I'm Steven John Drew from the official Gunageek.com show, a weekly geek news podcast that is a part of the Gunageek Network. Just like the show you're checking out now, shows on the network are individually owned and opinions expressed may not reflect others. Find other awesome geeky shows@gunageeknetwork.com Sam.
And.
Welcome to Play Comics, where once again, we're here looking at a video game based on a comic property and how well it represents that source material. And today we have a team of teens, but they're not turtles. One of them might be mythological. Who knows who the other ones are? I think there might be some aliens. I don't know. It's the Teen Titans. There could be anybody. And we have local friend Eilish Pickett here to help me figure out what is going on, because she really loves the Teen Titans and I really loved a couple versions of the cartoon. So, Eilish, how are you today?
I'm doing well, Chris. And to be clear, I really only loved, like, one and a half versions of the cartoons because Young Justice, I kind of count as Teen Titans just a little.
Oh, well, I'm counting it separately, so.
Oh, okay. Well, that was my half. The other One is the 2003 Teen Titans.
So what is it that got you to be such a Teen Titans fan in the first place?
I'm 100% a daddy's girl. And one of my father's favorite shows growing up was Adam West's Batman. And so we would watch the reruns upon reruns upon reruns religiously. He's a massive Batman fan. And so when Justice League and Justice League Unlimited came out, we obviously watched that just as religiously. And when Teen Titans came out, it was like a show made just for me. And he would watch it on occasion with me. But by that point, I was in school and he was doing more work stuff. So it was kind of my special version of DC that was like, oh, these guys, they kind of get it and they're younger and it's. I kind of had a passing fancy for Robin for a hot minute, but mostly Beast Boy because he made me laugh. And that was part of it. It was fun. It was between that and Avatar the Last Airbender, it was my introduction into an anime style. I'd never watched any anime up to that point. Maybe a few Ghibli movies later on, but it was just so unusual and so fun and colorful and bright and happy. I just loved all the characters for it.
So Colorful and bright and happy. And then you have to, like, destroy somebody's demon father who is trying to take over the entire world.
No one said bright and happy didn't come with daddy issues for a couple characters. I mean, you could argue that throughout, Robin had some serious daddy issues going because he was constantly trying to prove to Bruce that he was to himself with Bruce's excuse that he was good enough to do this on his own without having his adopted father figure over his shoulder going, okay, you did good. In one of the comic books issues, they actually, for this run, they actually had one where Batman's kind of looking through a telescope at. At Robin and Starfire on the roof of the tower, and he's like, yeah, he's got this. And never, ever tells Robin, of course, because what is Bruce Wayne but not emotionally damaged and damaging others, but he. He does through that kind of keep an eye on him, and it's like, yeah, he's doing fine. He's doing just fine. You know, kissing alien teenagers, having fun.
So for anybody who doesn't know, I think we need to really lay out who the characters are, especially with what we're looking at here, because you have not only a really good lineup, but possibly the most iconic lineup. So of course you have a Robin, because if you don't have a Robin, what are you even doing?
I think the only way that we really know that this particular Robin in this show is Dick Grayson is because of Larry, who's the imp character that we end up getting from a pocket dimension. And he ends up being called Larry because the team decides that his actual name is Dick Grayson backwards. And he says it a couple times and spells it out. And unless you're really paying attention and know what you're looking for as a kid watching it, you're just like, what was that? But my father pointed it out to me one day because he was sitting watching. He's like, oh, stick Grayson backwards. I'm like, okay, that makes sense. Because the other ones are someone's name backwards as well. The other imps, because Batman's got one bat mite, and then Superman's got one, too. Name I can't remember at the present moment, but we've got Dick Grayson as Robin. We've got Starfire in, honestly, her purest form. She's not wearing a string bikini this time, or bondage outfits like she does. They play down the hole she breathes through her skin argument, which I think was mostly for the comics to sell them to very lonely men who want to See women scantily clad in the 90s and 80s. And then we've got Raven, also at her purest form. Just a teenager with a bunch of emotional daddy issues. A mom is never really mentioned, so far as I recall. Her dad is a literal demon. The other thing about Raven is Raven and Starfire's powers. Both are emotionally driven. We have this in an episode where they end up trading places like Trading Bodies. And Raven has to teach Starfire to control her emotions so that they don't lash out. And Starfire has to teach Raven to actually feel something so that she can use her powers. She talks about flight as boundless joy. And Raven's over here going, I don't feel anything, though. We've got Beast Boy, who. I think it's hilarious that they reveal in one of the episodes his name is Garfield, which was like, really? Really? That's the best name you could come up with. He is also, in his purest form. He's not the womanizing sexist that he is in some of the earlier comics. He's the class clown because he's finally getting to be himself. He came from a team that was very controlling and overbearing and never valued him appropriately. He was always a tool to be used to satisfy a mission, not as an actual person of value. And then we've got Cyborg. Cyborg is so fun. He is. Starfire is pure joy, and Cyborg is just also pure joy in a slightly more responsible way. He and Robin butt heads a lot because Cyborg does have a good head on his shoulders, and he's good at leading a team to a point. But Robin does need to be the leader. It's one of those instances to lean on another teenage property like Leonardo and Raphael arguing over who should lead because they both have the same goal but different methods of achieving it. I think that was the first episode divide and conquer, the show that they have an argument, split up, and it ends. Obviously, it ends up happily in the end. And he comes back and they realize, yeah, we need to work together. The point is working together, not who's in charge, but working all of us as a team to our strengths. I don't know that they ever use Cyborg's actual name in the TV show. I don't recall it. And I. They may have used it in the comics, like, once. But on the whole, he's. Everyone's just kind of going by their superhero name.
