Welcome back to our coverage of Titans on Dc Universe with “Rose”! This was a shorter one this week but was still a solid episode. “Rose” keeps the momentum of the final minutes of last weeks season opener/finale and solidifies the tone and direction of the show going forward while keeping so much of what made Titans special in the first season. Great action, tantalizing name drops, and one (1) bad wig await us beware spoilers ahead!
1. The Doctor is in…
When it was announced Dr. Light was going to be in this season, I am sure I am not the only one who had war memories of “Identity Crisis”. For those approaching the character for the first time, Dr. Light was a character who was a minor villain in the Silver and Bronze Age and an annoyance for the Teen Titans of the comics. It was then revealed in an infamous storyline, “Identity Crisis” that he was a much much worse man which I won’t go into without a content warning, but was magically lobotomized by the Justice League to be an inept villain. Which is…dark (no pun intended). Titans is not a show that is afraid of being dark, but it has avoided being grim for the sake of being grim which “Identity Crisis” felt like at the time but the threat is still there for the show to “go there” with Dr. Light which would be very dodgy water.
Fortunately in “Rose,” this portrayal seems to be avoiding that characterization of Dr. Light altogether. Light comes off as a capable villain and a real threat with visually incredible light abilities. The character in Titans may just be the same in name and relation only which may be the best move for the show. With Deathstroke still not making his play, this episode would seem to set up Light as a definite threat for the Titans this season which I would be for. “Multiple villains” is a dirty word for superhero films and superhero television gets bogged down in villain of the week so more than one major threat towards the Titans seems to be a great balance.
2. A Rose by Any Other Name
The titular Rose Wilson is the focus for this episode. Well, she’s supposed to be. While there is a lot of great stuff in this episode, Rose’s storylin
e with the Titans felt like it was struggling to stretch out with the rest of the stories in an episode that could have easily been called “Kori and Donna” or “Hank and Dawn 2.”
The Titan’s have had three months to gel with each other and they have really settled as a family which we get to see in Gar and Jason’s training session, with excellent stunt work that sells that Jason, while a whole asshole, was trained by Batman and a really great scene with Gar and Rachel where Teagan Croft and Ryan Potter’s chemistry really shines. Dick’s family has grown really tight which brings up the issue when Rose enters and her place within and whether she wants to be apart of it anchors the New Titan’s plot.
Rose serves as an extremely interesting role in this episode because while the story puts her agency above everything verbally, she really does not have much to do or say. Rose has an excellent fight scene with a bunch of cops, then gets picked up by Dick and mostly just becomes the subject of conversation. Dick is trying not to repeat the mistakes of Bruce but wants to be a Bruce like figure for these wayward kids, which is a great motivation that becomes clear, especially through a conversation with vaguely accented and aged Iain Glen’s Bruce Wayne, whose role in the show is much more than a cameo. While Dick is all about Rose’s choice and autonomy, Bruce and the kids are less so leading to Gar and Jason discovering just why Rose is so special. Her father is Slade Wilson. Deathstroke. He is just a photograph in the final minutes of the episode but the presence is felt and that effect is great.
Continued below3. The Bird’s Nest…Ranch?
Off on a ranch somewhere are Hank and Dawn, who are doing well and have retired from the hero biz after the events of the last season and Dawn’s coma. Hank has taken to helping kids get clean from drugs and they seem happy and content. Until Hank realizes Dawn is still going out as Dove and betraying their commitment to get clean from the hero life by busting the meth lab run by friends of Ellis, the kid they are helping get clean.
This plot definitely feels the slowest in the episode, but at the same time feels the most sincere. In the previous episode, Hank and Dawn’s Trigon vision of falling into addiction felt like it came out of nowhere, and that maybe me missing its presence in the first season, and I felt like the show was using drugs to be gritty. However, seeing Hank’s dedication to getting Ellis clean and the show’s looking at the hero life as an addiction to Hank and Dawn added a lot of substance to something that could feel shallow otherwise.
4. The New Dynamic Duo.
Kori and Donna are the best part of this show. Connor Leslie and Anna Diop have such good chemistry and them staking out and mostly just chatting has no right to be as fun as it is. Objectively not much happens in their story this episode but they are having so much fun. Donna also names drops Roy Harper which kinda broke my assumption that prominent Arrowverse characters were off-limits. Donna and Kori’s banter is excellent and their quick fight with Shimmer at the end is a perfect climax to their story and really makes me want to see more and made me a little disappointed with Kori’s Tameranean plot seemingly taking her off the table.
5. WIG WATCH
Wigs were on the whole: Good.
Big Wig News: Starfire’s Dick Grayson Trigon Dream Wig™ is now canon and we are all the better for it. Applause to the wig department of Dc Universe’s Titans. Minka Kelly’s Dawn wig was also very good and looked really natural and really gave Christian Girl Autumn vibes and I respect it. Rachel’s wig is still a great upgrade and is a lovely color gradient.
Ryan Potter’s wig thinks it can get away but… something always feels a little off. It’s got light mullet energy which I don’t personally want to support and does not reflect on Gar’s pure soul.
We have a brand new wig to look at this time with Chelsea Zhang’s Rose Wilson wig. Good wig! Great color gradient, it’s stringy but that adds character and that’s important! Good storytelling through wigs!
Overall, “Rose” really pushes Titans firmly into the direction of season two without making the show radically different from season one. There was a lot going on and being set up this episode which could make the episode feel crowded but I think this soft season premiere benefitted by having the last moments of the previous episodes set up the new status quo and having this episode do more interesting things within it. Really excited to see what comes next and I am excited to go through it with you, dear reader. Until next time!
