[7.7/10] The third act is what makes this one. I cannot deny the rousing spirit of Cyborg, Starfire, and Raven bursting into the Brotherhood of Evil’s lair with their allies and giving the baddies the ol’ what-for. There’s so much fun, invigorating action in the big confrontation there, and it’s a fitting climax for the Titans’ battle against The Brain and his henchmen.
But I have the same complaint about the first two-thirds that I did for the prior episode. If this is the big climactic moment for Teen Titans in its final season, then why don’t we spend it with more characters the audience knows and cares about? Pantha, Herald, and Jericho are all fine. (Hell, by the end of this, I got a big kick out of Pantha.) But we just met them! We know next to nothing on who they are or what they’re about. Why are they so in focus for this final hurrah? Even Menos, who I enjoy quite a bit, hasn’t exactly gotten a lot of shading up to this point.
I get what “Titans Together” is trying to do here. (Or, at least, I think I do.) They’re trying to do a “How far Beast Boy has come” tale, and that means putting him in a leadership position for once. But there’s a few problems with that. First and foremost, Beast Boy is my least favorite character on the show, so putting him front and center is always going to be starting things at a deficit. Second, you basically already did this routine with Cyborg in season 3, and to better effect, so Beast Boy’s adventures already feel like a lesser duplicate. And third, it means less to see Beast Boy leading a group of heroes who don’t mean anything to the audience because they haven’t been established.
Why oh why didn’t they just put him with Gnark, Red Star, etc. instead? It has meaning when the rest of the Titans show up with those allies in tow because we’ve not only had an episode to get to know each of those characters, but we’ve seen relationships develop between them and the Titans. As much as I disliked Raven’s episode with the pint-sized heroes, there’s at least some resonance to her arriving with them because they’ve had a chance to bond that the audience witnessed. Beast Boy just shows up with three randos and Menos, which doesn’t have the same resonance.
Still, there’s at least something to appreciate here in Beast Boy overcoming his hesitancy and slip-ups from when he was in the Doom Patrol, and leading the charge to beat the Brotherhood of Evil in the here and now. The theme is that he never gives up which, in true Teen Titans fashion, is a little generic, but still a solid enough place to land with the character.
(As an aside, I have a more general complaint about the season arcs. While each Titan was involved in the big to-dos each year, one Titan in particular was more in focus than the others for each annual arc. Robin was in season 1. Beast Boy was in season 2. Cyborg was in season 3. And Raven was in season 4. But here in season 5, Beast Boy got more of the focus again. Why didn’t Starfire get a turn?)
That said, once Beast Boy’s adventures are mostly concluded, and it’s more of an Endgame -presaging massive battle between every hero and every villain we’ve ever met, “Titans Together” is made of awesome. Most of what we get are mere minor cameos, some with baddies or good guys we barely know, but the majority of them are at least quite fun. These kinds of gargantuan team-ups feel like the seventeen layer dip of action scenes, but that has a charm and an energy all its own, and I am not immune to it.
By the same token, I love that we got closure to the Kid Flash/Jinx storyline! Again, that matters because the show spent time with these characters, so seeing what they do and closing off their arcs leaves an impact. Jinx helping the good guys, wiping away her old teammates, and striking back at Madame Rouge is downright triumphant.
If that weren’t enough, this episode had the most practical solution to The Brain’s fusion bomb, which was a real treat. When Cyborg announced that it was a bomb he’d never seen before and wouldn’t be able to defuse it in time, I rolled my eyes and thought to myself, “Why don’t you just have the guy who can make portals send it somewhere else?” But then they did! I can’t tell you how refreshing it is to see a superhero show take the most direct path based on its heroes’ powers like that.
I also enjoy the Brotherhood of Evil being hoisted by their own petard with the freezing situation. The opening to this episode felt very Empire Strikes Back in its sense of the good guys at their lowest point. The carbonite-esque freezing only added to that. There is a thrill, however, to Menos breaking his brother out of the frozen goop, and catharsis in the team using the same mechanism to trap the Brotherhood. Likewise, it’s pleasant to see the Titans and all their allies hanging out in the tower, prepared to overwhelm poor Dr. Light with a greater force than he’d ever imagined.
Overall, this one gets big points for how it ends. There is something roundly satisfying to the conclusion of this Brotherhood of Evil arc (assuming the next episode is more of an epilogue than a continuation), which is not an easy thing to pull off. I had to dock a fair amount of points for the tiresome way in which this one proceeds through its first two acts, but ultimately, it’s still a great conclusion to the season and the series, which counts for a lot.
