Director: Doug Murphy
Writer: Kevin Hopps
Our story opens on Rimbor, with the seven framed members of the Justice League finally reaching the end of their monthslong trial. Surprisingly, none of these heroes sought to gather any information to clear their names before heading into the trial, despite the fact that this group includes Batman, the world's greatest detective, Wonder Woman, a beacon of truth, Superman, an investigative reporter and Green Lantern, a space cop. Luckily for them, the teenagers they left behind did all the work for them, and Miss Martian and Superboy are able to deliver a cheesy little speech to clear their names.
For some unknown reason, Superboy and Miss Martian hurry back to Earth before the Justice League members, ensuring that once again they will be forced to save the world without its most powerful heroes. And the final crisis the Team needs to deal with this season is Black Beetle's plan to destroy the planet with several nasty devices planted all across the globe.
On June 20, 8:16 EDT (just one day after the summit), all the heroes who are on Earth gather in Metropolis to figure out how to stop this threat. Bart is standing next to Wally, Barry and Jay, as they listen to Captain Atom explain that Black Beetle's devices are magnetic field disrupters (or MFDs for short), which are protected by drones. Captain Atom says each drone is the equivalent of a beetle warrior, but that quickly proves to not be the case.
Anyway, Blue Beetle has identified 20 MFDs around the world, and 40 heroes have answered the call, meaning they can conveniently split into teams of two. Lex Luthor has joined the fight, providing our heroes with an anti-Reach virus software, which he has loaded into 20 "eggs" that Blue Beetle has created. All our heroes need to do is touch the egg against the MFD to disable it.
Sounds easy, right? Well ... it actually is. The drones provide minimal resistance, and the MFDs shut down immediately upon contact with an egg. So the episode only shows us a couple of the MFDs being shut down. Until the Atom discovers from the Watchtower that there was a 21st MFD they missed.
In Taos on June 20, 6:47 MDT, Impulse and Blue Beetle are standing triumphantly over their disabled MFD when Blue is suddenly able to locate the missing device. It's in the Arctic and was apparently shielded from his previous scan by the Earth's magnetic pole. He sends the coordinates to the Watchtower, but unfortunately there isn't a zeta tube in the Arctic. So the Flash decides to just run up there, which worries Impulse.
At the North Magnetic Pole on June 20, 13:48 UTC, Impulse shows up right behind the Flash. I've checked with two separate time zone converters, which both indicate that 6:47 Mountain Daylight Time would be 12:47 Coordinated Universal Time, meaning it took Barry and Bart a full hour to run to the North Pole. But the episode plays it as if it took just a few seconds for the fastest men on Earth to reach the Arctic, as Barry is in the middle of his sentence while Bart races from New Mexico. This is another instance of this show being too precise for its own good. The only way this scene makes sense is to say it's 12:48 UTC instead.
Anyway, Bart reminds his grandpa that they need to be in squads of two and says they'll crash the MFD's mode together. They find the device in an ice cave, but realize they're too late — the MFD is surrounded by a field of blue energy, which they call "gone chrysalis." Luthor confirms that their little eggs are useless now, as the ball of energy grows into a large tornado. Barry asks Luthor what to do, who responds, "Run." Barry stupidly thinks Luthor was telling him to run away, but Lex clarifies that Flash and Impulse should be able to negate the chrysalis by running counter to its energy flow. It is a bit annoying that Barry Allen, a police scientist and experienced speedster, would need someone else to explain his powers to him, but here we are.
Wally and Artemis are following this conversation from the Watchtower, and Artemis worries if Impulse and Flash will be able to generate enough kinetic energy. Without saying a word, Wally teleports down to Earth. Kid Flash quickly joins the racing speedsters, acknowledging that even though he's not as fast as them, he can still add some kinetic energy. He also admits that he can't let the "new kid" take credit for saving the world. Bart and Barry are happy to have the company, and promptly begin lapping Wally.
Before too long, Nightwing, Artemis, Superboy, Miss Martian, Aqualad and Blue Beetle arrive in the bio-ship. The scarab tells Jaime that Earth's magnetic field is stabilizing, but it warns him, "The Kid Flash is in danger." Wally's slower speed is making him an exit valve for the chrysalis' energy. The scarab predicts that in 16 seconds, Wally will "cease."
Barry notices all the energy bolts hitting Wally, which is somehow making him transparent. He tells Bart they need to slow down more and draw some of the energy away from Wally. But it's no use. Barry tries to touch Wally, but his hand goes right through him. Wally laments that Artemis is going to kill him, not to mention his parents. He asks Barry to tell them he loves them, then simply fades away.
The energy tornado completely fades away, leaving behind an exhausted Impulse and Flash. Aqualad helps up Flash and Miss Martin helps Impulse. Artemis sadly asks where Wally is, and Barry puts his hands on her shoulders, telling her that Wally loved her. Artemis falls to her knees and sobs, while M'gann comforts her and everybody sadly looks on in silence.
