We continue our not at all anymore Multiversity Summer Binge, in the fall, with summer weather in most places, with a story about snow. Try to keep up. Yes that was a pun. A really, really bad pun.
1. Sweet 16
We get started on what seems to be a pretty innocent Wally episode. He’s turning 16, his mom makes breakfast, they make driving jokes, Iris gives him a shoutout on the news. It just really reminds me how much I haven’t at all enjoyed the portrayal of Wally in this show since the beginning. Definitely out of everyone on the show he is the least developed and I am so ready for horny Wally to die. Please be the episode that aspect of the character is discarded.
2. Finally Wally learns!
The other thing I really wanted to happen to Wally finally happened this episode as he learned that Miss M and Superboy were a couple. How in the hell had he not noticed this already? It’s been really weird seeing him make extremely pervy comments to her even now at the point where she’s dating Superboy. It’s really unnecessary. Thank god that’s over, and thank god Artemis got to tell him so they can finally be a thing.
3. Why Vandal Savage?
So Vandal Savage is a really heavy hitter to be on distraction duty for Wally on his cross country trek to save the the little girl who is actually the queen of the fictional nation of Vlatava. It seems like an interesting choice to pit Wally up against, especially since we know Vandal is basically the leader of The Light. It both signals that whoever is getting this heart is important, which we learn, and also that this task is important or connected to The Light. You would think there would be some fallout to this interaction, but there’s not. Seems wasted.
4. “It’s called regicide.
The rest of the episode with Wally dealing with Count Vertigo who we learn engineered the whole ice ship distraction to kill his niece to take the throne of Vlatava (which like last episode seems way overly convoluted) is really cool up until he spills his guts like a comic book villain and gets caught on tape. Diplomatic immunity doesn’t protect against hard evidence bruh. It’s interesting though to contrast this development to Wally’s struggle to take the heart at the beginning of the episode because he’s missing out on the team up with the League. Wally releases then it doesn’t matter whose heart it is he’s saving a life. The stakes though, untold by Batman which I think is a dick move and really wrong, are huge, there was the fate of a country on the line the whole time. Why didn’t Batman tell Wally? Why is Vertigo an idiot? But most of all why does The Light want Vlatava, and will we ever learn?
5. Episode 1 callbacks
We get some cool easter eggs in this episode, which to me are about the only redeeming aspects. The ice villains Batman and Flash presume were behind the five ice fortresses, Mister Freeze, Captain Cold, Icicle Sr and Jr, and Killer Frost, were all the villains being fought in the first episode and then dealt with later in Belle Reve. It’s still nice to see that sense of continuity, especially also since we the viewers know they were probably a part of it since we know Hugo Strange is evil. Fun continuity bits in an “eh” episode.
That’s all for this week folks. Sound off in the comments if this is your favorite episode and I’m way off and come back next week as we inch closer to end and meet the boy who will be the beast. Another bad pun, Garfield Logan aka Beast Boy in the future shows up. Yeah I’m signing off now.
