the presense of superheroes just makes building materials weaker, because you never see diasters happen as often as they do in superhero present cities. That thought occured in our dry opening, where a bridge in Metropolis starts to fall apart. And of course, the vehicle in most danger is a school bus of children. Natch.
Bruce Wayne, who has his own Wayne Tower in the Met, is about get his Batman on, when Superman gets in on it first, supporting the bridge and using his heat vision to solider the beams underneath.
Coincidentily, Superboy leaps in to help, though his heavy landings don't seem to impress the still bridge holding Superman. He starts to clear cars away from the edge, with Superman taking the bus off his hands "to be sure". He dresses down his clone for not thinking things through when he's not clear on the extent of his powers, though he avoids the issue when Superboy asks for help in finding out what those limits are, and runs away at the first chance. Superman, ladies and gentlemen! Batman, meanwhile, has watched all this.
Back at the team cave, Black Canary and Martian Manhunter drop in on the group; Canary for training (finally) and Manhunter because he wants to see his niece, but says he was "in the neighborhood". Yeah, because a New England crab town called Happy Harbor is just between here and there.
Canary starts her combat training, first taking on Kid Flash (who takes the time to hit on her fisrt), and whopping him quick. She says not to let the enemy dictate the flow of combat. Superboy scoffs, saying with his strength and the fact that he was created as weapon means that he always controls the fight. So of course, this means that Canary must now aptly demonstrate how very wrong he is. Numerous times.
Before he can storm off in a huff, Batman calls collect with a new mission; they'll be escorting two trucks carrying pieces of an android called Amazo, which can learn and replicate the powers of whoever it fights, to two different locations. It took the whole League four hours to take him down, and they're not taking chances on the scraps. They also fear the return of one Professor Ivo, thought dead.
The escort starts, Robin and Superboy as one team, KF, Miss M and Aqualad as a second. Despite being in two different places, both teams are ambushed in corn fields; huh. And they are being attacked by...
Flying monkies.
Robot flying monkies mind you, but still; flying monkies. I guess Ivo is "quirky". They're easy to destory, but there's a lot of the buggers and their eye lasers pack a punch (physics fail). Both teams do their best, but fail in keeping the little bastards from making off with the Amazo pieces. Superboy, not about to let them make a monkey out of him, gives chase, ditching his com-link saying he doesn't want/need help.
Luckily with some monkey hacking, they find out that the android parts have GPS in them (which was how the monkies knew which trucks to go after) and so they can track them. Unfortunately they're heading south to Gotham, which is too far for Aqualad and Miss M to reach in time. Kid Flash goes ahead, while Robin heads off himself.
Meanwhile, Bruce and Clark get pie and cake in a diner. Seriously (apple for Supes, Devil's Food for the Bat). Bruce tries to impress upon Clark that he can't keep avoiding Superboy like a one-night stand. He's here,he's queer, get used to it wait, no, sorry. He is here though. Clark really doesn't like the implication that he's like a father to the clone (whoo-ee, Superman: world's worst baby-daddy), and storms out (but makes sure to get his pie to go).
Superboy catches up eventually with the aeronatical simians, which he finds on a train. Inside the train car is the very alive Ivo, who actually has an acronym for the robots (M.O.N.Q.I). When Superboy is unimpressed with this creative feat, he sets the restored Amazo after him. Superboy gets his ass handed to him, Amazo able to change power sets continueally, finally just tossing him off the train (and at least a few miles away). Just a note (not that it factors into anything), he lands in a school, and that school is the same one that Robin attends.
Robin and KF meet up on the road (Robin on a monocycle), both taking the time to change into their costumes. While they make their way to the school, Superboy gets tossed around the place, winding up in the gym. Ivo is in the stands, saying that this was too good an ass-whop'n to pass up. There's more fighting, Robin and KF joining in; I'd describe it, but it's a fight. The only thing of interest is at one point an arrow is shot from off screen to distract Amazo. Remember that.