Yeah. I don't remember them using anybody's actual name, really, in the cartoon at all, which is Fine. Because I'm not here for the normal humans. I'm here for the superheroes and Robin, who I guess is a normal human, but is also a superhero, because that's how the world works. The whole thing is just a ton of fun. And I mean, take every good aspect of 80s and early 90s cartoons, and that is what you have here in a very, very colorful, very fun, very. I love this. And I'm gonna show you all of the reasons why I love it and make you love it too kind of way. But not shoving it down your throat.
No. And I mean, we've got a whole cast of villains. We do end up with Slade, who I actually always suspected was secretly Batman. But no, he isn't. He's his own character. But I spent the whole time going, what if it's Bruce Wayne and he's lost his mind? Which I think would be an interesting point, because Robin is oddly tied to him. And he's obsessed with Robin in a way that doesn't make a lot of sense unless they somehow have history, which they don't, but they feel like they do. I don't know. That was always my headcanon was that it's like, what if it's actually, like, Bruce Wayne and he's lost his mind and he has the mask over his face and, like, I officially lost it because he insists on Robin calling him his father. And Robin's like, I already have a father. And you see bats fly up behind. It's like, but that's not. That's not his father either. And then we've got the whole Red X issue as well. So it's, It's. It's accessible in a way. They've got villains that are. That are fun and silly, like Mad Maude. His whole thing is that he wants it to be, you know, 60s, 70s. He liked making puzzles and traps for them. Tried to take them to school to be villains or rob them of their intelligence by making them watch tv. That was the end of the world for them. We've got Control Freak, who literally uses a magical remote to put them into a tv. And I think it's one of them says he's just a souped up couch potato, which is like, okay. But it also lent for more parodies on classic tv. Like they have in one. In the mat. In the Control Freak episode, they. And one of them, they end up running through different TV shows. And it's basically Scooby Doo and he man and all these other properties. They're not specifically those, but it's basically that it also has. It's. It. It's got some good depth to, to it though too. Besides just being a really fun romp. It's got some good depth. Like the whole event with Raven's father trying to take over and the daddy issues that come from that. And there's some time travel weirdness. Didn't make a lot of sense at the time to me as a kid, but it's. It's a lot. And you see her lean on Robin and part of why she's with the teen is because he understands to see more than just the darker side of her. He sees her as a person. And it's a very important friendship. And I think it's. I know plenty of people over the years have been like, oh, she should have been with Robin. It's like, no, no. They're relationship is so much stronger as friends that he is her sane place every now and again to return to. Like, okay, I'm not my father's daughter. I'm more than that. I can be more than that. And he trusts her in a way she's never been trusted before. But it's definitely very fun with everyone turning into like Chibi versions of themselves and sparkle eyes and this over the top anime style that's just absolutely adorable.
And how does this show really compare to the comics that had come out at the time? I mean, not the one that's specifically based on the show, because that's cheating.
