Questions abound after the long-awaited arrival of the first three episodes of Young Justice: Outsiders. The highly anticipated third season of the beloved series has finally aired on DC Universe, following a massive fan campaign and years of petitioning. While the first three episodes answered many questions fans had regarding how the lives of their favorite heroes changed between season, there are other mysteries to consider.
As the new season opens, the remaining five founders of the Young Justice team have largely gone their separate ways. Artemis has seemingly retired from vigilantism whereas Nightwing is now operating as a lone agent. Miss Martian and Superboy are leading the rest of the Justice League's junior partners, with Kaldur - the former Aqualad - having taken up his mentor's mantle as Aquaman and a co-chair position as the Justice League's leader alongside Wonder Woman.
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Things take a turn for the worse for the Justice League and their young proteges in the two years that have passed since the finale of the second season, Young Justice: Invasion. The teams' ranks have grown, but they've found their efforts to help people hampered by a series of new regulations imposed by the United Nations. Perhaps not coincidentally, this occurred shortly after Lex Luthor became the Secretary-General of the UN. Though this is just a petty annoyance compared to the scourge of metahuman trafficking, which has become a major source of concern for the Justice League. Here are the biggest questions we have after watching the first three episodes of the new season.
- This Page: Catching Up With Young Justice and the Justice League
- Page 2: Batman, Superman, and Nightwing
- Page 3: Beast Boy and Halo-Girl
10. Who Are All The New Justice League Recruits?
Early on in the first episode, 'Princes All', we discover that the Justice League has expanded its ranks over the past two years, with Steel (John Henry Irons) arriving on the Watchtower and being designated as "36" by the teleportation system, which announces each member's number as they enter and exit the Watchtower. Later, Kaldur is revealed to be the 27th member of the Justice League.
When the second season ended, there were 26 official Justice League recruits, with the most recent being Zatanna (25) and Icon's partner, Rocket (26). In addition to Steel and Kaldur, we see Ice fighting alongside the Justice League team on Rann and Plastic Man, Batwoman, Hardware and Katana attending the team's meeting. Even with those five heroes and counting Adam Strange and Alanna (who are also seen on Rann) that still leaves a number of spaces between Kaldur at 27 and Steel at 36. So who are the yet-unspecified new Justice League members?
9. Are The Young Heroes Still Operating Out of Mount Justice?
As the Justice League is holding an emergency meeting on the Watchtower, we see Miss Martian and Superboy debriefing the teenage superheroes who are mentored by the various Justice League members, discussing their latest mission in another room. This seems somewhat strange, given that the team always held their meetings in a secondary base on Mount Justice during the first two seasons, only operating on the Watchtower in extreme circumstances. Given what we later learn about how highly regulated the Justice League's actions have become by the United Nations' Security Council over the past two years, one wonders if the teen sidekicks have been placed on a shorter leash and if their secret lair has been shut down.
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8. What Happened To Princess Tara of Markovia?
A news report by Cat Grant notes that it has been two years since Princess Tara of Markovia was abducted without any ransom demands being made. Her brother, Prince Brion, believes she may have been abducted by the metahuman traffickers that are said to be operating out of Markovia. When Prince Brion discovers that he has tested positive for the metagene and there's a chance his sister was a potential metahuman as well, it prompts him to push his personal physician, Dr. Helga Jace, to see if there is a way he might develop superpowers as a means of finding his missing sister and creating a hero to protect his troubled nation.
Comic book fans may recognize Princess Tara as Terra - the earth-manipulating heroine who turned traitor on the Teen Titans in The Judas Contract. It remains to be seen if the Young Justice version of Princess Tara will meet a similarly sticky end. Either way, the search for the missing princess is sure to be a major part of the storyline of Young Justice: Outsiders.
Page 2: Batman, Superman, and Nightwing
7. What Is Batman's Plan?
The Justice League's emergency meeting reveals that many members of the team have become dissatisfied with the increasing bureaucracy they've had to deal with since Lex Luthor became Secretary General of the United Nations. Reportedly the team can't even deliver humanitarian aid in times of natural disaster without a unanimous vote of the UN Security Council. This leads Batman to resign from the team, along with Green Arrow and several other members who wish to attack the metahuman trafficking problem more directly, in what was clearly a planned display of resistance.
When Black Lightning quits the team for unrelated reasons, Batman approaches him and asks if he would consider joining him because "we want the same things." Black Lightning scoffs at this, saying that for all the issues he has with the way the Justice League has been run, at least their leaders are democratically elected and he has no interest in being part of whatever Batman is planning. So just what are Batman and the other heroes who resigned from the Justice League planning?
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6. Why Is Superman Spending More Time In Space?
When Miss Martian and Superboy discuss how Conner feels a need to step up and do more to try and help people due to Superman's long-absence off-world, it's said that Superman and many other members of the League are trying to improve the image of Earth and the Justice League on an intergalactic level by fighting crime on other worlds. It is not said why Superman would volunteer for this mission, given that he does have a secret identity to maintain on Earth. Perhaps with Lex Luthor having effectively become the boss of the Justice League, he felt the need to put as much distance between himself and the Earth as possible?
5. Why Didn't Nightwing Recruit Miss Martian For His Mission?
Later, Dick Grayson visits M'Gann and Conner at home, though he is quick to note that it isn't a social call and that he needs Superboy's help with a covert mission. It seems odd that Nightwing would ask Superboy for help with this but not Miss Martian, whose powers of telepathy and shape-shifting make her ideal for a mission to infiltrate a hostile nation to follow a lead on a metahuman trafficking group. Then again, given M'Gann's position of leadership in the Justice League, where she leads the teen heroes, he probably expected her to say no to any unofficial vigilantism. Certainly she's unhappy that Connor agreed to help Nightwing out, though she doesn't voice that opinion until after Dick has left.
