Gotham S03E13 Review: Return of the Joker

Gotham, Season 3, Episode 13: Smile Like You Mean It

I have to admit that the initial teaser pictures for this episode soured me so much from watching it, mostly it features the "cut off my own face and then wear it like a mask" version of the Joker from New 52, which, while I try to not let myself be a raging purist when it comes to reinvention of characters... it's something that absolutely sickens me. Yes, the Joker is a psychopath, but he always has this absolutely great balance between being a sick psychopath and being entertainingly funny. Poison an entire city? That's just an evil thing to do. Poison an entire city to blackmail the mayor to give him trademark for laughing fish? That's funny. In the words of Jerome himself, New 52 Ultra-Psycho Joker just 'has no class'. He's turned into your run-of-the-mill psychotic killer that doesn't have the same hilarious charisma as what the Joker should be.

But Gotham, against all odds, actually made the cut-off-face thing come off as an unsettling thing, combine it with this spiritual adaptation of Batman Beyond's Jokerz gang, and still bring Jerome back. While watching this episode I totally bought the idea that Jerome wasn't coming back, and that we're going to have Dwight wear Jerome's face as one in a presumably rotating lineup of Jokers. It was actually a nice bit of subversion when the mad scientist set-up, despite the foreshadowing from last episode, didn't manage to bring Jerome back. But bring him back he did. 

Don't get me wrong, Dwight was absolutely entertaining, played by a pretty awesome actor who tries his best to rouse the army of Joker fanatics, but as both Jim Gordon and Jerome himself points out, all Dwight is doing is aping what Jerome did in the past, only managing to get along because the Jerome fanatics all bought in "we are all Jerome" spiel. Jerome himself comes back in the second act, and absolutely returns to form even without a face, channeling that glorious Mark Hamill/Heath Ledger Joker hybrid interpretation, with that conversation with Leslie being the highlight of the episode. Jerome absolutely steals the show from Dwight (quite literally), kidnapping him, blowing him and the power plant up on television, with a far more effective message than Dwight's longer one earlier in the episode -- in the darkness, unleash who you really are. And Jerome makes good on his promise by actually blowing up the power plant and plunging the city of Gotham into darkness. That was a wonderful bit of villainy. 

The slicing-off-the-face thing actually felt well-integrated in this, too, being a crazy act that a desperate wannabe like Dwight would do when he realized that after gathering so many Jerome fanatics, he couldn't deliver in time... and it serves to give Jerome that New 52 look without making the Joker-in-all-but-name feel crass. The Joker Cult is also handled really well, and showing that the cult has so many psychopaths hiding in society -- the guard in the beginning, officer Dove in GCPD -- pretending to be normal until they are confronted and they reveal their true starking mad nature.

The rest of the storylines here are pretty weak, so much that I get pissed off any time we cut away from the Jerome/Dwight plot. Jim and Leslie have this argument about how Leslie doesn't want to be bound and protected by Gordon any longer, which is just annoyingly repetitive. The Bruce and Selina plotline is also weak because Maria Kyle turned out to be nothing but a scam artist working with DoucheDude to scam some money from Bruce, and he knows it but goes along with the hopes that Selina will reconnect with her mother anyway. It's actually not super-bad, it just doesn't quite hit with the same emotional impact considering Selina's mother literally came out of nowhere. Oswald's disgraced in public, and while we get a nice return to the mafia genre with Barbara, Tabitha and Nygma pulling all sorts of strings to get various colourfully-named members of Penguin's organization dead should be fun, but really felt mechanical and nowhere as interesting as literally everything else that's happening in this episode. Hopefully Jerome's blackout will throw a huge monkey wrench in, well, all these bland plotlines to inject some fun into them. 

Overall, a very, very good police-vs-Jerome episode, but it falls short in all other aspects.

DC Easter Eggs Corner:

• I think I covered a lot of the Joker stuff in the review proper, didn't I?
• Speaking of the Joker, while no one refers to either Jerome or Dwight as the Joker, the beginning scene has people playing cards with one of them noting "Joker's wild", and the scene after the Jerome-cult guard stabs the other guard shows the blood splattering on the iconic Joker card featured in various live-action adaptations that feature the Joker.
• Dwight's actor is David Dastmalchian, and he played another psychotic Joker henchman in 2008's The Dark Knight.
• Riddler claims to be held in Kane Chemicals. Kane can refer to two things -- Bob Kane, real-life creator of Batman; or the Kane family, a member of which is Katherine Kane, a.k.a. Batwoman.
• Bullock's comment about how the graffiti has been here the whole time and they haven't noticing is actually accurate -- since season two, HA HA HA and smiley-face graffiti has been in the background of many scenes set in the streets. 

Journey to Un'Goro: A Hearthstone Expansion!

Before you read anything I write here, watch this! It's the announcement video, but instead of just a single trailer, we have the developers and their flannel shirts introducing the general themes and some new mechanics.

So, the new expansion is... JOURNEY TO UN'GORO! And it's not just dinosaurs, though dinosaurs certainly do make up the most exciting and coolest portions of the trailer. We've got Elementals! We've got explorers! We've got giant mountain-sized carnivorous plants! We've got cavemen-Murlocs! We've got Silithids! And dinosaurs! And elemental dinosaurs!

So the trailer opens with our old friend Elise Starseeker talking about this mysterious land of Un'Goro, later revealed to simply be talking to this little junior League of Explorers group. She does establish that Un'Goro is super dangerous, showing off some of the more carnivorous members of the Un'Goro wildlife, the trailer makes some emphasis to primordial wonder, with focus on elementals and on dinosaurs activating elemental powers. And it appears that elementals are going to make a huge, huge portion of the expansion. Also, the whole 'discovery' theme of Elise and her little groupies looking for treasure is related in the new quest cards.

(Alas, that poor Murloc turned into dust by plants...)

So, where to begin? Let's begin with the long-overdue addition of a new tribe to the Hearthstone card pool... not dinosaurs, as everyone was expecting, but Elementals! And, yes, the developers explicitly say that older Elemental cards will be given the Elemental tag, the way Dragon and Mech were added to older cards with their respective expansions. While we haven't seen any real Elemental-synergy cards, you can bet there's going to be some. Maybe not to the extent that Pirates or Mechs have because a lot of the older Elemental cards are already powerful on their own but it's going to be exciting nonetheless. Cards confirmed to be retconned into Elementals are both Ragnaroses, Al'Akir, Neptulon, Anomalus, Magma Rager, Baron Geddon, Fire Rager, Unbound Elemental, Fireguard Destroyer, Earth Elemental, Ice Rager and Rumbling Elemental, but I'm pretty sure other elemental cards (Fire Elemental, Water Elemental, Dust Devil, Frost Elemental, maybe Hallazeal and Am'Gam Rager) will be retconned too, the video just didn't want to run too long.


The addition of Elemental tags might be the reason that pushes Ragnaros out of Classic and into Hall of Fame, actually, allowing them to do cool things with the tag without having Ragnaros being this looming shadow breathing down their necks. In addition to the whole 'design space' thing, too, of course. One such new Elemental is Pyros, the Mage Legendary... who actually is pretty standard as far as Legendaries go. It's not super-broken, it's a 2-mana 2/2 that returns to your hand as a 6-mana 6/6 and finally as a 10-mana 10/10. The concept is absolutely cool, but I think it's not a super-good card in constructed without seeing any of the other Elemental synergy cards.

But we've got yet another brand-new portion of the game, which is a new keyword: Adapt.

See, dinosaurs aren't getting their own tribe separate from Beasts, because that would, I think, cripple Hunter too much by removing a chunk of their beasts (well, King Krush only, really) and turning them into a brand-new tribe with no synergy with Beasts and it'd be weird to have things like Mark of the Wild or Houndmaster buff other animals, but not dinosaurs considering they're, y'know, tameable beasts in World of Warcraft. So they're still beasts...

[Bit of an intermezzo -- shortly after I posted this thing, Blizzard went and clarified some things. Because I'm too lazy to whip up another brand-new post, I'll edit what I'm talking about down here.]

But they get a new tribe-exclusive keyword, which is Adapt. Adapt's going to let you discover an effect to add to your dinosaurs, which is shown in-universe as the dinosaurs being mutated by all the raw elemental energy in Un'Goro and basically transforming into Pokemon as the trailer shows off this fire triceratops and this lightning ankylosaur battling. The first dinosaur card we see, the Verdant Longneck, is a 5-mana 5/4 beast (yet another support for the still-not-there-yet Beast Druid), which is one mana too much for its stats... but its Adapt ability allows you to discover and choose one effect from six ten (+3 Attack, Deathrattle summon two 1/1's, Fairy Dragon's spell-proof ability, Divine Shield, Windfury, Taunt, +1/+1, +3 Health, Stealth and Poisonous). Charge and Stealth aren't there because, well, we've seen how troublesome they are to balance. Obviously depending on the statline things are going to be different. Like the Longneck wouldn't be super-good with Taunt, but maybe sometimes you really do need that ability. And the dinosaurs being beasts, and having the attack be part of battlecry, means a lot of synergy abuse options with things like Houndmaster and Brann. Oh wait Brann's leaving standard. Whoops.

In any case, for the Verdant Longneck, which is a pretty simple minion, let's go through what the ten various effects will end up giving you.

