Stargirl S01E12-13 Review: Legacy Fight

Stargirl, Season 1, Episode 12-13: Stars and S.T.R.I.P.E., Parts 1-2

Good lord, I tried twice to write a review for this two-parter, but my computer kept eating the drafts. So forgive me if this does feel a bit truncated. And honestly? Other than maybe the first season of The Flash, this might very well be the strongest first season of any DC superhero TV show. Admittedly part of me really just likes the JSA team in general, but between the unabashed comic-book love that this show ends up showing, the great costumes that don't try too hard to go for a 'this is realistic' vibe that makes everything drab and boring, a pretty tight storytelling and a mostly superb cast really ends up with this show ending pretty strongly. 

And... granted, the show itself is far from perfect. After their original recruitment, the three junior JSA members are kind of toeing the line between being prominent or being background characters. Shining Knight's story could've been incorporated a lot better. Icicle could definitely have done more, because at this point Brainwave honestly feels like the actual 'main villain' of the show if we're talking about screentime and impact. But honestly, the simple joy and unadulterated fun of the show really end up making up for a lot of the character-juggling and pacing weaknesses. 

The two-parter is basically a huge climax, and episode 12 in particular feels like it's just non-stop action. The huge ISA plan is sort of a mixture of a Bond movie plan crossed with some Silver Age superhero comic goodness. It's neat that all of the villains ends up having a role to play (most of them, anyway; RIP Fiddler for the two minutes of screentime you have in this two-parter) and even Gambler gets to cause a huge communications blackout. But then the episode immediately jumps into Sportsmaster and Tigress's frankly terrifying attack on the Whitmore-Dugan household. Last episode's civilian-heavy episode kind of runs on a 'as the plot demands' shrug on why Brainwave doesn't hunt down Stargirl since he knows her secret identity, but even the two non-superpowered villains attacking the unprepared family is pretty damn scary. I don't think the action scene here brings as much memorable stunt sequences as some of the previous conflicts between Stargirl and the ISA, but it's still harrowing to see Sportsmaster come close to beating an unprepared Pat to death, or Tigress barely missing killing Barbara while she's packing. 

Of course, Pat gets saved by the surprising arrival (and surprisingly violent) of Mike, who had an argument with him just two scenes earlier. And he drills Crusher right in the back! Meanwhile, the moment Courtney gets her bearings, her cosmic staff blasts poor Tigress straight in the face. She's not dead, but it does really show that Stargirl's slowly closing the gap between her and the more experienced villains. 

Interestingly, this Sportsmaster/Tigress fight, beyond being just a cool action piece, also helps to wrap up the "half the Whitmore-Dugans don't know what the other half is doing" bit. Barbara intellectually knows that her daughter and husband are superheroes, and are one foot into wanting to support and help them... but to see Courtney kick absolute ass with her glowing magic staff basically helps her get on-board with the superhero thing. And seeing Pat fight Sportsmaster is way more informative than any awkward father/son conversation could bring. 

The rest of episode 12 is kind of just a build-up as our heroes gather in a surprisingly fancy cabin. With Sir Justin obtaining nourishment in the form of lawyer-friendly KFC and Pat summoning the STRIPE armour, both heroes and villains are doing preparations. There's the odd B-plot of Anaya Bowin teaching her daughter to use musical instruments to beat up bullies (very dark!) before she herself gets killed for insulting Tigress and Sportsmaster's daughter. It's a bit weird, but I guess it's just setup for the next season? Isaac Bowin Junior's going to be a right nasty villain, even if 'the Tubaist' is nowhere as catchy as 'the Fiddler'. 

I think this cabin scene might be where I really sigh and accept that Justin, Yolanda, Rick and Beth aren't going to do a whole ton, but what're you going to do? Rick solves the honestly not very exciting journal B-plot after realizing that his dad's Ford Mustang is the answer, and with Beth and Chuck's help, they plan to assault the ISA base. More interestingly, Courtney and Mike have a very nice sibling bonding moment. The villains are mostly just planning their huge evil plan (and having Brainwave connect to the not-Cerebro-from-X-Men device), although there's the not-unexpected bit of Icicle's parents telling him to not use Barbara as a replacement for his dead wife. I dunno, I know we've got scenes of Jordan looking at Barbara longingly but I also feel like his creepy crush does kind of come out of nowhere. We also get a bit of a contrast where Pat, Barbara and Justin are apprehensive but ultimately supportive of their children fighting the fight, while we get a short scene of Ito shutting Cindy out of ISA business. 

There's a bit of a 'wait, are we fighting the good guys?' when they read the Project: New America manifesto, which is all about eliminating global warming and racial/gender/religious discrimination, and also embracing eco-friendly energy and universal healthcare. With the smaaaall price of having everyone brainwashed and killing around 1/4th of the adult population. The first part ends with Gambler 'hacking Beth's hack', and mocking them into thinking that the countdown is for the project starting, when it's actually a countdown for a speech. All the adults get their brains shut down by Brainwave's huge machine, and Brainwave controls Pat to fight Courtney! Dun dun dunn!

And we get the finale. Which, of course, falls somewhat in the 'could be better' category but I honestly am not nitpicking. It's pretty dang solid. The opening part of the episode is pretty awesome in itself. Stargirl versus STRIPE! The two lead characters of the show fighting! Oh noes! A huge giant Bond villain base rising out of the football field in Blue Valley High! All the adults mind-controlled! The fight is fun, but the biggest part of this little storyline is, of course, Courtney doing a 'I know you're in there' bit and ultimately calling Pat her father. Aww! Not entirely unexpected that a scene like this will take place, but it certainly doesn't lessen the impact of Courtney going to view Pat from just some dork her mother married to her actual dad. Meanwhile, Beth and Chuck manage to take down the Gambler's hacks by hacking his money and spending them, eventually freeing Pat, but the scene is heartwarming nonetheless.

And then we get an action scene! And the action scene was kind of chaotic but also surprisingly fun and actually easy to follow. We've got all the bad guys from the season -- Icicle, Dragon King, Sportsmaster, Tigress -- assembled against the new JSA. Because he's been foreshadowed since earlier this season, Gambler also eventually sics Solomon Grundy on the JSA, which is nice because Rick Tyler gets to deal with his season-long motivation. There's not much to say here, the fight is pretty fantastic and makes pretty great use of fun choreography and some neat CGI. Keeping STRIPE off-screen for a good chunk of the season to save the money for this fight when we see STRIPE, Grundy and Icicle run around with powers is pretty fun.

Oh, and while the Shining Knight/Dragon King rematch ends up with Dragon King's victory, he gets stabbed and seemingly killed off by Cindy, who breaks free from her cell in the chaos. Kind of a well-deserved death for Ito, I feel, considering how shit of a parent he's been all season long. Cindy herself also joins the fight later on, but beyond the obligatory pin-down of Stargirl I think it's hilarious that she actually gets taken out almost unceremoniously the moment Courtney gets her bearings.

And it's just kind of non-stop action with some interesting character moments. Yolanda (who, again, sadly doesn't get much screentime in this season after her initial episode) does get a bit earlier in the episode where she argues with Rick about not killing... but when she gets separated from the others trying to deal with Brainwave, she meets what appears to be Henry King Junior, who claims to have faked his death and pretended to be one of the hooded Dragon King minions. But the choice of words ('your friends' instead of 'our friends') causes Yolanda to figure out what's going on and rip out Brainwave's throat. Granted, it's stupid of Brainwave to ever leave the security of Not-Cerebro, bus that's still an interesting moment. The fallout from this isn't particularly clear beyond some haunting looks from Yolanda, and one would argue that it's certainly a well-deserved villain death, but still... unlike Rick's story, Yolanda's non-killing stance was literally just introduced this episode. So it really kind of loses a lot of the impact. 

Rick, meanwhile, manages to save Pat from Solomon Grundy... but ultimately, seeing the whimpering, animal-like giant zombie cowering and being utterly afraid of him, Rick finds it in his heart to spare and drive off Grundy. It's a complete reversal from how he acted earlier (when Yolanda admonishes him for continually yelling about vengeance against Grundy), and, again, while Rick doesn't get too much of development, it's still nice to see this.

Ultimately, most of the ISA members got beaten down (the show leaves Sportsmaster and Tigress's fate ambiguous), killed or escaped. Stargirl flies around and blows up the giant radar dish. With Grundy running away and Gambler cutting his losses, the rest of the ISA is in shambles. And, sure, you could raise the argument that we're not quite sure at what point the JSA suddenly gets to become a well-oiled fighting machine... but eh, I'm still entertained.


Perhaps the weakest part of the finale, in my opinion, and perhaps in the season as a whole? Icicle. Sure, his debut in the show in episode 3 was pretty badass with him killing one of his allies and ruthlessly murdering a child, but Icicle in this episode is... well, I genuinely felt far, far more threat and gravitas from Brainwave and Dragon King and even Solomon Grundy. Icicle himself seemed to be relegated to part of the B-squad-for-any-given-action-scene alongside Sportsmaster and Tigress, until he disappears partway through the fight to show up, freeze and destroy the Dr. Mid-Nite goggles (a moment that was probably pretty terrible for Beth, but it's also kind of a moment that felt like it didn't quite have the impact it should've) and kidnap Barbara.