4. Why Is Bedlam Dissecting A Motherbox?
As Superboy and Black Lighting explore Bedlam's facility under a Markovian children's hospital, Conner Kent is horrified to discover the remains of a dissected Motherbox. He is quick to explain to Black Lightning that the sentient computers utilized by the New Gods of New Genesis and Apokolips are living beings and that taking one apart is like killing a person. We know from the finale of the second season, Young Justice: Invasion, that The Light was already working with Apokolips and it is suggested that Bedlam is an off-shoot of The Light even before it is revealed that the villain Count Vertigo is part of Bedlam. Could The Light already be trying to reverse-engineer the New Gods' technology in anticipation of betraying their partners, as they previously betrayed The Reach?
3. Why Is Oracle Hiding Herself From Everyone But Nightwing?
It becomes clear as Nightwing is leading his mission that Barbara Gordon - now operating under the alias Oracle instead of Batgirl - is hiding her presence from everyone on the team except him. Whenever we see a POV shot from the perspective of the various heroes on Nightwing's team, we see a series of symbols for the other heroes on the left side of their HUD. Only Nightwing sees the eye symbol for Oracle and she only communicates to him through typed text when there are other heroes around. Oracle has some reason for wanting to keep her existence hidden from all but a select few people. Is this a nod to Barbara Gordon's infamous paranoia and desire for secrecy in the comics? Or could it be a sign of something else?
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Page 3: Beast Boy and Halo-Girl
2. Why Did Beast Boy Quit Being A Superhero?
One of the biggest surprises in Young Justice: Outsiders is the revelation that Beast Boy abandoned superheroism to become an actor and activist. The second episode, 'Royal We', opens with a public service announcement where Garfield "Gar" Logan (billed as Lt. Tork on Space Trek 3016) talks about the metahuman trafficking issue and urges his fans to remember "if you see something, scream something." The third episode, 'Eminent Threat', also features a scene where Gar is interviewed about his work and he once again speaks about the metahuman trafficking issue and his unique status as one of the few metahumans with an open identity.
While all this is a nod to the comics, where Beast Boy did pursue a career as an actor for a time, it's also a surprisingly logical progression of Gar's character and his goals given current events in the world of Young Justice. It was revealed in season 2 that Garfield's mother (former actress turned conservationist Marie Logan) was killed by Queen Bee - the supervillain ruler of the rogue nation of Bialya. The nature preserve where Garfield grew up was located between Bialya and Qurac - a nation we are informed has been torn apart by an invasion from Bialya, leading to refugees from Qurac fleeing to all corners of the globe.
As a superhero, Gar's power set as a shape-shifter who can only become green animals is somewhat limited and there's only so much he could do to fight Queen Bee, even without the limits imposed by the UN on the Justice League. As an actor and activist, however, there is much Garfield can do to turn public opinion against Queen Bee and present a public picture of metahumans as people with special talents rather than potentially dangerous living weapons. It's also a subtle tribute to his mother and his adoptive older sister, Miss Martian, who was partly inspired to heroism by Marie Logan's performance on the classic sitcom Hello Megan.
1. Who Was Halo-Girl?
Perhaps the greatest new mystery of the season involves a young woman, who is credited as "Dead Girl" in the first two episodes of the season, before being billed as "Halo-Girl" in the third. When we first see the young woman in the first episode, 'Princes All', she is sneaking around the Markovian palace and opens a door which allows the speedster assassin who goes on to kill the King and Queen entry to the palace. Once the door is opened, she is grabbed by a Bedlam agent, who knocks her out with a chloroform-soaked rag.
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We next see the "Dead Girl" in 'Royal We' as she is being dumped in a mass grave along with several failed test subjects of Bedlam's efforts to create metahuman soldiers. Her body radiates a strange violet light before she wakes up, apparently unharmed. This attracts the attention of Artemis, who was in the cemetery recovering her gear which was cached there earlier by Black Lighting and Superboy. Artemis saves the young woman from the Bedlam agents that were burying her and takes the strange young woman with her after the "Halo-Girl" saves her life by reflexively generating a force-field of red-light to protect them from the Bedlam agents' weapons.
Halo-Girl shows several other powers in 'Eminent Threat', flying while radiating an orange light and once again glowing violet as she instantly heals the injuries dealt to her by the fiery giant called Plasmus. Halo-Girl is revealed to be capable of understanding English and speaking it somewhat. She claims to have no memories of who she was, but does remember one word - Kill - when she sees the Markovian palace from a distance. It seems likely that she was recruited as part of the effort to kill the King and Queen of Markovia and place Baron Bedlam on the throne, but more than that cannot be said for certain.
Long-time comic readers will recognize Halo-Girl as a revamp of the Batman And The Outsiders heroine Halo - a young woman who seemingly gained odd powers based upon the color of the light she generated after she died and was resurrected with no memory of who she was. It was later revealed that, rather than being a metahuman, Halo was a gestalt entity formed from the body of a dead human woman and an immortal being of pure energy who somehow became trapped in the body and became a new consciousness. It remains to be seen if this will also be the case with this "Halo-Girl," or if she's also the result of metagene activation, but it is a safe bet we'll find out before the end of Young Justice: Outsiders.