• +3 Attack: You get an 8/4 beast for 5 mana, basically a better version of Salty Dog. Salty Dog doesn't see play, but with possible beast synergies it's... not the best thing you can get, but not the worst thing either.
• Deathrattle: Summon two 1/1's: It's always a default 'good' answer when you don't have anything better to do, I suppose. Both the Haunted Creeper and the Infested Wolf, which have identical or similar effects, have a -1/-1 dock from what's considered a good standard vanilla card for their cost, so it's fair.
• Spell proof: A more fragile but attack-oriented version of Spectral Knight, not the best thing either but not the worst.
• Divine Shield: A bigger, badder Silvermooon Guardian. It's actually not the worst thing you can get either, because at least you'll trade economically.
• Windfury: Possibly only useful if you have like a Druid of the Claw up, leaving the Longneck a setup for possible Savage Roar shenanigans. Windfury tends to be kinda shit, but the fact that you have two other choices means that it's a lot more flexible than, say, Grook Fu Master.
• +1/+1: A 5-mana 6/5 is a reverse Pit Fighter, which means it's probably not good enough for constructed, but not the worst thing out there.
• +3 Health: A free Power Word Shield, making the Longneck a 5/7 for 5 mana, which is a lot better than a 6/5 or a 8/4. You're almost a Boulderfist Ogre at this point, with the added caveat of being a beast.
• Stealth: Shit, you just turned yourself into a slightly-weaker Stranglethorn Tiger. The Tiger is actually one of the better finishers in Beast Druid, able to be copied by Menagerie Warden (which would work well if you get a Windfury or Stealth version of the Longneck, actually) so this is good.
• Poisonous: Oh, right, the Emperor Cobra effect has just got transformed into a brand-new keyword, 'Poisonous'. Right now there are only four cards with that effect, two of which are in Wild and never see play, but it's nice that they're seemingly going to introduce more key words. A 5/4 with the poison effect is good but not the most exciting thing...

But it's going to be absolutely awesome with this other card, revealed shortly after my first posting of this post. The Gentle Megasaur is a 4-mana 5/4 Beast, and a normal epic card. Right away from the get-go, the Megasaur already has a far more favourable statline than the Longneck, not getting any stat penalties. The tradeoff is that she doesn't buff herself... but she adapts your Murlocs. Which means combined with things like Call in the Finishers (which works wonders in a deck with Everyfin is Awesome, by the way) allows you to add insane buffs. A +3 Attack is basically a permanent Bloodlust, giving them all Poisonous basically wins you the board, +1/+1 permanently adds to the Everyfin/Warleader buffs going around, and if you already have an Everyfin-Warleader board set up, give them some Windfury to really seal the deal. I might be overhyping this simply because I'm on a huge Everyfin Murloc Shaman binge and absolutely climbing in the rankings, but shit, I really like this card. 

Also, while we're all distracted with the fancy Adapt keyword, the Verdant Longneck supports the Beast Druid archetype, while the Megasaur, in addition to being a good Murloc support card, also is asking to be played with the Menagerie cards from Karazhan, none of which saw any sort of play. 

It's a very exciting effect, but perhaps even more exciting are Quests. Something that I've seen in many, many fan-made concepts are Quests, which are continuous spell cards that you need to do a bunch of things throughout the game to activate. Here Quests finally get put into the game as Legendary Spells (another thing common in fanmade cards) and we get to see the Priest's quest: Awaken the Makers.

See, I'm not sure if each class gets a Legendary Minion and a Quest, or if Mages just get Pyrus while Priests get Awaken the Makers but hey It's confirmed that both class get a Legendary Minion and a Legendary Quest, but the total amount of Legendaries in the expansion is the same -- the neutrals are decreased. Here are some points:

• So basically, they are one-mana spells you always get in your opening hand. You can mulligan them, though, if you really need to. A bit important, because while it's not super relevant to the slower priests, it's probably going to be relevant to the other classes.
• The end up like Secrets on your side of the board, but your opponent can see them.
• For the Priests, you must summon 7 Deathrattle minions, and then you get the legendary minion Amara, Warden of Hope, as the quest reward.

Awaken the Makers itself seems very convoluted, and you'll probably not get 7 Deathrattle minions until late in the game. But when you do, Amara makes good her status as a Titanforged being far, far better than Reno Jackson. She's a 5-mana 8/8 Taunt, which itself is already an insane amount of stats, but she not only restores your health fully, she even gives 5 bonus maximum health to boot! Yeah, Priest isn't going nowhere. On paper Amara does seem a bit too slow for my liking, especially in the current meta, but holy shit if she isn't a very attractive card that really makes you want to play her. 

In addition to the Quest mechanic, the whole fully restore and increase your life pool total are definitely very welcome additions to the game. Hell, the continuous effect itself is something I'm very much cheering for. We'll see what the other classes get. Seven Deathrattle might seem a lot, but a dedicated N'Zoth Deathrattle deck might honestly manage it by like turn eight or nine, because it's Summon so things like Resurrect or N'Zoth himself works.

Hope that the nerfs to aggro cards at least makes the meta slow down somewhat so these cool Quests and value minions can survive a little and not die by turn five or six to aggro pirates, eh? 

Also, in addition to that, we can see the artwork for some upcoming card both in the brief montage at the beginning of the trailer, as well as some full art in the Battlenet site. Lots of dinosaur-esque humanoids, lots of Elementals, lots of dinosaurs at least a giant carnivorous plant and a caveman Murloc.... and maybe we can get a new Elise card? Man, I'm definitely hyped. It definitely knocked Gadgetzan out of the park by the sheer amount of new things it introduced.

So yeah, Questing! Adapt! Elemental tribe! Hype!

Seems like a shame that we end off this post with the Volcano card, which is supposed to represent the Volcano in the center of Un'Goro crater... and it's a very underwhelming card. It's 5-mana, deal 15 damage spread randomly on all minions. The Warlocks' Spreading Darkness is never played, but the specificity on minions means that you can guarantee a board clear if you really need it to be without risking of dropping everything on your own face. Volcano's 5-mana deal 15, which is great value, but while the 2 Overload might seem cheap now, in a world where we don't have Tunnel Trogg or Lava Burst I'm not sure how well the Overload mechanic will stand with only Unbound Elemental hanging around to synergize with it, and even the Unbound Elemental's going to be easily consumed by the Volcano. I'll say that it's a nice replacement for Elemental Destruction for Shamans, though, as the big 'fuck everything on the board' spell.

Also, shortly after this announcement, the nerf hammer came down on Small-Time Buccaneer and Spirit Claws. A couple of changes, like the Standard Arena, went live -- from the sample size of one Arena draft, I can confirm that class cards and rare/epic/legendaries do show up a fair bit more often... though of course I get offered crappy ones like Goya and Noggenfogger. Also, the Poisonous keyword got added, replacing the previously wordy effect on Emperor Cobra, you can pre-order Un'Goro cards, and some text and bugs got fixed.

So yeah. Very, very exciting expansion, which really feels to be super-different. Really digging the more kiddie art-style, very much digging the Quest and Adapt mechanics, and adding new tribes? Yes please.

Supergirl S02E13 Review: Kltpzyxm-ing it Like the Golden Age

Supergirl, Season 2, Episode 13: Mr and Mrs Mxyzptlk

Where Flash fought Gorilla Grodd and King Solovar in Gorilla City this week, Supergirl and Mon-El had to deal with the most famous fifth-dimensional reality-warping imp, Mr. Mxyzptlk. See, whether you want to know if someone is a real DC fan or not, you tell them to spell Mxyzptlk. If, like me, they spend way too much time reading comics as a kid, Mxyzptlk comes off the tongue (or the fingers typing on the keyboard) smoothly. 

The sheer hilarity of what's going on, with Mxyzptlk reimagined as a tall, handsome charming man who just wants to straight-up marry Kara, leading to the most bizarre romantic comedy where Mxyzptlk and Mon-El fight over Kara's affections. It was pretty one-sided, of course, with Kara really liking Mon-El, Mxyzptlk literally being an irritating dude that shows up out of nowhere, and of course we get a random conflict about how Mon-El's aggressive jealous defense of Kara's honour causes Kara to be angry. 

Yes, it has all the bearings of a classic Mxyzptlk story from the more light hearted comics. Put him into an unwinnable situation, and have him spell out his name -- in this case, Kara makes use of a loophole Mxyzptlk notes briefly at the beginning of the episode (he can't make her kill herself) by engineering the Fortress of Solitude into exploding with her in it, and if Mxyzptlk wants to shut down the reactor, he has to spell a password... which, of course, is Kltpzyxm. It's a pretty simple solution, but it's still fun with Mxyzptlk's insane power set that gives us a lot of flair. From resurrecting Parasite so he can come on down with a fake Superman costume, to dropping Mon-El in his underwear in the DEO base, to challenging Mon-El to a duel with guns on a stage, to reanimating Jor-El's statue in the Fortress, to putting Kara in a wedding dress, Mxyzptlk is absolutely entertaining. 

I'm not quite sure where they're going with Kara and Mon-El, other than to give them some rom-com subplot. Again, something that's beating a dead horse at this point, only the charisma that Kara and Mon-El have together really allows this subplot to proceed on its course without being grating. I'm a bit confused why Kara would be so angry for Mon-El being a bit of a pushy boyfriend that speaks his mind when in this episode her advice to Alex is to, um, be a pushy girlfriend that speaks her mind. But circumstances differ, of course -- Mon-El wants to straight-up murder Mxyzptlk, and keeps getting into situations where only Mxyzptlk's playfulness prevents him from getting killed by the imp.

Alex and Maggie's subplot would be absolutely trite and irritating in a different episode, but here, with the romantic theme between Kara/Mon-El/Mxyzptlk nonsense, it actually sort of fits? I literally don't care about this, though. Like, you're a secret agent and a badass policeman, stop spending every fucking episode repeating the same old 'we disagree, then we make up' subplot. 

There's also another subplot featuring Winn banging a random lady alien, Lyra, who literally comes out of nowhere. That was totally weird and random. I don't think Lyra's based on any particular character in the comics, but Starhaven is definitely a setup for more Legion-inspired alien goodness. 

So yeah, it's a huge comedic episode filled with Valentine's day festivities, and it actually kind of worked, which surprised me. A good chunk of it is thanks to the Supergirl-Mxyzptlk-Mon-El three-way being so gosh-darned hilarious, of course, but the B-plots, despite being weak, doesn't break the episode either. 