And... and, sure, Pat's moment fighting Icicle without his armour just to protect his wife and buy time for his daughter is badass. Sure, Barbara's defiance is cool. Sure, Courtney going up and having the one-on-one against Jordan is neat. But Icicle himself feels utterly under-utilized throughout the entire season and it's like 'oh yeah, we have to deal with this guy'. And his death (?) is even presented as an utterly comedic punch-line with Mike and the dog showing up on a truck and smashing him into itty-bitty pieces. After so much effort trying to make Jordan Mahkent this conflicted, three-dimensional villain and after all the effort with the Yolanda-killing-Brainwave scene, this scene, as batshit-funny as it was, did strike me the wrong way.

And then the episode wraps up. Sir Justin goes off to find his pegasus (and honestly, poor Justin is very much underused, huh? Hopefully he returns with a proper costume next season). Beth's goggles are broken but they resolve to help her fix it. We get our heroes having a nice Christmas dinner and Court and Pat share a nice daughter/father bonding moment -- Court gives Pat the 'best dad' mug she was saving for her own shitbag bio-father. And, of course, we get the obligatory next-season tease with Cindy finding the Eclipso crystal (!!), Shade shows up in the ISA base, and Sylvester Pemberton is apparently alive and looking for Pat.

As much as I'm a huge Shade fan (and Eclipso's cool, at least), I dunno about those bits after the comic book geek in me went 'oh shit that's a character I recognize cool cool cool', considering how under-utilized so many secondary characters in the show have been, I'm afraid that Wildcat, Dr. Mid-Nite, Hourman, Shining Knight and the ISA's children will end up basically being background characters in the second season if we really are going to focus on Shade and Eclipso.

Ultimately, though, a fun little romp of superhero goodness. More, please.

DC Easter Eggs Corner:

• In the original run of Stars and STRIPE, the Courtney-vs-Pat fight was actually reversed. Dragon King's machine in the comics allows him to mind-control children, so it was Courtney that got controlled to fight Pat. 
• The mysterious man with the top-hat is, of course, Shade, another DC supervillain associated with the Injustice Society. Shade has been name-dropped earlier this season and his power glimpsed during the prologue of the show. 
• Shiv finds the Eclipso shard. Originally a simple villain with a magic gemstone that transformed him into an evil personality, later on Eclipso would be revealed to be an ancient demonic being bound to a black diamond. This black diamond, the Heart of Darkness, was shattered into 100 pieces, and anyone angry enough while in contact with one of these shards would become susceptible to being possessed by the shards. Later revelations would show Eclipso's true nature as the original embodiment of the wrath of god, which was replaced by the Spectre. Eclipso has fought against the JLA and JSA multiple times, most iconically heralding the end of the original DC continuity during the lead-up to Infinite Crisis.
• MCU fans will recognize the little girl who Jordan meets while panicking about her brainwashed dad as Lexi Rabe, a.k.a. Morgan "I love you three-thousand" Stark. 

Stargirl S01E11 Review: Winged Victory

Stargirl, Season 1, Episode 11: Shining Knight

This one is a bit of a slower episode, huh? The Brainwave Junior episodes have been pretty intense, building up not just the 'Courtney's family is shattering' storyline but also the Injustice Society finally getting their shit together. And then this episode... ends up not really following up too much on the ISA stuff, but instead ends up becoming a heavy, character-driven 'has the hero finally lost her heroic spirit' style episode that also sort of feels more like a bit of a 'let's finish all of the sidequests' storyline. 

On one hand, Courtney's meeting with her biological father sperm donor Sam Kurtis is one of my favourite storylines from the original Stars and STRIPE run which really ended up being memorable even though I read those comics nearly a decade ago. On the other hand, it does feel kinda weird that it happened at this point just as the ISA stuff is building up. And... and the portrayal of Sam is a bit more expanded upon here than what I remembered the comic being, but there's the double-punch done to Courtney here because, well, Stargirl's Courtney has spent the past 10 episodes stubbornly insisting that she's Starman's daughter and she's carrying his legacy. 

And turns out that his biological father is just... literally some dude called Sam. Who Barbara is absolutely frosty towards, but Sam at the beginning seems at least friendly, decent, and apologetic, trying to make amends. Until, of course, the reason later on that Sam is just there to swindle Courtney out of the valuable locket (which the season has been pretty great at making it something very much associated with Court's obsession over her real missing dad) since it's actually valuable. The actor Geoff Stults (in addition to actually looking kind of like Sylvester's actor) is great, really well-done at being charming while also clearly trying to use all sorts of emotional words to trick Courtney into giving up the locket.

And, well, that assholishness as well as the later crass comment about Barbara really made Pat punching his face feel extra-satisfying. I also get the sense that Courtney totally knows what's going on, and yet she just wants so hard to believe earlier on in the conversation... and later, she just accepts that Sam is a piece of shit and doesn't want to keep the locket of fake memories around. 

Granted, part of me did feel like this is more of a 'well, that's actually well-done' since the Courtney/Sam scenes are one of the most memorable scenes in the comic. It was, personally, for me, the one piece of fiction that really hammer home how a step-family can be a lot better than the 'blood is thicker than water' trope. Some people are just assholes. But it's a pretty great moment for the series, too, particularly with Courtney being forced to confront that the entire premise of her crusade, that she's Starman's daughter and therefore obliged to avenge her dad, is sort of thrown in the trash. Except, well, what this episode really hammers home is that Pat Dugan, for all the mistakes he might've done, is truly Courtney's dad. To quote a Marvel movie, Sam might be Courtney's father, but he ain't her daddy. 

The other parts of the episode... isn't that solid. We don't get a particularly good reason why Brainwave doesn't hunt down the rest of the JSA Junior after killing his son. Okay, sure, maybe collapsing the tunnel allowed the JSA to escape, but I find it hard that Brainwave, Icicle and the loony sports couple wouldn't make it priority numero uno to hunt them down. That scene where Brainwave taunts Courtney at his own son's funeral is sure effectively creepy, but I also felt like it was kinda odd that he wouldn't, y'know, just give her and her buddies an aneurysm beyond a shrug and 'hey, plot demands it'.

In other B-plot storylines... Brainwave's got a power boost from absorbing his son's powers, Dragon Ball style, and Project New America just got that much more deadly. He's also basically pressuring Icicle to go further and further with it. Another B-plot that gets eclipsed by everything that's going on? Mike really not understanding what's happening and begging Pat, Courtney, anyone to tell him what's going on any what he did wrong. That's actually pretty sad. 

The Shining Knight stuff, as much as I do love the character, also felt pretty disappointing. After the little 'hooray' bit earlier in the season that Shining Knight, one of my favourite ridiculous DC superhero, is in the show... he's pretty much just kind of there, not really doing much beyond having confused, amnesiac headaches and speaking in ye-olde-Englishe. He finally gets to meet Pat and his 'fine suit of armour'. We learn that he got his mind shattered by the Dragon King. But for all the screentime and buildup that Sir Justin got, everything we got here felt more like exposition and a huge buildup of 'feel pity for this broken man'. I kinda expected something more. 

One thing that the Shining Knight storyline does have in common with Stargirl's is the fact that 'heroes can come from anywhere' (incidentally, the Star Wars sequel seeming to prop this up before going 'naaaaah bloodline all the way fam' is why I didn't like the final movie all that much). Justin's story isn't expounded much beyond him being a random page that was handed Excalibur... but so is Courtney. She's not Starman's child, but the Cosmic Staff picked her anyway because she's inherently heroic. The final act of Stargirl finally rediscovering her confidence with Pat and Barbara giving a pep talk is actually pretty damn well-done for something that's honestly pretty expected. 

Again, though, it's kind of a shame that the pacing is super-duper slow here. All the Courtney stuff is amazing, but the rest of the episode -- including the character it's named after -- is honestly pretty weak. Really could've done more with either Justin or the Brainwave/Icicle duo. We're building up to a two-part finale, though, and this episode ends with Icicle finally agreeing with Brainwave that, yeah, after everything, they can't let Jordan being sweet on Barbara get in the way... and Icicle even tells Brainwave to kill little Mike! Dang.

DC Easter Eggs Corner:

• Sam Kurtis, and the whole plot about him coming back and basically fooling Courtney out of a precious heirloom, leading to Courtney realizing that her biological father is a piece of shit and Pat is her real father, is taken from one of the final issues of the original run of Stars and STRIPE. 

Stargirl S01E10 Review: Revelations and Confrontations

Stargirl, Season 1, Episode 10: Brainwave Jr.

Okay, I was perhaps too hasty for calling the Shiv two-parter the huge mid-season finale. Because, well, episode 10, 'Brainwave Jr', is clearly meant to be the equivalent to the huge, status quo shaking episode. We have confrontation between the JSA and ISA! We have character development! Secret identity revelations! Romance, treachery, backstory, death! And while I did call the previous episode slightly muted, it's all basically just building up to this one.  

