Has the final episode aired anywhere yet?

Which other members of the Rogues' Gallery did we see in the bar? I'm pretty sure I saw the Top and the Weather Wizard. Was the Pied Piper around?

illogic, IIRC it airs in the UK next week. It's been held over this week because of some prior anime marathon or something...

LTG, according to this, he does appear as well.

See, I just don't believe Abra Kadabra would hang out with the rest of them. Turtle-Man, sure. Even the Fiddler. But not Abra Kadabra.

(And the quotes on that site just helped me remember how really great some of the dialogue in this episode was.)

I'd hardly say you have to look for the Barry Allen cameo. That was the first thing I noticed in the episode and posted about it right away over at "Justice League Animated". The "Not-Barry" is pretty hard to ignore and has two important bits on screen. A nice nod to the fans, though I'd still like to think that the Timm-Verse had its own Barry Allen Flash.

Not a bad episode tonight. Sure, it could have used less Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman, but hey at least Deadman made an appearance.

The main villians were Lex Luthor, Gorilla Grodd, Rampage, Black Mantis, Bizarro and some mystic chick I didn't recognize.

Gorilla Grodd's whole plan all along was to turn people into gorillas? WTF?

Pretty ironic that a Deadman possessed Batman shot Black Mantis since Batman despises guns.

*edited to fix spoiler tag*

[Edited to remove spoiler tags. Please don't use tags for episodes that have aired in the U.S. - LTG]

That was a bit blah. Too many villains and comic references, and Deadman didn't seem that interesting. Also...any reference to the JLApe storyline isn't a good sign. Thank you, Lex, for smacking Grodd down...and you get that creepy bitch clinging to you as a bonus. It's good to be the Lex.

I found it funny that Lex seemed just as annoyed by Grodd's plan as the audience was. "That was your master plan?"

Overall, the episode left a "meh" taste in my mouth. Looks like we'll see more Deadman as the season winds down.

I loved how Diana filled in as the comic relief on this episode, her "oh come on!" as she turned into an ape was great. I felt like they nailed the Deadman character and what he does great, from showing how a person will react to having done something not of their own will was great, especially the gun play w/Batman. I also agree, the whole master plan was to turn the world into apes was a wtf moment for me, so when Luthor took over I was like finally, although I hope they haven't forgotten about the Braniac connection and yearning he still has, that part is a new aspect about Luthor that I like.

I quite liked the episode. In 30 minutes, I think they managed to make Deadman properly portray great, tragic character. Grodd's plan was silly, but he's always been a naked megolomaniac with cheesey schemes and sapien fever. The brutality of the episode was chilling, and the action scenes were terrific. And Lex Luthor has really established himself as someone you just like to see win.

Okay, Grodd's plan was silly, but am I the only one who got annoyed when Supes turned into an ape? I mean, come on, he's not human!

Ahem.

Given how close to the end, I was absolutely amazed at how much it seemed to be setting up.

Well if we really want to get nitpicky, if it was just a matter of deevolution Wonder Woman should have become a lump of clay since she's not human either.

I don't think the JLU version of Wonder Woman was formed from clay, did they ever show that she was?

Yes, in "The Balance." When Hades claims to be her father, Diana responds that she has none, as her mother sculpted her from clay. Hades responds that he helped Hippolyta sculpt her, so he's her father.

Forgot that, I thought they left it somewhat ambiguous though...

There were way too many villains cameod in this episode - and me currently without a DVR. Here's who I saw: (main) Grodd, Lex, Tala (the magic woman), Atomic Skull, Rampage, Bizarro and the Black Manta-wannabe (what's his name again?). (raiding Gorilla City): Star Sapphire, Goldface, Major Disaster, Blockbuster - this all went so fast so there had to be tons more there! (final scene) Lady Lunar, the Key, Psycho Pirate, the Shark, Sinestro - arrrgh - anyone have a screen capture! Looks like they are pulling out all the stops on this Secret Society of Super-Villains.

I loved the fight scenes in this episode. Very well done. Wow. So Black Manta (or Devil Ray) is dead?
I wasn't very familiar with Deadman from the comics so it was nice to see what he's all about from this series.

Uneven episode. I don't know if they were trying to channel the silliness of the orginal Superfriends or that's just what happened. The only saving grace is Luthor at least being as smart as the audiance.

Did like the bit about Deadman possesing Superman and I was refreshed that it didn't turn into a HUGE misunderstanding for once.

I was yelling at the screen about this too. Would protohumanoid Kryptonians be apes? And they wouldn't even technically be apes, it would have to be the common ancestor of apes and humans before the split 5-7 million years ago. As soon as you get bipeds, they're hominids, not hominoids.