DC Easter Eggs Corner:

• Mr Mxyzptlk is usually portrayed as a orange or purple-shirted little imp with a bowler hat, with or without a cigar depending on the media. He hails from the Fifth Dimension, and has reality warping powers far, far more powerful in the comics than the relatively simple magics he wields here. Sending him back also involves tricking him into saying "Kltpzysm", his name backwards, although the reverse-name spell only lasts for like forty-two days or something. He's a lot less romantic in the comics too.
• Parasite's return is actually a nice reference to how writers like to use Fifth-Dimensional Imps, especially Mr. Mxyzptlk, to bring back dead characters as part of their game, and when they return they forgot to 'undo' the resurrection. 
• Zook, briefly mentioned by J'onn as being a Fifth Dimensional Imp that wreaked havoc on Mars, is actually J'onn's sidekick in the Golden Age. While his status as a Fifth-Dimensional Imp as powerful as Mxyzptlk, Bat-Mite or Yz is disputed, he is still an extra-dimensional being with limited reality warping powers.
• Starhaven is home of the Legion of Super-Heroes characters Dawnstar and her ancestor Wildstar, and Starhaven's inhabited with humanoids with large angelic wings. Neither Dawnstar not Wildstar have a proper given name, so maybe "Lyra" is supposed to be one of them? 
• In the comics, genies are straight-up fifth-dimensional imps.
• We get a "It's a bird! It's a plane! It's Superman!" from the crowd when Mxyzptlk-man shows up to wonk the fake Parasite. 
• Mxy kind of mentions the X-Men movies, albeit not by name, when he uses his magics to pull a bunch of criminals' guns, lift it up over their heads and start doing the mid-air dramatic gun cock, a sequence of action that's the signature of Magneto ever since the first X-Men movie. 

Justice League Unlimited S02E03 Review: Death of Superman

Justice League Unlimited, Season 2, Episode 3: The Doomsday Sanction

We're back with the Cadmus storyline, and we're back with more focus on the original founding members of the Justice League, giving the Superman/Batman team some additional emphasis. By virtue of both of them having long-running shows of their own, and Superman plotlines being some of the more eventful ones during the run of Justice League (their clashes with Luthor, Darkseid and Brainiac in particular), it's a fitting storymaking to have the overreaching Cadmus plotline have ties to Superman's own storyline.

Shit, where to even begin with this episode? Let's talk about Doomsday-vs-Superman later and start with the conflict between Batman and Amanda Waller, which is a very excellent choice for the showmakers. The Dark Knight needs a worthy opponent to challenge, and Waller is a breed of enemy that Batman hasn't exactly faced before in the DCAU, discounting Lex Luthor -- basically, Batman himself. Waller's similarities with Batman is highlighted several times. Sure, they approach things differently, with Batman donning a costume and beating up criminals, while Waller gathers a group of like-minded individuals and schemes in the background, but they're both paranoid, they're both open to negotiating with what they view as the 'lesser evil', and most importantly, as much as Amanda Waller brushes off civilians as acceptable casualties, they're both here to protect humanity. Batman was also the catalyst that formed the League's initial inception when he realizes there are threats too large for one rich man in a bat costume, which is essentially the stance that Amanda Waller is taking.

Amanda Waller is perhaps properly paranoid that these superheroes, beings with immense resources and powers, might turn on the people they protect. Whether by design or by accident, it's definitely plausible in-universe for her to think that way. After all, in-universe, we've got Superman himself being mind-controlled at the climax of Superman: TAS, we've got Hawkgirl revealing herself to be the harbinger of a full-on alien invasion during the final episode of Justice League, and other heroes like Metamorpho or Aquaman had proven to be antagonistic before, whether they mean to or not. And considering mind control is a very real thing in this universe, some of Waller's paranoia is well-founded.

And that's what makes Waller so scary and untouchable as a villain. Unlike Lex Luthor or TNBA's rendition of the Penguin, who are just villains with good publicity and a way to weasel out of actually being imprisoned, Amanda Waller fits more in the anti-hero category. Yes, she's extreme about it, but nothing she does is actually illegal.

Of course, Batman himself isn't a force to be underestimated. After their last meeting ending with Waller taunting Batman about the knowledge of his secret identity and presumably those of many others, it's time for Batman to show how scary he can be. This episode's first scene is an oddity in Justice League Unlimited, whose shorter running time tends to jump straight into the superheroing business. Here we start off with Amanda Waller's domestic life, showing her morning routine, just like any normal person, until it gets interrupted by Batman handing her a towel. Batman's appearance just shatters Waller's peaceful morning, showing that, yes, Batman can get to her any time he wants to, at moments when she's at her most vulnerable. Instead of a towel, Batman could've had a weapon in his hands. It's a very powerful scene, where these two master strategists and leader figures of their respective factions show up to simply talk.

We get the revelation that Project Cadmus was set up in response to the Justice Lords crisis in case the League ever went bad (though Doomsday rampaging before the Justice Lords even arrived kind of puts some holes in that), noting that they are the only line of defense against the metahumans should they go bad. Batman warns Waller against attacking his League, a threat that Waller accepts without missing a beat. It's very powerful storytelling in showing how nonchalant Waller is in the face of someone like Batman, yet the next scene, when she's alone, shows that her hand is shaking. It's credit to Amanda Waller as a character, who dares to stand up to what she believes is right even though she's shaking inside.

We get to see the rest of Project Cadmus, and it's revealed that there's a relatively significant amount of older faces among the group. We've got Amanda Waller herself, and Professor Emil Hamilton, Superman's treacherous friend... but we get the revelation that Wade Eiling, previously appearing as just an angry military general in the episode 'Dark Heart', as a member of Cadmus (which explains why he was so vehemently against the League's participation there) and Batman villains Hugo Strange and doctor Milo, the former explaining where Waller got Batman's secret identity from. Oh, and this mysterious white-eyed lady we've never seen before. Pay attention to her, she'll be important in future episodes.

There's a very cool transition where in the Watchtower, Batman gathers the seven heads of the Justice League, which transitions into Amanda Waller gathering her own generals on a meeting. Quite hilariously, when Batman reveals that he's got the Question investigating Cadmus (yay Question!), the rest of the founding members groan in unison.

Obviously, the titular Doomsday becomes the central antagonist for a huge chunk of the episode, with the recton-slash-reveal that Doomsday's randomly-out-of-nowhere appearance back in Justice League was actually him escaping from a Cadmus facility. It's the kind of 'tying all things together' retcon that feels like it actually makes sense, and we get our the DCAU's own take on Doomsday. Doomsday is basically Bizarro done right, a clone of Superman, but instead of being imperfect and speaking in reverse, Doomsday is engineered to be stronger and more powerful, with spikes all over. Instead of being naive and generally confused like Bizarro, Doomsday is programmed to hate Superman and wanting to destroy him.

It's a very well done alternate origin story for Doomsday, certainly far simpler than the "Kryptonian alpha predator modified by aliens to continually regenerate and overcome the thing that killed him" origin story that they gave him in the comics. Doomsday's earlier appearance in Justice League, as hilarious as it is to have him lobotomized by Justice Lord Superman, is a bit of a disservice to the iconic supervillain (as much as I personally dislike Doomsday) and this time around we get a bit of a do-over with him. We've done the "Superman dies" plotline before, though, so instead of retreading past grounds, Doomsday is instead used to develop the ongoing Cadmus Project.

Within the present-day Cadmus, there is significant discontent with doctor Milo, whose work in splicing animals ends up producing no results. It's a bit of Waller's fault to hire such a shitty scientist as doctor Milo, who is the asshat responsible for some of Batman: TAS's worst episodes. Waller fires Milo, and in his bitterness, Milo sneaks into Doomsday's prison and tells the monster, who has recovered his intellect, about the fact that it was Cadmus that tormented him and filled him with hate against Superman, trying to goad Doomsday into destroying Waller and the others. There's an absolutely great and surprisingly dark bit where Milo briefly hallucinates taking out a gun and murdering everyone on the roundtable in cold blood.

Milo frees Doomsday, only to be rewarded with a pretty graphic death as Doomsday grabs his face and the scene cuts away -- but not before we get a pretty definite CRICK. Doomsday heads off to do battle with Superman... who's off helping the League evacuate the residents of a tropical island threatened with a volcanic eruption. 

All of the scenes that I have just described takes place within the episode's act one, and the rest of the episode focuses more on the big brawl between Superman and Doomsday. With the rest of the League occupied with the evacuation (and honestly none of them bar maybe Wonder Woman standing a chance against Doomsday), Waller goes ballistic in Cadmus's base, which General Eiling takes as an invitation to launch a kryptonite nuclear missile at the island they're fighting on, and damn the consequences. Eiling notes how efficient this would be, getting rid of three problems at once: Doomsday, Superman, and a hub for drug trafficking. 

As Batman rushes in with recklessly driving a Javelin down towards San Baquero, he calls Amanda Waller (on the White House's hotline, no less!) and calls her bluff, noting that Waller had no idea that Eiling is acting behind her back. Amanda Waller is a harsh woman, but she's not completely evil and is absolutely furious at Eiling -- but there's nothing either of them can do to stop the nuclear missile. Instead, Waller's hopes of stopping a disaster borne of a weapon she designed ends up resting on Batman, the superhero she's threatened before. (Apparently, according to J'onn, Captain Atom and any other superhero suitable for the mission are just too far away to arrive in time)

Batman, of course, manages to use the Javelin to redirect the missile before ejecting himself off the Javelin, allowing the nuke to detonate safely away from the island. At the same time, Superman and Doomsday have a battle at the heart of the volcano, and kudos for the DCAU team for making intelligent!Doomsday a far more interesting villain than he is. Superman ultimately wins, though the show does a great job of portraying just how beaten the man of steel is, and he had to be rescued and bailed out by Wonder Woman.