It's interesting that the episode basically starts off with a flashback to Pat and Barbara's first meeting in a diner and ended up sharing a banana split (that diner waitress was totally playing Cupid, by the way, since we see two banana splits later on). This cuts away to the present day, with Barbara finding out Courtney, Pat and the Cosmic Staff, and after several episodes of the father-and-daughter pair being wishy-washy about telling Barbara everything (and after Courtney's broom excuse) we finally have everything on the table for Barbara. Who, after making the obligatory jabs about the absolute lameness of the superhero name 'Stripesy', begins to lay it on pretty thick on her husband and her daughter about just how utterly irresponsible they are. And considering the faux car accident... yeah, Barbara has an absolute right to go ballistic, making the 'civilian parent gets angry about teenage superhero' plot have a fair bit more impact. 

We also get the build-up that, hey, Courtney's "Starman's my dad!" insistence is about to get torn to shreds pretty viciously. Barbara denies it flat-out, and in the episode even sends an email out to get in touch with Court's biological father, Sam Kurtis, which is hopefully going to lead to an adaptation of one of my favourite heartbreaking scenes in the Stars and STRIPE comics. 

I also want to briefly talk a bit of poor, poor Mike, the little brother who tries his best to be mature but he's also just a kid and everyone keeps telling him to go out of the room, this doesn't concern him when he's seeing Pat and Barbara seemingly at the brink of a divorce. And as supportive as the little man wants to be, the sight of everyone essentially shutting him out is kinda sad. I'm not sure if we're going to have an elaborate 'family member finds out about superhero' stuff since we just got one with Barbara this episode. It'd be annoying, but I'm pretty sure they have to do something with Mike, right? After honestly being treated as an afterthought for the majority of the season, I find myself surprisingly invested in the little kid. 

On the bad guys' side, instead of a family breaking up, we have a reconciliation. Or at least, what initially seems to be a reconciliation. I have gone on record saying that one of my biggest pet peeves in fiction is convenient amnesia plots, and this would've been a pretty terrible one. Oh, Brainwave wakes up, and forgets everything about recent events, about Project New America, and seems to be a misguided but good dad who's proud and happy that his son is having the same mind powers that he has. Brainwave seems to have regressed into how he was many, many years ago after his wife Merri (who almost changed Brainwave's view of the world on humans being assholes) died... found in an ice-cold pool. Considering the lengths we've seen Icicle do things, of course we -- and Henry Junior -- assume immediately that it's Icicle that killed Mirri Pemberton (who also happens to be Starman's sister, oh what a small world). The 'damn you Jordan' in Brainwave's tape is also a pretty delightful red herring. 

Thus distrusting Icicle, Henry Junior returns to the hospital too late, because Brainwave and Icicle are already palling around, and the Cosmic Staff, who goes off to fight Icicle on his own, gets one-shotted and frozen by Icicle. Henry Junior sees it all but manages to hide. And, well, ultimately all he can do is seek out Courtney, literally the only person who he can trust to help him. Courtney, who, herself, is dealing with her parents fighting and her missing Cosmic Staff. I also absolutely love the meeting between the two. "My dad's lost his memory!" "That's good! ...I mean, that's bad!" as well as the instant decision to adopt Henry as her cousin because he's the son of Merri Pemberton. That's hilarious. 

Of course, the rest of the JSA refuses to hear of this, especially Rick and Yolanda. Rick's constant noting that they're going to have to take out Brainwave as well ends up causing Henry Junior to get aggressive too... but ultimately the JSA helps out although Yolanda does give an ultimatum that she's just helping Courtney to keep her alive, but they're no longer friends after this. 

I also do love that the show is giving Barbara some agency. Sure, she's panicking, planning to leave Blue Valley and taking Courtney away from this superhero madness... but she's also researching Starman on her own. The thing is, both Pat and Barbara's priorities of keeping the kids safe are on-sync, and when they actually do bump into Jordan Mahkent, Barbara acts smart and ends up recording his Norwegian-speaking parents. Sure, she's angry at Court and Pat, but that doesn't make their enemies any less supervillains. They don't discover much from the senior Mahkents, other than the revelation that Jordan likes Barbara and that there's some mysterious machine. 

The episode, of course, culminates in the JSA (and Brainwave Jr) going off to the underground base. Stargirl, Wildcat and Brainwave Junior recover the Cosmic Staff and fighting against the Dragon King's henchmen while Hourman and his one-track mind gets distracted by the cage with Solomon Grundy in it and tries to rip the door open. The fight scene in here is pretty neat even if it's just against a bunch of mooks, coupled with the revelation of the Dragon King's lizard-man face and Cindy just yelling in the background begging to be allowed to join the carnage and kill Courtney. Meanwhile, Brainwave has recovered his memory, and Henry Jr is clearly not happy at the cold-hearted asshole his dad truly is. Conflict! Sure, they get the staff back and zapped the Dragon King, but Rick ultimately just wastes time trying to open Grundy's cage and Brainwave is unleashed. 

The JSA are forced into a retreat, and, hey, it seems like this whole episode is a recruitment episode for Brainwave Junior, right? His dad's redemption and rehabilitation is aborted by Icicle and Dragon King; and he also discovers that Icicle might've killed his mom to ensure his dad's compliance. And while the rest of the JSA hates him, his 'cousin' Courtney likes him enough, right? Except not really. As they arrive on one of those RPG sewer dungeon gratings and they slip through the bent metal gratings courtesy of Hourman, Brainwave Senior arrives and faces off against them. Henry Jr uses his mind powers to forcibly send Courtney into safety before confronting his dad.

And Henry Jr tries his best to get through to his dad, talking about how people aren't monsters, talking about his mom... until we get the revelation that, no, Brainwave was the one who killed his own wife to strengthen himself to 'make a choice', and he's going to make one now. Brainwaves Senior and Junior fight... and Brainwave Senior straight-up just executes his son, whacking him with giant chunks of debris bringing the entire tunnel collapsing above Henry Junior, bringing us yet another casualty of battle -- this time a character we've actually spent time building up instead of a literal 'hi I'm here for the week' guest star like Joey Zarick. And just before he dies, of course Henry Jr manages to at least redeem himself -- apologizing to Yolanda and encouraging Courtney to continue with her belief about 'people are good'. 

And for a character that has mostly been a background presence alternating between 'jock' and 'mourning' and only really had any sort of proper screentime in episode 9 and 10, it's amazing just how well-done they wrote Henry Junior's eventual character change. The death is well-written and, while not super-original, pretty engaging. I'm not sure if the temporary amnesia for Brainwave was necessary for it to work (all it really functioned was to delay Icicle knowing about Courtney = Stargirl), but it somehow did. And ultimately, the episode serves what it's meant to serve -- the huge escalation before the ultimate final fight of the season. We've got one of the major villains being brought back to prominence, we've got a major character death, and our heroes are at the backfoot. I'm also surprised at how well the Barbara stuff ended up being portrayed, considering how these sort of storylines don't tend to always come off well. Anyway, a pretty fantastic episode. 

DC Easter Eggs Corner:

• The Girl of a Thousand Gimmicks, a.k.a. Merri Pemberton, is the adoptive sister of Sylvester Pemberton in the comics. She is a vigilante who uses a lot of gimmicks as weapons, and as here, he also married Henry King Senior and is the mother of Henry King Junior. She's not dead in the comics, though. 
• Brainwave Jr (or sometimes just "Brainwave", and sometimes with a space in the name), a.k.a. Henry King Junior, is a superhero who was bequeathed his powers by his dying father, the reformed supervillain Brain Wave. Brainwave Jr. was part of the original Infinity Inc, and would waver back and forth between being a hero or a villain. Evidently, this backstory and character history was vastly altered for the show. 
• "Snapdragon", the name that Courtney mis-calls the Dragon King, is actually the name of the Dragon King's project in the original Stars and STRIPE.
• One of the emails in Barbara's computer is from "RoyalFlushC", a reference to the playing card based Royal Flush Gang from the comics. In the comics, Sam Kurtis was a low-ranking member of the Royal Flush Gang for a while. 
• Barbara mis-names Icicle as 'the Iceman'. That's an X-Man, Barbara, wrong comic-book publishing company. 

Stargirl S01E09 Review: Brainwave, Year One

Stargirl, Season 1, Episode 9: Brainwave

So after the pretty intense Shiv two-parter, we delve into a pretty interesting episode focusing on another child of a member of the Injustice Society -- Henry King Junior. So far, the show has been pretty simple in splitting its characters into neat 'good guy' and 'bad guy' categories. And sure, Jordan and Cindy may have some sympathetic qualities to their backstories and their day-to-day life, but the show also emphasizes how off the deep end they are. And it's been pretty simple. Courtney and her family; her nice schoolmates; the weird janitor... they're all good guys. The bad guys are all villains, and the children of the bad guys are, so far, either villains or blissfully unaware. And being typecast as a typical jerk jock in the first two or three episodes and coming into conflict with Courtney and Yolanda, Henry King Junior sure fits the bill, right? Except he's been mourning his comatose dead throughout the season, and last episode's little origin story plunges Henry Junior into the fact that not only is he a telekinetic superhuman, his dad is also a supervillain and his girlfriend has been planted to watch over him.

