S03.E12: Prodigal

[Sakura12]

After Nightwing and Red Hood's battle, Rachel and Gar try to save their friend. Meanwhile Jason questions his allegiance. With Barbara behind bars, Donna leads her own resistance operation, and Conner helps Blackfire recover her ship. [ /quote]

[Sakura12]

This show has no idea what it wants to be. I know the writer wants a BatFam show but DC didn't give permission for one. But he tried anyway and made a mess of it. It's supposed to be a Titans show but actual Titans just seem to walk around and do things without impacting the story at all. So the show is a boring mess with no direction. 

If this show continues please get a new showrunner. This one doesn't know what he's doing. 

What is the point of killing characters if you are just going to bring them back right away. Are they saying Kory is pregnant with Dick's kid. They haven't been together in 3 years.

They keep saying they are a family, but they act like they barely know each other. Why are they still separated. Having them find each other in the last episode isn't going to be as epic as these writers think it is, since they kept them apart for stupid reasons. 

Also how did Dick know Donna's alive? It seems all the interesting and new information happens off screen. Like Donna finding and rescuing Bruce, Rachel finding Gar, Dick finding out Donna's alive. If we had less Crane boring monologues we could see that stuff happening.

 I fast forward all of Crane's scenes and have missed nothing interesting. This is probably their worst villian because he's so boring. Now hes trying to be the Riddler. 

[Snapdragon]

I feel so bad for the actors on this show.  I'm trying to imagine what their faces must have looked like when they got this week's script and read "Dick Grayson gets airlifted to the lazarus pit by bats."  

[UnoAgain]

Yeah the show is a mess.. Whatever... More Donna and Tim... All right I see you Connor Luthor... Still don't care about Rachel or Gar... Or Jason for that matter, but time will need young ppl around him next season so I guess it's cool... 

[Nellise]

At least I laughed a few times this episode, even though I think it wasn't intentionally funny. The bat airlift was ridiculous (and makes no sense like everything else in this show). And because I'm apparently 12, I laughed when Rachel was being super serious and said: "It wasn't hate that gave me power, it was love...for you...for Dick...". They probably could have worded that better.

At least they're making Tim into a worthy successor to Jason: he was so annoying in the car ride with Donna. Dude, you already died once because you don't know what you're doing.

They missed a potentially hilarious way to get rid of Superboy: I wanted Blackfire's fire to burn him up because she didn't know that Kryptonite weakens him.

It bugs me too much that the afterlives shown on this show and Doom Patrol aren't remotely similar given that they're the same universe.

 

Edited October 14, 2021 by Nellise

[Nellise]

Forgot Dick asking Blackfire to check if Connor was okay. He had no idea if it would kill him and did it anyway?

Edited October 14, 2021 by Nellise

[madhacker]

What's annoying to me is the fact that a few episodes ago I thought of the perfect way for the Titans to capture Crane with hardly any effort. Simply, let Krypto help. He's a Kryptionian dog, so his sense of smell should be just like our dogs, only super times more powerful. Dick simply gives Krypto a whiff of something Crane wore like one of his Arkham uniforms, tells him to go find him and tells Connor to go with him. Barely an hour later they've got him. End of problem, because I highly doubt Scarecrow has fear toxin that could affect them.

[Primal Slayer]

I just finished the episode and Im still not sure what happened. 

Half of this cast has died and been brought back to life within 3 seasons which is just ridiculous. 

How many vision journeys does Dick need to go on? And how many kids does he have to go have in them? He had kids with "true love" Dove in S1, and now he has a kid with his "true love?" Starfire? They keep repearing themselves but just change the setting. 

Blackfire got her fire and she isnt afraid to use it and now that Starfire knows the truth that her parents stole Blackfires flame it totally absolves Blackfire of everything she's ever done. And where did her ship even come from? Are we retconning the S2 finale where she kills a woman and uses her as a host to shift into her body? 

3 seasons and Gar finally is able to transform into something other than a tiger! Wow! And it couldnt have been a weirder scene. I still dont get why the Bats were following him...was he unknowingly communicating with them? And then the bats unite to fly Dicks body to a lavarus pit? 

Tim/Donnas storyline is fairly boring. Still dont understand why they ignored that he came from a life of wealth and why become a Robin when there is no Batman around? Just take up a new mantle? 