So wow, people actually got killed on JLU. They've been so careful about that 6-11 audience I was genuinely surprised. Remember how nobody died when the Watchtower blasted Cadmus HQ? As bad as the 'Look you can see their parachutes!' in the original dub of DBZ. Maybe they figured since they're cancelled they can go hog wild.

Obligitory. Heh.

I really liked it. I was happy to see all the extra villans running around. I liked seeing Deadman again. I enjoyed him in the comics.

I couldn't tell if Black Manta(?) was dead or just stunned etc. It was definately a different touch for have Deadman inhabit Batman to shoot him. However, from what I remember in the comics (pre every crisis and make over) Deadman and Bats had worked together before and I would think Deadman would know what Bats felt about guns.

Herc has a review up for the very last epsiode, Destroyer.

Isn't one of the reasons why JLU got cancelled that it never really pulled the 6-11 audience and was mostly being watched by much older people? Maybe the producers went to CN and said "Look, if the demographics are so flipping old that you don't even want to keep us on the air, at least let us put material appropriate to the actual viewership in the last few shows."

I think that Deadman was just going on instinct and Batman happened to be closest to him. The smart thing to do would have been to jump into Superman and take care of business.

Devil Ray was defintely killed, although technically it was stumbling backwards into an energy field (or exposed circuits) that finished him off, not the shot. It's similar to the ROTJ edit, for those that have seen the edited version. I also heard Grodd moan after being shot (which he deserved for just standing there while Luthor gave his little speech), so I don't think he's dead.

I don't remember Grodd moaning.

By the way, who was the guy who turned the apes to gold?

Where the hell is she from? When I heard her name, I thought they were trying to make some obscure Doom Patrol reference. Doom Patrol's biggest enemy was a super-intelligent ape named Monsieur Mallah who worked with his partners, Madame Rouge and the Brain (who is not, as you might expect, a super-intelligent mouse). It was later revealed that Madame Rouge and Mallah were in love with each other. Were the JLU writers just playing around, substituting Grodd for Mallah and using the Mala name for Madame Rouge? Or did this magic-using Mala have some prior existince in the DCU?

And who was that super-strong woman that Deadman possessed at one point? And the guy with the flaming green head?

You might be thinking of Mala, the evil Kryptonian criminal from the Superman cartoon who's never appeared on this show. The purple-haired demon woman is actually Tala, Queen of Evil. In the comics, she was a (red-haired) recurring antagonist of the Phantom Stranger and part of the cult that got Raven (from Teen Titan)'s mother pregnant.

BTW, was I the only one who noticed Juliet Landau voicing Kama Krishna as well as Tala?



Those were Rampage and the Atomic Skull, both Superman villains.



That was Goldface, a Green Lantern/Flash villain.

Also, color me shocked to see Lady Lunar in there considering she hasn't shown up in the comics since the original Crisis.

If they weren't pulling in the younger set, then couldn't they have asked if they could have the show bumped up to Adult Swim? A little awkward perhaps, but at least it would be more likely to have a home. Then again, I'm guessing it would need bigger ratings to cover production costs or something.

Anyways, as much as I would have liked to see more JLU members, Wonder Woman brought the funny, first snapping at Deadman after being possessed, shouting "Oh come on!" when she went ape, and pinch hitting for the "obligatory" Flash quip.

Are the names of the two parts of the finale, "Alive" and "Destroyer", KISS references?

I swear I saw Cheeta in there for a quick moment, during the attack on Gorilla City.


Ha. That would have been perect. Can you see The Brain and Luther going at it? Heh.

DMike, thanks for the clarification. I thought that Grodd was saying "Talia" and that couldn't be right. So I had no idea who that chick was.

Also, here is a screencap of the villains at the end of the episode, and I'm not even going to begin to try and identify them all!

Let's see...there's Moon Maiden, Merlyn, Sinestro, Shark....ummmm...I think Penguin's back there, but that can't be. Ah! I'm sure that's Queen Bee. And there's Live Wire in the back. The blobby black guy is Black Mass. I don't know who the red shades guy is, but he's with Psycho Pirate, KGBeast and Key.

Huge guess here, but based on the face and the differently-colored lights on his outfit, could it be the Captain Atom villain, Doctor Spectro?

Regarding Destroyer:
I kinda figured Lex had to save the world. I mean, how else do you follow up Flash saving the world last season? I prefered Divided We Fall, but it was still a good ep. Epic, and it tied together a lot of old threads and characters.

Loved Bats in it, being the voice of reason about letting the villians help, and then giving them a 5 minute head start. Though, . . . being the only one to have ever avoided the Omega Beam? Come on. He's not a meta-human, and even if he is the quickest, most agile normal human around, he's still just human. *rollseyes* The whole point of Batman is that he's a plain human and he still rocks. You undermine that when you have him do clearly super-human things.

