TV Review: Young Justice: Outsiders Mid-Season Premiere

Young Justice Season 3 Episodes 14-16 “Influence”, “Leverage”, “Illusion of Control”

Rating: TV-PG

Runtime: 23 minutes each

After another wait (although a manageable one by fans’ standards) Young Justice is back again.  DC Universe released three new episodes of the third season, subtitled Outsiders, on July 2, before moving to a more standard one episode per week schedule for the rest of the season.  The three episodes, “Influence”, “Leverage”, and “Illusion of Control”, dip the viewer back in the deep end of the complicated, multi-faceted battle between DC‘s heroes and villains and it looks like our young protagonists on both the Justice League’s covert ops Team and the independent Outsiders group (the divisions between which are eroding) are in for a tough fight as meta-human trafficking and the sociopolitical issues tied to it continue to expand out of control and personal conflicts and traitors in their midst threaten to destroy them.

Before highlighting the many exciting possibilities and developments the new installments introduce and develop, there are some flaws and potential problems worth noting.  A decent amount of fans were less than enthused when the mid-season finale introduced Brion/Geo-Force’s sister Tara/Terra and seemingly launched the series into a rather straightforward adaptation of famous Teen Titans story “The Judas Contract”, which already has a long history of appearances in other media. Still, just as many were confident the Young Justice creators, who have already proved themselves capable of subverting expectations several times, had a clever twist up their sleeves.  Which makes it more unfortunate that the first episode after the break confirms that Terra is indeed a mole for Deathstroke as usual.  The show is also strongly hinting that Dr. Jace is untrustworthy as well, however, so there is still plenty of intrigue for those tired of the treachery of Tara Markov.  Although that also points to a separate issue.  As is usually the case with Young Justice there is A LOT going on right now and the show continues to expand in scale and complexity.  “Illusion of Control” for example, addresses one of the fans’ complaints with the first half of the season by putting members of the Season 2 Team like Impulse, Blue Beetle, and Static back in the spotlight but it also somewhat randomly brings back Eduardo Dorado Jr. and adds a bunch of other minor characters as well as ending with the possibility of another separate team being formed as Beast Boy leads some of his teammates to take a more public approach to combatting meta-trafficking.  While Season 2 proved the creators’ skill at juggling a large cast, Outsiders‘ is even bigger and while if everything comes together smoothly at the end this could be the show’s most stunning achievement yet it also feels possible the season might collapse under the weight of its own scale.

On the bright side, while the central espionage plot is at risk of becoming too complicated, the actual details of said plot remain quite compelling.  With the connection between Goode Industries and meta-trafficking exposed in one of the last episodes before the break Granny Goodness is being backed into a corner, though it’s clear she’s not down and out yet.  The action in “Influence” comes when a contingent of the League’s space team (including Green Lantern Guy Gardner in his first speaking role on the show) launches an ill-fated direct attack against a fortress in which Granny is holding kidnapped meta-teens.  The series continues to nudge the heroes closer and closer to the open conflict with Darkseid it’s been building to for its entire run and I can’t wait to see how this storyline ends.  The Earth-bound heroes also have plenty to deal with as Lex Luthor and G. Gordon Godfrey continue to turn public opinion against the League thanks to the latter’s corrupt journalism.  These episodes feature the young members of the Outsiders (minus Cyborg) joining the Team as the new Gamma Squad but Brion and the others quickly begin to notice how compromised the public heroes are, after becoming accustomed to the outlaw brand of crime-fighting they practiced while being led by Dick/Nightwing.

Our heroes’ problems aren’t limited to the tactical variety, however.  The strongest developments in these episodes are Halo realizing that Gabrielle was involved in the death of Brion and Tara’s parents and Artemis’ mother Paula’s argument with her daughter over the latter’s decision to return to the superhero life again.  Halo fears that they will lose their relationship with Brion and possibly their place on the team if the truth comes out.  Paula has given up hope of Jade ever abandoning her criminal life as Cheshire and is deeply frustrated by Artemis’ inability to remain a civilian, afraid that she will lose her younger daughter as well, in a more literal and permanent fashion.  One of the best things about Young Justice has always been its recognition that the heroes of DC and their friends and allies make up a giant, inter-connected found family and testing those bonds makes for some of the show’s strongest storytelling.

Wally West Watch: Several mentions of Wally this week, notably in Artemis, Dick, and Conner/Superboy’s explanation of the hero life to the new characters and in Paula and Artemis’ argument.

Other Notes:

–  Halo decides that given their consciousness is largely that of a Mother Box they don’t feel comfortable being described as a girl or boy, so unless the show does differently, going forward I’ll be using non-gendered pronouns when referring to them.

–  The show continues to hint at a possible romance between Artemis and Will Harper/Red Arrow (which Paula is oddly supportive of despite Jade being Lian’s mother). Fans are not happy about it but Artemis’ own mixed feelings on the idea add to her struggle with leading a double life.