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Young Justice: Outsiders season 3, episode 1 recap: Princes All

By Monita Mohan

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Young Justice returns for a third season with a promising premiere. Discord runs through the Justice League and meta-humans have become a valuable, but deadly resource. Who will step up to save the day?

After a six-year-long absence, Young Justice is back! The beloved DC animated show debuts its highly anticipated third season, ‘Outsiders’, on the DC Universe streaming platform, with the majority of its original cast returning to voice the characters.

Young Justice: Outsiders begins with Dick Grayson/ Nightwing (Jesse McCartney) retiring from the superhero game. At the Watchtower in space, Kaldur’ahm (Khary Payton) tries to talk Dick out of it, but Dick is unrelenting. The death of Wally West in the second season finale weighs heavily on him – the three of them founded this team, after all.

But Young Justice is in good hands. Kaldur’ahm leads the group – with Barbara Gordon/ Batgirl by his side – dividing them up into teams to head out to different missions. It’s ‘business as usual’, Dick says as he walks away.

Two years later in Markovburg, a young boy is told that his sister has died of heart failure. Unbeknownst to him, she has actually been whisked away to a laboratory and dunked in a black liquid that activates her meta-gene. What emerges is a kind of lava monster that attacks the Justice League on Rann. When Jefferson Pierce/ Black Lightning fires at the lava monster, the girl’s heart gives out and she dies. The Justice League scan the entity and discover that she was a 14-year-old girl from Earth.

After the op, Black Lightning returns to the Watchtower to join an emergency League meeting. M’gann M’orzz/ Miss Martian (Danica McKellar) interrupts the Young Justice debriefing to tell him the League is waiting for him. M’gann is the new leader of the team and seems to have ditched the Green Martian façade, adopting a look closer to her White Martian origins. Just then, the team’s ‘fearless leader’, as Bart Allen/ Kid Flash (Jason Marsden) calls him, appears. Kaldur’ahm now goes by Aquaman, and he is suited up to look the part!

Diana Prince/ Wonder Woman (Maggie Q) leads the meeting – meta-human trafficking has spilled out into the galaxy. The League’s unknown enemy is deploying these metas on numerous worlds as weapons of mass destruction. These unwarranted attacks are undermining the League’s efforts to maintain a good image across the galaxy following their trial on Rimbor.

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Meta-humans are being treated as the next exploitable resource, Bruce Wayne/ Batman mansplains. Every corner of the globe is tapping into these powers and United Nations Secretary-General Lex Luthor is placing restrictions on the League, making them ineffective.

Batman believes the League has outrun their usefulness and tenders in his resignation, followed by Oliver Queen/ Green Arrow, Hardware, Tatsu Yamashiro/ Katana, Patrick O’Brian/ Plastic Man and Kate Kane/ Batwoman. It seems these members had already decided in advance and Dinah Lance/ Black Canary is outraged by this move. She tells Ollie to leave while she remains with the League. Black Lightning also resigns, but he was not in on Batman’s plan. He simply ‘can’t do this anymore’.

The Justice League isn’t the only team affected either. Seeing Batman, a number of the Young Justice members also resign, including Stephanie Brown/ Spoiler, Arrowette and Tim Drake/ Robin.

Young Justice: Outsiders (Credit: DC Universe)

In Moscow, Nightwing is raiding another meta-human trafficking lab. On comms, Oracle asks if it’s Bedlam and the two of them confirm it definitely is. Nightwing blows the place up and sends Oracle a sample of the black material he found in the laboratory. It contains a substance that can only be found in Markovia. In the comic books, Oracle was the codename Barbara Gordon adopted after becoming paralyzed by the Joker in The Killing Joke. Even though she could no longer save Gotham as Batgirl, she continued to be a hero as Oracle up until the 2016 DC universe Rebirth run.

In Markovia, Cat Grant reports from a press conference held by the royal family on the second anniversary of the abduction of their daughter. Seems not all is kosher in the family as Prince Brion (Troy Baker) Markov, who has returned from two years of travelling, may hold some ill-will towards his twin brother, Gregor. Gregor is only 16 minutes older than Brion, but that’s enough to make him first in line for the throne.

Oracle has tracked the source to a children’s hospital, but Nightwing won’t be able to infiltrate the place on his own. Instead, he’s come to Star City to recruit Artemis Crock/ Tigress (Stephanie Lemelin), who still has a picture of her and Wally West by her bedside. However, her housemate appears to be Will, the name adopted by the clone of Roy Harper.

Nightwing also enlists the help of Conner Kent/ Superboy (Nolan North), who is struggling with the burden of stepping up in place of Superman. The Man of Steel has been away in space for a long time, leaving a void that Conner feels he should fill. M’gann is certain he can do it but wishes he had passed on Dick’s mission to be by her side now that a large chunk of her team has resigned thanks to Batman.

Young Justice: Outsiders (Credit: DC Universe)

Conner takes this opportunity to get down on one knee and propose to M’gann with a ring he’s been carrying around for months. Of course, M’gann says yes!

In Markovburg, a meta-human speedster attacks and kills the King and Queen, making Gregor the new ruler. But since he is 17, his uncle, army general Baron Frederick DeLamb rules in his stead as Regent. Markovia declares martial law and only a day after opening the country’s borders to Qurac refugees, announces the need to vet all Quracis and hunt down the assassins.

Next. Young Justice: Outsiders season 3, episode 2 recap. dark

Nightwing tries to recruit Black Lightning next as his mission is the one-and-done kind. Unfortunately, it’s not that Jefferson doesn’t want to help, he can’t get his powers to work. But Dick wants him on the mission, irrespective.

That night, Tigress, Superboy and Black Lightning head out to take the trafficking syndicate down once and for all.

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