[Broderbits]

Maybe it's time to give Krypto his own show and put this one out of its misery.

[millennium]

19 hours ago, Sakura12 said:

 Now hes trying to be the Riddler. 

I thought he was trying to be William Dozier.

[millennium]

17 hours ago, Snapdragon said:

I feel so bad for the actors on this show.  I'm trying to imagine what their faces must have looked like when they got this week's script and read "Dick Grayson gets airlifted to the lazarus pit by bats."  

The lore of the Lazarus Pit is that every time you go in, you come out a little more insane.  Back in the days when only Ra's Al Ghul had a Lazarus Pit, he would need to be restrained upon emerging because he would be like a mad man for a day or two before regaining control of his faculties.   In an interesting reversal the showrunners have fixed it so that now every time a character rises from the Lazarus Pit, it's the viewers who start feeling crazy.

Edited October 15, 2021 by millennium

[millennium]

I don't like Tim Drake already.   Is there some unwritten rule that replacement Robins have to be whiny and needy and desperate to prove themselves?   His Robin entitlement is very off-putting.    Just because you're a Survivor superfan doesn't mean you're gonna win.

Blackfire and Connor running hot and cold doesn't make a lot of sense.   Oh no, Dick blew some Kryptonite dust on me and knocked me out, I must kill him now.  Sure.

Donna Troy seems peeved that she's on this show.  Her lipstick is killing it though. 

I don't want redemption for Jason Todd.   I'm weary of bad people getting off easy for their crimes because the people who ought to be punishing them are too soft or too weary to do the right thing.   "You'll never be a Titan again."  Well, Dick, I guess that'll make him reconsider all the lives he and Crane snuffed out. 

One last thing: I don't like it when superheroes curse.   It's not just their powers that are supposed to set them apart from us grimy mortals, but also their intelligence and decorum.   Hearing Donna Troy and Conner gratuitously saying "fuck" doesn't endear them to me, or make me think "wow, they're just like us."  In my eyes, it merely diminishes them. 

[blackwing]

Can this season just be finished already?  The showrunners act like they are building everyone to this grand epic confrontation between Crane and the Titans (with Jason's help), and I'm just like "please just limp to the finish".  If Crane does not die or disappear at the end of this season, I won't be back for Season 4.  I can't take him anymore being written as "the most incredible criminal mind Gotham has ever seen".  The actor is AWFUL and has been working my last nerve.

I realised while watching yesterday that I truly don't care about some of these characters.   Especially Barbara.  I don't care for Tim Drake, he is incessantly annoying.  I don't even really care about Rachel anymore, she's been gone for too long and the team did just fine without her, so ok.

Why is Donna afraid of a few cops?  She's Wonder Girl.  Super strong, super fast.  A few cops with bullets shouldn't faze her.

Did Connor sabotage the repair of Blackfire's ship?  He doesn't want her to leave, but she says she has to.  And he tells her that he can't survive on Tamaran so he will have to stay on Earth.  He heats up the glowing ball of stuff, puts it in the ship.  Then it explodes and he doesn't even react, while Koriander and Kommandr are both cowering and running away.  I hope this means that both Connor and Blackfire are sticking around, they are two of the more interesting characters.

I was laughing that Jason had to get rolled into the Pit naked but Dick gets picked up by bats and just dumped in there.  How did the bats know to pick up Dick?  It's not like there's any psychic connection between the bats and Dick.  Was it something that Rachel willed/did?  Glad to see that Gar transformed into something other than a tiger.  I was half-afraid they were going to make him into Man-Bat, because that's kind of what he looked like and I wouldn't put anything past this show to mess with the comics stories.

On 10/14/2021 at 8:06 AM, Sakura12 said:

This show has no idea what it wants to be. I know the writer wants a BatFam show but DC didn't give permission for one. But he tried anyway and made a mess of it. It's supposed to be a Titans show but actual Titans just seem to walk around and do things without impacting the story at all. So the show is a boring mess with no direction. 

If this show continues please get a new showrunner. This one doesn't know what he's doing. 

What is the point of killing characters if you are just going to bring them back right away. Are they saying Kory is pregnant with Dick's kid. They haven't been together in 3 years.

They keep saying they are a family, but they act like they barely know each other. Why are they still separated. Having them find each other in the last episode isn't going to be as epic as these writers think it is, since they kept them apart for stupid reasons. 