Once again, Superboy tries the direct approach of "rush and smash", with Amazo calling on Black Canary's power's of judo to toss him like garbage. He realizes he just got punked by a robot that could use any power it wanted and schooled him without any. Remembering back to the earlier lesson, he starts to direct his attacks at Ivo himself, which they should have maybe tried earlier, but then again there is a multi-superpowered android to deal with. Robin and KF pick on the change, going after Ivo as well, changing Amazo's priority order to protect instead of kill. With some luck and making him change his powers quickly, they manage to make him turn intangible and Superboy puts his fist through his head before he turns solid, making android head go boom. With the fight over, Aqualad and Miss M just finally turn up, while Ivo escaped at some point (though no one goes looking for him, and as he had some robot monkies with him, that laugh a lot, Superboy should have been able to track them easily).
Disassembled, Amazo is taken to the research labs as originally planned. While Batman acknowledges that Superboy went solo for a bit, they recovered and that they managed to take down Amazo (much quicker than the League no less) impressed the adults.
That arrow from earlier? While Robin and KF think it was Green Arrow not letting them do the job themselves, he pulls out at arrow of his own and show that they're not the same. So they think instead that Speedy is watching their backs; Batman and Arrow obviously don't think so.
We end with Superboy sucking it up, humbling himself and asking Canary for help.
Character Analysis
I'm not gonna go over all of them, since there's not much to say about all of them. Robin,Miss M, and Aqualad really didn't add much new this episode.
Kid Flash: Good god, this kid is one speedy hormone. He'll hit on anything female. And Black Canary? Really? There's being cocky, but there's also having no chance. And then he still goes and hits on Miss Martian. Dude, make a move, you can't just be all talk.
Miss Martian: I almost side-lined her, but then I remember something I noticed. She's starting to get annoyed with KF! Success! Character development! She was mentioning how Superboy was just giving off anger vibes, and KF says to just give him space, but stay as close to him as she wants, to which she just looks a little annoyed and disappointed that he basically ignored what she was worried about. So kudos to that, hopefully that becomes something.
Superboy: As this was his episode, he played a big part, obviously. I'm happy that they didn't wait long to address his anger, as well as mixed in some of Superman's issues with having a young clone. He also learned that just being strong isn't going to get him by all the time, or that it's an instant win.
Black Canary: Why she just now starting to train them I don't know, but she's in it so I can't complain too much. Not in it a whole lot, however. But she wipes the floor with KF and Superboy, so it even outs. She has an almost raspy voice, which I actually like considering her real power is a sonic scream. She's like the Macy Gray of superpowers.
Villains: Scientist villains are usually hard to make a threat, because really, they aren't. It's what they create that's the problem; they're a problem because they create it. So it's a weird dynamic, the villain is dangerous but not on a visual level, something that is usually needed in an action based show. So instead they go with creepy. Ivo plays on that old-school, "Mr Rogers-as-a-serial-killer" personality, which works for him. He not much without his creations, but just seeing him is unsettling, so he's not a joke. Amazo was pretty cool. His look was based from that in the comics, though without the stupid looking head fin or green-on-green stripes he wears. He also actually "looks" like an android, not just a regular person just called one. He's also set apart from the Justice League series, which made him just a silver (later gold) golem.
There were several differences besides looks as well. He was totally a robot, reacting mechanically and not thinking independantly (outside perimaters). Also a change from any previous incarnation, he appears to be able to only use one power set at a time. He annouces whose, sometimes with "access [name]" sometimes just the name. But he never combined powers at all, something the previous Amazo could do. I like the limiter, it keeps him a threat but still makes him beatable; in the JL cartoon, they basically had to write him out of the series because he just got too damn powerful.
Episode Analysis
Origin ep, character ep, mission ep, character ep. There's definitely a pattern. It's not bad though, we need stuff like this to get more in tune with the characters, and it did more than just focus solely on the subject of the (half) hour. While not going away immediately, Superboy's anger/acceptance issues are being worked on. Superman is a dillhole, which I love, because he really isn't perfect, and this is an awesome way to show it. He's freaked that he's been cloned, and really doesn't like to acknowledge that. I'm wish that Black Canary would've had more lines, but as she is just a minor character, and an adult in a teen series, I can't say much. I just want more females on the team; oh wait, next episode!
