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"Justice League" Season 2

Series
Someone once told me, after expressing my disappointment in the first season of "Justice League", that Season 2 was much better and that I should hold out with the series until I'd seen that.

Season 2 suffers from the same problems as Season 1 - There's so much cartoon mayhem that character and plot get lost. Having a series consist entirely of 2- and 3-part episodes is a great idea, one that I had advocated for "Star Trek: Enterprise" years before the "mini-arcs" of Season 4. The problem with "Justice League" is that most of the episodes don't have enough plot to justify a second part, and the writers make up for it by making about 80% of the show's runtime into massive battle sequences between multiple characters.

Gone are the wonderful lists of supporting characters from the previous Batman and Superman shows that had given both of those series a welcome bit of variety. Rarely do we see any of the JL members in the guises of their "secret identities". Bruce Wayne appears twice in Season 2, Clark Kent maybe three times. Instead, the Justice League are all slight variations on Superman, taking inhuman amounts of physical punishment. Even the Flash, whose powers are speed-based, can have a truck land on him with no ill effects. Batman is almost criminally underused, and usually shows up just to save the rest of the team and prove that, without a doubt, he's the most powerful of the bunch even without any fancy superpowers.

The show's ability to handle comedy is well-displayed, too. Everyone gets a few zingers in (though it's mostly Flash). Even Batman elicits some laughter, which is especially impressive considering he does it without breaking character.

All that said, the cartoon mayhem is mostly satisfying to watch. Sure, there's only so many times I can see Superman slammed into a stone wall... but damn, sometimes it's really cool to see Superman slammed into a stone wall. The character thread love story between Green Lantern and Hawkgirl is well-done, if predictable and gives Season 2 a slight edge over Season 1, even if the three-part "Star-crossed" season finale isn't quite as geek-cool as Season 1's "The Savage Time".

Standout episodes:
"Twilight" Parts 1-2: Brainiac and Darkseid join forces to destroy the Man of Steel.
"A Better World" Parts 1-2: The League fights their alternate counterparts from a dimension where the Justice Lords rule with an iron fist.
"The Terror Beyond" Parts 1-2: Solomon Grundy tries to get his soul back.
"Hereafter" Parts 1-2: The League tries to soldier on after Superman is apparently killed in battle with the Toyman.
"Comfort and Joy": A Very Special Justice League Christmas
"Wild Card" Parts 1-2: The Joker plants two dozen bombs in Las Vegas and gives the Justice League 22 minutes to disarm them all... and televises the whole thing.
"Star-crossed" Parts 1-3: Hawkgirl reveals her true mission as a spy on Earth for the Thanagarian military.

Video:
Presented in 1.78:1 non-anamorphic widescreen, "Justice League" looks pretty good. Colors are bold, blacks are deep. There's nothing much to complain about, save some jagged edges here or there.

Audio:
The 2.0 Surround mix is adequate, though not entirely impressive. For an animated show, it sounds good. A full-on 5.1 mix would have been welcome, what with all the action this show displays. But the audio is crystal clear, even if it isn't enveloping or impressive.

Extras:
The DVD set features three commentaries by the producers on "Twilight, Part 2", "A Better World, Part 2" and "Star-crossed, Part 3". They're informative, but standard fare if you've listened to any of the previous commentaries from Bruce Timm et al. There is one featurette on the voice cast, hosted by Phil Lamarr (Green Lantern) that finally shows us the cast in action in the recording studio (something I've wanted to see since "Batman: The Animated Series" premiered on DVD). Unfortunately, it's not the entire cast (Kevin Conroy as Batman and Michael Rosenbaum as Flash do not appear). A second featurette, a discussion with the producers about Season 2 as a whole and a look at several of the background paintings from various episodes, isn't even listed on the packaging. It lasts only a few minutes.

Overall:
Series: B-
A/V: B+
Extras: B-

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