Also how did Dick know Donna's alive? It seems all the interesting and new information happens off screen. Like Donna finding and rescuing Bruce, Rachel finding Gar, Dick finding out Donna's alive. If we had less Crane boring monologues we could see that stuff happening.

 I fast forward all of Crane's scenes and have missed nothing interesting. This is probably their worst villian because he's so boring. Now hes trying to be the Riddler. 

I agree with everything you said here.  Too much Crane, not enough Titans.

20 hours ago, madhacker said:

What's annoying to me is the fact that a few episodes ago I thought of the perfect way for the Titans to capture Crane with hardly any effort. Simply, let Krypto help. He's a Kryptionian dog, so his sense of smell should be just like our dogs, only super times more powerful. Dick simply gives Krypto a whiff of something Crane wore like one of his Arkham uniforms, tells him to go find him and tells Connor to go with him. Barely an hour later they've got him. End of problem, because I highly doubt Scarecrow has fear toxin that could affect them.

Yes exactly.  Or why not use Connor and Donna together to find Crane and end this easily?  So stupid.

[Sakura12]

49 minutes ago, blackwing said:

Yes exactly.  Or why not use Connor and Donna together to find Crane and end this easily?  So stupid

They can't because the showrunner has a hard on for Nightwing and he has to be the one to save the day on his own. Conner and Donna can't be around to steal his thunder. So Donna's stuck with a wannabe hero and Conner is becoming Lex because he feels abandoned. Which just makes him Jason 2.0. 

They also can't keep saying they are a family if they don't show them being a family. Dick barely acknowledged Rachel whom he hasn't seen in awhile, then somehow found out his old friend Donna is alive and has no reaction to that. 

Also why did Dick have to die, the writers do know you don't have to be dead to use the pit. It heals injuries too. Because we could've skipped Dick's visions since we didn't see anyone else's visions when they died. That just took up uneccessary time. Since Dick still didn't learn to share his decisions with the team and ran off alone to get Jason. 

[millennium]

3 hours ago, blackwing said:

Yes exactly.  Or why not use Connor and Donna together to find Crane and end this easily?  So stupid.

In my native New England, this would be pronounced "Conna and Donna."

I had the same Man-Bat apprehension (Skree!) but then he went poof and turned into a bat like a bad prop from Love At First Bite or some other vampire comedy movie.   Where do his clothes go, by the way?

[blackwing]

2 hours ago, millennium said:

I had the same Man-Bat apprehension (Skree!) but then he went poof and turned into a bat like a bad prop from Love At First Bite or some other vampire comedy movie.   Where do his clothes go, by the way?

The POOF reminded me of the vampire in that Bugs Bunny cartoon where Bugs is constantly saying "nananananana nanananeh abracadabra" and the vampire alternately poofs between human and bat.

Not sure what happened to his clothes.  When he turns tiger, even this season with the battle with the police, he has been shown needing to strip out of his clothes.  I guess he doesn't have to, but if he turned tiger then his clothes would be ripped/shredded, so he takes them off.  When he turned into a bat, I guess his clothes just fell off of him?  Yet he was presumably one of the bats in the cloud of bats, which picked up Dick, transported him some lengths including underground.

The next we see Gar, he is in his pants.  So... did Gar Bat or some other bat pick up Gar's pants and transport them to the Lazarus Pit along with Dick's body?

[millennium]

3 hours ago, blackwing said:

When he turned into a bat, I guess his clothes just fell off of him?  Yet he was presumably one of the bats in the cloud of bats, which picked up Dick, transported him some lengths including underground.

The next we see Gar, he is in his pants.  So... did Gar Bat or some other bat pick up Gar's pants and transport them to the Lazarus Pit along with Dick's body?

In a funny coincidence, just before watching this episode with its dubious medivac-by-bats I saw a report on the BBC news about a lung transplant considered historic because the organs were delivered by drone.    The footage of the drone taking off with the lungs wasn't that different from the bats airlifting Dick.

When Highlander The TV Series was a thing, we had a joke in the forums about "Quicken Clean," an imaginary service that showed up after an immortal had a Quickening and took away the decapitated bodies, swept up the shattered glass, etc.   Maybe the Titans have a similar service to get clothes to everyone on demand.

P.S. I hope Gar was tested for rabies.