Also just a writer peeve of mine, I don't like Canary's last line. "Good" should've been good enough on it's own, there's was no need to add, "Because I'm here" like that's all she's there for.
Final Thoughts
I should probably try to start adding some pics to these things.
I'm noticing a kid's show convention, one that calls for shows aimed primarily at kids to teach a lesson by the end. The writers have been pretty subtle about it, and it took me this long to see it, but there is a lesson they're trying to impart on you each episode. And that's not a bad thing, per say. I'm a little mad that now that I've seen it I can't unsee it, but the concept isn't without merit. I thinks it's stupid that just because a show falls within a certain demographic and time slot a show is forced to accomadate preconcieved notions of what kids "need", but there are worse ways of doing it. The lessons are applied to the situation of the episode, as most are, it just when it's hammered in that liiittle bit too much at the end where it makes itself noticeable.
I'm unsure what to think about Kid Flash's comment that he feels naked in civvies. Maybe it speaks to his character, but the show's premise was that of teenagers who are superheros. He can't be "on" all the time, so... I dunno, seems odd.
One thing I never understand, and continually happens, is when someone gets Superman's, or really any of the League's powers, and then they're used the same way. In that, it's usually stated or a given that a hero is never going to go full out unless it's an absolute must, so in a fight they're constantly holding themselves back. Superman the most, because he could easily kill someone if he didn't keep himself in check. And here we have an android, an unfeeling robot, not using Superman's strength to it's greatest ability. Why is he holding back? I could guess that maybe he only analyized the proportion of strength Superman used on him, but even then, that level would have risen as the fight got tougher, so his own level would've risen.
Artemis comes in wholly next ep, so that's awesome. She needs to add a bit of snark and spice to this group, they are seriously lacking of a firecracker. Maybe it's a cliche female personality trait, but there's a reason it exists in a team setting. Besides themselves, there's no one who is putting the boys off their game. Aqualad and Superboy probably won't shake easily, but Robin, and Kid Flash especially, need someone who will poke back.
Episode Recap
"Schooled", Ep 5. I wonder if the presense of superheroes just makes building materials weaker, because you never see diasters happen as often as they do in superhero present cities. That thought occured in our dry opening, where a bridge in Metropolis starts to fall apart. And of course, the vehicle in most danger is a school bus of children. Natch.
Bruce Wayne, who has his own Wayne Tower in the Met, is about get his Batman on, when Superman gets in on it first, supporting the bridge and using his heat vision to solider the beams underneath.
Coincidentily, Superboy leaps in to help, though his heavy landings don't seem to impress the still bridge holding Superman. He starts to clear cars away from the edge, with Superman taking the bus off his hands "to be sure". He dresses down his clone for not thinking things through when he's not clear on the extent of his powers, though he avoids the issue when Superboy asks for help in finding out what those limits are, and runs away at the first chance. Superman, ladies and gentlemen! Batman, meanwhile, has watched all this.
Back at the team cave, Black Canary and Martian Manhunter drop in on the group; Canary for training (finally) and Manhunter because he wants to see his niece, but says he was "in the neighborhood". Yeah, because a New England crab town called Happy Harbor is just between here and there.
Canary starts her combat training, first taking on Kid Flash (who takes the time to hit on her fisrt), and whopping him quick. She says not to let the enemy dictate the flow of combat. Superboy scoffs, saying with his strength and the fact that he was created as weapon means that he always controls the fight. So of course, this means that Canary must now aptly demonstrate how very wrong he is. Numerous times.
Before he can storm off in a huff, Batman calls collect with a new mission; they'll be escorting two trucks carrying pieces of an android called Amazo, which can learn and replicate the powers of whoever it fights, to two different locations. It took the whole League four hours to take him down, and they're not taking chances on the scraps. They also fear the return of one Professor Ivo, thought dead.
The escort starts, Robin and Superboy as one team, KF, Miss M and Aqualad as a second. Despite being in two different places, both teams are ambushed in corn fields; huh. And they are being attacked by...