Simultaneously, this episode also serves as a bit of an origin story for Henry King Senior (hereby referred exclusively as 'Brainwave' so I don't have to keep going back and forth) via a brief flashback and little VCR tapes that Henry Jr finds in his father's creepy supervillain closet. It's... it's kind of interesting how they basically show us Brainwave's delve from being a man who's constantly scared due to his own abusive father; how he was scared and confused of his powers; discovering he can cure his migraines after he killed a mugger and blinded a lecher; and ultimately he was corrupted into into being a supreme misanthrope that views all humans as absolutely ugly and trash underneath it all. And with Henry Junior being absolutely confused and all of these recordings not only come from someone with the same powers at him but his very father... yeah, it's not surprising how halfway through the episode Henry Junior is leaning dangerously close to becoming a psychotic supervillain himself. 

Yet this is where Courtney comes in. Realizing what's going on with Henry Junior from the climax of the previous episode, Courtney realized just how confused and panicked Henry Junior is, and while it's a bit naive on her part to immediately assume that Henry Junior could be JSA material, the logic that Courtney employs -- that Henry Junior, while a dick, is not a bad guy. And that hand of hope, that olive branch, is ultimately what causes Courtney and Henry Junior to become buddies. Unfortunately, Courtney is the only one who feels this way. Pat treats it with indifference and caution at best, while the rest of Courtney's JSA, especially Yolanda, is outright hostile at the idea of Henry Junior hanging out with them. 

Unfortunately, Henry Junior having powers is also something that the Injustice Society really needs. Having had their mysterious New America supervillain plan (they casually just reveal they want to brainwash half of America with the devices they've collected) hit a snag due to Brainwave being comatose, Dragon King decides that they can use Henry Junior in his father's stead. To complicate matters, Henry Junior awakening his own powers causes Brainwave to start waking up from his coma... and Courtney's attempts to talk to Henry Junior gets him to read from her mind that Courtney was responsible for putting Brainwave in a coma in the first place. The dialogue is honestly a bit clunky, and it's more or less just setup. Ultimately, while Henry Junior drives Courtney away, he is left thinking about it.

Slightly later on in the episode, Yolanda shows up as Wildcat to fight Henry Junior, threatening to gut him and leave him bleeding to death if he ever comes near Courtney and her family. It's honestly a bit understated and Yolanda, Beth and Rick have been put on the backburner ever since the JSA-formation episode... but it's a pretty powerful moment, Yvette Monreal actually feels threatening, and it raises a bunch of interesting questions about Henry Junior's eventual fate in the show. Again, it's nothing particularly novel, just a case of 'can an antagonist who wants to redeem himself make amends to his victims?' bit, but one that I feel is done neatly enough. Of course, when Henry Junior gets to meet a particularly asshole lawyer who wants to kill Brainwave to get some compensation money, he ends up using his Brainwave powers to kill the lawyer... an act that somehow wakes Brainwave up. Cliffhanger!

There's a bit of a B-plot with Barbara inviting the entire Mahkent family to the Whitmore-Dugan household for dinner, and there's the general awkwardness of Main Superhero and Main Supervillain saying grace together without realizing who the other is. For his part, Jordan seems genuinely happy to see this girl that his son has been crushing on (with the obligatory jumpscare of 'I know all about you', rendered a bit extra effective after the Shiv stuff last episode) and I think he kinda maybe has a thing about Barbara? Ultimately, Courtney has her suspicions that Jordan is actually Icicle, because he uses his powers to cool a plate of chicken dumplings. Kinda comes out of nowhere and feels a bit too silly for my taste, honestly; although I do like the thematic and very teenage-girl worry of Courtney thinking that Icicle's son Cameron might also be a villain. 

Also kind of silly and worth pointing out is the Norwegian grace that the Manhkent clan says before praying. Cameron has no idea what it is (he takes elective French) but essentially it's them promising the vengeance of Niflheim (are we in Thor now?) towards their enemies. That's like, so random and kind of over the top. 

Other than that... we do get a bunch of extra world-building exposition. Turns out that the Seven Soldiers of Victory also exists in this continuity, and they fought the Dragon King before he became a creepy sewer lizard-person that joins up with the ISA. There's also exposition through Rick and Beth's off-screen research that Blue Valley is built over a network of tunnels by Freemasons or whatever. We get more Janitor Justin scenes, but nothing super concrete. Also, the establishment that Cindy has basically disappeared, with some cover story or other of her going off on rich-girl holidays. The actual Cindy is in a cell, trading barbs with her lizard dad. That's it for our resident psychotic cheerleader, I guess.

Oh, and the cliffhanger! Courtney and Pat arguing about using the staff to hunt down Icicle, only to be witnessed by Barbara. This is honestly the sort of superhero story trope I've never been the biggest fan about (which is why I am so pleased the MCU's Spider-Man kept Aunt May discovering and freaking out over his superhero identity off-screen between movies), always finding it kind of repetitive, but in Stargirl and it's more family/small-town drama setting, it actually kinda fits. Ultimately, not the strongest episode, but still a fun watch. 

DC Easter Eggs Corner:

• Pat reveals that he was part of the Seven Soldiers of Victory in this continuity as well, which is also a superhero team that he was and Star-Spangled Kid were part of in the comics. Alongside the characters that have already appeared in the show (Star-Spangled Kid, Stripesy and Shining Knight), the other members of the original Seven Soldiers of Victory are:
• Green Arrow, a.k.a. Oliver Queen, is an archer who was once a rich millionaire who was inspired by Robin Hood and ended up going around fighting crime. Green Arrow is one of the few heroes to actually remain unchanged and not rebooted during the Silver Age (albeit he did get the now-iconic Van Dyke beard in the Silver Age).
• Speedy, a.k.a. Roy Harper, is a teenager trained by his father in the art of archery, and upon his father's death, was adopted by Oliver Queen. Speedy would become Green Arrow's sidekick, and later on, one of the founding members of the Teen Titans.
• Crimson Avenger, a.k.a. Lee Travis, is the very first superhero published by DC comics, preceding even Batman and Superman. Originally debuting with a trenchcoat and fedora, Crimson Avenger would later adapt a more superhero-y look. While the origins for Crimson Avenger have changed over the years, he's basically someone inspired to take up vigilantism, battling with gadgets including a gas gun that created crimson smoke. 
• Vigilante, a.k.a. Greg Saunders, is the first superhero to have the name 'Vigilante', a cowboy-themed, well, vigilante who went back to his hometown to exact vengeance to a gang of bandits that killed his father. While not a super-powered individual, his hand-to-hand combat skills earned him a place among the Seven Soldiers of Victory. 
• Wing is Crimson Avenger's valet and sidekick, and is the unofficial eight member of the Seven Soldiers of Victory. 

Stargirl S01E08 Review: School Girl Fights

Stargirl, Season 1, Episode 8: Shiv, Part Two

Okay, this is another pretty interesting episode even if a good chunk of it is just sort of wrapping up the plot threads raised by "Shiv, Part One". With Courtney severely injured, Pat quickly gets her to a hospital and also rams his Buick onto a tree to make up the car accident story that he sells Barbara later on. A good running story throughout these episodes is that Courtney and Pat really struggle on whether they should tell everything and spill the beans to Barbara or not, but it's one thing to keep the information to themselves and disguising training sessions as learning to drive, and actively creating a fake accident as a cover story to hide the fact that Courtney was nearly damn well killed fighting supervillains.

It's pretty interesting that we cut away from a father/daughter relationship where both daughters have fucked up. Courtney for going into a fight without backup; and Cindy for going into a fight against her father's express orders. But where Pat's consumed with guilt and is just far more glad that Courtney's alive more than anything, Dragon King's a complete jackass to Cindy, continuing to bring up the fact that Cindy killed her mother, playing down Cindy's admittedly good first outing as a supervillain, and constantly pointing out her failures before dismissing her. Again, Cindy's not a perfect daughter or whatever, but seeing her getting absolutely zero recognition or praise from her father really does explain why she ends up being such a rotten egg.

The rest of the junior JSA, meanwhile, are divided. Rick is absolutely livid and is ready to go town on Cindy Burman, eye-for-an-eye style, but Beth ends up talking him down by noting that they need to find out more information about who Cindy's parents are. This ends up in a pretty interesting scenario where Cindy goes off to visit the house-bound Courtney in the guise of an apologetic friend, while Beth and an unfortunately dragged-along Pat gets roped into infiltrating Cindy Burman's house and dealing with the ambiguously-human-and-maybe-a-robot-or-a-clone Bobbie Burman. This sequence jumps back and forth between the two groups, as well as Henry King Junior discovering that he has mental powers (and that his dad is a costumed supervillain) in a pretty traumatic way.

