Justice League S02E15-16 Review: Ph'nglui mglw'nafh cthulhu r'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn

Justice League, Season 2, Episodes 15-16: The Terror Beyond

After Flash in the previous episode, we finally get a big Hawkgirl episode that doesn't focus on her romance with Green Lantern or angsting about her planet. But it's not just a Hawkgirl episode -- we get a lot of backstory about Atlantis, we get an unexpected spotlight on a relatively minor villain, we get the very awesome return of Dr. Fate, we get a brief moment of hero-vs-hero fighting (including Aquaman vs Wonder Woman, easily the highlight of the episode action-wise), we get one of the saddest moments in the entirety of the DCAU, we get a Cthulhu homage... yeah. This two-parter was one that felt a bit filler-y to me as a kid, but watching it now kind of raised this episode to one of my favourites.

We don't get much in lieu of the Justice League themselves in this episode, with only Hawkgirl, Superman and Wonder Woman showing up from the main cast, making this the only episode of Justice League to only feature as little as three members from the main seven. And honestly, Diana and Superman are only around to be punchy. The main focus is on the unlikely team of Aquaman, Doctor Fate and Solomon Grundy, which is one of the best things ever.

The usage of Doctor Fate and Solomon Grundy, exploring the latter's backstory, as well as bringing in Aquaman and the DCAU version of Atlantis's backstory, takes the show in a different direction. The episode begins in a pretty basic superhero/supervillain material as a bunch of military troops are tracking down Solomon Grundy, with a pretty cool sequence of him going around and crushing and throwing military tanks around. We've seen Solomon Grundy several times before throughout Justice League as, well, just this big powerful brute. We didn't know much about him, honestly, just that he's a simpleminded evil brute.

And then Aquaman shows up out of nowhere on a big-ass sea serpent, hydro pumps the military people, and goes all Arnold on Solomon Grundy, rescuing the dude and bringing him to Dr. Fate's tower. We learn over the course of the episodes why they are doing this. Aquaman, king of Atlantis, and Doctor Fate, a guardian of order, wants to protect the Earth from the coming of Cthulhu. Er, Icthultu, I mean. Aquaman's protectiveness of Atlantis and him being all 'I'M A REGAL KING' and being a bit more anti-hero-y compared to other superheroes makes him a pretty good choice to star in this slightly more ambiguous venture. Doctor Fate, who has appeared before in Superman: TAS but not within this show, is quickly re-established as this master of the mystic arts, and very very knowledgeable and mysterious.

Have I told you guys that I love Dr. Fate? Because I do. I'm not sure what I really like about him, and I'm pretty sure a good chunk of it is due to his pretty swanky helmet and design, but I really like Doctor Fate.

Meanwhile, all the talk of Doctor Fate and Aquaman going all 'this is the only way' and all the heavy talks about sacrifice and the coming of dread Cthulhu is juxtaposed with Solomon Grundy on a good day. He's just this simple creature, loving the gold reward that Aquaman gave him, eating cookies offered by Inza and being unsure about how polite he should be, and making a child-like "girl gave Grundy cookies!" in a very defensive tone when Dr. Fate shows up.

Dr. Fate then shares to us Solomon Grundy's backstory. DC fans know this, but it's nice to see it rendered in a suitably old-timey manner, showing how the old gangster Cyrus Gold grew too powerful and was killed by his rivals. And apparently you can show someone riddled with bullets graphically if it's in shadow. That bit was a surprising moment of brutality that I didn't expect was allowed in the 90's cartoons considering how many cartoons aren't even allowed to show guns. Cyrus Gold is dumped in a mystical swamp after a spell was cast on his corpse, and thus was born Solomon Grundy, soulless zombie.

And Grundy? Grundy realizes that, yeah, he wants his soul. Fate and Aquaman needs a soulless vessel as a sacrifice to stop Icthultu's coming, and since Fate probably knows Grundy will be revived later on, promises Grundy that he'll help Grundy find his soul. Or maybe it's a John Constantine-style lie to sacrifice a single person to seal a greater evil?

