Greg Bishansky writes...

After last week's somewhat lackluster episode of "Young Justice," I'm happy to be able to say... NOW THAT'S MORE LIKE IT!

The team seems to have come together, and it was cool to see them handle their first mission. I also loved how they determined who should lead. Usually once the leader is selected, he remains the leader for the duration of the series. But Aqualad as a placeholder until Robin is ready to lead is a pretty inspired take.

The character dynamics were fun. Seeing Miss Martian swoon over Superboy, who was being a jerk to her last episode was sadly quite true to life (seriously, do women like being mistreated?), but it was nice to see that Superboy has lightened up quite a bit, and is treating her much better now. He also seems to be developing a sense of humor. Looks like there is hope for him.

Now, to discuss the villains. I thought the timing of this episode was great, since it was only a few days ago that Bane (played by Tom Hardy) was announced as a villain in "The Dark Knight Rises." I also enjoyed this take on him. Smart, cunning, and utterly ruthless. This is a guy who I can see being as smart as Batman, and it was nice to see that take on him since, outside the comics, Bane has never been depicted as all that bright. I also loved Danny Trejo as his voice, perfect casting there.

I've never heard of Sportsmaster before tonight. His name is beyond hokey, but I liked him as an emissary of the Light. I'm sure we'll see more of him. Speaking of the Light, it was nice to get confirmation that Mr. Twister was working for them last week.

And finally, the Cult of the Kobra, who I have heard of. I liked them in this episode, they were fun. Although they felt like an imitation of Marvel's Hydra, but to be fair, they always felt like that. I suppose I could make a joke about GI Joe's nemesis, Cobra, but I won't. Still, as far as comics go, Hydra was always the original ruthless, terrorist organization determined to rule the world. Oops, guess I did make that joke.

All joking aside, I enjoyed Kobra, and his scheme. Mixing the Venom with the Blockbuster serum produced some pretty creepy results. I was surprised to see that much muscle and tissue ripping through torn skin on a cartoon. But I also enjoyed how understated, and calm Kobra himself was (and that was always how I thought Cobra's Emperor, Serpentor, should have been played, but that's another series and era).

The animation remains gorgeous, and I hope it stays that way.

I give this one a solid A. Loved it.

Laura 'ad astra' Sack writes...

Not that you probably have the time to do it even if you wanted to but... I heard the Peter David will be writing some episodes of Young Justice. Should the opportunity present itself, would you like to write a story in his version of YJ like he is writing in yours?

Anonymous writes...

how old are flash, batman and superman?

Bazell writes...

I am under the impression that you guys created your aqualad for the show and DC followed suit by introducing a version of the character into it's main Universe. This is correct?
I'm curious about the level of communication between the major parties in the seperate character developments. Did you clearly delineate your origin and characterization to the comics team so that they could purposfully create a different character will only intentional overlap, or was there no sharing (beyond the basic look and powers) so that each team could create their own character without undue influence of the other (kind of like the way you have described avoiding much of the 90s Spider-Man show to avoid influence upon creation of Spectacular Spider-Man)

Anonymous writes...

Hey Greg one of the stronger internet rumors going around about Young Justice is that one of the main characters is gonna die. This speculation comes from that comic-con video about young justice. Now I seem to be the only person in the world who seems to think that this meant that your show wasnt afraid of killing off characters when necessary. (already in the first episode Mr. Freeze kills a ton of civilians(well I'm assuming they died because you said that your trying to anchor some of the science in the real world))

So I was wondering are we free to keep on speculating about the death of a team member or was this a misinterpretation of informaton given?

Anonymous writes...

Hello Greg,
I was watching YJ on Sunday and I was curious as to what brought Mr. Twister (a robot version)to be the villain of the week? Considering the original human only faced Robin Aqualad and Kid Flash once and decades ago.

Ozaline writes...

How could the bioship have blocked the YJers from Twister's line of site, in episode 3? It's invisible and we see the ground underneath the ship from Twister's perspective and we see Twister through the ship from the YJers perspective. It seems to me that it could have acted as a shield but it shouldn't have cloaked the children who were not inside it.

Paul writes...

I heard that there won't be any more two-parters in season 1 of Young Justice. Did you and Brandon Vietti decide to make the series premiere the only two-parter of the season or did Cartoon Network tell you that you could only have 1 two-parter in the first season?

Wilco writes...

A year ago I rediscovered the Gargoyles, by accident. I'm from germany and the last time I saw Gargoyles was back in 1998, so I was like "WTH?" when I switched through all those stupid TV channels here in germany and all of a sudden I stumbled over Gargoyles. I was about 8 years old, the last time I did see the show (and never actually understood the storyline), Gargoyles was just sooo cool back then. I love watching those Disney Afternoon tv series (Darkwing Duck, Talespin and stuff), but completely forgot about the Gargoyles. Thanks to the internet I found out, that they re-air Gargoyles in germany: Every sunday two episodes, since 2008! And they still air it and don't seem to take Gargoyles off-air for another year. I think you must be very proud of Gargoyles. Anyways after I discovered Gargoyles again I watched the complete show and what can I say? It's a true masterpiece but the last 12 episodes were strange. The Gargoyle Chronicles are aired with the intro of the second season here in germany, but I'm aware of them now. :D This time around I finally understood the timeline and everything. Brilliant! I couldn't resist and ordered the three TPB of Gargoyles/Bad Guys. Again: Brilliant, but just too short. I imported both DVDs and received them a week ago. Thank's god there are region free dvd players around! I like watching some movies in the original language and that's what I'm trying to do with Gargoyles, even though the german dub is fantastic, too.
I follow this "ask Greg" section since a few months and was reading a lot about Young Justice then. I thought I'd give it a try and thanks to the internet (forgive me) I was being able to see the pilot of Young Justice. What can I say: Another great show! Problem is here in germany we barely know of any of these superheroes, because all these comics aren't being sold here. I know Batman, Robin, Superman, Spiderman and that's pretty much it. So I was like "hell, I don't know anything" when all those superheroes appeared at the end of the pilot. And then my question is:
Do you know when and if Young Justice is coming to other countries? Germany to be precise?
I asked the german Cartoon Network channel, but they say they don't have plans to air Young Justice right now, but that may change in the future...
Just wanted to ask if you know a bit more.
Forgive me my grammatically weirdness and keep up your great work!!

Anonymous writes...

First off, I have been enjoying the show so far, an kudos to all involved.
While I've seen a very positive reaction to the show online, I've seen several bloggers take issue with the way Miss Martian has been portrayed so far.

Not trying to stir the pot, but do you have anything to say to those who feel she is too much of a stereotypical "girlie girl" or that she was belittled by the boys and hit on by Wally?