I really do like the pair of scenes, particularly Courtney and Cindy. The show really plays off on the 'does she know?' angle a lot, and Cindy initially just seems genuine in trying to apologize to Courtney for her 'bad day' and trying to reach out to the one person that doesn't dismiss her outright as a bitch. And... and, sure, Cindy still acts like a complete dick while hanging out in Courtney's room, calling it 'thrift store chic' and acting like a complete princess, but it's not hard to see why Courtney lets her guard down. Maybe she is just apologizing? Courtney totally knows that Cindy is Shiv, though, and I do like that it's not until Cindy is about to leave the Whitmore-Dugan residence that she reveals that she figures out the whole 'Stargirl' deal because, well, it's just a mask and both Stargirl and Courtney are blonde girls that got injured at around the same time. I really do like just how the show really could've gone either way, that Cindy is genuinely being nice to Courtney while wanting to murder Stargirl in a Peter Parker/Harry Osborn dynamic.

Interestingly, and in what's a very in-character choice, Cindy is actually keeping her knowledge of Stargirl's identity a secret from Ito or the rest of the Injustice Society. Stargirl, after all, is her prey, her achievement and hers to kill. That's a pretty interesting situation that makes Cindy's place in the show as a villain so much more unique than just another member of the ISA.

Pat and Beth's little sojourn into the mysterious creepy house of Cindy Burman is interesting only because Beth's chipper attitude and perfect acting while she walks around the house conversing with 'Chuck' is so entertaining to watch. As is Pat as he is completely uncomfortable and scared that he's putting himself and a bunch of schoolchildren at risk. The comedy as the two of them stumble over each other's cover story is also hilarious, although ultimately Beth doesn't figure out anything too much that the audience doesn't already know. Cindy's dad is the Dragon King (Ito's existence doesn't even faze Pat) and there's a secret door that leads to a creepy underground tunnel. Ultimately, while there's the tension that Cindy might reach home and see the JSA in action or any other Injustice Society member might show up, this is just kind of a low-key wacky adventure, and Yolanda manages to get Beth out before Cindy catches her.

Until, of course, the fact that the episode actually closes with another Courtney/Cindy fight. Cindy straight-up threatens to kill Courtney's friends, so Stargirl ends up striking first, going alone (damn it, girl, learn from your mistakes) and fighting Shiv one-on-one when the other girl is letting her guard down at her own house. Sure, Shiv might not have her super-suit, but she still has those cybogr arm-blades thing and Stargirl nearly gets herself defeated again if not for the timely arrival of Henry King Jr and dr. Ito's hooded minions. Henry King Junior, able to read minds and absolutely confused at what's going on (his dad's a villain, so is his girlfriend, there's also Stargirl who apparently put his dad in the hospital) ends up unleashing his powers and knocking everyone aside. This ends up with Shiv being dragged by Dr. Ito's minions down into the sewer while she protests. Oops!

Other B-plots that happen in this episode? Mike's little jealousy fit is absolutely just shoved aside because the kid feels absolutely terrible for being a bit of an ass to Courtney in the previous episode and just apologizes and shares some pizza bites with his sister. That's cute. Also, Pat has a surprisingly heartfelt scene talking to a goddamn inanimate staff about the difference between Sylvester and Courtney, and that's somehow one of the more heartwarming scenes in the episode. There's also Icicle killing some dude, too, which I mis-attributed to the previous episode. Barbara... has a weird series of glancing and meeting Jordan's eyes a couple of times in the episode, but that's also something that goes nowhere.

Overall, a neat little set-up/cooldown episode. Not one that's super-duper solid on its own and a pretty mellow one, but the character interactions and the dynamic between Cindy and Courtney is definitely well done.  That's where the show's going with this episode in particular, and with Shiv seemingly out of commission (albeit no thanks to Courtney), it's interesting to see where the show will go from here.

DC Easter Eggs Corner: 

• The new password the ISA uses is 1999, which is the year that Stars and STRIPE (and Courtney Whitmore in general) was first published. 
• Cindy being dragged by her father's minions into a sewer is taken from Stars and STRIPE #7.

Stargirl S01E07 Review: Cindy's Bad Day

Stargirl, Season 1, Episode 7: Shiv, Part One

Okay, I've been enjoying Stargirl a whole ton, but this episode is actually pretty dang good! I really didn't think much of having a lot of school cast members. Sure, I thought that they'd be relevant at some point -- there's no way Henry King Jr isn't going to be, well, Brainwave Jr (minor spoilers), and I know about Cameron, Artemis and Cindy's comic-book alter egos. But for the most part, I genuinely thought that this season was going to focus mostly on the Injustice Society, for a teenagers-vs-adults style of story.

And then, of course, this episode kind of turns that concept over its head by showing that the children of the bad guys are also very much interested in their family's legacy. On one hand, you have Icicle's son, Cameron Mahkent. Icicle gets a couple of recurring scenes throughout the episode that primarily focus on how even so many years down the line he's still mourning the loss of his dead wife, and even goes around killing people that are only tangentially related to his wife's death (he kills someone who didn't blow the whistle). Yet for all his scariness, Jordan still tries to be a good dad to Cameron, and wink-wink-I-killed-that-guy dark jokes aside, for the most part he's supportive to Cameron, telling him to go out and pursue love before it's too late. And while I'm not sure about how this would mean for Cameron down the line when Courtney inevitably fights his dad, it's certainly a stark contrast to the other prominent bad-guy-child in this episode.

Enter Cindy Burman, a very prominent supporting character for the past six episodes. After Henry King Junior's brief stint as a big bully is crushed when his dad was hospitalized, Cindy is basically number one in standing for Blue Valley's top teenage bitch. For the most part Cindy's horribleness tended to revolve around verbal abuse and that terrible nude-picture-exposure thing she did to Yolanda, but turns out that not even her friends are free from her wrath. She's nothing but dismissive and outright rude to her boyfriend being sad over his comatose dad because of something as insignificant as prom. She's a catty bitch because her cheerleader friend got a date to the prom and she didn't. She's extra-horrible to the janitor.

And then... and then there's the chemistry class. Cindy's distant and arrogant, even, but after a bit of exposition from Beth on how Cindy became horrible after her mother died, Courtney tries to give the benefit of the doubt and be friendly, getting a little friend-date to hang out in the Homecoming night. Simple, right? Courtney can befriend everyone, why can't she befriend alpha bitches? And honestly, this was where I thought the story was going to go with this. Cindy's a horrible person, of course, but maybe she's just a bitch with no friends because of family circumstances with a dad who can't be a good parent. And that's kind of true to a degree.

...and then we get the scene in her house. She's absolutely terrible to her stepmother, treating her as less than dirt and essentially blackmailing the poor woman into giving her wine and stuff because Bobbie Burman is absolutely terrified of Cindy's dad. And Cindy's dad? Doctor Shiro "Dragon King" Ito, of course, who has had a bunch of minor appearances in previous episodes. And while the scene seems to be set up as Cindy finally learning about the Injustice Society as she eavesdrops into a meeting (we don't learn much, but they really needed Brainstorm for their plans). But no! Turns out that Cindy is hungering for a seat at the table, she's already got superpowers (some Wolverine-style daggers in her wrists), she kills one of her father's brainless goons without a second thought and she just wants to prove herself to get a seat on the table. Basically what every teenager goes through, but with murder and supervillain armour-suits instead of 'may I go to prom, dad?'

Meanwhile, her dad, Dr. Ito, really isn't that much better. In addition to owning brainwashed slaves and whatever he's done to poor Bobbie Burman (apparently 'prepared' by him? I guess she's a clone or something), he also forces Cindy to date Henry King Jr in order to see if he has inherited Brainwave's powers. Which, while certainly doesn't excuse her behaviour, puts Cindy's antagonist of Yolanda for stealing her boyfriend in a whole new light. Highlighting Dr. Ito's "parenting" style honestly feels like it's meant to purposefully be a contrast to good daddy Pat Dugan. And where Pat forbidding Courtney to do some things comes from a place of concern and protectiveness, Dr. Ito wants to simply control. Again, just like Icicle a couple episodes back, the episode does a great job at making Cindy be somewhat sympathetic (it's clear that part of her lashing out is because of her own insecurities) without undermining any of her alpha-bitch parts.

Courtney, meanwhile... does a bunch of stuff. Pat's dorky yet earnest attempt to get some JSA training with faces painted on buckets ends up being a bit of another exposition scene... and Stargirl just shows off with her cosmic staff and her bravado, pissing off not only Pat but also her JSA buddies who actually do feel like they needed the training. There's then the ball game, where we get a pretty interesting fight between Courtney and her stepbrother Mike, who's super-duper jealous of the time that Courtney is spending with his dad -- the fact that Court and Pat's excuses include things like 'oh yeah, we're learning to drive' alienates poor Mike even more. It's a scene that doesn't go on for too long, but one that is pretty dang effective.

Speaking of other scenes that doesn't go on for too long but is pretty effective? Henry King Junior cheats on a math test after discovering his mind-reading powers. Also, Cameron asks Courtney out to the dance, while she ends up rescheduling her friend-date with Cindy right before the climax of the episode. Again, none of these ran for too long, but are very effective in building up the story of the show's characters.

