DC Nation returns!

You may have read my review of a cartoon you should be watching here: Young Justice. For some unfathomable reason the DC Nation lineup was taken on hiatus for some months, but i’m thrilled to report that it is back.  Tune in, set your DVR or what have you, because there are multiple shows here worth watching.

Green Lantern the animated series is growing on me.  With the interest of full disclosure, I am only 10 episodes into it, but at first the animation style rubbed me the wrong way. It looks a little bit too much like CG Toy Story than the cell animation  for some reason I was expecting. That said, you get past that initial shock and find that this show is fun. Hal Jordon and Killawog find themselves on the frontier of the Green Lantern territory with a ship controlled by a lantern powered AI which they name Aya (get it?), who is able to move away from the ship into a physical body of parts she can assemble (eat your heart out Andromeda). I was excited to see that the first villain that they introduced was Atrocitus (if only because i’d love to see an animated Darkest Night series!), and we are on our way for a long series of hunting the Red Lanterns and making the 9 month journey back to Oa.

All of this said, if you are not familiar with the Green Lantern series (comic or cartoon), this is an easy introduction to the universe. Obvious deviations from the comic aside, it’s an engaging story, and any way to incorporate Hal Jordon’s humor goes a long way to break up the ‘lost in space’ story line.

I am most excited for the return of Young Justice! When we left off before the hiatus in the beginning of season 2, some time had passed since the end of season 1. “The Team” has grown significantly in size, including new members like Beast Boy, Bat Girl (Wouldn’t it be awesome to progress the story line to Oracle?), Impulse, Wonder girl, Bumble Bee, Blue Beetle, a new Robin (Tim Drake, which means somewhere in this universe there is possibly a Jason Todd to contend with), Nightwing and more that I am sure i’m forgetting.

At the end of Season 1 there was a small bombshell that the 6 founding members of the Justice League while under the control of Vandal Savage, have 16 hours wiped from their memory where their whereabouts are still unknown for that time period – a story line discussed frequently (what would happen if the Justice League turned rogue, who could stop them?). Moving into this new season, We still don’t know that exact information, but we see the universe growing rapidly with members of The Team traveling to other planets, and discovering how any member of the Justice League are wanted criminals off world due to what happened in those 16 hours.

Spoilers below!

Now, I could care less about drama of Miss Martian splitting up with Super Boy, but I am absolutely hooked that they introduce the concept that a good guy can go too far in invading the privacy of a villain by Miss Martian probing so strongly into the brain of someone that it leaves them in a catatonic state, that she would do this so much that Super Boy would give her an ultimatum about it, and she would use her powers to try and erase his memory of that act… The drama in that goes on, but these are deep concepts for what many would write off (wrongly so) as only a kids show.

/End Spoilers

Some could nerd rage about how these series aren’t staying true to the original source, but I think if you take it for what they are – very entertaining, engaging and somewhat addicting shows – you’ll agree this is worth the time to tune in.  Saturday mornings on Cartoon Network and Itunes, check it out – you will enjoy it!