The last two episodes of Titans have been great because they introduced a perfectly cast Superboy.

Superboy joined the Titans on DC Universe, and has been present more or less in the last two episodes. The first episode that introduced him, called Conner, was really good. And bonus...we got Krypto the Wonder Dog as well. Why am I excited? It's kind of fun seeing the dog shoot heat vision beams out of its eyes. Played by Australian actor Joshua Orpin, I think that the casting for Superboy is absolutely perfect.

***Spoiler alert if you are planning on watching the series***

Okay, if you have made it this far, then you probably have either seen the episodes or don't really care. Either way is good. So the way "Conner" (who is Superboy) gets introduced is a bit jarring and messes with the pacing of season 2 just a bit. However, it pays off because Conner is in the right place to scoop Jason Todd out of the air to keep him alive a bit longer (see "A Death in the Family" for more of Jason Todd's ultimate fate). It seems "hamfisted" just a bit. However, I'm so glad they went there. It was really embracing the whole "superhero comic book show" theme. Plus, I think live-action Superboy is better than any of his animated doppelgangers have been.

The introduction of "Conner" feels like a great new direction for the show. Now if we could just get Koriandr to fly around I think I might be a bit more satisfied. 

Titans has actually gotten pretty good.

I upped and re-subscribed to DC Universe again to watch the second season of Titans. It's parceled out at the rate of one new episode every Friday, so if you are a person who likes to blaze through content and then cancel, you'll still want to wait a few weeks for your binge-watch weekend. I did like the first season of Titans, but not as much as I liked Doom Patrol (which seemed to be a fresh-take on just about everything I'd learned about superhero shows). But, to be fair, I haven't been able to watch Titans and not think of Amazon's The Boys and realize how close The Boys actually is to the Titans. The only thing that separates the Titans from the shockingly and all too real The Boys is 1) empathy, 2) ethics and morality, and 3) the removal of scarcity via capitalism through the use of a wealthy benefactor, Bruce Wayne, who just buys everything so that the Titans can be awesome at just being good people.

Unlike some people who are complaining about the series, I actually like the actress cast to play Starfire. Additionally, I think that the casting for the other characters is really good. The guy that plays Nightwing actually has the butt Nightwing is internet-famous for having, and the guy that plays Jason Todd plays that role to the hilt. He's every bit the annoying brat I remember from Detective Comics and Batman comics, which led up to his demise in the four-part story, A Death in the Family (I used to own these but lost most of my comics over the years).

If there is one thing I am finding fault with, it's not story. No, it's the budget and the wonky special effects. They look...bad. However, not unwatcheable bad. Just more on par with your average Asylum film like Sharknado. You can tell exactly when the C.G.I. is being used and when the actors are (in fact) acting in front of a green screen. So there is that.

For example, in the season two premiere, Trigon the Terrible looked as bad as anything I've seen from the Hercules series or Xena series from years and years ago. Yeah...that bad. And Raven has yet to manifest a soul self. I would have thought that the soul self thing would have been an easy C.G.I. effect to do as it's just a shadow in the shape of a raven. However, the way they are doing it is by using clouds of billowing black smoke. When her soul self emerges, it just looks like a swirling/floating whirlwind of black oil bits shaped like razor blades. By far the best effects center around Wonder Girl and Gar. To be fair, Gar's tiger has always looked a "bit" fake. It's not nearly as good as the C.G.I. tiger The Walking Dead had a few years ago when Ezekiel became a main character. But I imagine that The Walking Dead has a huge budget, so they can afford to spend more on things to make them look real. And Wonder Girl's lasso has the same effect of golden light that we saw Wonder Woman using in her movies. So that all looks good.

We also got to see Aqualad in one episode. I thought that his water power looked a bit cheesy, however, it didn't ruin or spoil disbelief. Sure, it wasn't the fantastic powers that Aquaman wields in his own movie, but again, I knew that wasn't going to happen. And...I honestly don't like the way Starfire's powers work, but whatever. She should just be able to energy blast things the same as Captain Marvel. But the way it's working on screen is more like she raises her hands and fire just comes rushing forth in every which (and uncontrolled) way that fire usually goes.

All in all, I think that Titans has actually gotten pretty good. The writing seems to be tight, the actors are giving it their all to inhabit these characters, and the story does appear to be growing. I'm just hoping that more subscribers hop on so that DC Universe can add more budget to the series and give us some spectacular stuff down the road. 

I finished watching Titans and I gotta say that I'm excited for season two whenever it comes.

There are Titans spoilers in this post, in case you are planning on watching it.

I finished Titans first season, and I actually liked the whole thing. To explain just a wee bit, I'm a pretty big Titans fan, having owned the original run of comic books written by Marv Wolfman and drawn by George Perez (who was the Michaelangelo of comic book art). I was there for the first visitation of Trigon the Terrible, and I was there for the second coming as it were when the comics were released in all new format and they dropped "Teen" from the title to just become The New Titans. They've made a bunch of changes from the books. For one, Trigon never needed a bunch of cultists trying to help him to cross over into our world. Raven, a being trained in Azarath and taken under her wing by the goddess Azar herself, used all of her willpower to keep Trigon from stepping into the world through her soul. She ended up finally losing to him, and when Trigon stepped through, he was as tall as a mountain, turned Titan tower to stone, and sat on it like a throne. Then he took over the entire world and all of its heroes with his mind. Not a single hero...even Superman and Wonder Woman...could resist him.