Courtney, meanwhile, is focused on superhero stuff, highly hyper-fixated in proving that their principal Anaya Bowin is part of the Injustice Society as the Fiddler. It's understandable; uncovering the Fiddler is something that Courtney and Yolanda found out on their own without Pat's help. Just like Cindy on the other side of the pond, Courtney has something to prove. And to be fair, Courtney does discover that Anaya Bowin goes around in secret doors and walks around the catacombs underneath the school. That's progress! But she does it without the backup of Pat or her JSA buddies.

Which leads to the very thrilling fight. Cindy, in frustration after being 'dumped' by even Courtney, ends up waltzing into her father's base and finds out that this "Stargirl" lady is running around in the ISA base. Seeing a chance to prove herself, she steals the pretty cool super-suit and the dragon head staff, and leads to yet another thrilling fight between her and Stargirl. The action scene is absolutely great. And, sure, there's a fair bit of 'obvious CGI' and 'obvious choreography' if you're going to be nitpicky. But this doesn't make the fight any less enjoyable, and, again, Stargirl honestly has hands-down the most entertaining superhero fight scenes in TV. There's a particularly cool bit where Courtney accidentally burns half of Cindy's face off while they were dancing around like a trophy case or something and goes "oh no!" in panic before going "oh, no" when Cindy shows off some healing-factor stuff.

And while she's gotten some setbacks in the past couple of episodes, for the most part Stargirl's confrontation against Brainwave, Icicle and the sports duo have ended up in either her winning or driving away the enemy. Not so here. Shiv beats Stargirl so badly that she gets unconscious and nearly killed if not for the arrival of Janitor Justin, the god-damned janitor with his sword (who is still enigmatic, but I know exactly who he is -- very cool that he's actually been around since episode like two or three, but I didn't even think he's going to be relevant). Even the Cosmic Staff has to hover off and grab Pat to help.

Anyway, a very thrilling way to build up Cindy Burman up as a character, and to also expand on several other plot points. Shining Knight, Dr. Ito, Henry King Jr, Mike Dugan, Cameron Mahkent... everyone gets something to do here. Easily one of the strongest episodes of Stargirl so far.

DC Easter Eggs Corner: 

• Shiv, a.k.a. Cindy Burman, is one of the main antagonists for Stargirl's original solo comic-book series, Stars and STRIPE. A good chunk of her portrayal here is faithful to her original appearance in Stars and STRIPE, where she's the cybernetically-augmented daughter of the Dragon King who ends up encountering Courtney in school. Shiv's abilities included a suit that granted her super-strength and bladed weapons (though TV!Shiv seems to have the blades embedded in her body, Wolverine-style) and a staff that can turn into a snake. 
• It's not outright stated, but the sword, the horse and the speech patterns marks the mysterious janitor as none other than Shining Knight! Debuting in Adventure Comics and being associated with superhero teams like the Seven Soldiers of Victory, All-Star Squadron and both the JLA and JSA, the Shining Knight is Sir Justin, who was a knight at King Arthur's court. Granted with a magical sword and a winged steed, Victory, by the wizard Merlin, Sir Justin was frozen in ice during a fight with the ogre Blunderbore, and woke up in 1941 where he ends up fighting alongside other heroes during the World Wars in the modern day; a knight out of time. 
• Shining Knight recognizes Pat as Stripesy, a not that the two characters were among the seven that formed the original Seven Soldiers of Victory.
• "Star-Spangled Bitch", of course, is a nod to Courtney's first superhero name, Star-Spangled Kid.

Stargirl S01E06 Review: To Make A Superhero Team

Stargirl, Season 1, Episode 6: The Justice Society

So this is the big payoff for the first half of the season. The formation of the brand-new Justice Society of America. It's honestly kind of a shame that Pat and the villains actually ended up being sidelined for such a huge part of the past two or three episodes, but otherwise the pacing's been more or less pretty decent to get us here.

I do really like just how utterly cocky everyone is, though. Courtney has always been reckless, Yolanda's not too big on restraint and Rick puts the two of them to shame. Beth's a bit better, but she's so eager to jump into all this fun superhero stuff that she doesn't really act as the brakes for the team. And being the only non-combatant among the quartet, she's way too eager to try and tell everyone about news that her A.I. buddy, the disembodied ghost-voice of Charles McNider, is telling her.

I really do like the pretty realistic conversation between Pat and Courtney, which is a very effective way in removing Pat from the main meat of the storylines in the past couple of episodes. Pat doesn't see the struggles that Rick and Yolanda goes through. He doesn't know what becoming the new Wildcat or Dr. Mid-Nite meant to Yolanda and Beth. All he knows is that these are unknown quantities, and they might very well get themselves killed just like poor Joey Zarick. The fact that someone had died -- and Pat saw his entire superhero team get killed in a single night -- makes Pat's concerns so much more realistic instead of reducing him to the don't-have-fun guy.

The problem, as the episode shows us... it's hard to even consider it. As Courtney tries to bring up the courage to talk to them, Yolanda and Beth are both thanking Courtney for the incredible, life-changing purpose that they've gotten from becoming their respective superheroes. (I do really like that we get a bit of a connection to the 'legacy' theme when Yolanda researches her predecessor, Ted Grant, and gets super-duper inspired by his life) When Courtney rips the band-aid off and asks for the superhero gadgets back, all she gets is an understandable set of 'fuck you's. Even Pat's attempt to talk to Rick ends up with Pat speechless because, for better or for worse, Rick is able to utilize his father's legacy, the hourglass, better than Pat will ever be.

And there's also the fact that, well, Pat really didn't think to utilize any of the gadgets before. Sure, maybe the Hourman hourglass, the Cosmic Staff, Green Lantern's lantern and presumably the Thunderbolt refuses to work for Pat. But as the junior JSA discovered, literally five minutes after Beth looks into Rex Tyler's plot device notebook, they get something via Dr. Mid-Nite's goggles. Sure, it isn't much and the plot moves straight into superheroics. Beth's goggles ends up discovering that Dr. Mid-Nite's old nemesis, the Gambler, is doing some hacking villainy. And, well, as the new JSA points out... he's just some schmuck that's great at hacking. He doesn't even have cool superpowers like Icicle or Brainwave, he's basically easy meat.

The problem is, of course, the audience is also simultaneously following the story of other members of the ISA -- crazy sports-fanatic parents Lawrence "Crusher" Crock (the gym dude we got introduced to in episode 1) and his wife, Paula Brooks. Who to the world looks like just a pair of overly-enthusiastic sports parents, but we quickly establish that they're tied to the ISA when they talk to the Gambler... and they killed the coach that benched their daughter Artemis for getting into a fight. Honestly, I love this pair. Nevermind the fact that they somehow got the comic-book looks into extreme accuracy (as much as I love the CW-DC and Netflix-Marvel shows, we don't get any sort of 'military kevlar is more realistic' bullshit here), I absolutely love that somehow, they made these two adorable. As adorable as sociopathic parents who kill gym teachers are, of course, but there's just a hilarious charm seeing the two of them get excited when Icicle lets them off the leash to bodyguard Gambler's hacking job, or them turning into awkward parents talking to their daughter about going for a date night (and suggesting an ideal workout routine). There's a very fun cartoon/comic-book-y energy to them.

Of course, a good chunk of this episode's appeal comes from the last 10 minutes, which is just a genuinely well-done superhero action scene. The past couple of episodes have all been super-light on action scenes and... this might probably be my favourite sort of action scene? Flashy nonsense, slow-motion wire-fu... it's genuinely a delight to watch. Sure, I really do love the more adrenaline-pumping realistic explosions of the big-screen movies or the super-gritty fights in the Netflix shows, but there's also something to be said about watching Tigress and Wildcat jump on and off walls while exchanging blows, or Sportsmaster using baseballs to whack Hourman and knock him off-guard, or that particularly cool double-team takedown that Sportsmaster and Tigress did to take out Stargirl. The fight choreographer had fun, really knowing the sheer fun and ridiculousness that comes with a character whose gimmick is 'fights really well with sports gear'. Just look at that scene where Sportsmaster catches Tigress and gives her a twirl and they hold a pose. It's not particularly realistic, but neither is anything in a superhero show. So yeah, I absolutely love the fact that they embrace the very comic-book-y aesthetic. Very fun without falling into campy ridiculousness. Everything here from the mid-battle pose and the exploding baseballs are all played straight -- they might be goofballs, but they're also serious villains that pose a threat, and I feel like the show just strikes the perfect balance between the two.

And as much as Hourman and Stargirl might have abilities that wouldn't make a regular human (as well-trained as the gym-rat couple are) stand a chance, I really do like how the episode highlights just how disorganized and overconfident the JSA are. Stargirl, having been out fighting Icicle and Brainwave, has slightly more experience than them. But there's a very great scene where the four kids just stop dead at the sight of the corpse of a security guard. Sure, they've got superpowers and super-gadgets... but at that point, the danger just became real. And they might feel invincible, but people like Sportsmaster and Tigress have made a living fighting -- and killing -- other superheroes. Which is why Hourman, too secure in his strength, gets absolutely overwhelmed by Sportsmaster. Or how Wildcat, with her super-suit and gymnastic training, is absolutely no match for Tigress until Dr. Mid-Nite comes in with a convenient fire extinguisher. Yolanda and Rick are easily the ones that have the biggest power trip from their newfound superpowers, and are also the first two to be taken out by the more experienced supervillains. Superpowers (or a super-suit, in Yolanda's case) they may have, but they don't have adequate training or the mindset to actually be in a fight for their life. In the end it's Stargirl that puts up the longest fight, but even then she also gets taken out of the fight. They didn't even manage to stop the Gambler; all they did was get him to shut off his 'Timber' music.