On the Watchtower on July 4, 21:16 EDT, the reunited Justice League and Team celebrate the long overdue departure of the Reach. Captain Atom turns over chairman duties to Black Canary, and Nightwing puts Aqualad in charge of the Team. Bart pays respects to a hologram statue of Wally, while wearing one of Wally's old uniforms. Artemis tells him he looks good, but Bart confesses he feels like a fraud. Artemis says it's good of him to honor Wally's legacy by becoming Kid Flash, and says Wally would be proud.
Bart notes that Artemis is wearing her old Tigress uniform, so she explains that Artemis was Wally's partner and she currently needs some distance. Bart asks if she's going to try to be Tigress as a hero, but she coyly responds, "As a blonde." Virgil Hawkins becomes the first of the runaways to accept the Team's invitation, going by the hero name Static. Robin and Wonder Girl officially become a couple, and Superboy and Miss Martian get back together ... sort of.
Everybody's called together, and Batman announces the Team will now operate out of the Watchtower, side by side with the League, not because Mount Justice was destroyed, but because they deserve it. The League then leaves, and Aqualad addresses the Team. He puts Superboy, Miss Martian and Beast Boy on Alpha, tasked with helping B'arzz O'oomm on Mars. Tigress, Kid Flash, Bumblebee and Guardian are Beta, ordered to investigate LexCorp bringing out the Reach soft drink under a new name. The rest of the Team is Gamma, set to track Vandal Savage's next move. But none of them seem to realize that Savage has taken Warworld to Apokolips, where he makes a deal with Darkseid himself.
And on that cliffhanger, this show will be canceled ... until it was miraculously revived on the DC Universe streaming service six years later. We'll get to Season 3, but it will take a while.
Anyway, this was a pretty decent episode that simultaneously displayed all the strengths and flaws of the show. First, the animation. Miss Martian and Superboy looked very strange and jumpy on Rimbor. But all the action scenes were top notch. Then there's the dialogue. This show absolutely loves to have multiple people deliver a speech where they seamlessly trade off every other sentence. It always feels unnaturally rehearsed, and it gets really obnoxious when you pick up on how often the show does it. Again, the Superboy/Miss Martian speech was the low point of the episode. But at the end, Wally's final words were practically perfect.
The main conceit of the show is for the teenage sidekicks to step up and save the world themselves. This requires the heavy-hitters of the Justice League to be kept busy elsewhere, giving room for our heroes to do their thing. I didn't review the first season on this blog, but I felt like it managed to come up with plausible reasons for the Justice League's absence from episode to episode. This season felt like a contrivance. Yeah, I get that the Justice League wants to be responsible and go through the intergalactic legal means, but it doesn't make any sense for them to show up so ill-prepared, and then only be released because of one extremely cheesy speech from a couple of teenagers. And how convenient that they took their sweet time coming back to Earth, arriving just after the crisis had been averted. Of course, that had to happen, because if Superman was there, he would have been able to help take down the final device and possibly save Wally. Wait a minute ... Captain Marvel was there and he could have done that, too. Why didn't he? I mean, beyond the show not wanting to pay his voice actor.
But at the end of the day, this episode was all about Wally, the only hero we've seen die in the line of duty on this show. And that's a big deal since he was a founding member of the Team. Of course, in this season, he was mostly retired, choosing to only show up on occasion for a couple of missions and to yell at Dick (who STILL never faced any consequences for his disastrous decisions). It was fitting that Wally, the reluctant hero, was able to find his courage at the end and make the ultimate sacrifice. And you know what, even six years later, I still get a little teary eyed when I watch this scene. It was handled so beautifully. I think it's good to occasionally kill off a major character, just as long as it means something. And it certainly meant something here. Reminiscent of Barry Allen's classic death in Crisis on Infinite Earths, with the exception that Wally was not alone when he went. And even though this version of Wally often drove me nuts, I have to say his death was much more effective than the two "deaths" of Bart we've covered on this blog.
The one drawback of Wally's death is the pressure it put on Bart to become Kid Flash. As I've said before and I'll say again, there's absolutely nothing wrong with being Impulse. But after Wally's casual suggestion the last episode, and now his death here, how can Bart NOT be Kid Flash? It's an unfair position for him to be in. At least he had the decency to say he felt like a fraud wearing that suit.
All in all, I am a huge fan of this show. They finally brought Impulse to life on screen, and handled him wonderfully, thanks to the fantastic setup by Peter David and the superb performance of Jason Marsden. It's just a terrible shame that we only got him for half a season, then had to wait half a decade for the next story.
In the meantime, we'll just have to make do with the Kid Flash of Teen Titans and the Impulse of Smallville. Next time, Smallville's Bart will finally confront the Black Flash.
