Review: Young Justice Episode 14, "Revelation"

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The Injustice League! O.O were they “the Light” all along?

Looking at that lineup I recognize only three definitely – the Joker, Poison Ivy, and Black Adam – and one possibly (is that Gorilla Grodd?). The other three are a mystery to me.

Hello there, Wolf! :D

Aand yup. Kon and M’gann *are* officially a couple…and it seems like the show wants us to root for Wally and Artemis to become one. I’d have liked Artemis/Kaldur, actually, but after “Homefront” I’m not sure she’d be so keen on him.

That’s John Zatara – famous magician/homo magi, Zatanna’s dad and Zachary’s uncle…and Young Justice’s “babysitter of the week” according to Wally.

LOL at Captain Marvel eating Wally’s snacks, though XD

We see Superman, John Stewart GL, Hawkwoman and Hawkman in Cat Grant’s report about the giant plant that attacked Metropolis.

The kids summarize the results of their investigations (in the last few episodes) for us. :)

Next on the attackers’ list? Gotham City, Paris ( D: ), Star City, and Taipei. Hmm. Interesting combination there…what’s the significance, I wonder?

Obviously Gotham and Star cities are home to Bats, Dick, Artemis, and Ollie respectively…but what do poor Paris and Taipei have to do with it? Or was Dick just stating the names of cities as he got them?

Ah. Dick’s got the villains’ message recorded and is able to identify the ones I couldn’t (and correct one error I made): Count Vertigo, Ultra-Humanite (whoops!), Atomic Skull, and Wotan. I wonder whose rogues they are in particular, if any one hero(-family)’s at all.

Hmm. Zatara can pinpoint sources of concentrated sorcery…on a holo-map. Interesting.

I love Billy’s enthusiasm to go with the team that he thinks it’s more fun working with :D

Louisiana, huh? That’s the same place where “Madame Xanadu” had her shop. Interesting.

Ooh. That plant’s buds had Joker venom in them! O.O

Hmmm – the Injustice League’s plans involved attaching some sort of mechanical rig to a plant that’s clearly a big deal to Ivy.

M’gann and the bioship have some sort of telepathic link, allowing M’gann to feel what the bioship – also a ‘she’ – feels.

The way M’gann and the bioship were affected by Count Vertigo’s power reminded me of a scene in the 2006 Agents of Atlas series in which Bob felt the effect of Namora hitting the saucer (IIRC) with something (a derelict helicopter or some other scrap from the abandoned navy base they were at, I think). I wonder how much of it he controls with his headband….

‘Plan B’ is something that can be carried in a duffle bag! XD

Artemis: “No. No way am I nearly drowning three missions in a row.”
~
She pulls out a rebreather – looks like she’s adopted Batman’s ‘always prepared’ motto :D – and happens to have one for Wally, too.

M’gann’s able to shape-shift gills for herself, Dick of course has his own rebreather, Kaldur’s in his element, and one of Kon’s powers is apparently the ability to hold his breath for longer than the others can (and I like the detail that therefore, he’s the only one who really had to take big gasps of air once they surfaced) :).

The chaos has continued into the next day. J’onn and Orin/Arthur – Aquaman – are in Paris. Slight ex-Parisian-resident nitpick, though – that’s not quite what the area near the Eiffel Tower looks like. :P

Barry, someone I don’t recognize (Blue Devil?), and Captain Atom are at a nuclear power station in Taipei.

ROY! :D and Ollie are in Star City (but where’s Dinah?).

…ah, she’s in Metropolis. And look – she’s using the Canary Cry! :D

The Joker’s got multiple personalities in this ‘verse.

Wait, that *was* still Star City! Dinah *is* with the two male Arrows (that we’ve seen so far. I wonder if Connor – and Mia, while I’m thinking about the Arrows! – exist in this ‘verse).

Hey, hello Guy Gardner! :D Now all we need is a Kyle cameo and we’ll have seen all four male Earth GLs.

I guess what momentarily confused me about where Dinah was was the fact that the bus had Metropolis School District written on it.

Plastic Man! He’s in Gotham.

Two more heroes in Paris as well – but I don’t recognize both of them. I wonder if the purple-glowing one is a woman – certainly looks to me like it could be! (Not a Star Sapphire though, surely?) The other is, if I’m not mistaken, Mister Terrific.