And, well, the JSA manages to stop themselves from getting killed by exploding hockey pucks with the simultaneous arrival of STRIPE in his big scary robot-man armour as well as the Gambler's mission being done. The only victory the good guys have here is the fact that all four kids survived a fight against far, far more experienced fighters. I do really like the final scene, though, of Courtney ranting to Pat the difficulties of essentially, well, herding a bunch of teenagers. Pat and Courtney have a bit of a laugh when Courtney realizes that her own rebellious streak is giving Pat the exact same problems, but hey, at least everyone is on the same page and Pat's ready to try and mentor a new generation of superheroes.

Other than the JSA and the Sportsmaster/Tigress date night, there are a bunch of side-plots going on. Icicle gets a bit of a monologue regarding Project New America, there's an off-hand mention about how Principal Bowin is the wife of the original Fiddler, Yolanda learns about Ted Grant, Pat gives Rick a speech about his dad putting a limiter on powers, and Mike makes a volcano out of chocolate. Mike's probably the longest side-plot out of this, I feel. The family drama is, of course, the least interesting part of the show but I am intrigued that Mike's basically being tsundere about his dad coming to see his science fair project. Granted, Pat's actually dealing with superhero stuff, but the crushed look on his face, and the delight when his step-mom Barbara shows up. That's neat.

Now if you'll excuse me, I'll rewatch that action scene again. That's awesome.

DC Easter Eggs Corner: 

• We've talked about them lightly before, but yeah, this episode marks the formal present-day debut of superhero couple Sportsmaster and Tigress, as well as their daughter, sometimes-supervillain and sometimes-hero Artemis Crock, although she's still basically a civilian at this point. We've spoken about the rough origin stories of Sportsmaster, Tigress and the Gambler before. 
• The shot of the JSA standing with STRIPE behind them was glimpsed during CW's Arrow/Flash/Supergirl/Legends Crisis on Infinite Earths. 
• They're using hand-me-downs, so Rick is using Rex Tyler's yellow-caped suit (comics!Rick has reverses the yellow and black) and Beth is using Charles McNider's green-hooded suit (comics!Beth has a unique costume distinct from the other Dr. Mid-Nites).
• The access code password is 1941, which is the year that the Justice Society of America debuted in the comics. 
• A blink-and-miss-it easter egg is that one of the theaters is playing the movie 'Strange Adventures', a 244-issue comic book focusing on science fiction stories published by DC comics. Later, some of the stories would be retconned to have involved the original JSA in it. 

Stargirl S01E05 Review: Teenage Vengeance

Stargirl, Season 1, Episode 5: Hourman and Dr. Mid-Nite

And after spending the last episode centering around Yolanda, "Hourman and Dr. Mid-Nite" focuses on two of the obvious recruits to Courtney's JSA Junior. I suppose that it's good in terms of pacing, having one-hero-per-episode would probably get a tiresome a bit fast. I didn't mind the Wildcat episode per se, but it would definitely be a bit tiresome if we had every single episode be focused on one of Stargirl's team's origin story without really advancing any of the JSA/ISA story. That said, though, until I sat down and looked up the title of this episode, I genuinely did think that this was the full Hourman episode and episode 6 would be the full Dr. Mid-Nite episode. I suppose we're just lumping the two in while focusing more on Rick's backstory? I still think we'll get a full, proper Beth episode somewhere down the road.

Granted, Beth Chapel has probably been one of the more prominent side-characters with the most screentime in the first three episodes until we get the full Yolanda Montez focus in episode 4. Being geeky, socially awkward and a bit too forward, and just wanting to be helpful, Beth is so easy to be likable! She's figured out what Stargirl and Wildcat are, and during Beth's attempts to go into the Dugan-Whitmore house and talk to Courtney, she ends up stumbling upon yet another JSA gadget (thanks, convenient doggy friend!), namely the goggles of Dr. Mid-Nite.

Said goggles contains an A.I. version of Charles McNider, essentially making it slightly more believable that someone would properly explain to Beth and catch her up about the whole JSA thing without too much exposition on Courtney's part. Beth honestly spends most of the episode as being super-helpful and super-excited, but Yolanda's just kinda grumpy and Courtney is too nice to drive her away but also unwilling to think of her in the same ballpark of badassery as herself, Wildcat or Hourman. For what it's worth, though, I did like the focus on her, she just motor-mouths her ways through every single conversation with Courtney and Yolanda, it's hilarious. Beth's actual story, as we see it, is something relatable but not really explored too much, the idea of a couple of parents who see that their kid has grown up to be independent and they want time to be themselves. It's neat, and Beth's actress is pretty great, but ultimately it's definitely the backseat compared to the Courtney/Rick stuff.

The bigger focus, of course, has to be Rick Tyler. He gets the flashback that reveals that he is the son of the first Hourman, Rex Tyler. We've established that Rex was investigating Blue Valley before Pat Dugan showed up, and was presumed killed in a car crash. Rick is raised by an asshole of an uncle who keeps selling his car parts and is outright hostile to Pat (who's trying to be nice to Rick). We get a nice scene of Rick frustratedly punching the tree that killed his parents -- and later on, when he gets the convenient superpowers, Rick punches the tree and knocks it down. Unlike Courtney, Yolanda and Beth; Rick embodies the complete other side of the superhero spectrum. He's not doing it because it's right, or because he thinks it's cool and fun, but straight-up out of vengeance. Something that is solidified when Beth's Mid-Nite goggles allows them to see what actually happened that day, that Rex and Wendy Tyler were killed by Solomon Grundy of the Injustice League.

Courtney's attempts to recruit Rick is far, far more disastrous than her being a good happy friendly cheerful girl to Yolanda, too. Thinking that Rick's basically 'destined' to carry on the Hourman legacy like how she's destined to carry on the legacy of totally-her-real-dad-trust-her Starman, Courtney just gives the Hourman necklace (it's an ambiguous magic necklace than super-drug pills, which is a very necessary update) to Rick without even considering Yolanda's complaints about how Rick's kind of a giant antisocial douchebag, even moreso than Yolanda herself. Granted, sure, Rick is literally the only person who can use the Hourman hourglass because of DNA reasons, but still.

And Rick, well, just takes the hourglass necklace and runs with it, punching his uncle's truck. It's not quite supervillain levels of power abuse (he leaves his asshole uncle alone), but still. Sure, Beth ends up bringing the team together by telling Rick of the whole Solomon Grundy thing, but that alliance between JSA Junior is one out of convenience more than anything for the revenge-obsessed Rick Tyler. There's also a neat subtle theme of parenting, too, where Courtney and Rick's respective father-figures really ended up being in stark contrast to each other.

Ultimately, it's... it's honestly pretty basic. Rick's story is pretty neat and executed very well, and it certainly ties in into the bigger-picture plot of the JSA-vs-ISA storyline. And yet... it's kind of one-dimensional, y'know? Especially compared to Yolanda in the previous episode. It's not terrible, though, and it's clearly just them introducing the audience to the new Hourman and Doctor Mid-Nite pretty quickly so we can get into the actual superheroing in the next couple of episodes.

Of course, with episode 4 and 5 focusing on Courtney Whitmore's recruitment drive, everyone else is basically in the background. The rest of Courtney's family are basically just there for one-off gag scenes, while Pat... Pat's there, but he really doesn't do much. He sort of befriends Rick but didn't catch the connection because Rick's using a pseudonym last name (and Rex had kept his existence a secret from both the ISA and Pat). He gets to interact with Rick's asshole uncle Matt, but beyond the contrast of their parenting styles there's really nothing there. Pat tells Courtney about the existence of the Fiddler, but what they found out about Principal Bowin last episode is too little to really connect her to the supervillain. He did find the Green Lantern lamp at the end of the episode, so a confrontation between Pat and Courtney might be incoming.

Other things that happen in this episode? Cindy Moon dresses up as an absolutely killer teenage vampire, but she's a complete bitch even to her supposed-boyfriend Henry Jr, who briefly seems to display a weaker version of his dad's mind-reading power. Foreshadowing! The Injustice Society is doing something nefarious in the background. Sharpe/Gambler is meeting people in theaters and paying them with chocolate coins (he doesn't have any superpowers, I don't think, and he shoots some chump at the end with a gun), and at the end of the episode we get to see her and Principal Bowin (who is the Fiddler with violin powers) hijack some sci-fi equipment or something. It sure is something, but the bad guy stuff is kind of too nebulous and will probably only really make sense later on.

Definitely weaker than the previous four episodes, but it's not a terrible episode. It's very fun, and I get the fact that they just want to blitz through character introductions before we get to the main meat-and-potatoes of the story. Again, a good part of why Stargirl is so strong is just how well-done the acting and how charming most of the character are.

