Plot summary: Amazo continues to evolve, now wielding the combined powers of the Justice League. Can Martian Manhunter save the day? Probably!

For background on the creation of Justice League and info about how I’ll be covering it, check out the Series Primer.

1. Notes and Trivia
2. Recap
3. Best Performance
4. Episode Ranking
5. Rogues Roundup

Notes and Trivia

Episode: 30 (S2.E4)

Original Air Date: October 4^th, 2003

Directed: Dan Riba (16)

Written: Stan Berkowitz (14)

Animation: DongWoo Animation Co., Ltd. (2)

Music: Lolita Ritmanis (16)

Batman pocketed a chunk of Kryptonite used by Lex in ‘Injustice for All‘, the same episode that revealed Lex is dying from K-poisoning. He may have already secured his own samples outside of that, but it’s also possible this is the same piece.

The DCAU version of Amazo took on a bit of a life of its own… fittingly for the episode’s themes. In the comics it has a more elaborate design and much like Parasite, does not permanently maintain absorbed abilities, often unable to absorb too many at once. This version? Basically a Golden God. Finally, the name is shown here as an acronym, vs that just being its name in the comics.

Amazo will return in… ‘The Return’

Recap

Superman does a pretty decent job fighting Amazo despite their identical powers, allowing Batman to drive the android away with a hunk of Kryptonite as Amazo also absorbs weaknesses.

Mercy helps move Lex to a secure location to continue his repairs. Amazo tracks them down and despite some bickering, Luthor is able to guilt-trip it into trying again to kill the Justice League.

The rematch goes much worse for The League, as Amazo is able to remove its vulnerability to Kryptonite, and then in turn uses it to injure Superman.

Things go from bad to worse as Lex – having fixed his battle suit – joins the fray, with their combined powers wiping the floor with the heroes.

Meanwhile J’onn contemplates the evils of man in the woods, but is interrupted by a search party looking for a lost little girl. He helps them find her, which restores his faith in humanity.

Confronting Amazo, he accurately predicts that absorbing J’onn’s telepathy would cause the android to turn on Lex after learning the true intentions of his ‘friend’.

Lex reveals a ‘killswitch’ Ivo built into Amazo in case it turned violent, but it doesn’t work. Amazo tears Lex’s armour off (not in a sex way) but stops his assault due to Luthor seeming so pitiable.

Amazo declares the entire planet pathetic and small, flying off into space to continue its evolution. Lex is arrested and tries to call Mercy for help but she hangs up on him. You go, girl.

Best Performance

I know I’m like a broken record with my favourites, but Clancy Brown gives us more of that modulating temper he was so good at in STAS, with Lex running extremely hot and cold with Mercy. He tries to seduce her, then screams at her for being cheap. He does the same with Amazo, trying to scold it for failing to kill the Justice League, and then trying manipulative guilt-tripping instead. Brown’s aptitude for furious fits of rage would make Lex a fun character even if that was his permanent mode, but it’s the emotional range that makes the entire thing work so well. We do not deserve this performance.

Robert Picardo makes less sense as a casting for Amazo as the episode goes on, as the android becomes more evil. I get that he’s often utilised for his ability to play snooty too, but I guess I miss the sombre tone of ‘Part I’.

Episode Ranking

They try to do a little more with the ‘mirror match’ gimmick compared to Part I, but it’s still not really my favourite. Firstly Batman deduces he’s the safest person to tackle Amazo as there’s nothing to copy from him. He also realises Amazo absorbs weaknesses along with strengths, so uses the Kryptonite. This is good. But then Amazo just runs away and later ‘removes’ its vulnerability, which to me just undermines the whole ‘copies powers by scanning people’ schtick. If Amazo can just decide to switch off a weakness, why can’t it just decide to be stronger than all of them or have telekinesis or whatever? Still, pretty funny when it just wings the Kryptonite directly into Superman’s chest and floors him.

The resolution to the entire thing being J’onn allowing his powers to be copied is legitimately good though. It’s in the same wheelhouse as ‘overloading’ an energy-absorber with more power than they can handle. J’onn correctly gambles that being able to peer into the minds of others would force upon Amazo a similar sense of existential dread, and it simply leaves the planet to go and travel the universe. This of course also gives them a bit of a downer ending and allows them to bring Amazo back at a later date, which they very much do.

That being said, J’onn’s side-adventure is a little iffy in my opinion. After opening his mind to an entire city he’s overwhelmed by the selfishness of the human race, fleeing to the quiet of the woods for solace. He talks to a coyote and questions the point of playing hero to these evil creatures. That’s all great, and him sitting on a big rock and asking these big rhetorical philosophical questions to the moonlight is among the most iconic material for the character.

However! Him reading the minds of the search party and realising they genuinely want to find the girl despite being cold or not even knowing her isn’t the most compelling defence of the human race one could imagine. Even if you overlook that, J’onn choosing to revert to his ‘hero’ form again to rescue the girl, and then being heaped with praise doesn’t send the best message. I understand he takes this form so as not to scare people, but isn’t that telling kids to conform if they want to be accepted? Shouldn’t J’onn’s character eventually get to just be who he really is and then be surprised humanity still thank him for his good deeds? Still, nice that he and Diana hug, I guess! And as I said last time, it is a clever B-Story to pair with Amazo’s own journey as an outsider wrestling with identity.

I think Part I was a smidge better than Part II, and as a complete package I do understand the appeal to others, but it’s simply not really for me. Too much monotonous fighting with a big ugly android that barely talks and is far too powerful to be very interesting in my opinion, as well as a few missed opportunities.

1. The Savage Time
2. Legends
3. Twilight
4. Injustice for All
5. Paradise Lost
6. In Blackest Night
7. Tabula Rasa (↓)
8. The Enemy Below
9. Secret Origins
10. A Knight of Shadows
11. Fury
12. War World
13. Metamorphosis
14. The Bold and the Brave

Rogues Roundup

Lex Luthor (Clancy Brown) (fourth appearance)

I loved Mercy clocking Lex’s manipulative behaviour toward Amazo, perhaps recognising some of it from her own history with him. More of the same from last time really, as being able to pretend to be nice to get what he wants arguably makes him worse than someone who is purely evil.

His ability to turn almost any situation to his advantage is always fun, but I also like that Amazo turned him to a whimpering coward at the end… only for him to quietly dismiss its power after it flies away. He’s just an extremely three-dimensional character.

Amazo (Robert Picardo) (second appearance)

So the crux of what they’re getting at with this take on the character, is it gradually becoming a fully sentient, constantly evolving lifeform, to the point it becomes a more literal golden god and flies off on a cosmic journey at the end, unimpressed by humanity.

That sounds great to me, but again, there’s just something about the whole affair that leaves me cold. Perhaps because the personality Amazo begins to develop is surprisingly vindictive, lacking any of the sympathetic qualities from ‘Part I’. I know it’s borrowed from Flash, but the choice to have Amazo sleaze over Mercy is a weird one in my opinion. I definitely prefer the gold to the grey, but overall I just don’t find this character anywhere near as interesting as I’m meant to. I will leave him where is though.

1. Lex Luthor (–)
2. Darkseid
3. The Joker
4. The Injustice Guild (and Brainwave!)
5. Vandal Savage
6. Amazo (–)
7. The Imperium
8. Brainiac
9. Hades
10. Draaga
11. Aresia
12. Deadshot
13. Orm
14. The Injustice Gang
15. Simon Stagg (and Java!)
16. Felix Faust
17. Morgaine le Fey
18. The Manhunters
19. Kanjar-Ro
20. Mongul
21. Gorilla Grodd