Batman Beyond S01E08 Review: Straight Flush

Batman Beyond, Season 1, Episode 8: Dead Man's Hand

Haven't been done a Batman Beyond review in a while. Whoops! "Dead Man's Hand" is kind of an interesting episode, and a pretty solid one, even if the plot developments aren't my favourite. It's sufficient to carry 20 minutes of screentime, though, which I suppose is what counts. After Terry's continued commitment as Batman ends up causing him and Dana to break up -- understandable, because, after all, these are teenagers -- Terry gets increasingly frustrated with how Bruce is obsessed with catching the villain of the week, the Royal Flush Gang. Meanwhile, Terry meets up with the mysterious Melanie Walker, a girl who clearly is suffering a fair bit from similar circumstances as Terry himself. And it's an interesting, if slightly tired storyline -- teenaged superhero tries his best to reconcile his social life with his superhero life. It's something that Spider-Man movies and comics really love to hammer home, and while these are never my favourite storylines in any given superhero material, this episode is solid enough. Sure, there are some parts of the episode that I felt could've been handled better. Terry and Melanie really ended up getting close way too quickly to feel natural, although at least the show sort of lampshades this in a way?

I also kind of find it interesting that the episode doesn't go the "he's a jackass for a single episode" route with Bruce. It would've been so easy for the show writers to characterize Bruce as being particularly paranoid or angry or forcing Terry to take extra patrols or something along those lines, but Bruce is just being what he is every other episode -- it's the inherent curse of the duty of the Batman mantle, and Terry's just being particularly angry because of his breakup. 

The Royal Flush Gang themselves are a fun, quirky sort of villain that feel pretty much at home in the setting, a bunch of supervillains themed after playing cards riding floating giant cards. We learn through the episode that Bruce had fought these schmucks in a prior incarnation before (something we see in Justice League and Justice League Unlimited, released way after this episode's over) and while only King and Ten really end up mattering to the overall plot of the episode, the style and the backstory given to the Royal Flush Gang is neat. Jack's just a smarmy asshole and Queen's just a "go with the flow, daughter" mom to Ten. Plus, Ace's apparently just a robot, so that's one less minor character to keep track of. 

The twist here, of course, is that Ten of the Royal Flush Gang is actually Melanie Walker, the pretty blonde girl that Terry befriends. It's honestly kind of an obvious twist, although the episode at least doles it out in a pretty well-paced way, not making any real misdirections but dropping subtle hints during Melanie and Terry's original conversation that her family's job might be something more than just a family that travels around a lot. King, of course, turns out to be kind of a control freak of a father. He hits his son (?) Jack when he talks back with the very sensible reason of "we got the money, why even tangle with Batman?" and is clearly dismissive of any concerns that Melanie has towards their methods. There's a bit of a parallel when both Terry and Melanie, in their costumed identities, are distracted by the time of their date and ended up rushing things and nearly fucking up. I'm... not quite sure why Batman refuses to punch Ten during the museum encounter, because this is clearly before he suspects Ten is the girl he's sweet on. 

Meanwhile, Ten/Melanie is having a pretty interesting argument with her parents, and it's... it's interesting. Melanie clearly has the chance to be turned to good, or to leave the family business entirely... but family and legacy is a very tricky thing, and her mother Queen ends up talking her out of leaving the Royal Flush Gang to basically live with Terry... and it's this decision that ends up altering Terry to something particularly fishy, eventually leading to his investigation and his realization that the Walker family is actually the Royal Flush Gang's secret identity. And I do really like that this whole final act of the episode is all Terry, because Bruce doesn't even enter the fray here. As much as I love Old Man Bruce, we really do need Terry to show that, yes, he is the Batman now, and while he might be inexperienced, he certainly is worthy of the mantle. 

And it's not that the previous action sequences were bland or anything, but man, that bit when Batman uses his stealth abilities to sneak around the Royal Flush mansion and take out Jack, Queen and Ace like a predator is simply amazing. The final confrontation between Batman, King and Ten is... it's all right, and there's the tragedy that Ten simply can't walk away from rescuing her father, and ends up branded a criminal and arrested by Batman. And, of course, at the end of the episode, the entire Flush Gang gets arrested. Old Man Bruce shows up not to give Terry a mouthful, but to give an understanding nod and begins to talk about his own tryst with Catwoman...

Except, y'know, it's a completely different beast. Bruce and Selina's dealings, at least in the DCAU, is between their costumed counterparts -- between Batman and Catwoman. Terry and Melanie, meanwhile, end up being attracted to each other's civilian identities. There's also the whole factor of Melanie being trapped in the 'family business' and finding herself unable to betray or leave her family, which is a lot more sympathetic. Still, it's kind of nitpicky, and this overall is a pretty solid episode. If nothing else, it sets up a very interesting character in Ten that we'll end up following for a couple more episodes down the road. 

DC Easter Eggs Corner:

• The Royal Flush Gang makes their debut in the DC Animated Universe in this episode, and they are based on a recurring, ever-rotating group of five members that menaced the Justice League as well as other villains. In the DC Animated Universe, they would be retroactively added to the present-day timeline when two separate prior incarnations of the Royal Flush Gang battled the Justice League in Justice League Unlimited. 
• Bruce, of course, references his on-and-off romance with Selina Kyle, or Catwoman.
• King is voiced by James Bond actor George Lazenby, and has a homage to one of the lines that Lazenby says in On Her Majesty's Secret Service: "We have all the time in the world."