DC Easter Eggs Corner:

• Hourman II, a.k.a. Rick Tyler, is the son of the first Hourman, Rex Tyler. In the comics, Rex was a distant father who was either caught up in superheroing or his addiction to the super-serum Miraclo which gives him super-strength for the duration of one hour and has a cooldown of 23 hours. Rick and his father came to a massive disagreement when Rick took some Miraclo during the events of Crisis on Infinite Earths to save Beth Chapel. Rick would become the second Hourman on-and-off, and temporarily retired when Miraclo gave him severe medical side-effects. After his father's death and being cured of his disease, Rick would succeed him as Hourman in the Justice Society, using a non-addictive variant of Miraclo. 
• Dr. Mid-Nite II, a.k.a. Beth Chapel, is a medical doctor that succeeded the first Dr. Mid-Nite, Charles McNider. Chapel was blinded by an oxygen explosion, but thanks to a derivative of the Miraclo serum from Rick Tyler, gained the ability to see in the dark. Chapel, who parsed her alter-ego as "Dr. Midnight", joined Infinity Inc. only to be tragically killed by the supervillain Eclipso. (The far more prominent Dr. Mid-Nite successor was Pieter Cross, one of my all-time favourite DC comic superheroes)
• Artemis Crock appears! Made particularly famous in the Young Justice cartoon, Artemis Crock (a.k.a. just Artemis) is a sometimes-superhero, sometimes-supervillain depending on what part of her history you read her in. I won't talk too much about her since it'd probably be spoiling things down the line. 
• Red Bee, a.k.a. Rick Raleigh, shows up as a hero killed by having is secret identity exposed, as told by the robotic voice of Charles McNider. Red Bee's superpower was fighting with a 'bee gun' as well as trained bees in his belt buckle, and is often derided as one of DC comics' more lame superheroes. He was ultimately killed off in the pages of All-Star Squadron, and for the most part Red Bee was mostly used more as a gag. 
• The little data bank on the Mid-Nite goggles lists Red Bee as being associated with the superhero teams All-Star Squadron and the Freedom Fighters. 

Stargirl S01E04 Review: Legacy Hero

Stargirl, Season 1, Episode 4: Wildcat

This is a pretty... all right episode? It seems that Stargirl is going to spend the next couple of episodes basically on a bit of a recruiting spree. All the characters that are going to be in Stargirl's JSA Junior have already essentially shown up (other than maybe Jakeem Thunder, if he's even going to appear this season) but they were all in the background. It's honestly pretty obvious for both comic-book readers and those introduced to these characters for the first time that all these kids that Courtney meets in school would be involved and important somehow. And if it isn't already apparent, this episode makes it so. 

There is admittedly the odd, slightly off bit of pacing where episode 3 ended with the gruesome, tragic death of Joey Zarick after he got caught up in Stargirl vs. Icicle, and it's just a bit odd that Courtney is so dead-set on recruiting more teenage students to join her little superhero club... but the writing and earnest acting by Brec Bassinger does sell Courtney's motivation pretty well. And sure, it's a bit hand-wave-y, but Courtney saying that she can't trust adults since they might be Injustice Society members kind of makes sense, I guess. While I don't want this entire episode to be "Courtney is depressed and angsty", it's still kind of jarring just how pushy she is in trying to get Yolanda Montez to become a superhero. 

That said, the episode itself is a pretty solid outing. Courtney is insistent and persistent, but, again, the acting and writing does make Courtney end up being charming instead of irritating. More importantly, if the show's going to slowly bring up more and more characters, we're thankfully going to explore who they are. And I feel like the 'origin stories' for these characters are going to be less about how they gain superpowers -- Courtney's superhero McGuffin delivery service duffel bag does that on its own -- but for Yolanda, we get to explore the bits and pieces of her story that's been dropped as an obligatory scene in every episode prior to this. 

We learn about why Yolanda is basically being slut-shamed by the entire school into being an angry, anti-social girl who pushes everyone away. And resident alpha-bitch bully Cindy is the genesis of all this, although Yolanda doesn't know this and she instead blames her ex-boyfriend, Henry King Junior, for spreading the nude photographs. There's a pretty nice showcase of Yolanda's perfect life before the spread of the photographs -- her family is supportive, her friends are supportive, her boyfriend is a cool dude, and she's on the run to be the student council president or something. And then because of a couple stupid decisions that teenage kids make -- and because Cindy is an awful human being who ends up engineering that photograph being spread right as Yolanda is giving a speech in front of the school... her life comes crashing down. 

We've seen her get bullied throughout the season, and late in the episode we get to see how much her family is essentially treating her like a shame, a stain on the family. It's not explicit, but Courtney's insistence that it's Henry's fault for spreading the nude pictures instead of putting all the blame on Yolanda for taking the photos is probably one of the first times that anyone's really defended her, to spin her situation from her being condemned and vilified as a slut into her being a victim of bullying. And that's probably why the grouchy Yolanda is so willing to get roped into Courtney's crazy superheroing gig. That and the fact that Courtney plays into Yolanda's own anger at Henry. They have what's essentially a common enemy. A common enemy that Yolanda very nearly kills (or maims)... but she stops short of doing it when she sees Henry crying next to the bed of his comatose dad. 

And... okay, Yolanda becoming Wildcat is perhaps not the most exciting thing ever, although I did like the Wikipedia search scene. It's nowhere as exciting or magical feeling as, say, Courtney's own discovery of her legacy as Stargirl. The show tries its best to make it feasible that Yolanda isn't just hanging on gymnastics training to be a vigilante, and takes a page out of Marvel's Black Panther movie. The Wildcat armour is form-fitting, presumably armoured a fair bit and has retractable claws. The two of them essentially go straight into trying to figure out the Injustice Society stuff without much of a planning and, honestly, Courtney's basically putting Yolanda in a lot of danger. To the show's credit Yolanda actually realizes this at the end of their own near-disaster of an infiltration sequence -- they didn't have any real plan, they didn't think that a cabal of Illuminati-esque supervillains would be able to cover the tracks of something like hospital visitation records, and if not for the Cosmic Staff actually interfering, they might've even cause a whole ton of damage to the hospital. 

Ultimately, Yolanda decides to not be the Wildcat and instead use this little fun superheroine-night-out to embrace herself and get some confidence... only to be immediately shot down by her family. Realizing that Courtney's probably the only person in Blue Valley who believes in her and sees her worth, she decides to be Wildcat at the end of it. Honestly? The entire episode isn't super-duper exciting, neither does it move the plot forwards or whatever. All they discover is the Wildcat suit, and the only real developments is that Principal Bowin plays a violin in Brainwave's room (which may or may not mean that she's the Fiddler) and Beth Chapel might've figured out that Courtney and Yolanda are superheroes. Still, I do like it, for what it's worth. It's a very solid episode that really puts Yolanda's character and backstory in great perspective. 

There are a couple of B-plots, of course. Pat mostly takes a backseat and mostly interacts with Denise Zarick, being warned about the creepy people in town... before Pat finding out that Denise has probably been killed off-screen by the Injustice Society since her car and her cat are left in the junkyard. Poor Zaricks, that's very depressing. There's the aforementioned Beth seeing and realizing what's going on with the JSA-junior. And we get to see Icicle meet up with a hooded villain, Dr. "Dragon King" Ito, a mad scientist who wants Wizard's body for his experiments. It's not the best or strongest episode in Stargirl's retinue, but it's an all right one. 

DC Easter Eggs Corner:

• Yolanda Montez in the comics is the second Wildcat. Unlike the original Wildcat and her god-father, Ted Grant, Yolanda was an actual metahuman with superhuman reflexes and cat-like claws thanks to experimental drugs given to her mother by a mad gynecologist attempting to create metahumans. During the Crisis of Infinite Earths, Ted Grant was crippled while saving a child, and Yolanda assumed Grant's identity as the Wildcat, joining Infinity Inc and the Shadow Fighters superhero teams before ultimately falling in battle against the supervillain Eclipso.
• Incidentally, I am actually surprised that they made a fake in-universe Wikipedia page for Wildcat that described how the public viewed him within the context of the show's history. I half-expected them to just take Wildcat's actual Wikipedia entry. 
• Dragon King, a.k.a. Shiro Ito, was a high-ranking official and scientist in the Japanese government during World War II, most notably battling the All-Star Squadron and weaponizing magical artifacts like the Holy Grail. Dragon King is actually one of the first arc villains in the Stars and S.T.R.I.P.E. comic book run, being responsible for infiltrating Courtney's school with robot teachers. 
• While it's unclear if Principal Bowin is actually a supervillain at this point, her namesake in the comics, the Fiddler, is a supervillain that used a violin to hypnotize his prey. 
• The Shade is revealed to have betrayed the Injustice Society at some point. In the comics, the Shade was always a villain that skirted the line between being a villain and something more of an anti-hero. 
• I'm not sure if the "Miss America" jab is actually intended as an easter egg, but it is the name of a Marvel comics superhero.