Hi! Welcome to my episode-by-episode recap of, and reaction to Justice League. There will be no spoilers beyond the current episode. As is my custom with recaps, I will give you a short summary recap followed by a long and unnecessarily helpfully detailed version. My reaction will follow at the end if you just want to scroll past all of the recap.
If you want to see my prior Justice League episode reviews, click HERE:
THE QUICK AND CLEAN SUMMARY:
Lex Luthor manipulates a powerful android named Amazo with the ability to copy any superpower, posing as a father figure to it. Meanwhile, Martian Manhunter questions the nature of humans and struggles with the burden of hearing thousands of their minds in his head at once, after performing a psychic sweep of the city of Metropolis in a failed attempt to locate Luthor.
THE EXTRA DUSTY RECAP:
We open with a Justice League battle involving Hawkgirl, Green Lantern, and Superman against Lex Luthor in a flying suit. It’s a relatively even match. After being injured, Luthor flees.
We see him arrive at Lex Corp to the surprise of Mercy, who is now in charge of the company.
Lex asks Mercy for help and then collapses. She mocks him and comments on why he put her in charge, noting that he believed her to be a loyal dog who would give him the company back as soon as he returned. She tells him that *this dog* dug the company out of a hole he dug and brought the stock up by 38%. He ends her tirade by putting his hand around her neck and squeezing.
Lex asks here Professor Ivo is, and she replies that he was fired to save money. Lex is outraged but she manages to tell him where the professor most likely went after being let go.. He tells her that she’s a good girl, as if she is a loyal dog, and then flies away.
The Justice League rescues a sinking freighter ship. When they finish, Superman asks Martian Manhunter if it’s possible to do a psychic sweep of the city in search of Lex Luthor. MM replies that he’s never tried anything like that before but agrees to make the attempt.
Luthor arrives at Ivo’s house and finds him there, apparently deceased. Just then a giant android walks into the room with him. After putting the deceased Ivo’s foot back beneath the blanket, the android scans the ailing Luthor.
MM psychically scans the city and becomes overwhelmed by the tragic inner lives of its people. In anguish, he he flees.
The android asks Luthor when Professor Ivo will come back, and when Luthor tells him never, the android repies childishly that he has to. Luthor seizes the opportunity to manipulate him.
Lex: You miss him. So do I. He was one of my best friends.
Android: He was?
Lex: Almost like a brother and he would have wanted me to look after you if anything ever happened to him.
The android asks Lex if he will take care of him, and he says he will, but Lex also says the android will first need to take care of him or he will also go to sleep and never wake up again.
Next we see the android break into a facility to obtain fuel for Lex. Despite a lot of resistance and security, he does it easily. As he exits, he runs into Hawkgirl. After she knocks him down, he scans her and transforms to mimic her powers and to use against her. They fight again and this time he wins.
A while later, Lex sees him return, with wings and a mace like those of Hawkgirl. Lex comments to him that he sees Ivo’s duplication technology works and asks if he ran into Hawkgirl. After confirming that she is still alive, and seeming sad about that, Lex tells him a story. Lex explains that there was a young man who successfully built a great empire, but then lost it all due to seven very bad people – Hawkgirl and her friends – the Justice League.
Lex admits the young man was himself and says that his new dream is to take back the empire and then hand it down to someone who will continue his work – the son he never had. He implies that this is the android.
Lex: But none of that can happen until you give the Justice League what they deserve.
Later, we see Mercy in her office agreeing to help Superman and the Justice League. She agrees to contact them if Lex contacts her. Batman seems to realize that she is holding back and asks if he has already contacted her. She asks him why she wouldn’t have told him that already if Lex had. Batman notes that the two of them were very close, but she replies that she is a different person now.
After, Superman notes to Batman that she was a little too cooperative and Batman replies to him that he’s learning.
MM is still trying to escape the psychic voices of humanity that he’s hearing when Superman contacts him. MM says he cannot talk now and Supes asks if he is alright.
MM: LEAVE ME ALONE!
MM smashes his comms link and morphs into his Martian form.
Later, Hawkgirl describes her experience against the android to Wonder Woman and the Flash. Wonder Woman notes that whoever made it seems to have had Hawkgirl in mind. Moments later, Wonder Woman sees it herself and a battle between the android, Wonder Woman, Hawkgirl, and the Flash commences. He copies the powers of the other two Justice Leaguers also. Green Lantern shows up next and also has his powers duplicated. He fights Hawkgirl, Flash, GL, and WW and has an upper hand against them.
Lex is called by Mercy but collapses on his way to the phone.
Batman and Superman are driving to see Professor Ivo, with Batman reasoning that the Professor is an MD and that Lex needs an MD right about now. On their way, they are contacted by GL who tells them about the android and warns them against coming to help, due to its replication abilities. Superman comes anyway, after GL is obviously injured during the phone call.
Superman approaches it from behind and welds a metal covering over its eyes. He proceeds to pummel the android but during their fight, it removes the covering and scans Superman as well. We see the Superman shield emerge on its chest.
Wonder Woman: Hera, help us!
GL: She better. No one else can, now.
To be continued
REACTION:
This is a great part 1. What happens if the Justice League is matched up against something that can equal their power? It delivers to them a whoppin’.
We’re just entering into a technological era wherein these types of stories are less “sci fi” and just fiction outright, with the explosion of AI technology and the building of robots housing said technology. We might be a while from nanotech being able to do duplicative things like we see in the episode, but we might not be as far from the rudimentary version of that tech as it used to seem. Earth in 100 years might be as unrecognizable to us, or more so, as the present would be to someone from 1850.
Was it dumb for Superman to show up like he did? Probably. He did have a plan though, to his credit. It just failed.
As much as I like this story, it’s relatively easy to see the weakness of this bad guy. He simply needs to learn the truth about Lex. How might that happen? What if he had a mind reading power? (Just sayin’.)
Anyway… this is a really great part 1. The animation is awesome. I’m looking forward to Part 2.