Needless to say, the show doesn't do that, and it probably never had the budget to do that. But I still think it turned out okay. Maybe in Titans's second season, we could get more of Trigon the Terrible and a bigger budget to make the truly spectacular things that are in the best issues of The New Teen Titans and by extension The New Titans. But it does make me worry just a bit that the whole DC Universe is going to implode upon itself with the cancellation of Swamp Thing (while its still airing its first season) and talks of another streaming platform being released because Warner Brothers (and Time Warner) have now merged with AT&T. As new owners go, they have a different vision for where all of these things should go, which is their right. Capitalism ruins so many good things folks, but don't get me started on any of that.

For what its worth, the cast of Titans is spectacular. They are all good actors and actresses, and I even like Raven, though her representation in the show is vastly different to the one that you see in the comic books. But maybe they will get there? Here's to hoping. 

I did like that the season finale exclusively focused on Trigon the Terrible using his mind powers to completely take over Nightwing. I was wondering how they were going to show Trigon's mind control, as it seems like a difficult thing to do. And it made perfect sense to kind of play on Dick's fear of the Batman going off the deep end and going full-on psychopath murderer (which is what happened in Dick's personal universe that Trigon trapped him in until his will to resist him crumbled). There will no doubt be more of these, as the Titans one by one are succumbed to Trigon's will in the first season, and then I imagine somehow they will free themselves to battle him in the second season finale.

I wonder if they will be able to work out any cameos from Warner Brothers' larger DC universe franchises. An appearance by Jason Momoa with Aqualad might be cool, as would an appearance of Gal Gadot with Wonder Woman. And then maybe they could use Titans as a launching point to introduce Pattinson's new Batman and possibly do the same thing with whomever they cast to play Superman.

Anyway, there's lots of potential here. I'm just hoping it doesn't get squandered.

I'm five episodes deep into Titans and I think it's actually pretty good.

I finally broke down and subscribed to DC Universe so I could watch Titans, Doom Patrol, the third season of Young Justice, and Swamp Thing. I did get a seven day free trial, and I've been rapidly consuming Titans (I'm on episode five of thirteen as of this writing). I know I'll have to pay for at least a month just to get through all of these shows, but I want to give credit where credit is due, before you just see this as a subscribe/binge watch/ and cancel routine to save money. Titans is actually kind of enjoyable despite what I've heard other people say (which did prove to lower my expectations quite a bit).

Most of the negative criticism is directed at the series by Titans die-hards. And by all reckoning, I should be a die-hard Titans fan. I owned all of the original run of the comic books by Marv Wolfman and George Perez. For a time, I enshrined my "Who Is Donna Troy?" and my "Who is Wondergirl?" comics in mylar. My favorite characters are 1) Raven, 2) Donna Troy, and 3) Starfire in that order, although (just to be fair) I love all of the Titans. I should pound my fist as to why Raven doesn't manifest her soul self by episode 5...that thing is integral to her character. I should be bugged as to why Princess Koriander (or Kory Anders as she's called in the show) doesn't fly around with energy streaming from her hair or fire blasts of energy beams (not fire) from her hands (in the show she just shoots out fire like a flame thrower). Personally, the way Carol Danvers powers are in Captain Marvel remind me a lot of how Starfire should look. Those issues aside, I actually love this show.

Dick Grayson is very handsome. He's also got a huge chip on his shoulder from living with the Batman. I'm not sure how I feel about the Batman being painted as a psychopath, but the shoe does kind of fit. But in these first few episodes, Dick does kind of come across as a bit of an ingrate, reminiscing on a childhood that was stolen from him when his parents were murdered and which he landed in foster care and had the misfortune of being adopted by a billionaire who was in a perfect place to understand his particular trauma. Oh how unfortunate that must have been! Poor boy!

I actually love Gar (Garfield) who is Beast Boy. The casting on him seems to be perfect, and he too is quite handsome. Koriander is gorgeous so they nailed at least three of the cast. I'm not happy with Raven's look. In the comics she had an otherworldy maturity to her (and an otherworldy beauty to match). In the show she's a goth teenager who dyes her hair and is into tattoos and wearing black. There's way more to Raven's character than that. I am pleased that they are making a solid attempt at showing her incredible empathic and healing abilities. However, we need that soul self. It's just awesome, and I'm not sure why they aren't showing it yet.

I already know that Cyborg is part of Doom Patrol, and I'm okay with this choice. But in the Wolfman and Perez comics, Cyborg was a huge part of all of the stories. But then again, so was Titan tower, and I'm hoping that at some point we get to see an actual Titan tower. That would be great. I honestly don't expect much from the first season. I already know from a spoiler that Trigon the Terrible, when he appears, is just some actor. They probably didn't have the budget to make Trigon into his real comic book terrifying self, but who knows? Maybe they'll have that budget together a couple seasons down the road if this thing proves to have legs. Maybe we'll get some really amazing Titans's storylines.

It's what I'm hoping for at least.

So yeah, I'm five episodes deep into Titans and I think it's pretty good.