Teen Titans, Season 5, Episode 5: Snowblind
After two episodes that are mostly disappointing and confusing respectively, Teen Titans finally got a pretty good episode with Snowblind, which manages to both introduce yet another new character while still delivering a good story and putting a nice highlight on a member of the central cast. Teen Titans' sudden change in tone from a Superfriends-style divorced-from-normal-DC-continuity comedy-action show into something that suddenly tries to incorporate a huge chunk of comic-book Teen Titans lore is a bit jarring, but it's one that would've been great if it was all handled the way that Snowblind was, where the main cast isn't unceremoniously shoved aside, but still participated in the plot even if in a reduced role.
It's a bit of a shame that the plot was honestly a bit predictable and the episode suffers a little for it. A rampaging energy monster in a Russian town, as well as the locals' insistence that one of their own caused the disaster, causes the Titans to hunt down and find Red Star. It's a pretty common sci-fi and superhero story to tell, where the person with monstrous power isn't actually responsible for the monster plaguing the local town, though here there's a small twist to the formula that it isn't the villain-of-the-week that's responsible, but rather Red Star himself is tangentially responsible -- his excess siphoned energy has manifested into an energy monster.
Starfire is the Titan that the episode focuses the most on in this episode, being the one that can withstand radiation due to her own starbolt powers, and she meets and befriends Red Star, who's holed himself up in a military bunker. There's a bit of a strange character moment where Starfire charges into battle and leaves the other Titans behind recklessly and collapses in the cold, but her subsequent scenes of bonding with Red Star over being outcasts of some kind finding a place in the world is pretty well-done. This leads to Starfire confronting Red Star over his 'cowardice', which is something Starfire herself has had problems with before -- her focus episodes in the first two seasons all revolve around her lack of self-esteem and fitting in.
There's also something slightly different compared to traditional Teen Titans episodes where we get a short backstory at Red Star's powers, where he was part of a super-soldier program, which is something I appreciate but might be jarring for viewers not used to it. Red Star's role as a tragic being that's forced to painfully store his excess energy every now and then is well-told and portrayed, which is a shame that he was forced to undergo a heroic sacrifice at the end, happy to have briefly made friends and set the villagers straight before he brings the radiation monster into orbit and explodes with it.
I think the episode could've done a lot better by not being so damned depressing, really, though for the most part I actually liked it for trying different avenues at storytelling instead of repeating yet another 'insane' episode format from the first four seasons. I really think throwing in the Brotherhood of Evil plotline -- maybe they're after Red Star too -- could've spiced things up, though that would kind of defeat the whole 'your inner monsters' thing that the episode probably meant to tell us. Could've been better if we had more focus on exploring Red Star's character beyond his guilt-riddled moping instead of focusing on the mystery, but it's still a nice, melancholic episode.
It's a bit of a shame that the plot was honestly a bit predictable and the episode suffers a little for it. A rampaging energy monster in a Russian town, as well as the locals' insistence that one of their own caused the disaster, causes the Titans to hunt down and find Red Star. It's a pretty common sci-fi and superhero story to tell, where the person with monstrous power isn't actually responsible for the monster plaguing the local town, though here there's a small twist to the formula that it isn't the villain-of-the-week that's responsible, but rather Red Star himself is tangentially responsible -- his excess siphoned energy has manifested into an energy monster.
Starfire is the Titan that the episode focuses the most on in this episode, being the one that can withstand radiation due to her own starbolt powers, and she meets and befriends Red Star, who's holed himself up in a military bunker. There's a bit of a strange character moment where Starfire charges into battle and leaves the other Titans behind recklessly and collapses in the cold, but her subsequent scenes of bonding with Red Star over being outcasts of some kind finding a place in the world is pretty well-done. This leads to Starfire confronting Red Star over his 'cowardice', which is something Starfire herself has had problems with before -- her focus episodes in the first two seasons all revolve around her lack of self-esteem and fitting in.
There's also something slightly different compared to traditional Teen Titans episodes where we get a short backstory at Red Star's powers, where he was part of a super-soldier program, which is something I appreciate but might be jarring for viewers not used to it. Red Star's role as a tragic being that's forced to painfully store his excess energy every now and then is well-told and portrayed, which is a shame that he was forced to undergo a heroic sacrifice at the end, happy to have briefly made friends and set the villagers straight before he brings the radiation monster into orbit and explodes with it.
I think the episode could've done a lot better by not being so damned depressing, really, though for the most part I actually liked it for trying different avenues at storytelling instead of repeating yet another 'insane' episode format from the first four seasons. I really think throwing in the Brotherhood of Evil plotline -- maybe they're after Red Star too -- could've spiced things up, though that would kind of defeat the whole 'your inner monsters' thing that the episode probably meant to tell us. Could've been better if we had more focus on exploring Red Star's character beyond his guilt-riddled moping instead of focusing on the mystery, but it's still a nice, melancholic episode.
DC Easter Eggs Corner:
- Red Star, real name Lenoid Kovar, is the first Russian superhero in the DC universe after he was exposed to radiation from a crashed spaceship and obtained radiation powers. Red Star's first superhero name was actually Starfire (which probably explains why he was paired up with Starfire in this cartoon) before Leonid changes his codename to Red Star. He doesn't have the fancy furry hat in the comics, though.
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