Plot summary: Felix Faust returns to usurp Hades, resulting in an unlikely team-up between Wonder Woman and Hawkgirl to restore order to The Underworld.

Notes and Trivia

Episode: 18 (S2.E5)

Original Air Date: May 28^th, 2005

Directed: Dan Riba (9)

Written: Stan Berkowitz (5) (story) and Dwayne McDuffie (7) (teleplay)

Animation: Dong Yang Animation Co., LTD. (9)

Music: Lolita Ritmanis (6)

Diana briefly mistakes Hermes for The Flash. Hermes served as partial inspiration for Flash, with the original scarlet speedster, Jay Garrick, even being briefly labelled as the reincarnation of Mercury (Hermes). On top of that, Hermes is lusting after Podênemos, who was also known as Iris… Iris West is Barry Allen’s wife and Wally West’s aunt. Cute!

We get our first instance of a long-running tradition of League members being assigned numbers, with Wonder Woman designated as 003.

In his previous appearance Hades seemed unaware Hippolyta had a daughter, even kind of hitting on Diana, while here he explicitly claims to have helped sculpt Diana from clay. Don’t worry though, he tries to talk the writers out of this awkward retcon by suggesting the sculpting happened long before she was actually brought to life, so he didn’t know she was the same person. Suuuure.

DCAU Debuts

Diana uses the finally activated Lasso of Truth on a demon called Abnegazar. He and his brothers, Rath and Gast, collectively known as The Demons Three, debuted in 1962, and were created by Gardner Fox and Mike Sekowysky. They were frequently summoned by Felix Faust to fight The Justice League, likely explaining their appearance in the episode. They’re generally more powerful than they’re depicted here, but nothing too crazy.

Recap

Tala tries to modify the spells on The Annihilator, but is instead tricked by her old mentor Felix Faust (remember him?), getting trapped inside a magic mirror while Faust possesses the colossus.

Shortly thereafter, Hermes delivers Wonder Woman an order from Zeus to deal with Faust, who has sought revenge against Hades, unseating him from the throne of the underworld.

Diana reluctantly takes Hawkgirl with her due to the anti-magical properties of her trusty mace. They head to Themyscira and help the Amazons beat back demons spilling through the gate to Tartarus.

Hippolyta scolds her exiled daughter for returning to the island, but then activates the full power of her armour and Lasso to protect her on the upcoming journey.

These new abilities come in handy right away as the lasso compels a demon to lead them to Faust… who is simply too powerful now he’s been studying in Hades’ library of dark tomes, banishing them.

Lucky for them, Faust banished them to the same depths as Hades, and once they free him he transports them all right back to their shared enemy.

Even with their powers combined, Faust proves a major challenge, but Diana wielding Shayera’s mace does the trick, destroying The Annihilator and leaving Faust at Hades’ mercy.

Hades claims to be Diana’s father, but she dismisses the idea, returning to Hippolyta who officially ends her exile and welcomes her home.

Best Performance

It remains kind of crazy to me how much better Maria Canals-Barrera is than basically all the other series regulars. Sometimes it’s in the fire and the sass, other times, like this, it’s quiet moments like her refuting Diana’s assertion she doesn’t need her help with a calm “Yes you do.” Shayera’s duality of sometimes being so measured, while at other times being a total hothead is fascinating, and Canals-Barrera sells all of it so well. She and Susan Eisenberg have a really nice chemistry, elevating all of the bickering scenes, but Maria is the clear winner to me.

Bob Joles steps in for Jonathan Rhys-Davies (as Hades), something he’s done many times as his soundalike. He’s… fine, I suppose? But you can really hear how much he’s ‘putting on a voice’ and it undercuts the intended high drama.

Solid use of Wayne Knight as the irritable (and irritating!) demon Abnegazar, and a fun little cameo from Jason Bateman as the sleazy Hermes.

Episode Ranking

Villain vs villain conflict is almost always good, as it often provides an interesting character study of everyone involved by removing the standard binary of good vs evil and instead providing some kind of moral quandary that heroes and audience alike have to weigh up. Diana rightly asks why she should help someone as evil as Hades, which Hermes dismisses on Zeus’ behalf, reminding us there are larger forces at work in this universe, and some evils are necessary. They underline that idea with the various magic-sensitive members of The League being driven feral by Faust’s actions, which was cool in itself, taking advantage of the expanded roster without having to give everybody big roles that eat into the run-time. Doctor Fate, Zatanna and Etrigan needing to be restrained as they ramble, rave and writhe sells the concept plenty, and Diana of course wants to help them even if she despises Hades.

All of that pairs nicely with our key character relationship dynamic for the episode: the beef between Wonder Woman and Hakwgirl. I say that like it’s a staple of the show, which it unfortunately is not, but absolutely should be. Diana was the most open critic of Shayera’s actions in ‘Starcrossed‘, but lest we forget Shayera also frequently attacked the Amazon outlook on the world, at one point even implying Diana needed to get laid. It’s a shame that the only two women on the previous version of the team were catty like that, but I do think they’re strong characters and their arguments were always well-written, and as Flash suggests (in a surprising moment of insight from the comic relief character), they’re actually more similar than they are different, and that’s often the cause of their conflict.

