DC Comics has yet another TV show, a medium in which its superhero catalogue shines while the cinemas remain devoted to Marvel. This time it is the not-so-teen Titans, as in a superhero team. DC tv-shows have had plenty of dark elements before, Gotham in particular revels in a Tim Burton-style gothic vibe. However, Titans is pitching closer to Netflix’s Marvel limited series such as Daredevil.
I say closer to Daredevil than, say The Flash but not very much like it. It has stylistic elements of a prestige TV show and no shortage of bloody and violent fight scenes. It also has lots of angsty character and everybody is dealing with inner demons. Most critically Rachael Roth (played by ex-Home & Away actress Tegan Croft) literally has an inner demon and a tendency to blow things up with her mind. Fans of other versions of Titans (either in comics or in multiple animated versions including the charmingly silly Teen Titans Go) will know that she is Raven but like Netflix’s Marvel shows, characters don’t get necessarily get their superhero names.
Dick Grayson (Brenton Thwaites – ho was also in Home & Away. Weird.) on the other hand is revealed as Robin straight away. The twist is that it is an identity he is trying to get away from. Far away from Gotham as a cop in Detriot. It’s an interesting premise in itself (ex-superhero tries to go straight as a cop) but its one which gets abandoned pretty quickly when Rachael crashes into here life fleeing assassins and her own demonic powers.
Rachael’s story forms the series arc, running from a shadowy conspiracy and an eventual reveal of the big bad. I should note that the series ends on a cliff hanger with the arc unresolved – because I know that annoys the heck out of people you might want to wait to bings this when season 2 comes out.
Added to the mix is Anna Diop as Kori – a woman with incredible powers and fighting skills who somehow has lost her memory somewhere outside of Vienna (as you do). Again, if you know the characters you know that she is Starfire but I think it all works better not knowing who is who. I’m not that familiar with the characters in the DC universe and I think that helps.
But wait, there’s more. As well as the core three we get Beast Boy, Hawk & Dove, Wonder Girl, the Jason Todd version of Robin and a cameo/soft-pilot for Doom Patrol. Barely an episode goes by when another superhero doesn’t show up.
It’s sort of the anti-Gotham. Both Titans and Gotham are directly connected to Batman without featuring Batman but otherwise they take different directions. Gotham is darkly comic and Titans is more serious. Gotham confines itself (mainly) to the titular city, whereas Titans changes location more-or-less each episode and mainly features real US cities rather than Metropolis or Gotham. Gotham has a massive roster of super-villains but not superheros, whereas Titans has, what, maybe twelve(?) but no super villains [OK the Joker gets a kind of a cameo and the big bad appears in the final episode]. Gotham is a prequel to classic Batman, whereas Titans centres on a man’s life after Batman.
Returning instead to the comparisons to Netflix’s Marvel series, there is the same troubling ethics to the show. It is fighting for justice by beating up bad guys (and sometimes just guards or cops). The heroes kill a lot of people and mainly in nasty ways, That’s all a source of angst but it isn’t examined as an issue in any depth. And also like the Netflix Marvel series, it probably would have been better with fewer episodes.
Having said that, there’s no obvious dud episodes. Some are slower than others and most characters get an episode dealing with their past. The season arc is well done as Rachael grapples with her powers and is pursued by a shadowy conspiracy. It’s rarely lighthearted but the characters are sympathetic and while serious it doesn’t have that sanctimonious air that the Zak Snyder DC films have. More of a Grant Morrison feel to it: respectful of source material but keen to take it other places.
Camestros Felapton 
17 responses to “Review: Titans (Netflix)”
I can’t say I’m enthused about Titans, but I’ll probably subscribe for Doom Patrol. The Silver Age series and Morrison’s reboot are both favorites of mine.
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Considering that in the comics, Beast Boy was adopted by the Doom Patrol (I think they’d prevented an attempt on his life by his then-guardian who was trying to embezzle the money in his late parents’ estate), the Doom Patrol being brought in makes perfect sense.
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I enjoyed the Doom Patrol episode but it was a bit of a diversion from the main plot (other than bringing in Beast Boy to the team).
