Plot summary: Mister Miracle is blackmailed into returning to Apokalips to help Granny Goodness. Luckily The Flash is willing to lend a hand even if the rest of The League are not.

Notes and Trivia

Episode: 15 (S2.E2)

Original Air Date: February 12^th, 2005

Directed: Dan Riba (7)

Written: Jim Steranko (1) (story) and J.M. DeMatteis (4) (teleplay)

Animation: Dong Yang Animation Co., LTD. (7)

Music: Lolita Ritmanis (5)

This episode marks the first time J’onn J’onzz has been seen anywhere but The Watchtower in the series. His closed off behaviour will be addressed in ‘To Another Shore’.

Likewise it’s the first time Flash has spoken since the end of Justice League!

Barda made her debut in ‘The Call‘ where she filled Wonder Woman’s slot on The Justice League of the future because the rights with Diana were too complicated at the time. Mister Miracle got a tiny cameo in that same episode but was a fully-fledged member of the team in the tie-in comics.

Arte Johnson riffs on his catchphrase from Laugh-In, “Ver-r-r-y interesting… but futile”

DCAU Debuts

Matt talk about Mister Miracle for only a single paragraph challenge, difficulty: impossible. ‘Scott Free’ (real name never given) is the creation of Jack Kirby, and is the son of Highfather of New Genesis, traded to Darkseid to broker a peace treaty. While Orion got to be raised in comfort to become a noble hero, Scott was tortured on Apokalips, with his constant escape attempts earning him his cruel ‘name’. He eventually succeeded and made his way to Earth where he took over the role of Mister Miracle from a travelling escape artist who showed him kindness. Big Barda was sent to bring him back to Darkseid but instead they fell in love, with most of their comics depicting them trying to blend in and live a normal suburban life. My problematic fave Tom King wrote an acclaimed miniseries about him which everybody should read, or if you’re too lazy for that, James Gunn has ordered an animated adaptation which I will absolutely review. With bells on.

Debuting in 1971, Virman Vundabar is also a creation of King Kirby, one of Darkseid’s many oddball generals. Modelling his look on a Prussian general, it’s unknown if he spent any actual time in Germany like Kanto and his renaissance Italy thing. He pops up here and there because of his memorable look, but has never really developed as a character. I dunno man, Fourth World is weird. He’s got no unique abilities or powers, but as a New God he’s immortal and whatnot.

Recap

Mister Miracle pulls off another of his impossible escapes… which Granny Goodness uses as a distraction to kidnap his friend Oberon, demanding compliance in exchange for his life.

Turns out Apokalips has fallen into civil war since Darkseid’s demise, and Granny wants Scott to seize Kalibak from her rival, Verman Vundabar, effectively handing her the throne.

Scott & Barda implore The League to help, but J’onn refuses given it will only help Apokalips. Flash disobeys and offers his services, which they reluctantly accept.

The trio Boom Tube to Apokalips and take out the first wave of guards and then head into the dreaded ‘X-Pit’, which has been remodelled since Scott successfully escaped.

Flash finds Kalibak in no time and breaks him out, but Darkseid’s snarling son is somewhat reluctant to accept help from his enemies.

A series of traps activated by Vundarbar smooths that out though, with Kalibak (and Barda!) delighting in having a swarm of robotic guards to smash, while Scott and Wally bypass the various obstacles.

Vundabar destroys the entire X-Pit in response, but the heroes manage to escape and confront Granny. With some help from J’onn they rescue Oberon and escape.

Flash and J’onn later make amends after their earlier dispute, and it turns out Kalibak is now locked up on Earth, leaving the two would-be rulers of Apokalips left to continue their feud.

Best Performance

No matter how many times I hear Ed Asner as Granny Goodness it’s still an absolute trip they ever convinced him to do the role. Even minutes apart in the same episode! It’s so ridiculous but works so sublimely. It’s fucking mesmerising. Every line. Every time. “You wound Granny… But not as deeply as Granny is going to wound you” was just excellent. All of the sinister lines and deeds take on an extra edge when they’re accompanied by this ‘butter wouldn’t melt’ sweet old lady voice. I say sweet, there’s an unsettling quality to how he delivers the lines that means you can never trust a single thing she says.

It’s probably because I was introduced to Mister Miracle via Tom King’s book, but I never really saw Ion Gruffudd in the role. He’s perfectly fine but not quite what I’m looking for. Farrah Forke is much better as Barda, capturing her short-tempered fiery nature. Dick Miller is a great casting for the grouchy old Oberon, making little comments left and right, but always showing concern for his surrogate son. He’s also great at talking shit to Granny. The three of them have a really nice chemistry together.

Michael Dorn goes full Worf as he complains about being saved by a female, which is fun. Arte Johnson gives them exactly what they’re asking for, I suppose.

Episode Ranking

Many fans complained about Flash’s total absence from Season One. I’ve always found him a mixed bag – at times injecting some much-needed levity, at others a cringe little sex-pest. He certainly didn’t get the same level of development as the other newcomers (obviously he technically appeared in STAS but feels so off from that portrayal so to me he was basically new as well.) Yet I did feel his absence last season and am glad he got to cut loose here as the resident veteran. His scene with Elongated Man as they lament not being taken seriously while they play Rock ‘Em Sock ‘Em Robots was a good little bit. Extremely funny that Scott & Barda had no idea how fast he was though, given that’s his whole thing.