In a way, similarly to how Eiling and Milo launched the nuke and unleashed Doomsday without Waller's supervision, this time it's Batman that has to deal with the rest of his people doing something morally questionable without his supervision. The founding members of the League, minus the wounded Batman, as well as minus Hawkgirl (though strangely she's in the opening meeting), vote to banish Doomsday into the Phantom Zone because there's no way to rehabilitate Doomsday.

Batman is recovering in the Watchtower's infirmary, wounded after the heroic crash and he calls out Superman because they passed down judgments like gods, and realizes that Amanda Waller has a point -- Cadmus is scared for a reason. Granted, Phantom Zoning Doomsday (the big fucker isn't even killed!) isn't quite on the same level of evil-ness as launching a nuclear bomb at an island full of civilians, and Doomsday is a threat they're not prepared to deal with, but the principle still stands. Batman calls Superman out, asking him what would humanity do should Superman actually go crazy like his Justice Lord counterpart. Superman tries to joke about the kryptonite piece that Batman carries around, and in one of the best and most emotional moments in the entire DCAU, he lashes out in a perfect combination of anger, disappointment and a bit of uncertainity. "You don't get to joke! Not today. I just took a bullet for you." 

It's an amazing moment for Batman. While the conversation does kind of show the amount of trust and respect Superman has for Batman -- noting that Batman would be the one to take him down should he go evil -- Batman acknowledging that Amanda Waller has a point, and really, the only thing that keeps him going is Superman going "Trust me. You know me.", a statement that Batman agrees in... the seeds of doubt is planted. Right now they might say that they wouldn't cross the line, but as Superman and Wonder Woman leaves Batman while he is shrouded in darkness, it seems that, well, Batman isn't completely convinced. Just like how Waller has seen some of the points in Batman's argument, it works the other way around, and the great part of this story is that neither of them are completely in the wrong.

What an amazing confrontation, really. And that's honestly not everything that's happening here. All throughout the episode, we've got hints here and there that Lex Luthor is running for president, which, of course, in the Justice Lords universe ends up leading to the chain of events that ended with Superman murdering Luthor in cold blood. Will events play out similarly? Is Amanda Waller right to be paranoid?

Justice League Roll Call:

• Speaking Roles: Batman, Flash, Wonder Woman, Martian Manhunter, Superman
• Non-Speaking Roles: Green Lantern, Hawkgirl, Hawk, Vixen, Fire, Ice, Vibe, Booster Gold, Black Canary, Obsidian, Hourman, Wildcat, Shining Knight
• Major Villains: Amanda Waller, Doomsday, Emil Hamilton, Tala, dr. Milo, General Wade Eiling
• Non-Speaking Villains: Lex Luthor, Hugo Strange

DC Easter Eggs Corner:

• A lot of callbacks to "A Better World", including references to Doomsday's arrival and conflict with the Justice Lords, the events that led to the creation of the Justice Lords in the alternate timeline, as well as Lex Luthor running for president. (Itself based on an arc in the Superman comics where Lex actually does become president). The Watchtower's giant space cannon is also referenced from the episode "Dark Heart", which was witnessed by General Eiling. Other Cadmus projects like the Ultimen and Galatea (who's mentioned by Hamilton to have fully recovered) are also mentioned.
• The Phantom Zone projector returns from Superman: The Animated Series, and Batman carrying Kryptonite around is a reference to their first meeting in Batman/Superman, as well as Batman using the Kryptonite to fight Amazo in "Tabula Rasa".
• Hugo Strange and Doctor Milo both return from Batman: The Animated Series, one of the few characters other than Batman himself to appear in Justice League Unlimited despite the 'bat-embargo' preventing the showrunners from using any major Batman-related characters. This is Hugo Strange's sole appearance in the series, and he doesn't get any lines. The producers note that Strange's appearance here is a set-up for future episodes, but they were unable to use Hugo Strange after this.
• Milo makes allusions to another scientist well-involved in splicing animals, presumably a reference to Kirk Langstrom, better known by his alter ego Man-Bat.
• Doomsday adapting to the thing that last killed him, in this case by growing spines on his forehead to block Superman's heat vision, is true of him in the comics as well, where every time Doomsday returns from the dead, he has evolved to counter whatever killed him last. 
• A bit of a little interesting thing to note is one of the original plans for the show was to have this episode be the turning point that would eventually lead to Batman splitting off from the League and form his own team of non-powered superheroes (like Huntress and Wildcat), all Civil-War/Injustice-style, and also presumably explaining Bruce being estranged from the Justice League in the future in Batman Beyond. This idea ended up being scrapped because the showrunners found it too difficult to tell that story without making Batman feel like a villain. How cool would that be, though?

Pokemon of the Week #13: Mandibuzz

Pokemon of the Week: Mandibuzz, the Bone Vulture Pokemon

Actually good in competitive.

So... Mandibuzz. Mandibuzz is not a Pokemon I'm very fond of, mostly due to its rather unattractive design. Oh, it's not quite as bad as, say, Jynx or Garbodor, and I didn't put Mandibuzz on my top ten least favourite generation five Pokemon list (Mandibuzz's pre-evolution Vullaby is a honourable mention, though) but it's not a Pokemon that I'm full with positive energy towards either.

Mandibuzz gets to actually look a lot better with the modern 3D models in Generation VI and VII where it shows her flying like a bird of prey, but how it looks in the original Black/White games and the anime really make it look like this very chunky bird with random human-looking elements like the bone topknot and the skull skirt and the eyelashes for no good reason. It just felt like they just took a cartoon vulture and just plopped a couple cavewoman fashion sensibilities into it and called it a day. And it's supposed to be a counterpart to Braviary, which, while not a design I particularly like either, at least looked powerful and cool. 

Vullaby and Mandibuzz are also exclusive to Black and Black 2, whereas Rufflet and Braviary are exclusive to White and White 2. They are very rare, only found in like a route or two and as a rare encounter at that, and absolutely no few trainers actually use the two lines, meaning that they're literally nonexistent in my playthrough of White/White 2 and what little I saw of them in like websites or mangas or anime only had me going "oh, these stupid cavewoman vultures". They were also close to nonexistent in XY or ORAS, and finally saw some relevance in Sun/Moon. It's Moon-exclusive, but at least it's used by the Elite Four member Kahili, as well as some trainers in the later part of the game, bringing her from this very obscure and iffy-looking bird from Generation V (where it's competing for attention with so many other Pokemon) to, well, I wouldn't say prominence, but at least it's a lot less obscure than it was before. 

Mandibuzz is also an entirely-female species, a counterpart to Braviary being all-male. Perhaps that's why they all died out? It's like how Tauros is all male and Miltank is all female, yet neither pairs can interbreed (contrast this to Nidoran family and the Volbeat/Illumise species, where the females of these pairs can produce either male or female versions of the pairing). No wonder they are close to being extinct. The recent Sun entries even lampshade this: "[Bone decorations are] supposedly an effort to attract males, but no male Mandibuzz has ever been found." Did all the male Mandibuzz get turned into bone skirts and diapers?

Mandibuzz's dex entries aren't exactly interesting. It basically behaves like a vulture, attacking weak prey and then uses their bones to make a nest, which explains the bone diaper that its stupid-looking pre-evolution has, and the stupid-looking bone-skirt that Mandibuzz herself has. Generation VII added the grisly detail that Mandibuzz's favourite food is Cubone, which I suppose makes sense -- Mandibuzz is a vulture, which preys on weakened animals... and Cubones are both children without parents to protect them, and they have extra bones on their person. But Cubones are cute little buggers! Why must Mandibuzz be such assholes? I guess that's why they're Dark-type.

Which brings us to its stats. Mandibuzz has a base stat total of 510, which isn't bad, being slightly weaker than starter final evolutions. And to become a proper counterpart to Braviary, it means that their stats are switched around. While Braviary is offensive, Mandibuzz has high Defense and Special Defense, and respectable HP. It's very balanced, ever so slightly having a higher physical side than a defensive one, and Dark/Flying isn't the worst typing out there. It's nothing new, with Honchkrow being a more offensive-oriented predecessor, and it's a decent enough defensive typing -- though granted Rock, Electric, Fairy and Ice are all relatively common offensive types.

It's movepool is relatively large, though limited to Dark and Flying types with a smattering of others... in other words, decently wide enough for competitive mucking but not very overpowered. It's got recovery in Roost, it can Defog, it can help set up weather effects (which was the THING in Generation V meta), it can cast Tailwind to buff its buddies, it can Taunt to shut down other stallers, and it can even bounce back with U-Turn. Foul Play allows it to get past its inferior Attack stats while still getting STAB, too. Mandibuzz is an absolutely irritating thing on the battlefield, a menace in the few Wi-Fi and Battle Tower battles I've met her in... it's just that its lack of stats and honestly any kind of offense beyond Foul Play makes her kind of eh.

Her abilities are not spectacular, but not damning either I guess. Overcoat prevents Sandstorm and Hail damage, which might be useful in Wi-Fi battles but not particularly. Big Pecks are eeeeh not the worst ability out there, but hardly relevant. Weak Armor is risky and the speed bonus isn't exactly why you want Mandibuzz in the first place, but I guess maybe you can make it work? I dunno, none of these three really appeal to me.  

I dunno. It's actually pretty good, if irritating, in competitive, the way Klefkis are good in competitive, but I'm not a big fan of it, honestly, design-wise or playstyle-wise. Ken Sugimori, one of the lead art directors in Pokemon, actually notes how Mandibuzz and Vullaby are a last-minute addition to the Generation V games, kind of shoved in and weren't even planned to be counterparts of Braviary... which might explain the relative lack of effort the two designs had.

Before I close it off, let me tell you guys that Mandibuzz's Japanese name is Vulgina. Yes, the origin might be from 'vulture' and 'regina' (queen in Latin), but come on, who's going to think of that instead of the obvious?

