Titans S02E05 Review: Fractured Titans

Titans, Season 2, Episode 5: Deathstroke

A shorter review today, mostly because I don't really have a whole ton to say about this one. It's honestly a pretty solid hour of superheroing, but at the same time, episode 5, "Deathstroke", is mostly just action scenes and things happening. And that's okay since the past couple of episodes have been pretty big on buildup and exposition, but at the same time when I do sit down to type this review I realize I didn't really have a whole ton to say here.

"Deathstroke" serves mostly to be the climax of this first arc of season two, the mystery behind Deathstroke and the ever-growing rift between Titans 1.0 and Titans 2.0. And within all that we have Dick, who's blaming himself for whatever clearly happened to Jericho, and also blaming himself for Jason's kidnapping. The tension is palpable among the older members of the group, who clearly went from angry to absolutely crazy-concerned and panicked that one of their younger charges have been kidnapped and potentially hurt by a pair of psychos.

There are some brief bits of action that happens here and there that feel more obligatory than anything. Jason escapes by tricking Dr. Light only to be captured immediately. There's the whole series of scenes showing Kory finally arriving into the main plot after her diversion. There is the argument between the older Titans with them finally referencing Garth because the audience knows about it, Gar is apologetic and stuff, and there's the obligatory Rachel-can't-control-her-Raven-powers scene. The first act is ultimately kind of a red herring, with the older Titans casing out the sewers, Dr. Light and Deathstroke getting into an argument (Light wants to kill them all himself) and Deathstroke just boom-headshots Dr. Light and shoves Jason's tracker into Dr. Light's corpse. It's neat, I guess, even though I'm bummed out that Dr. Light ended up doing absolutely jack shit in the show.

The show's also really leaning in to pushing Kory as someone that's the glue for the team, but I don't think that it displays it particularly well. The speech between Kory and Rachel about how they both have powers that they can't control (Kory's 'Starfire' powers are especially powerful even among Tamaraneans) is great. And Kory being a more mature member of the group but without the emotional baggage of the rest of Titans 1.0 does put her in a unique situation where she can advise Dick without being caught up in emotion, but ultimately while it's a significant improvement to her role in the first season, I really did wish that we saw Kory have some interaction with this current group.

The Titans come to a conflict when the older Titans argue whether to hand over Rose to Deathstroke as he threatens them to, while Rose gets to trick Gar and Rachel (mostly Gar) into letting them eavesdrop. There's a bit of a conflict where Hawk fights Rose for a bit, but then Rose gets into conflict with Rachel... who loses control of her Raven powers, kills Rose... but then Rose's bones just snap back together because her regeneration powers in this show would give Wolverine a run for his money.

And at this point it's just some buildup as the Titans have conversations with each other, but I didn't find any of them particularly interesting (Donna and Kory catch up; Dawn threatens Dick that she'll burn down the tower if he doesn't stop the experiment; Dick exposits to Kory about the previous episode) save for Hank admitting and being ashamed for being so hard on Jason, knowing that having a troubled childhood himself, he totally knows what it's like to be afraid. Hank's got an amazing actor, and he really doesn't quite get put in the spotlight enough. The rest of this montage is kind of bland, though, and after the huge fight against Rose it feels like the writers just shrugged and had the characters randomly interact before the final act.

And then, when the final act comes... Dick sort of betrays everyone by taking everything into his own hands, and goes off to confront Deathstroke solo. Which is stupid, but pretty on-brand for the Dick/Slade relationship from the comics. It's just that arriving without weapons or a suit, and thinking that Slade would just make the trade ends up backfiring, and only Kory pre-empting Slade ends up saving Dick from certain death. Perhaps for the first time this season the action scene is genuinely cool to watch and doesn't end too quickly, with the close-combat scene between Deathstroke, Dick and Kory being pretty fun.

The episode, however, ends with the cliffhanger (ledgehanger?) of Slade using a detonator to blow up the ledge where Jason is hanging on to and dropping him from the skyscraper. Oh no, a cliffhanger!

And... I dunno, the action scenes and the acting are great. I don't think that I have too much of a complaint about any of the acting here, and the dynamics between the characters are explored pretty well. The rift between the Titans are pretty fun to see, too, with Dawn being absolutely tranquil-but-furious at Dick's "experiment", Rachel being out of control, Rose mistrusting half of the people there who are ready to give her up... and there's still the mystery of what Deathstroke's specific beef with Dick is, since it seems way too personal, and I'm going to assume that something actually did happen between Dick and Jericho -- something that happened after the events of episode 4. It's just that the structuring of this episode moves a bit too fast, I feel, and while it's not actively messy or terrible, I feel like a better version of this episode could've rearranged or omitted some events to make the Dick/Slade confrontation or the hectic Rose argument in Titans tower work better. Ultimately, while an entertaining episode... it's also a bit... shallow, I guess? 

DC Easter Eggs Corner:

• Is this the first time that "Starfire" has ever been spoken outright in the show? And done to describe Kory's powers instead of being used as a moniker? It might very well be. 
• The circumstances behind it is certainly wildly different, but,  of course, Jason Todd is most well known as the Robin that died in the arc Death in the Family.