It was an interesting wrinkle to establish that Scott & Barda are NOT in The League despite its huge size, with J’onn having to be talked into helping them. His reasoning that there’s nothing in it for them to help a new evil overlord come to power is sound, but the refusal to help save a life was uncharacteristically brutal. I would complain, but they save it with the comment about looking at the big picture, a clear indicator of where they’re going with J’onn this season. Plus he obviously comes around by the end of the episode.

I’m so glad Barda finally got her ‘battle armour’ instead of constantly prancing around in the bikini she was in for the entirety of ‘The Call’. Likewise the debut of the giant armoured dogs the Apokalips soldiers ride around on. Basically anything that further digs into The Fourth World stuff is alright in my book, so I got a kick out of Scott flying around on his hover discs and Barda tossing fools with ease. Speaking of which, I adore the decision to have her catch Flash and Kalibak in each hand like they weight nothing. We love big strong women on this site. I also enjoy an impromptu team-up, and the dynamic of the two crafty skinny guys in Flash and Mister Miracle pairs nicely with the two bruisers, Barda and Kalibak, with the latter two having a bit of a contest to see who can destroy the most robots.

But for all the things I love to see in this episode, it’s also quite a lazy script that definitely needed another pass.

I appreciate that the point of the X-Pit is more how difficult it is to escape than get around, and it does make sense for Flash to find Kalibak so quickly because of his ability to check every inch of the place at super speed… but Scott & Barda appearing right behind him seconds later really feels wrong. I did enjoy all the death traps during their exit and actually thought they could have gone even further with it, setting the bulk of the episode in the pit. That being said, the cutting back and forth between the present and Scott’s traumatic past is really effective. You simply have to feel for the kid trying over and over but always getting caught and punished by Granny in horrific new ways.

Making a joke out of Flash refusing to reveal how they escaped is frustrating because the obvious answer is J.M. DeMatteis doesn’t know and just had to get to the end of the episode faster. Likewise the convoluted mess that was J’onn disguising himself as Kalibak to trick Granny into thinking she’d won, just so he could read her mind to get Oberon’s location was entirely unnecessary. What would have prevented J’onn from just waltzing up to Granny to get the info? What did they really gain from the bait and switch? And then the real Kalibak was just quietly locked up off-screen in an instant, but we’ll never see him again. All so contrived.

I fear my own personal bias for Mister Miracle and Fourth World stuff is clouding my judgement on the episode. I think there’s plenty to like – particularly the flashbacks, all the death-traps, the bond between Scott, Barda and Oberon, and the return of Flash – but the ending IS really bad. Hmm. What if we slotted it in just ahead of the previous episode, as it has a few more ideas going on, and get out of here?

For the Man Who Has Everything
Fearful Symmetry
The Return
The Once and Future Thing, Part 1: Weird Western Tales
The Ties That Bind (NEW ENTRY)
The Cat and the Canary
The Greatest Story Never Told
Dark Heart
Initiation
This Little Piggy
Kids’ Stuff
The Once and Future Thing, Part 2: Time Warped
Wake the Dead
Ultimatum
Hawk and Dove

Rogues Roundup

Granny Goodness (Ed Asner) (first appearance)

It’s one thing to kidnap Oberon, the closest thing Scott has to a father, and use him as a bargaining chip, but truly quite another to exploit The X-Pit in her schemes. Scott was of course the only person to ever escape The Pit, winning his freedom on Earth, so the notion of forcing him to go back in and risk never returning is particularly cruel, especially as Scott’s success would mean knowing he helped someone he hates take control of Apokalips. This is that good psychological warfare shit.

Plus we actually see her repeatedly torture a young Scott in the X-Pit, taunting him every time he fails to escape, which is super dark. Worse, she’s proud of the fact she’s never ‘failed’ before and is genuinely confounded as to how he broke free of her grip.

It may seem like too high a ranking, but she’s got such a strong sense of personality that I can’t seen an argument against her. If she kicked just a little more ass I’d put her above Mongul, but alas, nerfed for comedy value. Did you know Granny is actually a pretty formidable fighter? Fucked up, right???

Virman Vundabar (Arte Johnson) (first appearance)

Dripping in xenophobic stereotypes, Virman is a bit of a shortcut to ‘cheap heat’, torturing Kalibak and speaking exclusively in his thick German accent. Playing Jigsaw and constantly deploying new traps and security measures is much more fun, but it does mean he spends almost the entire episode in a chair pressing buttons, and then flies away in a crazy car. He’s very much skating by on the weird factor and isn’t interesting at all.

Lex Luthor
Circe
Amazo
Chronos
Mongul
Granny Goodness (NEW ENTRY)
Galatea
Project Cadmus
Dark Heart
Tobias Manning
The Jokerz
Roulette
Solomon Grundy
Brimstone
Ares (and The Annihilator!)
Mordred (and Morgaine le Fey!)
Mordru
Virman Vundabar (NEW ENTRY)