Eh, I dunno. I just can't really talk a lot about this thing. Just one of those Pokemon that I don't like is all. 

Fairy Tail 524 Reaction

This isn't so much of a review, because a review would require objectivity and effort. It's just that I really, really want to talk about this week's chapter of Fairy Tail. I'm not sure if I missed a chapter or two, nor did I particularly care -- some people told me to read this week's chapter because of how badass Acnologia is doing?

He, uh, shows up, scares the piss out of Erza and Wendy and stomps Eileen's face into a squishy pile of blood. HAHAHAHA! Fuck you, Eileen, no one respects you, piece of shit. Of course this probably means in a chapter or two Erza will get so angry that even without magical power and with only one bone unbroken in her body she'll be able to gather enough BURNING JUSTICE to slash Acnologia's head off because of the POWER OF LOVE AND FRIENDSHIP and BECAUSE SHE'S ERZA.

In other news, Acnologia continue to be mysterious and look cool and have everyone afraid of him. Just like how he was 200 chapters ago. So, yeah, in 200 chapters Acnologia never got past the 'mysterious powerful villain with a cool design' trope, and at this point I am absolutely bored of him. Do something already! He's still better as any of the other villains in this arc, but shit, that's like saying I'd rather eat mouldy bread than eat shit.

Natsu and Zeref has the most boring-ass fight in all of manga history. What the fuck? You two are magicians, and all you do is whack your fists at each other.

Also I don't understand Zeref's motivations, like, at all.

Natsu gives some boring-ass crap about "the power of me". It's probably supposed to look badass, and if we're going with a hero that's actually been through some effort to get their power -- Naruto, Ichigo, Eren, Toriko, Midoriya, Luffy, Gon, Gintama, Ed Elric.... literally every other shonen protagonist -- but it makes him feel like a sore loser protected by plot armour.

August proves himself to be quite pointless, rambling on and on about how Zeref is the only way. Fucking fight Gildarts already, you old Hades knockoff. Cana shouts about how "we don't care about justice, the precious time and blah blah blah whatever with friends is what's important to us", thereby sealing the deal on how utterly selfish and crappy the Fairy Tail mentality is. Like, jeez, Hiro Mashima, if you want to write Fairy Tail as a group of anarchistic psychopaths who only care about their own, y'know, you can write that. But I don't think they're supposed to be anarchistic psychopaths, I think they're supposed to be likable? Somehow? (Also Cana, why even bother? You're not part of the main six characters, whatever you do doesn't fucking matter in this manga)

This is really the part of the chapter that really entertained me and led me to finally make a post about Fairy Tail. It's really this mentality that, I think, makes the Fairy Tail cast as a whole so unlikable. They talk such a big game and bullshit about friendship and everything, but they clearly don't really give two shits about people outside their little group, relying on nothing but brute-forcing their way through all their problems, then crying about it afterwards because oh my god Lucy is sad. Everyone in their way that isn't won over by friendship (read: converted) ends up getting flat-out murdered. How the hell are these guys still our protagonists? Like, they don't quite go into wanton murder territory, which is their one saving grace, but the people living in Fairy-Tail world probably doesn't find it very nice. It's either the Alvarez Empire that wants to invade and kill everyone or whatever vague thing they're planning, or Acnologia who wants to kill everyone, or it's Fairy Tail, who causes as much damage in their insane rampages and clearly isn't fighting to protect the world, just their friends. So yeah.

Like, characters are human and there's a significant portion of humanity that's inherently selfish. I can accept that. Attack on Titan recently did a chapter about how all the events circle around Eren's group and they keep getting all the good stuff, but at least he's called out for being such an ass.

Then August, despite previously being portrayed as this very down-to-business, ultra-loyal Zeref majordomo, suddenly goes on a rant about how he wants to see Gildarts' reaction when his daughter is killed in front of him, because, shit, let's make all the villains as cartoonishly and stupidly evil as possible, without any variation between them -- except for the big-boobed women, whereby they have a Freudian excuse as to act as they do and be redeemed and everyone forgets about their crimes.

Yeah, this is nonsense.

Nanatsu no Taizai 208 Review: Big Angelic Beam

Nanatsu no Taizai, Chapter 208: Elizabeth v.s. Indura

All very exciting... but, again, my sentiments from the last three or four chapters remain. We know the conclusion to this story, so spending an entire chapter for Derriere and Monspiet transforming and rampaging, and then spending another chapter entirely for Elizabeth purifying them felt way too much of wasted space. I was wondering how Monspiet and Derriere managed to survive in the present day considering the talk about how the Indura transformation kills them, but eh, should've seen this coming. (I thought they were going to be sealed before they can die out)

But Elizabeth shows up, purifies the two of them as they mutate even further, but Reduciel is a dick that continues his 'exterminate all demons' creed. Meliodas flies up to block Reduciel's attack, and Reduciel mentions a 'him' which may be the fourth Archangel (I was wrong! Elizabeth wasn't the fourth archangel!) or the god equivalent. 

Bit odd that Tamriel and Sariel suddenly decide to help Elizabeth after a quick "who has the right to decide the worth of anyone?" speech, because honestly neither of them even have a shred of personality... but eh, only Reduciel's a dick I guess. The two of them help Elizabeth purify Derriere and Monspiet, turning the two of them back into regular demons... which is all well and good, but when are King and Diane going to see what they need to see? This flashback is interesting and all, but at the same time it needs to be paced a lot faster because we already know what's going to happen in the end, and this isn't some huge big mystery that needs to be solved and extrapolated so much. 

Justice League Unlimited S02E02 Review: FLASH SPEAKS

Justice League Unlimited, Season 2, Episode 2: The Ties That Bind

One of the most common complaints against Justice League Unlimited is the lack of focus given to the original seven characters, while still juggling a huge cast of brand-new superheroes, introducing them and making them all have their own distinctive characterization and all that. The previous episode even didn't feature any of the original seven founding members bar a brief cameo by J'onn at the end. While the various members of the original seven characters have all had their roles reduced to some degree, with only Martian Manhunter and Green Lantern really having an almost-constant presence due to the former being mission control and the latter just appearing pretty often compared to the others, none really had the brunt of reduced screentime as badly as the Flash.

You see, throughout the first season, Flash didn't even get a proper speaking role, only appearing as part of the group shot in the first episode, as well as briefly as part of the ground team that got one-shotted by Amazo in 'the Return'. Every other member of the original seven had major roles in an episode or other, but Flash didn't even get a single line of dialogue. It's a bit of an oddity that he's not given any role in the first season of Unlimited. Whether it's a problem with the voice actor, or simply the showmakers forgetting about one of their old main characters (Michael Rosebaum did voice Ghoul from the season finale, though, so it's unlikely to be that), Flash is back now.

There's a hilarious bit of meta-commentary where Flash complains that he's seeing a lot less action since the expansion of the team, and the little scene with Elongated Man (who's portrayed in this universe as a bit of a whiner) where Flash complains about the other members not seeing him as mature enough... while they play on a beat-em-sock-em-robots toy, is one of the most hilarious scenes ever. The show's great scripting, scene choreography and Michael Rosenbaum's great voice acting really sells Flash's own insecurity and his own immaturity very well.

The guest stars of this week are Mister Miracle and Big Barda as we tackle the Apokolips characters again. We quickly establish the quirkiness of these two characters, Mister Miracle being this very-colourfully-costumed new god that spends his time being an escape artist for a show. Their buddy Oberon gets kidnapped by Granny Goodness's agents, however, as the two of them get trapped in Apokoliptan politics. After Darkseid's death in Justice League's second season, Apokolips have fallen apart as the various mini-factions led by Darkseid's generals fight for their former master's place on the throne. Kalibak, son of Darkseid, has been kidnapped by one of the generals, the hilariously-voiced Virman Vundabar, who wants to use his possession of Kalibak to boost his claim to the throne. Meanwhile, recurring enemy Granny Goodness wants to force her former 'pet' Mister Miracle to break into Vundabar's prison and free Kalibak.

Vundabar is just such a weird design. He's this slightly baby-faced man who's dressed like one of those British soldiers, yet speaks in an accent that's... very mangled German, I think? And he's one of the generals of a planet that generally has a hell theme to it.

Granny Goodness is one of DC's more sinister characters, and one that has always made me uncomfortable. Yes, on the surface she's just weird. One of the most powerful generals of Darkseid is an old, muscular grandmother who calls herself Granny Goodness? But Granny is the embodiment of parental abuse, and while we never see anything truly graphic, a combination of her unsettling man-voice, her continually trying to pretend to be a mockery of a nice grandparent (you wouldn't want to make granny sad, would you?) and the sheer callous sadism she shows in Mister Miracle's very effective flashbacks show the sheer depths of depravity that Granny Goodness sinks into. She is the personal demon that Mister Miracle is trying to escape from, as Miracle has been raised and tortured by Granny Goodness as a child and his only preoccupation is escape -- thus showing his skills in being the universe's best escape artist. Miracle is a grown man now, but he still carries the emotional scars within himself. Even his 'real' name, Scott Free, is an adaptation of how Granny Goodness keeps telling him that he'll never get away scot-free from Apokolips.

Mister Miracle tries to recruit Superman's help in all this, but the League is unwilling to choose a side in the political struggle for Apokolips, because whether Granny or Vundabar wins, Earth stands to lose anyway, and their best bet is to let Apokolips be embroiled in a self-destructive civil war and hopefully exhaust its own resources. It's a bit callous, of course, and arguably hypocritical considering how many times the League has interfered in other countries' political situations, before, but you can see the side in J'onn's argument. It plays into the theme of "should the League get involve in political situations" argument, as well as a slight display in J'onn being more detached and more... analytical and strategist-y with everything.

Flash sees this as the perfect opportunity to get some high-stakes superheroing going on, and add that to the whole 'rebel against the rules' thing that the younger Flash finds so appealing, Flash volunteers to help Mister Miracle and Big Barda out, and the initial rejection that he gets from the two new gods -- that Flash simply isn't as good as Superman, their first choice, only increases Flash's desire to help out and prove himself.