Edited October 16, 2021 by millennium

[Cthulhudrew]

11 hours ago, blackwing said:

I was laughing that Jason had to get rolled into the Pit naked but Dick gets picked up by bats and just dumped in there. 

Not only that, but somehow his Nightwing costume got transformed by the Lazarus Pit into civvies, because that was the last thing he was wearing in his spirit journey.

Agree with so many of the comments here. Oddly enough, except for a some of the random side-treks the heroes have gone on to (I guess) keep them separated and just stopping Crane outright, this season has probably been the most focused on its storyline. It's just too bad that storyline is really boring, and centered around the unimpressive performance of its main badguy.

[Wonderlad71]

yeah what a mess of a season. Crane has to be one of the worst villians ever ( and there have been some awful ones on the CW) .

So are we getting an villain Connor for Season 4? looks like he's going off his rocker.

The Starfire-Blackfire soap opera is tiresome as well. And a redemption for Jason already is baffling.

 

[blackwing]

On 10/16/2021 at 3:18 AM, Wonderlad71 said:

yeah what a mess of a season. Crane has to be one of the worst villians ever ( and there have been some awful ones on the CW) .

So are we getting an villain Connor for Season 4? looks like he's going off his rocker.

The Starfire-Blackfire soap opera is tiresome as well. And a redemption for Jason already is baffling.

 

I think it's fine for CW villains to be campy and over-the-top, but too often, they continue to exist LONG after their expiration date.  I never watched "The Flash" or "Supergirl" so don't have any reference from those shows.  But on "Arrow" and "Legends"... Vandal Savage from Season 1.  Damien Dahrk (great the first few times, then his all-powerfulness and witty banter just got really old).  Bad Laurel (actually, I hated good Laurel too, so maybe that one was the actress herself).  The singsonging guy from this season of Legends.

Connor is one of the few characters on this show that I wholeheartedly like, so I will be disappointed if they make him into the villain for Season 4.  But I could see them doing this, because the problem otherwise is that he is too powerful for the level of threats they have on this show, and it's so stupid to continue making up excuses to sideline him.  Every single fight this season should have been over in less than a minute with Connor around.

[tennisgurl]

Connor is one of the only characters that I still like at his point, so I really hope they aren't going to try and make him a villain. Its not really his fault he's getting so messed up, he looks like a young man but is emotionally still about a month or so old and everyone he knows is too busy with their own angst to teach him about how to process his emotions in a healthy way. Or else he's an emotionally unstable toddler with insane amounts of power and no idea how to handle them, and the only people who have ever treated him as more than a lab experiment (besides his dog and lab mob) are these idiots who can hardly even bother to say more than two words to each other. They keep saying how they're family, but they don't even seem to know or like each other.

Of course the Titans cant really bond as a team and as a family because this whole season is really a Batfam show not a Titans show. Its painfully obvious what the show runners are actually interested in and its dressed like a bat and is nowhere near Titans Tower. I guess Jason has finally realized that being evil sucks? And Dick takes a dip in the Lazarus Pit and it means nothing? Ever character is off on their own in their own plots, which is bad enough on a team show but its especially unfortunate because the only story the show cares about is the one with the Batfam.

The highlight of the episode was definitely the bats carrying Dick off, that was hysterically funny. Not the reaction the show wanted, but its something. Oh and Krypto, as always. The goodest boy. 

[marihunc]

On 10/14/2021 at 7:40 PM, Nellise said:

It bugs me too much that the afterlives shown on this show and Doom Patrol aren't remotely similar given that they're the same universe.

Actually, according to the end of Crisis on Infinite Earths, this show is set on Earth-9, and Doom Patrol is on Earth-21. I'm guessing that's how they explain the different Chiefs and why they never even mentioned Gar on DP.

Edited October 19, 2021 by marihunc

[Nellise]

2 hours ago, marihunc said:

Actually, according to the end of Crisis on Infinite Earths, this show is set on Earth-9, and Doom Patrol is on Earth-21. I'm guessing that's how they explain the different Chiefs and why they never even mentioned Garth on DP.

Thanks for the clarification. The last of the Arrowverse shows I watched was the Invasion crossover and never saw Crisis.

 

[marihunc]

15 hours ago, Nellise said:

Thanks for the clarification. The last of the Arrowverse shows I watched was the Invasion crossover and never saw Crisis.

