Review: Young Justice: Outsiders “Elder Wisdom”

LUTHOR: ‘OUTSIDERS SAD.’

The episode begins with news coverage of a UN Climate Conference at the (fictional) African nation of Bwundasa, Where Lex Luthor (who still works for the U.N. as a Secretary advisor) appears with Troia & Tempest doing a Photo-op, however it’s interrupted by a terrorist group called the the “Bwundian Independence Front” who also attack Troia within her hotel room. While the attackers wish to de-throne the so-called “tyrant general” in charge, they underestimate The Outsiders stepping in lead by Beast Boy to proceed and form an assault team on the ground. In the aftermath of stopping the attack, Lex gets General Mbarra (the leader of Bwunda) to sign off on inviting the League to stop the attackers, and this ends up being a public relations fuck-up for the Outsiders. However, the kids aren’t idiots and suspect Luthor was behind this attempt, that it was a false flag, but can’t prove it.

In the aftermath, several Outsider members are now at odds with their parents in regards to putting themselves on the line since they’re now more public with their superhero antics compared to the Justice League causing concern for their well being, it’s a great scene intercut with another mission some of the other Outsider members are on involving some Professor Ivo’s “Robot Monkeys” and Lex-Corp “Spider Robots” in Dublin Ireland. This also leads to another scene where Luthor gets dragged by the Anchorman G. Gordon Godfrey on live television, but much of it has not-so-subtle parallels to Trump and using a Superhuman “Registration act” of sorts which screams “Immigration laws” but that ends up going horribly wrong on Lex’s end when we learn that the parents of several Outsiders reveal to be nothing but supportive to their hero-kids leading Lex to approach his strategy towards this situation a little differently.

However after all the Social Media/PR crap that took a good portion of the episode in-between the action, what got my attention the most about this episode was how it didn’t waste time with Violet’s storyline, with her telling Brion/Geo-Force about her lesbian kiss along with the indirect role her hosts body played in the part of his parent’s deaths. Unlike some of the other yet to be resolved plot threads throughout this show, the proverbial “truth bomb” Violet dropped was somewhat refreshing, no matter how difficult it was. It didn’t drag for half the season or overstay it’s welcome like anything CW’s been crapping out lately. While Brion’s reaction was less than thrilled, it’s commendable that the show’s writers had Violet come clean with him and his sister Terra, considering Violet still has a few more secrets that she’s keeping from her friends. But I think an even bigger reveal was the twist ending involving Batman’s crew and what they’ve been up to. Let’s just say, it’s something Wonder Woman finds highly objectionable, while the last shot shows us Violet writing something down.

Our Take

There was a lot for me to process regarding this episode. So much drama, political intrigue and behind the scenes machinations from both sides that it can be hard to determine who’s worth trusting and who are even doing the right thing at all. For Lex’s solution to deal with the Outsider’s antics, it has broad strokes of misinformation and fake news invading all aspects of the superhero world with Lex Luthor being at the helm with all of it with his secret ties with “The Light” who are basically the Supervillain Illuminati at this point. Also, the scene when Lex says “Sad” is reminiscent of those Trump Tweet Memes which got a genuine chuckle out of me too.

As for Violet, I don’t even understand what Dr. Jace’s endgame is for helping her or the fact that even after a year has passed that she’s still somehow alive despite being told by Jace she has “only a few months” left to live, yet Jace still encourages Violet to keep that shit a secret which you’d think would be essential to those who actually care about her. And like most dramas, this mostly works as a cautionary tale of how well-intentioned lies can sometimes lead to heartbreak, mistrust, and fear.

With the way this episode ended, I wouldn’t be surprised that Violet would be writing a “Goodbye” letter of sorts and who could blame her after Brion & Terra’s reactions?.