I’m looking forward to the Doom Patrol series
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Your memory is spot-on. Gar was constantly trying to convince them how crooked his guardian was, but it took him a while. Eventually Elasti-Girl and her husband Mento adopted him.
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Wasn’t Chris Hemsworth also in Home and Away before he became Captain Kirk’s Dad and picked up Thor’s hammer? Because in that case, Home and Away is becoming a recruiting ground for US superhero films and TV shows.
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Yes, Hemsworth was in H&A. Hugh Jackman was on various Aus TV shows early in his career but not Home & Away. Guy Pearce was Neighbours rather than Home & Away. The soaps are effective training grounds for actors
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Also Margot Robbie was in Neighbours I think
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Hollywood used to find its actors in US daytime soap operas, but since most of those have died off, they’ve outsourced the actor development to Australian and British soaps.
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…I also forgot that Heath Ledger was in Home & Away
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So it is the new Glee? (3 of the leads in the Arrowverse played a role in that show)
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The old joke used to be ‘Star Trek actors never die, they just start doing voices for Gargoyles’.
Johnathan Frakes (Riker) voiced Xanatos
Marina Sirtis (Troi) voiced Demona and her alter-egos
Michael Dorn (Worf) voiced Coldstone and Taurus
Brent Spiner (Data) voiced Puck
Kate Mulgrew (Janeway) voiced both Titania and Anastasia Reynard
Nichelle Nichols (Uhura) voiced Diane Maza, Elisa’s mother
Colm Meaney (O’Brien) voiced a one-off character named Mr. Dugan
…
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I forgot to mention that Sirtis has a small role in Titans also
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Okay, your review makes that sound better than I thought it was.
But the fact that our “heroes” kill a lot of guys, kills any interest that I had again.
The trailer propably killed any chance that I ever want to see that show (and since Doom Patrol comes from it, probably this, too)
Interesting enough I have more problems that the Titans do it, than that Arrow did it.
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It’s a weird series, good acting, visually could be a little easier to see (lots of night scenes). It’s all built around the idea that violence is like an addictive drug and so superheroes walk a fine line. Dick is essentially a recovering addict, having lost some of his ethics on revenge after being toxicly raised by Batman on violence and then hiding as a cop in Detroit, but he’s then sometimes falling off the wagon because of helping Raven, and has to try and find a better balance in handling things and separate from his past. He doesn’t want the others’ support, but having it and them needing him starts to turn him more into a leader and less of a burnout. His replacement as Robin is a violence addict and tries to justify his addiction. Raven has a literal demon of violence and power in her, though it’s protective of her, and it urges her to let go (get high) on violence. And her father is like a drug dealing cult leader of a demon.
Wonder Girl is also a recovering addict of violence who has switched to journalism. Hawk has had his body damaged by the violence drug and promises to stop soon, as Dove begs him to do before he dies from it. Beast Boy crosses the line in violence in self-defense and then struggles with whether he can live with it and whether he will be violent again. Kory has blackout amnesia like an addict who has overdosed. She loses control at one point when they are trying to get her memories back. She has to constrain her considerable power, but Dick at one point tells her to “let go” and burn a mental hospital down, which might have not just taken out the baddies. Some of the baddies have been essentially engineered and controlled through drugs to be violent. And part of the end of the season hinted at a new young superhero character who will also be struggling with controlling violence, etc.
There are a lot of interesting things they are playing with on that theme, but I’m not sure it always works. I kind of found Hawk & Dove more interesting than Dick overall, though they are side characters in this first season (but get an origins episode.) I think I’ll probably watch part of the next season to see the cliffhanger bit, but then I’ll have to see. Anyway, killing people, when it happens, is not done without remorse and/or ethical issues coming up. It’s a key point in the series. Doom Patrol looks like it will be a slightly different flavor of show with different, more outcasty themes.
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Good summary 🙂
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Funny is that DC has with the third Young Justiceseason a cartoonshow that shares a few topics (and at last one maincharacter) with the Titans streaming now.
The show is made by the creator of Gargoyles.
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Yeah, there’s like twenty different versions of the Teen Titans. This one wants very much to be noir, but is entirely too cuddly to pull it off. It’s kind of more like Arrow territory with curse words and a bit weirder.
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