Whatever the case, as this is all going on the Old Gods' minions start to bleed out into the world, and the League finds out about Aquaman kidnapping Solomon Grundy from the military soldiers, about these magic aquatic beasts (which isn't as horrifying as I would expect from a Cthulhu homage, but this is a Saturday Morning cartoon), and put two and two together. The three end up in the Tower of Fate, seeing Doctor Fate making a ritual going SO FATE DEMANDS! SO FATE DEMANDS! with Grundy screaming, and assuming the worst, the three immediately attack without knowing the full story. Which, actually, is a bit realistic especially with Aquaman being a prissy high-and-mighty kingly douche.

We get a pretty cool one-on-one fights as Fate transports everyone to different planes. Superman fighting Grundy is a bit boring, honestly, just a bit of a punchy punch that ends up with Superman piledrivering down Solomon Grundy from the sky. Aquaman and Wonder Woman is the highlight, definitely, showing Aquaman's being dismissive of Diana ending up to being something that's a bit of a mutual respect thing, with some really cool moments with the harpoon and throwing around Easter Island statues. That was a very cool fight scenes. Hawkgirl faces the problem of magic with the same approach as anything: beat it with her mace! Of course, her mace is made up of Nth Metal, which klongs Doctor Fate in the head.

That last fight is interrupted when Icthultu himself appears and going all cthulhu fhtagn and shit, to which Aquaman tells us the story of Icthultu, how his attempt to invade Earth in ages past causes ancient Atlantean kings and mages to seal them off and later cause Atlantis to sink. Hawkgirl also identifies familiarity with Icthultu, noting that the big tentacly dude is, in fact, an ancient god that the Thanagarians used to worship. Hawkgirl throughout this episode has been the ultimate atheist and skeptic, calling out Wonder Woman's constant usage of "Hera give me strength" (which she actually only does like five times throughout the entire series) and basically pissing all over the idea of souls and gods and whatever. It's not as heavy-handed as some shows that tackle religion and atheism does, because, y'know, at the end of the day it's Cthulhu and Cthulhu is trying to rise from R'lyeh and invade the world and stuff.

There's a bit of a nice growth throughout Hawkgirl as she goes from being a skeptic to realizing that, yeah, religion does have a place in our lives, even if it's just something to comfort dying comrades and friends. And there's nothing wrong with being a staunch believer in your own beliefs as well, as Wonder Woman and Aquaman shows.

But anyway, back to the Cthulhu-demon-beast-punching plotline, the team bar Aquaman heads off to take the fight to Icthultu's own dimension, while Aquaman buggers off to protect Atlantis and hold the line with his army of Atlantean warships on the portal's gateway in our dimension.

Meanwhile, the focus of the episode shifts to Hawkgirl and Grundy developing a bit of a friendship as they help each other while tearing their way through armies of demonic minions. Ichtultu, the big octopus man himself, immediately recognizes the stench of Thanagar on Hawkgirl, but Hawkgirl gives no fucks, telling Ichtlutu that "I have a gesture for you, but my hands are tied." Ichtultu is displeased that the Thanagarians have not worshipped him anymore, when his version of worship apparently involved sacrifices and enslavement.

Meanwhile, Solomon Grundy, enraged by the 'you took our souls' comment during the Hawkgirl/Ichtlutu confrontation, as well as the fact that he's befriended Hawkgirl, flies into a rage, jumping straight into Icthultu's head and start ripping apart the dude's nervous system. Apparently old gods have nervous systems, who knew? And Grundy himself being powered by magic kind of puts him in a position that probably gave him a bit more advantage against Icthlutu. The fact that the other big guns -- Superman, Wonder Woman and Doctor Fate -- are preoccupied with Ichtultu's horde of horrors probably helps, too.

