Justice
League
Only A Dream
Original Airdate - 10/11/03
After
a five star outing last week for the second season premiere,
Justice League takes a few steps back this week with
Only a Dream.
Prison
inmate John Dee dreams of life outside of jail fighting along
side his heroes, The Injustice Gang. He dreams about it so
much he's volunteered as a test subject for a secret project
the prison is working on that gives people ESP (Metropolis
really knows how to spend its tax dollars).
After
failing to make parole and getting dumped by his wife, John
risks everything during a prison riot and subjects himself
to an overloaded blast of the ESP machine's energy. Before
long he's wearing a cape, looks like a skeleton and calls
himself Doctor Destiny.
John's
new powers revolve around the world of dreams. Similar to
Freddie Krueger, he is able to take over the dreams of anyone
sleeping and trap them in their nightmares. If left too long
in the dream state, the victims die. After the Justice League
round up the escaped convicts in a very cool sequence, they
begin looking for John and discover his ex-wife screaming
in her sleep. Soon, most of the Justice League is trapped
inside their worst nightmare.
Doctor
Destiny is creepy at times and definitely the scariest villain
we've ever seen on Justice League. His face melts off, he
looks like Skeletor from He-Man and he calls himself a Doctor
despite the fact that he has no medical training.
That's
truly the stuff nightmares are made of.
Dream
episodes are always tricky. On one hand, they are very cool.
It's always interesting to see the psyche of our favorite
super heroes. What does Hawkgirl have nightmares about? What
is Superman's greatest fear? These are intriguing questions,
perhaps, but we've seen the answers.
Hawkgirl
has nightmares about being buried alive which makes sense
if you look at DC continuity and count the number of times
she has died. Superman lives in fear of being too powerful
and accidentally hurting the people he cares about (the writers
set up nice continuity cameos with appearances by Perry White,
Lois Lane and Jimmy Olsen looking like they did in Superman:
The Animated Series.)
Their
nightmares are not overly clever and are probably what you'd
imagine they were if you wer asked. The writers are smart
enough, however, to recognize that we don't need to see Batman
or Martian Manhunter's nightmares. We already know that MM
has lived through his nightmare of watching his race die and
Batman's nightmares were given their own half hour show back
during the run of Batman: The Animated Series. Wonder
Woman isn't in the episode this week, presumably because her
nightmare involves falling out of her top and they just can't
show that on Cartoon Network.
 Justice
League is moving further away from being a kid's show
and catering more towards the young adult audience. For the
second week in a row, a character has died and the beginning
of Flash's nightmare involves little kids with sharp teeth.
Also
for the second week in a row, Flash got the stuffing knocked
out of him by the bad guys and had to rely on his team for
help. Does Bruce Timm seriously hate Flash? He has some of
the best one liners in the show but if he's just there for
comic relief, replace him with Plastic Man.
I'll
take it all back if this all leads up to a Flash episode where
he turns evil and beats everyone up.
Despite
a lackluster main villain, Only a Dream did feature
a baker's dozen of cool cameos. Most of the Injustice Gang
was featured during the prison break, as well as villains
from previous Justice League episodes. Solomon Grundy
was the most fun as he battled Superman and Martian Manhunter.
Someone at Warner Brothers has been playing the Hulk video
game, because all of Solomon Grundy's moves during the fight
were straight from it. I know because I'm in the middle of
the game and I love doing that Gamma Radiation slap.
Firefly
and Volcana made an interesting duo as they tried to outdo
each other's fire abilities. Volcana was playing hard to get
but I think she's hot for him. Volcana: "That's your flamethrower?"
Firefly: "Wait till you see how I use it."
Even with
the cameos and funny one liners this week, the main plot wasn't
as good as last week. That's the double edged sword of having
a great opener.
Derek's
Continuity Corner: The Hawkgirl in the show actually
hasn't died over and over -- she's a pureblood Thanagarian,
not the eternally reincarnated Egyptian warrior woman. But
I wouldn't put it past Timm and company to be setting such
a thing up...
Dr. Destiny
plagued the Justice League many times, though originally without
the skull face. His tapping into dreams re-launched both the
current JLA series at DC and Neil Gaiman's Sandman,
where his more homicidal tendencies first came into play.
And boy,
I'd love to see Plastic Man join this show.
Next
Week: "Maid of Honor" Wonder Woman befriends a jet-setting
Kasnian princess. (Sexually?)
|
