Batman Beyond, Season 1, Episode 13: Ascension
The final episode of Batman Beyond's first season, and despite the relatively high praises I do sing for the show, this episode was... well, it was a solid episode, but as both a season finale as well as a send-off for one of the first season's bigger villains, it's kind of underwhelming. And yes, I know, back in the 90's, we don't quite treat season finales with as much reverence as modern-day (or, honestly, even Batman Beyond's successor, Justice League) cartoons do, but after watching this episode and realizing that this is genuinely it for Blight... well, I can't help but be more than a little disappointed.
And one of the things that I really do feel that the show didn't quite capitalize on is the fact that Derek Powers is as much a villain as Blight himself. Sure, as Blight he's a lot more radioactive and angry, and physically can throw things around, but I really did enjoy Derek Powers as a smarmy antagonist who took over Bruce Wayne's company through underhanded means, thus giving both Batmen young and old a foe to contend with. Instead, Derek Powers' status as a CEO is basically brushed over and he gets discredited around five minutes into this episode by him losing his temper and his skin flaking off. Not even the dual identity thing is something that Terry and Bruce even really figure out themselves (the closest the two Batmen get is to find that there's a connection between the two after a dropped ID card), which I felt was a massive cop-out and easily the most anti-climactic thing they could've done. Throw in the fact that he hasn't really been an actual presence in the show since... oh, "Shriek", I guess, and I really do kind of feel like this could've been done better.
Instead, "Ascension" instead focuses on Derek Powers' son, which was never foreshadowed before, and gets pretty awkwardly thrown into this as an unpopular and unfavourite son that is given what's essentially a glorified puppet job, dealing with people who are angry at pollution. Derek recruits the assholish Paxton and reveals his condition, telling him that he's planning to sign over the company to him because Batman keeps foiling his chemical supply raids that is required to give him his skin.
And... that's kinda dumb of Derek, but you might maybe handwave it with his growing insanity. What's more dumb, though, is Paxton's plan of very obviously setting up his father's fall, which, again, would've worked a lot better if we actually knew who Paxton was, and whether him helping Derek was a question or not. With the assholish behaviour we've seen of him prior to him meeting Derek, we can kinda guess that he's going to backstab his old man. Paxton pays off the fishmongers to basically interrupt a Wayne-Powers board meeting and throw some smelly, polluted fish onto it, causing Derek to lose control and reveal his true identity as Blight, causing him to become public enemy numero uno. Later on, Paxton calls in the ambulance down to Blight's hideout under the thinly-veiled guise of concern, while also using a Batsignal to summon a very unhappy Batman to also help out with the arrest of his dad.
And... Batman's just kind of a plot device in his own show, which I honestly didn't like a lot. Instead the focus seems to be way more on the far less interesting Paxton. We did at least get a pretty good scene between Terry and Bruce, where Terry actually muses that he is actually pleased that Derek's transformation to Blight is caused by Terry's interference as Batman all the way back in the first episode. But other than a brief, non-committal reproach from Old Man Bruce, we really don't get a proper follow-up to this because, hey gotta take down the radioactive monster. That sequence is about the only characterization moment we do get from Terry, and... again, facing down this monster who killed his father and kick-started his vigilante career, I really do wish we got more for Terry.
The two Batmen eventually technobabble-procedural their way to Blight's hideout in an abandoned nuclear submarine (which is actually a pretty nifty idea from the show-writers), and Batman engages in some theatrics with the submarine intercom. And... again, the most that Terry did was to growl that Blight killed his father, which I suppose is smart of him not to divulge any more information, but eventually things just devolve into a sequence of "ah-HA I got the drop on you" "uh-HUH I got the drop on you" as Paxton shows up with a radiation-sucking net machine, then Batman avoids the assassination attempt and tries to stop Blight from dying (in a moment that's honestly glossed over), then Blight powers up even more, then the submarine blows the shit up but everyone else survives.
And... despite the seeming "Joker is Immortal" style teaser at the end, with Batman even lampshading this to Paxton Powers himself, this storyline is never really followed up on, so honestly, both Blight's conclusion as a villain, as well as Batman's relationship with Blight... sort of kind of ended on more of a whimper than a bang. Which is a huge, darn shame. Again, this is 1999. Superhero cartoons aren't quite as interconnected as Young Justice or Justice League Unlimited or Earth's Mightiest Heroes. But honestly, after all the work they did in the first half of the season really crafting Derek Powers not only as a powerful radioactive monster but also a cunning adversary in his alter-ego... they sort of forgot about him, and brought him in for one last hurrah with a genuinely underwhelming storyline involving his son. And... yeah. It's overall not a bad episode in its own right, and I did enjoy watching it, but knowing what I do about how this is the end for Blight and any sort of depth we might get out of him and his character does sting a fair bit.
DC Easter Eggs Corner:
- Paxton uses the Bat-signal, and it is chronologically the final time the Bat-signal is used in the DC Animated Universe.
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