But Grundy didn't last that long as one of Ichtultu's antibodies delivers a fatal wound. As he lies dying, Hawkgirl tries to comfort him. Grundy gives this childish line "Grundy can't move. Bird-nose get Grundy's soul for him?" Hawkgirl charges in with a vengeance of an angry space viking, charging Ichtlutu with the only way she deals with problems... hit it really hard with her mace. Icthultu's brain dies, killing the dread old god, while the other heroes use the conveniently floating asteroids to block the portal to prevent any more of the horde from coming into Atlantis.

But while taking down Ichtultu and the faceless horde might be more procedural than anything, the short moment of Hawkgirl comforting the dying Grundy is amazingly tearjerking, especially as you're liable to not really care that much for Solomon Grundy prior to this episode. "Is Grundy's soul waiting for him?" Grundy asks as he lies dying, sounding like a child. Hawkgirl is very prepared to instinctively reply with the atheist answer: "Grundy, I don't believe-" before cutting herself off and going "Yes, it's waiting for you." Did she believe it? Did she say it to comfort a dying friend? Whatever the case, Grundy smiles and goes "then Grundy gets his reward." before dying. Death is very effective when handled like this, and I think this was easily the most on-screen a heroic character has died so far throughout this series. The heroes hold a short funeral for Solomon Grundy, and Hawkgirl still doesn't understand why the zombie was happy... but Aquaman closes out the episode with the amazing line "It's called faith, Hawkgirl. You are not supposed to understand it. You just have it." as we zoom into Solomon Grundy's tombstone.

Pretty awesome episode all around. Shame Ichtultu is kind of a shit villain, but he is a Cthulhu stand-in, so he more than makes up for it.


DC Easter Eggs Corner:

• Dr. Fate and his wife Inza have appeared before in the DCAU during Superman: The Animated Series, and Superman makes a short reference to his prior meeting with Dr. Fate. I'm a bit tired today so I won't really talk that much about Dr. Fate's origin story. Maybe if I'm bothered I'll come back to this review and edit it in, or maybe I'll talk about it when Fate shows up in another episode. I dunno.
• Solomon Grundy's origin story is basically lifted wholesale from the comics, minus the 'constantly regenerating whenever he's killed' bit, which, considering that Solomon Grundy apparently has never been killed before in this continuity, kind of makes sense. Grundy has spent some time as a somewhat-controlled confused ally of superheroes in several of his incarnations.
• Icthultu is obviously a bastardization of Cthulhu and the Old Ones from the Cthulhu Mythos, as a race of incomprehensible superpowerful godlike aliens that live outside of our reality and want to return to conquer it. Atlantis's sinking in the DCAU continuity is stated to be an attempt to protect themselves from Icthultu.
• Hawkgirl's real name is revealed to be Shayera Hol in this episode, the real name of the original Silver Age Hawkwoman, the version that this Hawkgirl is most based on.
• Hawkgirl's mace is made up of Nth Metal, like that of the original Hawkman and Hawkwoman, which allows her to bypass magic. While Hawkgirl's mace has been consistently shown to be able to whack anyone and anything short of a forcefield, this is the first time that it's been explained. Take note of this, Hawkgirl's Nth Metal mace is going to be quite important down the line.
• The team of Aquaman, Dr. Fate and Solomon Grundy are selected to mimic Marvel Comics' Defenders team, comprised of Namor, Dr. Strange and Hulk respectively. Other Marvel Comics references include Hawkgirl's line "Hawkgirl smash", a nod to Hulk's "Hulk smash" catchphrase. Solomon Grundy's nicknames "Birdnose", "Stupid Magician" and "Fishman", directed to Hawkgirl, Dr. Fate and Aquaman respectively, are the insults that Hulk uses to Nighthawk, Dr. Strange and Namor respectively.
• Aquaman quotes the Terminator's famous line "if you want to live, come with me!" when recruiting Solomon Grundy.