The episode is very much a fantastic journey as Flash, Mister Miracle and Big Barda go through the crazy alien fortress in Apokolips trying to rescue Kalibak and Oberon, fighting through Parademons, hell-hounds and using Mister Miracle's crazy methods to escape from Virman Vundabar's death traps, but the episode makes it a far more compelling episode by continually juxtaposing to scenes of young Scott Free, being tortured and refusing to be broken, escaping on his own from Granny Goodness, escaping from the hell that's not just physical torment but mental as well. There's a great sense of cinematography where the flashbacks are bleak and desolate, using a depressing, monochromic blue tone in its scenes, while in the present day we get the absolutely colourful costumes of Mister Miracle and Big Barda going insane in a similarly fun and colourful environment.

There's a nice bit where J'onn finally ends up helping out as Flash has the idea to use the martian's shape-shifting powers to pre-emptively doublecross Granny Goodness, having J'onn use his mind-reading powers to find out where Oberon is being kept in Granny's palace before she can kill Oberon. J'onn's fears that helping out the struggle for the throne would unify Apokolips is ultimately averted as Kalibak is imprisoned on Earth, thus meaning that neither Virman nor Granny have a solid claim to the throne and are forced to continue their little war. It's a bit cold that they're basically sentencing Apokolips to perpetual war and possibly the deaths of many, many Parademons and other soldiers... but then, eh, Parademons aren't people. So.

There's a very nice scene at the end after everything is said and done, where Flash basically expects J'onn to punish him for disobeying orders. But J'onn breaks from his earlier stiffness and all-business demeanor and just asks Flash to play some Brawling Bots with him. J'onn's disconnect with the world and his humanity (martianity?) is shown earlier this episode, and it's Flash's youthful energy and 'help people first, think of political backlashes later' stance that gets J'onn to, well, basically take a break. J'onn's character arc is building very slowly and subtly in the background as he becomes more and more detached with his humanity, but this is it's characters like Flash that prevents this from happening sooner.

"I wanted the green one..." man, that is the most hilarious scene ever. I never thought I would ever see J'onn J'onzz pout.

Justice League Roll Call:

• Speaking Roles: Mr Miracle, Big Barda, Flash, Elongated Man, Martian Manhunter
• Non-Speaking Roles: Fire
• Major Villains: Granny Goodness, Virman Vundabar, Kalibak

DC Easter Eggs Corner:

• Darkseid's death happened in the Justice League episode 'Twilight'. Kalibak was last seen in the Justice League episode 'Hereafter', where he was part of the villains that attempted to kill Superman, and was beaten down by Lobo. Presumably he travelled back to Apokolips between that episode and this one? Regardless, this marks Kalibak's final appearance in the DCAU. Granny Goodness last appeared in Superman: The Animated Series' series finale, and has been a frequent enemy of Superman throughout the series.
• Big Barda, a.k.a. Barda Free, has appeared in the DCAU before as a member of the future Justice League Unlimited in Batman Beyond. She was one of Granny Goodness's brainwashed Female Furies until she was freed by Mr. Miracle, and later married him. Big Barda's more... revealing outfit from Batman Beyond appears briefly when she's helping Scott out on his performance, but for the majority of the episode she wears a full-body armour based on her costume in the comics. Barda is immensely powerful, and in battle wields the Mega-rod, a verstatile weapon that augments her strength.
• Mister Miracle, a.k.a. Scott Free, has had brief cameos as background characters in Superman: TAS and Justice League episodes among the New Genesis gods. While not really mentioned here, Scott Free was actually the biological son of New Genesis's Highfather, traded for Orion during the weird child-trading pact between New Genesis and Apokolips. As told here, Scott could not be broken by the tortures of Apokolips, and eventually escaped alongside his lover Barda and rejoined the side of good.
• Oberon is a human born with dwarvism who was abused in a circus, before eventually meeting Mister Miracle and, well, basically being his manager-slash-mentor as shown here. 
• Virman Vundabar (sometimes spelled Vundabarr) in the comics serves mostly the same role as he does here, as a treacherous member of Darkseid's minions with a penchant for designing traps. He clashed multiple times with Superman and Mr. Miracle, and is involved in various Apokoliptan stories. He was eventually killed by Darkseid for his treachery, though.

The Flash S03E13 Review: Planet of the Apes

The Flash, Season 3, Episode 13: Attack on Gorilla City

"I am a gorilla." never sounded so badass.

See, for all the problems that I bitch about Flash ever since we had all the inconsistent plotlines and repetitive nonsense in season two, episodes like this week's "Attack on Gorilla City" is why I watch and love this show. It's predictable, yes? It's your basic action movie fair, no? The CGI's conspicuous at some parts, ain't it? It doesn't progress the plot, yeah? I don't care. Yes, when it comes down to it, this episode probably is a merely slightly-more-impressive-visually version of your standard procedural fare. But you know what? Fuck you! Like, seriously. I really liked this episode.

Like, go back and read my review on the episode of Grodd's debut. Fuck, man, it's Gorilla Grodd. Without repeating everything I said in that review, know that throughout this episode I was still being a huge fanboy going "ohmygod Gorilla Grodd is on the teevee again!"

And honestly, compare the latest few episodes to the early days of Arrow's first season, where the showmakers are even too chickenshit to call their vigilante "Green Arrow" because it's not mature or badass enough. Well, this episode we've got Flash, Vibe, Killer Frost and Draco Malfoy Indiana Jones Doctor Alchemy going off to an alternate-Earth Gorilla City to fight Gorilla Grodd, ending with a gladiatorial death-match between Flash and King Solovar. Not bad from a show that's so scared of DC's more wild characters that they're even too afraid to adapt Firefly and re-imagines him as this wussy angry arsonist.

I knew Gorilla City was coming after last episode's teaser, but I didn't realize how much of it will be shown. The CG of a high-budget show like Game of Thrones tend to depict battle scenes and dragons very strategically, how would the Flash fare? Last two seasons only managed to have one entirely-CG character like Grodd himself or King Shark, and even this season's Savitar relies on being invisible to non-speedsters and reusing some animation between episodes. But they manage to be very strategic. It's not that the gorillas aren't shown, it's that we get shown just a couple of sweeping views of the city, or the huge coliseum, but the main brunt of the action and closeups are saved for just Grodd and Solovar. And even then, for a fair amount of scenes, Grodd speaks through Cisco or Wells. The actions scenes with Flash also features some slo-mo rotation scenes which I'd wager is far easier to animate than for the entire five minutes of the battle to be constant movement.

And honestly? I'm fine with what they did. Both Grodd and Solovar looked impressive, and, yes, there were times where the CGI looked a bit suspect, especially the big gorilla army pan at the end, or the turnaround during Flash's speech, but for the most part it's amazing. We get to see Grodd be a creepy telepathic gorilla and his voice is always amazing. David Sobolov gives this perfect blend of barely-contained animalistic rage, a deadly intelligence and the general creepiness that really makes it feel that Grodd is projecting his thoughts out to everyone. It also helps that he gets a lot of really, really awesome lines. "I am an animal. Kill or be killed!"

Grodd's plan is simple, of course. He eggs both Solovar and Flash on to rise into power. Solovar seems to be portrayed as a warlord here, and Grodd's attempts to curry sympathy has enough of a selfish streak to make us buy into at least part of it... though of course, he's Gorilla motherfucking Grodd, he's a card-carrying villain. Team Flash doesn't necessarily know it, though, they think Grodd's just using them to gain power, whereas Grodd's real plan is to invade Earth-1 and wreak vengeance. It's pretty simple plot, and, yes, there are a lot of plot holes in it -- why didn't Grodd use mind-control to force Cisco to make the portal as soon as he became leader? Why did Grodd drag Flash out of his cell only to leave him right outside it? Why are there no gorilla guards? How did the power-dampening happen and why does it only work in the cells? I don't care, I've got the fastest man alive fighting a gigantic albino gorilla with a spear-axe in a gladiatorial match, I can deal with a couple of tiny plot holes.

It's also amazing to see Harry Wells reappear. H.R. is entertaining, that's for sure, but as much as the show pretends that H.R. is an essential part of the team, he absolutely can't hold a candle to the cantankerous Harry Wells of Earth-2. Shame he spends three-fourths of the episode being either unconscious or a gorilla's puppet, but hey, what little screentime he got, he used very, very well. Caitlin also has a brief subplot where she learns to use her powers more without turning into Killer Frost, and Julian has a lot of great scenes, from him showing up in full Indiana Jones gear and showing off his inner archaeologist, to him caring for Caitlin -- a chemistry that works so much better than the shoehorned Caitlin/FakeJay last season due to how this is allowed to build up over time.

It's a shame the Earth-1 subplot was so weak. It's great to see Jesse Quick back, but her subplot with Wally, and wanting to stay on Earth-1 with Wally, felt absolutely weak, and Wally does come off a bit like a douche for going all "we need to solidify our relationship" when Jesse's worried sick about her father, who's on a different Earth kidnapped by a fucking city of gorillas. The whole Jesse being upset because Wally's life felt complete (dude lives in a different dimension, you'd think not writing back for a couple of months would be acceptable). It's a very badly-paced story mostly because Wally and Jesse hung out like twice before this. H.R. has some great scenes and steals all the Earth-1 scenes, though. The whole 'stop the future from happening' plot is glossed over somewhat, though certainly the main appeal and plot is, y'know, escaping the city of telepathic gorillas.

Ideally, we'd see more of Solovar, more of Gorilla City in general. Solovar comes off as a flat might-makes-right warlord whose only redeeming factor was that he's not Grodd. But you work with the CGI budget you get, and while it's a more villainous take on Solovar than the tradition, he has one helluva badass voice.