Review by Andrew BloomVIP 9BlockedParentSpoilers2021-09-02T19:00:24Z
[7.7/10] The third act is what makes this one. I cannot deny the rousing spirit of Cyborg, Starfire, and Raven bursting into the Brotherhood of Evil’s lair with their allies and giving the baddies the ol’ what-for. There’s so much fun, invigorating action in the big confrontation there, and it’s a fitting climax for the Titans’ battle against The Brain and his henchmen.
But I have the same complaint about the first two-thirds that I did for the prior episode. If this is the big climactic moment for Teen Titans in its final season, then why don’t we spend it with more characters the audience knows and cares about? Pantha, Herald, and Jericho are all fine. (Hell, by the end of this, I got a big kick out of Pantha.) But we just met them! We know next to nothing on who they are or what they’re about. Why are they so in focus for this final hurrah? Even Menos, who I enjoy quite a bit, hasn’t exactly gotten a lot of shading up to this point.
I get what “Titans Together” is trying to do here. (Or, at least, I think I do.) They’re trying to do a “How far Beast Boy has come” tale, and that means putting him in a leadership position for once. But there’s a few problems with that. First and foremost, Beast Boy is my least favorite character on the show, so putting him front and center is always going to be starting things at a deficit. Second, you basically already did this routine with Cyborg in season 3, and to better effect, so Beast Boy’s adventures already feel like a lesser duplicate. And third, it means less to see Beast Boy leading a group of heroes who don’t mean anything to the audience because they haven’t been established.
Why oh why didn’t they just put him with Gnark, Red Star, etc. instead? It has meaning when the rest of the Titans show up with those allies in tow because we’ve not only had an episode to get to know each of those characters, but we’ve seen relationships develop between them and the Titans. As much as I disliked Raven’s episode with the pint-sized heroes, there’s at least some resonance to her arriving with them because they’ve had a chance to bond that the audience witnessed. Beast Boy just shows up with three randos and Menos, which doesn’t have the same resonance.
Still, there’s at least something to appreciate here in Beast Boy overcoming his hesitancy and slip-ups from when he was in the Doom Patrol, and leading the charge to beat the Brotherhood of Evil in the here and now. The theme is that he never gives up which, in true Teen Titans fashion, is a little generic, but still a solid enough place to land with the character.
(As an aside, I have a more general complaint about the season arcs. While each Titan was involved in the big to-dos each year, one Titan in particular was more in focus than the others for each annual arc. Robin was in season 1. Beast Boy was in season 2. Cyborg was in season 3. And Raven was in season 4. But here in season 5, Beast Boy got more of the focus again. Why didn’t Starfire get a turn?)
That said, once Beast Boy’s adventures are mostly concluded, and it’s more of an Endgame -presaging massive battle between every hero and every villain we’ve ever met, “Titans Together” is made of awesome. Most of what we get are mere minor cameos, some with baddies or good guys we barely know, but the majority of them are at least quite fun. These kinds of gargantuan team-ups feel like the seventeen layer dip of action scenes, but that has a charm and an energy all its own, and I am not immune to it.
By the same token, I love that we got closure to the Kid Flash/Jinx storyline! Again, that matters because the show spent time with these characters, so seeing what they do and closing off their arcs leaves an impact. Jinx helping the good guys, wiping away her old teammates, and striking back at Madame Rouge is downright triumphant.
If that weren’t enough, this episode had the most practical solution to The Brain’s fusion bomb, which was a real treat. When Cyborg announced that it was a bomb he’d never seen before and wouldn’t be able to defuse it in time, I rolled my eyes and thought to myself, “Why don’t you just have the guy who can make portals send it somewhere else?” But then they did! I can’t tell you how refreshing it is to see a superhero show take the most direct path based on its heroes’ powers like that.
I also enjoy the Brotherhood of Evil being hoisted by their own petard with the freezing situation. The opening to this episode felt very Empire Strikes Back in its sense of the good guys at their lowest point. The carbonite-esque freezing only added to that. There is a thrill, however, to Menos breaking his brother out of the frozen goop, and catharsis in the team using the same mechanism to trap the Brotherhood. Likewise, it’s pleasant to see the Titans and all their allies hanging out in the tower, prepared to overwhelm poor Dr. Light with a greater force than he’d ever imagined.
Overall, this one gets big points for how it ends. There is something roundly satisfying to the conclusion of this Brotherhood of Evil arc (assuming the next episode is more of an epilogue than a continuation), which is not an easy thing to pull off. I had to dock a fair amount of points for the tiresome way in which this one proceeds through its first two acts, but ultimately, it’s still a great conclusion to the season and the series, which counts for a lot.