I really like that Wally was the one to try and force them to sit down together rather than say… Superman. Flash is the easiest person for everybody to be angry at without the audience turning on them, because he’s so frequently a goofball even if his heart is in the right place. We know he voted to keep Shayera on the team, while he and Diana shared a nice moment when everybody revealed their secret identities… but he also pissed both of them off a LOT in Justice League. It’s just good utilisation of their existing character dynamics. Even Diana’s impulse to steal Shayera’s mace (and getting caught red-handed) was a nice bit of recall as it was confirmed in her last appearance to disrupt magic because it’s made of Nth Metal. I’m simply never going to be mad about writers remembering things, as low of a bar as that sounds.

These two big concepts – the Villain vs Villain plot mechanic and the feuding heroes relationship dynamic – mesh well, capturing the feeling of a chaotic odd couple road trip movie like Midnight Run. Our heroes can’t even agree on their main objective, with Shayera wanting to find Hades for an unlikely team-up against Faust, while Diana wants to simply defeat Faust and then let Hades do what he wants, holding a grudge after the events of ‘Paradise Lost’. One can’t help but sympathise with her position, but we know Zeus directly ordered her to restore Hades to his throne, and Shayera’s plan does make more sense… but she was a spy for an invading army and we have to still hate her a little for that… right? Yet she’s the bigger person in this moment, deferring to Diana’s decision on how to carry out their task and then snatching up a lesser demon to interrogate, because how could we forget they’re doing all of this in hell?

It’s kind of unfortunate that had Diana successfully stolen the mace in the first place she might have won the day faster, as it takes her superior strength paired with the anti-magic weapon to defeat Faust, but I suppose there’s a nice payoff there. Heck, even something much smaller like the two bickering about if Diana even sweats ends up coming back around when Shayera accepts a hand up after the fight, only to complain about her moist palms. I’m glad they don’t end up BFFs, because that’s not how they were in the first place, but they do come to a realistic truce of sorts.

I think my big criticism is how quickly we go from Hades’ library to the snowy domain where Hades is being tortured… and then straight back to the library again. One of the pitfalls of the 22-minute run-time, I suppose. I could also really have gone for a few more minutes of Hades to beef up his role in the plot, which would have made the ending hit harder.

Finally there’s solid art design throughout, chiefly from the various flaming skeletons dangling from the ceiling in Hades’ library – which are of course set on our heroes during the final fight – as well as the Necronomicon and various demons. Again, more of all of that would have been nice, but I’m so often inadvertently asking for the return of two-parters in these reviews and need to learn to live with what I’ve been given.

There was enough here to make one of the best episodes in the series, but they just don’t fully make good on that potential. An increased role for Hades would have fixed that, fully unlocking the complex character dynamics and making the ending land better. I could also always go for even more of the Greek Mythology, but I won’t hold that against them. As is, it’s a lot of fun, making good on a surprising amount of history and demonstrating some solid set-up and pay-off writing, which makes sense given it’s from one of the longest tenured DCAU writers and the dude who has been put in charge of the overall narrative arcs of the show.

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

Rogues Roundup

Felix Faust (Robert Englund) (first appearance) and The Annihilator (third appearance)

Taking a fun but under-utilised character and bringing him back with a MAJOR upgrade is a fun idea, even more so when they make good on the previous appearance as Faust bears a grudge for his master betraying their alliance at the first opportunity. His unquenchable thirst for knowledge of yet more dark magics is a nice touch, with Hades’ library distracting him from basically everything, and Shayera beginning to burn it down sending him into a rage.

Speaking of rage, he removed that flaw from The Annihilator, allowing it to operate even in the face of being met with peace and love. Neat! Sure does make things sticky with my final ranking of The Annihilator though, as no sooner had I spun it off from Ares… it gets tied to Faust. I do think all in all it’s had a surprisingly solid role in the series despite barely being sentient.

But yeah, Faust is alright. Taking down two other villains makes him look like a major player. I feel like they got his personality right in ‘Paradise Lost’ but he didn’t achieve enough, whereas here he achieves a lot but is less interesting. Many such cases.

Hades (Bob Joles) (first appearance)

Wow, talk about a downgrade. I don’t know if it’s the script deferring to Faust as the main foe or the replacement of Jonathan Rhys-Davies leading to reduced dialogue, but either way he’s not anywhere near as compelling a character as he was last time.

Like sure, he still breathes fire and the design is unchanged, but where’s the helmet? The monster form? And most of all, where’s the silver (forked) tongue? They take a swing at that last one as he taunts Diana about being her ‘father’, but it just falls kind of flat because his presence in the episode is so small.

Tala (Juliet Landau) (third appearance)

Soooo I’ve been including Tala in Project Cadmus’ ranking up to now, but here she is acting alone, and when we next see her they’ll have been dealt with… so why not spin her off now?

A real rollercoaster appearance for her here though. Making a student of Felix Faust was a fun wrinkle. Not sure I love the implication they were fucking, but they brush right over that and state she entered Tartarus to recover his corpse, which is pretty metal… only to have her easily duped by Faust and trapped in the mirror herself. Womp womp.

I’m afraid she’s going to have to drop a few places below her colleagues as a result.

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