And besides, we definitely haven't seen the last of Grodd. He's apparently got Gypsy (whether it's the same Gypsy we met, or if she's Earth-2's version, or if she's brainwashed is not clear) and a full army of armour-plated gorillas ready to invade Earth-1. Gypsy's return would have actual shock impact if, y'know, the recap section didn't randomly focus on her. Not sure if this will happen later this season or if it's just next season's Grodd episode, but dang, I was so happy watching this episode. No, it's not perfect by any means, but fuck you, we've got Solovar creating gigantic shockwaves with his spear, and Flash punching Solovar with a vibrating hand, Grodd being a badass evil psychic gorilla and man, if you don't find that awesome, I dunno. Go watch like the five o'clock news or something, because clearly superhero shows aren't for you.

DC Easter Eggs Corner:

• King Solovar is the king of Gorilla City in the comics. The comics' Solovar is more of the wise allied king, though, instead of the strength-based leader he is here. Gorilla City is also a location from the comics, although in the comics gorilla-kind have hyper-advanced technology instead of living like the tribal setting we see them here. Solovar also has his comic counterpart's telepathic powers. 
• Grodd last appeared in season two, and he recounts being dropped off near Gorilla City in that episode. Caitlin recalls Grodd's affection for her in their previous two outings (though Grodd's grown past that now). Grodd also refers to his 'father', Reverse-Flash, while Caitlin recalls her doppelganger, Earth-2's Killer Frost. In addition to all that, when learning of Caitlin's powers, Harry also notes how he never believed that he and Cisco were responsible for releasing Barry from Mirror Master's mirror. 
• Julian gets abnormally excited about the "Planet of the Apes", repeating it twice while talking to Barry. Julian's actor, Tom Felton, was in Dawn of the Planet of the Apes as a glorious monkey-hating douchebag. Referencing the franchise is, of course, Cisco, who notes how Grodd had Flash "damn dirty work."
• Bludhaven, which has been a setting in Arrow for a couple of episodes, also known as sister city to Gotham City and romping grounds of Nightwing, gets mentioned yet again. 

Boku no Hero Academia 128 Review: Internship

My Hero Academia, Chapter 128: Boy Meets...

Pretty decent chapter, even if for some reason some of the artwork here isn't finished. In addition to some sketchy panels (and some panels where a couple of characters are sketchy) mouths keep going missing in this chapter. It's not that big of a deal, because a good part of the sketches and rough shading are done -- it doesn't get quite as bad as some Hunter x Hunter chapters where it's nigh-impossible to follow what the shit's going on -- so yeah, not a super-big deal. 

Anyway, Midoriya gets accepted as Nighteye's new intern. There's a bit where Nighteye's powers are shown to be really powerful as Midoriya flirts around with how to get past his Foresight ability within a minute, all the while Nighteye's mocking him and it's awesome. The dude's just so awesome in general. He calls Midoriya's bouncing around a Gran Tourino ripoff, easily gets past his increased speed and his attempt to confuse his vision by throwing lots of books in his face. Nighteye keeps talking about how All Might's vision and lack of worry and doubt are all not expressed in Midoriya's actions. 

Midoriya then crash-lands into a wall and Nighteye calls him out on crashing and burning after a single attempt, noting his lack of adaptability... and then Midoriya says about how he doesn't want to hit an All Might 10th Anniversary tapestry and d'awww. Nighteye isn't impressed by the fact that Midoriya is a fellow fanboy, but rather by his ability to dodge and bounce around like Gran Tourino, taking on all the emotional baiting and still be able to consider things like strategy and surroundings. 

Nighteye accepts Midoriya in, but notes, with full hostility, how he still doesn't acknowledge Midoriya as All Might's successor, noting that people want a dazzling symbol and he will make Midoriya realize that it's not him, no matter what All Might thinks. Midoriya notes that Nighteye is hiring him with the purpose of making him give up, which is a very interesting dynamic -- Midoriya wants to learn from Nighteye, and Nigtheye isn't enough of a dick to not acknowledge Midoriya's guts but he's still not acknowledged Midoriya as All Might's successor yet. 

We cut off to the next day where their small group, now with Midoriya in tow, investigate a group of villains called the Eightfold Cleaners... which is Overhaul's group, and we learn Overhaul's real name: Chisaki. Bubble Girl even notes that they know that Overhaul's Cleaners made contact with the Villain Alliance, but no detail of their meeting really came out. Also that they have no real evidence that the Cleaners are behind any real criminal activity.

Also we get to see Mirio in costume and it's a gloriously doofy-looking one. 

Mirio and Midoriya get bumped into by a little girl with bandaged arms and a single horn... which I'm not sure if it should mean something, if there's someone I'm forgetting who also has a single horn. The kid's called Eri, and immediately Overhaul walks up to them, not acting villainous (as much as a dude in a bomber jacket and a plague mask can not look villainous, anyway), telling the little girl off for causing trouble to a superhero and asking her to come back. 

Who the fuck's Eri? There was a little midget in a plague doctor mask during the fight with the Villain Alliance, is that her? Or is she part of Overhaul's mysterious master-plan? Or is she just her sister or kid or something? What's Midoriya going to do with Overhaul? At least we're not wasting time with these confrontations, eh?

Hearthstone Talk: Housekeeping

So it's been a pretty chatty couple of weeks for Hearthstone -- in addition to the announcement of the nerf for STB and Spirit Claws, the setup of 2017's sets and the lack of adventures, we're also getting some of the best cards in Classic rotated into Wild, all of which I've talked about before It's all very healthy changes that promises some change to the monotony that Hearthstone has been having with the dominance of Pirate-Aggro Shaman and Warrior everywhere -- decks that are ever-present but not exactly super fun to play. They're all pretty healthy changes, I think, even if the meta is absolutely stale at the moment and I'm only logging in for my daily gold.

Shit, the nerf for Small-Time Buccaneer and Spirit Claws was announced, what, two weeks ago? Where are my nerfs, damn it? Also where is Un'goro and my dinosaurs? (Probably they'll make the announcement around mid-to-late-March by my count)

But there's a lot of talk by the developers about their design process, talking about good versus bad combos in response to the Conceal/Power Overwhelming exile, about what kind of balance they're looking for, stuff like that. I won't repeat what they're saying for the most part. But we're getting some changes too soon, which I'll do a super-speedy recap of:

• Arena will be Standard in the future. Not sure how I feel about this, TBH. I'm very much on board with the Hall of Fame and the nerfs, but Arena has always been one of the funnest things simply by virtue of the sheer amount of cards in it. I'll acknowledge that Arena is problematic, though, and shaking up the meta by reducing the amount of cards is definitely something they can do. The developers also promise to rotate things out, citing things like a Naxx-only Arena, or a Legendaries-and-Spells only arena. 
• Spells will show up more often than they are now in Arena drafts, while neutral Classic cards will show up less. Finally, those asshat Windfury Harpies and Mogu'shan Wardens can fuck off from my drafts.
• In addition, Flamestrike and Abyssal Enforcers, two degenerate AoE cards that are super one-sided if you ever manage to draft them, will appear less often. Thank you thank you thank you Blizzard balance team.
• Golden cards will show up in Arena if you have them in your collection. It's about time, really, and I'm surprised this wasn't implemented in like the first year.
• Druid of the Claw's text is going to be changed to reflect its transformation effect, finally.
• Legend-rank matchmaking has been improved -- like in a patch that should roll out very soon.
• The team is considering unnerfing at least Molten Giant and moving it to Wild. I agree with this, but not to the sentiment of unnerfing, like, Leper Gnome, Knife Juggler and others. Still no plans to fill in the gaps left by hall of fame cards, though apparently isn't set in stone. People Fake OCD need each class to have equal amounts of class cards, though, so I'm hoping for this to happen, even if we're going to introduce some sub-par cards. 
• No plans to move Reno Jackson to Classic, or to move Fiery War Axe out of Classic. I see no problems with either of this, and people who do really need to step back and get a better perspective on balance. 

Which is all well and good, if only some or all of these changes actually show up in the game. I'm getting bored of getting my face fucked by pirates in both Standard and Wild, and Arena's stale as all hell. Or announce Un'goro, so we can all speculate and drool over all the new cards.

Justice League Unlimited S02E01 Review: Fight Club

Justice League Unlimited, Season 2, Episode 1: The Cat & the Canary

Well, back to this again! I have a love-hate relationship with reviewing Justice League Unlimited. On one hand, it's such a delight to review what is easily one of my favourite pieces of fiction, like, ever. On the other hand, there's so goddamned much to talk about, from the episode review, to talking about character development, to gushing over how well they adapted the source material... all that jazz, y'know?

And it's this kind of double-layered duality that you can see in this episode. The younger members of the audience, myself included when I first saw this episode, will see a fun, different plot than the usual Justice League fare, where our two street-level heroes, Green Arrow and Black Canary, have to deal with a freaking superhero/supervillain fighting ring, co-starring a fall-into-villainy/love-triangle subplot with Wildcat. The older members of the audience will see something more... depressing, as we get to see just what crimefighting actually does to your mental state. Obviously it doesn't quite go to as dark a place as, say, Watchmen does, but seeing Wildcat basically trying so hard to relive his glory days is a pretty harsh depiction of the problems of depression and inadequacy that many people are struggling with.

Wildcat is a professional boxer turned crime-fighter, and both of his professions involve violence in some form or other, but as many people probably points out, in a huge team made up of the likes of Superman, Wonder Woman, Captain Atom and other godlike beings, where do 'enhanced normal' superheroes stack up? More casual superhero fans often joke at how out-of-place the likes of Batman or Hawkeye are in their respective superhero teams, and, well, it's not hard to see why.

