Plot summary: Metamorpho sets his eyes on his true enemy… who is turned into a giant green goo monster.
For background on the creation of Justice League and info about how I’ll be covering it, check out the Series Primer.
Notes and Trivia
Episode: 23 (S1.E23)
Original Air Date: October 11th, 2002
Directed: Dan Riba (12)
Written: Len Uhley (2) (story) and Dwayne McDuffie (5) (teleplay)
Animation: Koko Enterprise Co., LTD (23)
Music: Michael McCuistion (9), Lolita Ritmanis (9) and Kris Carter (8)
The giant rampaging synthoid vaguely resembles DC villain Chemo.
In Season 2 John Stewart will suggest Metamorpho to join the Justice League. When the team expands in JLU Metamorpho is indeed shown as one of the new members.
Conversely in the comics Metamorpho was the first character to turn down a membership offer, but would find his way onto the team briefly because basically everybody has over the decades.
Recap
The Justice League swoop in to save Green Lantern from Metamorpho, but his powers prove difficult for them to work around and he eventually turns himself to water and swims away.
Emerging from the sink in his and Sapphire’s apartment, he flips out at her for ‘dumping’ him for John. She convinces him that he’s been tricked, so he flies off to confront her father.
Rex finds Stagg at one of his facilities, but smashing the equipment results in a giant mutagen-powered ‘Synthoid’ powered by Stagg’s subconscious rampaging through the city.
John reluctantly agrees to a team-up with Rex, but none of the team are able to hurt the creature in anyway and it seizes Sapphire King Kong style.
Batman completes a chemical analysis of the creature but can’t produce a counter-concotion fast enough. Luckily there’s a dude helping them who can turn his body into any substance…
Rex dives into the monster, transforms and bursts the damn thing. We were told this would kill him too, but he reforms himself in the aftermath and he and Sapphire kiss.
Best Performance
Earl Boen is still excellent, but they dramatically reduce his role in favour of the big goo monster. I do think there’s a strong argument to still give him the nod… but I guess I’d switch to Phil LaMarr. He did solid work in Part I which I chose to broadly ignore, but I think he wins this time around. Weird that John would be a better character when he’s a traditional hero with emotions instead of a cop!
Tom Sizemore is still really bad. You’re meant to sympathise with Rex but he just comes across like a total dick without a likeable and engaging performance to drive him. Even when he’s working alongside the heroes he’s just so many steps below the regular cast that he stands out in the worst way.
Episode Ranking
I figure the opening scene with Superman standing stoic as Metamorpho’s blows bounce off him was what many fans wanted from his average action sequence versus constantly getting electrocuted or gassed or blown up. I will admit it was cool to see here, but you can’t spam it or it loses impact. Plus they smartly followed up by having Rex inadvertently turn his hand to Kryptonite, which is a massive checkmate. Ditto turning his head to goo when Hawkgirl smashes it with her mace, and then encasing her wings in concrete to bring her down. How is one expected to fight this guy? You’d figure psionic attack, but J’onn prefers to morph into a dragon, which is pretty metal to be fair.
They do end up trying a telepathic assault on the ‘synthoid’. Listen. I’m as big of a fan of giant monsters rampaging through cities as exists in the world, but this is such a bizarre way to pivot the story, going as far as to tack ‘Simon Stagg’s consciousness partially transferred into it!’, which is just entirely unnecessary. Could it not have been the next set of test subjects against Metamorpho and the Justice League? Or maybe using the chemicals on Java or something? Why a building-sized creature in this story about relationship dynamics?
I talked about it under the performances section, but the problem at the heart of both these episodes is they have simply not written Metamorpho to be remotely likeable, and Tom Sizemore doesn’t meet them halfway to try and elevate that writing with charisma. His violent temper directed towards Sapphire sucks, as does his choice of wording when confronting Simon Stagg, stating he ‘took’ his daughter. Overbearing parents are bad obviously, but thinking women are objects to be taken away is the exact same thing. Those weird relationship dynamics aren’t fixed in a tremendously satisfying way either, as Sapphire reveals to John that Rex idolises him and wishes they could trade places. Feels a bit inconsistent with his abrasive treatment of his old friend, though I guess if you felt charitable you could call it misplaced resentment rooted in admiration. But I don’t think they really earned my charity across these two parts beyond the fun visuals Metamorpho’s powers allow, and a couple of nice little character moments in Part I.
On the subject of his powers, not to nitpick about how abilities work in superhero media but wasn’t one of the key selling points of the Metamorpho concept that they could survive in any environment? Feels like his powers shutting off at sub-zero temperatures may be a fairly large flaw in that promise. I also don’t think you really achieve or earn anything by having Rex frozen for less than 60 seconds of screen time, escaping, and then ending up back in a conflict with Stagg and Java. If you’re going to do something like that either make it the Part I cliffhanger or at least cut away to a scene between the two events to tease out the slightest bit of tension. As it stands it’s a solid idea poorly executed.
This just ends up feeling like a slog more than anything. Part I was at least a mixed bag, but I found this episode unpleasant to sit through. I don’t think any part of it really worked for me aside from the very brief creative uses of Metamorpho’s powers, but they undercut most of what worked about the previous episode and stapled something very dumb on top of it.
- Legends
- Injustice for All
- Paradise Lost
- In Blackest Night
- The Enemy Below
- Secret Origins
- A Knight of Shadows
- Fury
- War World
- Metamorphosis (↓)
- The Bold and the Brave
Rogues Roundup
Simon Stagg (Earl Boen) (second appearance)
I fear their total failure to make good on his strong debut means I’ve got to move him way down the list. I still think he’s a really fun character, but pivoting to a 100 foot green goo monster that carries a portion of his id was a weird choice. Gone are his clever machinations and interesting character wrinkles, and instead they functionally transformed him into something they could punch. They had other options for the third act battle, including Java and other Metamorpho ‘recruits’, and changing the very nature of one of my favourite human villains in the show to date just undercut him entirely.
- Lex Luthor
- The Joker
- The Injustice Guild (and Brainwave!)
- The Imperium
- Hades
- Draaga
- Aresia
- Deadshot
- Orm
- The Injustice Gang
- Simon Stagg (and Java!) (↓)
- Felix Faust
- Morgaine le Fey
- The Manhunters
- Kanjar-Ro
- Mongul
- Gorilla Grodd
The Matt Signal 
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