Loved that J'onn has apparent hooked up with a middle aged Chinese woman. Rock on, Martian dude.

Also loved Luthor showing up in his "power suit." Is Luthor, in fact, a 12th level (or higher, per the "over qualified" statement) intellect? Is that just a residual of having merged with Brainiac?

BWAH! So true and funny. I like that his powers is manipulation and making dubious alliances. I just found it plain funny how arrogant he is with being very smart (which he may very well be) even at the sight of Metron

Dunno.. that one felt like a stinker... Luthor was sooo right on killing Grodd... because that plan of his of turning everyone into an ape is like a plot straight from the Batman live action series of the 70's (Holy Intelligent Monkeys, Batman!)

So, go Luthor. Thanks for killing Grodd. The lesson is kids: Next time you join a band of baddies, ask for the damned plan in advance.

Tala and Grodd?!? (bestiality, much?) I did shudder for a second there.

Destroyer

Very very good. Not as good as Divided We Fall, but that ep was exceptional in many ways. Wasn't really fond of the deus ex machina ending, but it was certainly well set up with Luthor's accurate arrogance backing it up.

Flash and Giaganta? Riiiiight.... Kinda annoyed that no resolution towards the whole Bats/WW thing, but it was a truly packed episode though.

Best line: Tie between Superman's "Oh come on, it's Lex flippin' Luthor." and Luthor's "Sorry it took me so long, I had to go put on my power suit."

J'onn rocks, BTW.

I thought Grodd's plan was an homage to the first Challenge of the Superfriends episode, were the LoD changed everyone on the planet into Bizarroes and Cheetahs.

My favourite line from Destroyer would have to be Batman (to Superman):"Don't you have a tall building to go leap?" Kevin Conroy brilliantly delivered the line with all the resonance of a person saying 'Go fuck yourself.'

Yeah, me too. Actually, even more than that, I was still holding out for Lois' Superman/Clark reveal. I guess we'll either get it in the upcoming Un-Timm related Superman DTV or maybe, maybe in some future Timm and crew JLU DTV...if they ever do any. However, it was a great ep. It was a fitting goodbye to all the heros. And Question got some screen time. That makes me happy.

So, do you think this Darkseid invasion can be considered the "Apocalypse of '09" that's mentioned in Batman Beyond?

Here's the thing about Grod's plan: It's counterproductive. I mean, you're a super-intelligent ape. You're smarter than almost anyone, so you've got that going for you. And, as an ape, you're stronger than just about all humans (except for those pesky superheroes). So why would you want to turn all humans into creatures that will be as physically strong as you are? How does that promote your agenda of ruling the earth? Sure, you can still outthink everybody, but now any two other people on the planet can beat the crap out of you.

But . . . but . . . monkeys are funny! (Yeah, I got nothin')

So he could find the gorilla his dreams.

Wordity Word Word, CafeRene. I would say that Luthor's "Sorry it took me so long. I had to go get my power suit." was a close second though.

Also loved The Question fighting evil . . . by hitting it with his car. Also loved Steel (Hank Heywood version, not John Henry Irons version) doing a blatent Captain America impersonation with the sheild-throw.

And can I mention again how much J'onn rocks? I was totally going "hmm, who's that Chinese guy? Is he a superhero I ought to recognize." But then he turned into a Dragon, and I realized J'onn was back.

Destroyer: Man, J'onn came out of nowhere. I knew he would be in this episode, but it slipped my mind in all the fast paced action. I was wondering who he was when he first showed up, trying to think of some obscure Chinese super-hero or being. The Dragon didn't do it for me, but when he went through a few enemies, then I hit on it! Was so cool to see him again, and see him kick butt! He really has changed in the short time he was away, the old J'onn would have never returned Diana's hug like that!

Destroyer: This episode lots of good lines. I liked all three mentioned so far. But Kevin Conroy's delivery was the best.

Now about the end, what happened? And above all what happens next now that Darkseid knows the anti-life equation?

riffola:


That universe dies, and that's why there's no more JLU on the air. *sob* I'll miss this show so much.

Comics 101 has a list of Legionaires

Anybody got spoilers for "Patriot Act"? That's coming up on CN this Saturday.

Clarkins:



Herc over at aicn has this review.

My favorite geeky fanboy detail about "Destroyer" was that all the Ditko-created characters had their scene together: Hawk and Dove, the Creeper, and the Question were all on-screen within about two seconds of each other fighting the Parademons. Kind of a Steve vs. Jack moment, come to think of it. I sure hope Ditko is getting royalties from their usage on JLU: he may be a demented Randoid fruitcake, but I still love his character design and drawing style.

A little late, but I just wanted to say that Luthor is my kind of villain. No overly elaborate but easily escapable death traps, no long winded soliliquoy that allows enemies to storm the place, just a simple killing. Refreshing, really.