Flying monkies.
Robot flying monkies mind you, but still; flying monkies. I guess Ivo is "quirky". They're easy to destory, but there's a lot of the buggers and their eye lasers pack a punch (physics fail). Both teams do their best, but fail in keeping the little bastards from making off with the Amazo pieces. Superboy, not about to let them make a monkey out of him, gives chase, ditching his com-link saying he doesn't want/need help.
Luckily with some monkey hacking, they find out that the android parts have GPS in them (which was how the monkies knew which trucks to go after) and so they can track them. Unfortunately they're heading south to Gotham, which is too far for Aqualad and Miss M to reach in time. Kid Flash goes ahead, while Robin heads off himself.
Meanwhile, Bruce and Clark get pie and cake in a diner. Seriously (apple for Supes, Devil's Food for the Bat). Bruce tries to impress upon Clark that he can't keep avoiding Superboy like a one-night stand. He's here,
Superboy catches up eventually with the aeronatical simians, which he finds on a train. Inside the train car is the very alive Ivo, who actually has an acronym for the robots (M.O.N.Q.I). When Superboy is unimpressed with this creative feat, he sets the restored Amazo after him. Superboy gets his ass handed to him, Amazo able to change power sets continueally, finally just tossing him off the train (and at least a few miles away). Just a note (not that it factors into anything), he lands in a school, and that school is the same one that Robin attends.
Robin and KF meet up on the road (Robin on a monocycle), both taking the time to change into their costumes. While they make their way to the school, Superboy gets tossed around the place, winding up in the gym. Ivo is in the stands, saying that this was too good an ass-whop'n to pass up. There's more fighting, Robin and KF joining in; I'd describe it, but it's a fight. The only thing of interest is at one point an arrow is shot from off screen to distract Amazo. Remember that.
Once again, Superboy tries the direct approach of "rush and smash", with Amazo calling on Black Canary's power's of judo to toss him like garbage. He realizes he just got punked by a robot that could use any power it wanted and schooled him without any. Remembering back to the earlier lesson, he starts to direct his attacks at Ivo himself, which they should have maybe tried earlier, but then again there is a multi-superpowered android to deal with. Robin and KF pick on the change, going after Ivo as well, changing Amazo's priority order to protect instead of kill. With some luck and making him change his powers quickly, they manage to make him turn intangible and Superboy puts his fist through his head before he turns solid, making android head go boom. With the fight over, Aqualad and Miss M just finally turn up, while Ivo escaped at some point (though no one goes looking for him, and as he had some robot monkies with him, that laugh a lot, Superboy should have been able to track them easily).
Disassembled, Amazo is taken to the research labs as originally planned. While Batman acknowledges that Superboy went solo for a bit, they recovered and that they managed to take down Amazo (much quicker than the League no less) impressed the adults.
That arrow from earlier? While Robin and KF think it was Green Arrow not letting them do the job themselves, he pulls out at arrow of his own and show that they're not the same. So they think instead that Speedy is watching their backs; Batman and Arrow obviously don't think so.
We end with Superboy sucking it up, humbling himself and asking Canary for help.
Character Analysis
I'm not gonna go over all of them, since there's not much to say about all of them. Robin,
Kid Flash: Good god, this kid is one speedy hormone. He'll hit on anything female. And Black Canary? Really? There's being cocky, but there's also having no chance. And then he still goes and hits on Miss Martian. Dude, make a move, you can't just be all talk.
Miss Martian: I almost side-lined her, but then I remember something I noticed. She's starting to get annoyed with KF! Success! Character development! She was mentioning how Superboy was just giving off anger vibes, and KF says to just give him space, but stay as close to him as she wants, to which she just looks a little annoyed and disappointed that he basically ignored what she was worried about. So kudos to that, hopefully that becomes something.
Superboy: As this was his episode, he played a big part, obviously. I'm happy that they didn't wait long to address his anger, as well as mixed in some of Superman's issues with having a young clone. He also learned that just being strong isn't going to get him by all the time, or that it's an instant win.