Here we see Wildcat going through some kind of a late-life identity crisis. His crimefighting methods are sorely outdated and ineffective to really compare with these new-fangled superheroes, and even the 'enhanced normal' superheroes like Batman, Green Arrow and Black Canary generally tend to rely both on technological gadgets and not just simple fisticuffs. As a simple man who just wants to fight, Wildcat feels absolutely inadequate, so when he has an opportunity to relive his glory days, fighting against supervillains and metahumans in this Metabrawl, he jumps into it despite the constant warning from his loved ones.

He feels absolutely inadequate compared to the stronger and larger-than-life metahumans, and transferring that rage and anger to beating up, well, metahumans in Roulette's Metabrawl does double work for his mind -- relive his glory days and be a wrestling superstar, and at the same time, work through his aggression against the metahumans that he feels are overshadowing him. And he needs this glory, and the villain of the week Roulette knows just which buttons to push. Like how Cadmus and Amanda Waller are such different villains than your usual superhero breed, here Roulette isn't dangerous because she's very strong, but rather because of how well she can prey and manipulate Wildcat's inadequacies and addiction, getting him to stay and continue fighting despite him having second thoughts.

While there's an obvious 'Green Arrow is jealous of Wildcat' plot, the relationship between Wildcat and Black Canary is quickly established to be one of a surrogate parent to Black Canary, and the interactions between Canary and Wildcat is really well-told, similar to how a child argues against her stubborn dad to quit doing the reckless, self-destructive things he's doing. Usually it's like, gambling or drugs or alcoholism or something, but those would get too real too fast for a superhero cartoon (Black Canary's actual father in the Arrow TV show straight up struggles with alcoholism) so we get, well, this superhero fight club. And it's a very well-told story of how Wildcat's addiction ends up leading to a path of horrifying self-destruction that very nearly alienates and kills the people he cares about.

Oh, don't get me wrong, Black Canary and Green Arrow very much carry the bulk of the episode, with Wildcat mostly serving the role of the secondary character they have to rescue, but it's the Wildcat story that really feels the most fascinating to me. That's not to say that Green Arrow and Black Canary are badly-executed here, of course.

Green Arrow is established pretty early in the Unlimited series as this happy man who's a bit anti-authority, but ultimately is a nice fellow. He's got two very strong spotlight episodes, and while that's not to discredit CW's live-action Arrow adaptation, this is a Green Arrow that's far less troubled with angst and brooding and personal sins, but one that's just concerned about being a nice superhero and flirting with the ladies. And, boy, what a lady he's fallen for. Green Arrow's interest in Canary has been shown all the way since his first appearance, and while he's a bit reluctant to help out, the very well-done little sparring session (that has a lot more 'wink-wink' flirting than I remembered it to be) shows a very hilarious and different side to these superheroes.

Canary makes great use of Arrow's obvious interest for her to gain his help in dealing with Wildcat, and it's hilarious where in the sparring session Green Arrow tries his best to 'teach' things to Canary but she quickly establishes herself as the far superior fighter. It might not mean much at a glance, but it's a very well-executed way to show that, yeah, Canary is exactly on the same level playing field as Green Arrow, and isn't just a damsel in distress. Hell, Wildcat even mentions at one point that Green Arrow is straight-up inferior to Canary, and while that might just be a nod to how Canary was trained by Wildcat himself, it's this showcasing how Canary is both a woman that's not beneath using her charm to get what her want, but also someone who can drop-kick your ass when she feels like it.

There's some degree of emotional manipulation involved, of course, and Canary's pretty obviously holding back before making that bet, allowing the cocky, macho-gesturing Green Arrow to pin her down before making a bet and showing what she can really do. Yes, the end goal might just be access to Oliver Queen's huge, huge wallet to get into the metabrawl itself, but as the show quickly establishes, the attraction that Arrow feels towards Canary isn't one-sided.

Of course, Green Arrow himself feels a different form of inadequacy, quickly assuming that Canary's relationship with Wildcat is a romantic one, and he's just the third wheel being strung along. It's a feeling that many people definitely dealt with before in the past, second-guessing your loved ones because you feel that there's someone better. When Canary establishes that, yes, there is something between them and Wildcat is a father-figure to her, Green Arrow goes extreme in trying to make up for his accusations, knocking Canary out and facing Wildcat in the ring. ("That was reckless, macho, stupid... but very sweet", as Canary herself points out later) Yes, it's a pointless macho gesture, but Green Arrow has a gambit of his own. He knows that Wildcat and Canary might hold back against each other, and he intentionally riles Wildcat up, calling him a has-been and all sorts of insults to get him really riled up and apparently kill Green Arrow (he uses a 'stun arrow', apparently. An arrow for every situation!). It's all fake, of course, but the jarring sight at the ugly side of his addiction manages to shock Wildcat out of his rage to see how low he's fallen, and the shift from unbridled, blind rage to shame is well-done.

It's a nice way to end the conflict, of course, because even if it was simply Green Arrow or Black Canary beating Wildcat down to the ground in the ring, Wildcat's anger and desire for glory and his deep-rooted addiction isn't going to go away. It's a surprisingly emotional way to get Wildcat to see the error of his ways, by having Arrow fake the worst-case scenario for Wildcat's unhealthy addiction -- that someone will end up dying.

Oh, and let's not get into the fight scenes in this episode. The choreography of the varying styles of martial arts shown in this episode and the sheer upgrade in animation smoothness and quality is very well displayed. There's a distinct stylistic difference in Wildcat's more wrestler/boxer style that focuses more on his wide upper body, to Black Canary's more fluid, acrobatic fighting moves that relies on using her legs, while Arrow's kind of a more general, street-level of brawling. That long sequence of Wildcat or Canary running through a barrage of enemies is just amazing. Yes, Black Canary does have her canary cry power (which looks pretty cool in this cartoon, by the way), but the show has her rely more on her martial arts skills.

Yes, the superheroes team up and beat down Roulette's army of colourful supervillains (what the shit is an alien overlord like Evil Star doing among them), but a single realization isn't quite enough for Wildcat to get through his issues, and there's a nice little nod to his gradual healing as Wildcat goes into therapy with J'onn. He has been forced to see the error of his ways, but that doesn't mean he's automagically healthy again mentally. Acknowledging that you need help from a 'shrink' is one of the hardest things that people struggling with all sorts of mental issues have, and, well, it's a nice little bit for the cartoon to acknowledge this.

Shit, that's a lot more than I thought I would write for this episode, to be honest, but man, I really love this episode. It's a different approach to characters who've all been adapted into live action (Green Arrow, Black Canary and Wildcat in Arrow; Roulette and the metabrawl in Supergirl) but take a wholly different approach to it.

Justice League Roll Call:

• Speaking Roles: Black Canary, Wildcat, Green Arrow
• Non-Speaking Roles: Martian Manhunter
• Major Villains: Roulette, Atomic Skull
• Non-Speaking Villains: Sportsmaster, Hellgrammite, Bloodsport, Electrocutioner, Evil Star, Tracer, Gork

DC Easter Eggs Corner:

• Wildcat, a.k.a. Ted Grant, is one of the original members of the Justice Society of America, one of DC's first (both in real life and in-universe) superhero teams. He's a heavyweight boxer who tangeld with the criminal underworld and adopts a costumed superhero alter ego to clear his name. He's also super-old, first being active before World War II, though there have been attempts to handwave his still being alive right now with magic or whatever. Wildcat serves as a mentor to many younger heroes, including Black Canary and Catwoman in the comics, and is often portrayed as a rowdy grandfather-type figure with a streak of old-fashioned male chauvinism thrown in here or there.
• Roulette, a.k.a. Veronica Sinclair, is a villain associated with the Justice Society, though she primarily singles out Mr. Terrific as her nemesis. Roulette runs an underground 'metabrawl' like she does in this episode in the comics, though at various points in her career she's also pitted heroes against each other, or sent supervillains to wreak havoc and gain points like a game show. 
• Atomic Skull, a.k.a. Joseph Martin, is a Superman enemy, a normal human that has been exposed to a gene bomb unleashed by the alien invaders, the Dominators, which activated his latent metahuman gene and turning his skin transparent, while wreathing his head in atomic fire and allowing him to shoot energy from his hands. This is his first appearance in the DCAU.
• Other supervillains in Roulette's employ, in quick recap order:
• Sportsmaster, a.k.a. Lawrence "Crusher" Crook: enemy of the Justice Society, specifically the original Green Lantern (Alan Scott) and Wildcat. A petty thief who uses, well, sports equipment, and is often a member of various incarnations of the Injustice Society. He's more well-known nowadays for being the jackass father to superheroine-slash-antihero Artemis, who stars as one of the main characters of Young Justice.
• Hellgrammite, a.k.a. Roderick Rose: Hellgrammite is a minor Superman enemy, who experimented with insects and mutation and turned himself into a hideous insect hybrid. 
• Bloodsport, a.k.a. Robert DuBois: A Superman enemy, Bloodsport is a man obsessed with the Vietnam war because he had chickened out and his brother went in his stead and lost his limbs. Luthor manipulated the unstable man to become a mercenary, fighting Superman with Kryptonite bullets and other sorts of heavy duty weapons.
• Electrocutioner, a.k.a. Lester Buchinsky: a lesser Batman villain who uses electricity-powered gloves to fight. In recent years has received far more focus than he deserves thanks to being featured in the game Arkham Origins, with a hilarious chronic loser status. 
• Evil Star: An enemy of the Hal Jordan Green Lantern, Evil Star is an alien from the planet Auron who creates the powerful artifact the Starbrand, and then comes to Earth to terrorize it.
• Tracer: He's the Sabertooth-looking dude, and an obscure alien enemy of the Justice League. Tracer is a member of the Extremists, a group of aliens whose appearance and powers are based on Marvel comics characters.
• Gork: Gork (dude with the weird pustules) is apparently based on a pretty obscure Batman enemy, having a single appearance as one of the genetically-modified soldiers of Doctor Moon. 
• In the comics, of course, Green Arrow and Black Canary is one of the series' longest-running superhero couple.