The bioship is back and recovered! :D

Both Kaldur and Artemis find they’ve lost their weaponry.
~
Artemis: “Argh, I feel naked…not in a fun way.”
Kaldur: “We will make our own fun, as we have been trained.”
♥

He calls for “maneuver seven” and gives Artemis a big boost up and over the plant creature – and straight into Ivy, who was controlling it. I’m glad to see Dinah’s training being acknowledged and put to such good use here.

Robin (as the control-tower plant comes crashing down): “Timber.”
~
XD I really like the casual way he says that.

Joker: “Children. Children foiled our plans? Inconceivable. Unacceptable! RETRIBUTIONABLE!” “That last one might not be a word.” “So sue me.”
~
Heh.

Kaldur can give as well as take magic attacks! :D Look at him being the only one able to hold off Wotan’s power – when he really needs to – there!

‘Plan B’ is the Helmet of Fate! O.O Wow. Apparently Wally’s ‘souvenir’ collecting can come in handy too…if Wally even knew they were taking it on the mission. Hmm.

I love that Wally desperately tries to warn Kaldur against using the Helmet. It’s a great bit of character work – he knows what that usage means and how serious it is. His nervous “oh, dude” when Kaldur does put it on confirms this for me (and I guess he didn’t know it was being brought).

So who knew what ‘Plan B’ was, then? Just Kaldur, or did M'gann know as well? I wonder.

Joker: "Always wanted to carve this bird."
~
D: Creepy. Especially with Dick in DCAU Tim’s colours…

The big guns have arrived!
~
But Ollie and Dinah are sans Roy this time, I see :(. Still, it was good to see that Roy’s goals for working solo don’t mean he’s entirely unwilling to help out the others – meaning the Justice Leaguers – when needed. He could have made a special exception to not wanting to work with Ollie in the earlier case, though, because Star City’s his home too.

And there’s been absolutely no sign – well nothing significant anyway IIRC – of Diana since that second episode where she also appeared in a group shot. :S At least she could have been shown doing *something* here. :S I *really* hope those little bits I’ve been reading about a Wonder Girl appearance turn out to be true. Having her eventually join the team too would be even better!

LOVE that scene with the heroes standing around the villains.

Hmm. Vertigo gives Ivy a look before they put up their hands – is there even more going on here than what the YJers have been able to detect (and what meets the eye)?

Joker venom! D:

…that Kaldur/Fate was able to stop (with a rather dramatic “Fate has intervened” :D :P). Thank goodness! Really didn’t want a repeat of what the Joker venom could do to a (group of) hero(es)….

I wonder if Artemis is going to have a dig at Wally for pretending that putting on the Helmet didn’t do much to him (except rewire some biology temporarily or something) when clearly it did affect him more.

Kaldur mentioning Wally’s ‘friend’ Kent and how useful he was to convince Nabu to let Kaldur take off the Helmet is a nice shout-out/use of continuity.

Batman: “The supervillain secret society has been neutralized. As for your performance…it was satisfactory.”
~
XD I wonder if they’ve learned to take that sort of thing as complimentary, coming from Bats? Or have they not, seeing as this Bats is in many ways more expressive of his approval than most portrayals are?

Oooh. So the Injustice League weren’t the Light, but mere proxies!

And we get another supervillain reveal – the main one whom I don’t recognize (but the credits inform me is Vandal Savage), a woman (possibly an Amazon? Or Circe, maybe??), Black Manta, Ra’s, Lex, Klarion (and Teekl), and Brain.


General Roundup:
Interesting.

This is a villain-focused episode and as such the baddies - some iconic ones that probably any fan will recognize, some more obscure ones (at least for me) - get most of the screen time. It's also a team-up, but quite different from the one that happened in a previous episode. There's quite a bit of fighting, a global problem that literally does not go away in a day, and cameos aplenty (on the Justice Leaguer's side).

It's also nice to see that the kids of the team are trusted to do some important work here. They show they're able to handle it, too, by showing they've learned - from their mistakes, from their YJ mentors (one point in particular delighted me), and from their previous adventures. There's also evidence of character development and I noticed two points in particular relating to Artemis and Wally.

The "revelation" of the title is a pretty big one...but it's made at the end so I won't spoil it in the general roundup :P. Suffice to say that it made me go "ooh", that people introduced in previous episodes weren't for any simple reason, and that I continue to look forward to new episodes of this cartoon.