Black Canary: Why she just now starting to train them I don't know, but she's in it so I can't complain too much. Not in it a whole lot, however. But she wipes the floor with KF and Superboy, so it even outs. She has an almost raspy voice, which I actually like considering her real power is a sonic scream. She's like the Macy Gray of superpowers.
Villains: Scientist villains are usually hard to make a threat, because really, they aren't. It's what they create that's the problem; they're a problem because they create it. So it's a weird dynamic, the villain is dangerous but not on a visual level, something that is usually needed in an action based show. So instead they go with creepy. Ivo plays on that old-school, "Mr Rogers-as-a-serial-killer" personality, which works for him. He not much without his creations, but just seeing him is unsettling, so he's not a joke. Amazo was pretty cool. His look was based from that in the comics, though without the stupid looking head fin or green-on-green stripes he wears. He also actually "looks" like an android, not just a regular person just called one. He's also set apart from the Justice League series, which made him just a silver (later gold) golem.
There were several differences besides looks as well. He was totally a robot, reacting mechanically and not thinking independantly (outside perimaters). Also a change from any previous incarnation, he appears to be able to only use one power set at a time. He annouces whose, sometimes with "access [name]" sometimes just the name. But he never combined powers at all, something the previous Amazo could do. I like the limiter, it keeps him a threat but still makes him beatable; in the JL cartoon, they basically had to write him out of the series because he just got too damn powerful.
Episode Analysis
Origin ep, character ep, mission ep, character ep. There's definitely a pattern. It's not bad though, we need stuff like this to get more in tune with the characters, and it did more than just focus solely on the subject of the (half) hour. While not going away immediately, Superboy's anger/acceptance issues are being worked on. Superman is a dillhole, which I love, because he really isn't perfect, and this is an awesome way to show it. He's freaked that he's been cloned, and really doesn't like to acknowledge that. I'm wish that Black Canary would've had more lines, but as she is just a minor character, and an adult in a teen series, I can't say much. I just want more females on the team; oh wait, next episode!
Also just a writer peeve of mine, I don't like Canary's last line. "Good" should've been good enough on it's own, there's was no need to add, "Because I'm here" like that's all she's there for.
Final Thoughts
I should probably try to start adding some pics to these things.
I'm noticing a kid's show convention, one that calls for shows aimed primarily at kids to teach a lesson by the end. The writers have been pretty subtle about it, and it took me this long to see it, but there is a lesson they're trying to impart on you each episode. And that's not a bad thing, per say. I'm a little mad that now that I've seen it I can't unsee it, but the concept isn't without merit. I thinks it's stupid that just because a show falls within a certain demographic and time slot a show is forced to accomadate preconcieved notions of what kids "need", but there are worse ways of doing it. The lessons are applied to the situation of the episode, as most are, it just when it's hammered in that liiittle bit too much at the end where it makes itself noticeable.
I'm unsure what to think about Kid Flash's comment that he feels naked in civvies. Maybe it speaks to his character, but the show's premise was that of teenagers who are superheros. He can't be "on" all the time, so... I dunno, seems odd.
One thing I never understand, and continually happens, is when someone gets Superman's, or really any of the League's powers, and then they're used the same way. In that, it's usually stated or a given that a hero is never going to go full out unless it's an absolute must, so in a fight they're constantly holding themselves back. Superman the most, because he could easily kill someone if he didn't keep himself in check. And here we have an android, an unfeeling robot, not using Superman's strength to it's greatest ability. Why is he holding back? I could guess that maybe he only analyized the proportion of strength Superman used on him, but even then, that level would have risen as the fight got tougher, so his own level would've risen.
Artemis comes in wholly next ep, so that's awesome. She needs to add a bit of snark and spice to this group, they are seriously lacking of a firecracker. Maybe it's a cliche female personality trait, but there's a reason it exists in a team setting. Besides themselves, there's no one who is putting the boys off their game. Aqualad and Superboy probably won't shake easily, but Robin, and Kid Flash especially, need someone who will poke back.
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