Yeah, this was basically an epilogue to establish which shows are now part of the multiverse. :)

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KUvCqSX-NPM

Edited October 19, 2021 by marihunc

[Affogato]

On 10/14/2021 at 3:32 PM, Primal Slayer said:

3 seasons and Gar finally is able to transform into something other than a tiger! Wow! And it couldnt have been a weirder scene. I still dont get why the Bats were following him...was he unknowingly communicating with them? And then the bats unite to fly Dicks body to a lavarus pit? 

 

Yes, the conversation he has with Raven over the Lazarus pit confirms the bat connection is one of his powers, Not only 'beast boy' but 'beastmaster'. if he ever gets conscious control of them. I have no idea if this is true in the comics.  I suppose he is going to get a shot of fear drug at some point and unleash is potential. It can't be an accident that fear is the key to his powers.

I don't know if the bat carrying the body off scene ever happens in comics, because I have a clear and detailed picture of the scene flattening out into a panel.  It could be a random memory or just my way of interpreting the action. As a realistic scene it sucks because the bats couldn't possibly carry Dick's body. It defies physics. As a comic book panel--well, that stuff happens in comics all the time. A lot of this tv show reminds me of comic book panels and presentations and writing and I think that is one of the reasons it is disorienting as a tv show. What good covers that view of Nightwing standing on the car, or later dragging his tasers over the metal railings on the walkway. The way the stories progress, too...since it is a comic story it is an endless serial.

 

 

[Affogato]

18 hours ago, tennisgurl said:

 

Of course the Titans cant really bond as a team and as a family

I don't think they are supposed to be a 'team and a family' at this point. I think they have made clumsy attempts but really, not there. I think that is the point of the show, I think it doesn't start with the team, it ends with the team.

I hope Nightwing gets away from his endless batman angst, which they keep on playing over and over in the comics.

[whiporee]

The New Teen Titans was my favorite comic; Robin was always my favorite hero. I followed the book until Wolfman left, and this incarnation was key to me. I remember the shock I felt in the new prestige format the first time they showed an unmarried Dick and Kory in bed together. I remember when Dick decided to hang up the tunic and grow up, the brilliance of the one-shot "Who is Donna Troy?" and the joy of Donna's wedding to ordinary guy Terry.

The book dealt with hard themes, but the Titans were not a dark group.  Dick, Donna and Gar were, at their core, optimistic, happy people. Even with her backstory, Kory was not damaged. Vic was doing the best he could. Raven was, for sure. Wally had dark moments and feelings of insecurity, but there was nothing hard about that book. These were kids with superpowers who were cool being kids with superpowers. Which is why I'm having a tough time with this incarnation. No one is having fun. You get the idea they are all tight with each other, but you never get the idea why they like each other. Everyone is moody all the time. 

I'll keep watching but I had hoped for something different. 

[Linderhill]

On 10/19/2021 at 10:38 AM, whiporee said:

The New Teen Titans was my favorite comic; Robin was always my favorite hero. I followed the book until Wolfman left, and this incarnation was key to me. I remember the shock I felt in the new prestige format the first time they showed an unmarried Dick and Kory in bed together. I remember when Dick decided to hang up the tunic and grow up, the brilliance of the one-shot "Who is Donna Troy?" and the joy of Donna's wedding to ordinary guy Terry.

The book dealt with hard themes, but the Titans were not a dark group.  Dick, Donna and Gar were, at their core, optimistic, happy people. Even with her backstory, Kory was not damaged. Vic was doing the best he could. Raven was, for sure. Wally had dark moments and feelings of insecurity, but there was nothing hard about that book. These were kids with superpowers who were cool being kids with superpowers. Which is why I'm having a tough time with this incarnation. No one is having fun. You get the idea they are all tight with each other, but you never get the idea why they like each other. Everyone is moody all the time. 

I'll keep watching but I had hoped for something different. 

I too read the Wolfman/Perez run and yeah, this group is nothing like the Titans of that run.  Cyborg was the only one that seemed to have any angst besides when Wally found out Raven had kind of manipulated him to join.  And Raven being the daughter of Trigon -- but then she was also an actual teen contemporary of the rest of the team.  Gar was the youngest member and wanted to be called Changeling.  I didn't stick around for the later incarnations with Hawk and Dove and Super Boy.