From what I can. I tried picking them up so many times because they're my. It's again, one of my favorite properties. But I would always get so disappointed with the regular Teen Titans, like the quote unquote adult Teen Titans. They, for one thing, they generally have a different lineup. They generally include Donna Troy and Kid Flash as solid team members, which this one did not. It traded out a couple characters. We do end up meeting those characters in various episodes along with Aqualad, who everyone had a crush on. And I was just like, yeah, but he's still yet another guy who can talk to Fish. I don't see the point. They had a. I think it was towards the end of the series, they had a massive, massive event where you end up with like everybody, all of the young heroes fighting together and all the friends they made along the way, and even some bad guys that they kind of convinced maybe, maybe don't. Maybe don't. And it was huge. And I remember that sitting there watching it going, wow, this is. This is like Justice League Unlimited, but kids. And it was really intense, but I just didn't get into the comics as much. They were too heavy, for one thing. And I also did not appreciate the art style at all. And again, it was pitched more as a boys comic book than a anybody comic book. That's how it felt anyway, in reading it. It was written by men, drawn by men, for men and boys. Whereas Teen Titans, we had Starfire and Raven, which still is not majority of the team or even half the team, but still very strong female characters. And being a kids show, it felt more accessible. Whereas the comic books, like, say I tried and I'm just like, this isn't my Teen Titans. I still look at it from time to time and go, it's not my Teen Titans, though.
Wait, so are you saying that seeing somebody who is maybe a teen, but definitely younger, running around space in a string bikini, that that's. That's for men and boys?
It's for somebody? Not for me.
No. I mean, it's how things are, though. And like, unfortunately, it's how things are. You have a lot of stuff in the 80s happening with that. One of the things that I really like about a lot of these team books is that you have a rotating lineup, which works out really well when somebody has to go off and do an event in their adult partner person's book or something, or you just get tired of using this character, then you can pull in somebody else. It kind of makes things a little weird if you're going back looking at all of those and you've seen something like this show where it is the same lineup the entire time. I think it's one thing that the Justice League cartoon did really well, was, especially in the later seasons, mixing up who is actually doing things. Whereas this show is here's your five. And you might pick up a friend for this episode or story arc.
So I see that, and I. And I do appreciate Justice League Unlimited. I really do. But that was the last two seasons. The first two seasons of Justice League were the core, what, six. We had Batman, Superman, Aquaman wasn't there all the time. GL of Jon Stewart as Green Lantern, Hawkgirl. I guess that was it. It was just that core set and Flash. So we had that five for the first two seasons. And we'd have a couple people every now and again come in. But it wasn't until Justice League Unlimited that we had the Watchtower and all these different people. And they just kind of popped up out of nowhere. And, you know, you'd have an episode of Huntress in Question or, you know, Green Arrow meeting Black Canary for the first time and Supergirl meeting Power Girl and fighting her for the first time with the question, wandering around, asking many questions, as he does. Love you, Jeffrey Combs, perfect voice actor for that one. But I feel like the first Justice League series set us up for that, to be able to handle that, because otherwise we'd be going, why are Bruce and Diana having a Will they, won't they? And what's the beef between, you know, Jon Stewart and Hawkgirl? Like, what's going down there? Because they're always, like, really tense because they'd been a thing until they weren't kind of a thing. Again, I think what you have when you have a set grouping is you have that deeper. Well, for character growth. I mean, what we see in the first episode of Teen Titans with Cyborg and Robin butting heads, and everyone's still trying to get used to everybody else. And, like, Beast Boy doesn't know how far to take a joke with Raven. Starfire's still very confused about Earth culture, and she doesn't really know anybody. And she's got a lot of history still back on her planet of Tamran that we don't get to see until later. And the will they, won't they? Of Robin and Starfire that finally comes to fruition in the Trouble in Tokyo movie. I feel like there's a good. There's a good value to watching those characters grow and progress. Of Cyborg trusts Robin and even starts thinking a step ahead of Robin and being his support and his safety net. Of if you don't got this, I've got you. Of Raven opening up to everybody. We have the episode where they literally go into Raven's head of Cyborg and Beast Boy and they're like, why can't you take a choke? And it's because she can't. Human. She's afraid to feel. She does think the Beast Boy is funny, but if she laughs and shows that emotional weakness, her powers could go out of control. And she's also used to being abused emotionally and for physically and verbally, for feeling anything. It's not just her power. She's been abused to be that way. She does think he's funny. She does think that he can be charming at times. She does love everyone. She just doesn't have the freedom to express it or doesn't feel that she has that freedom yet. I think if you just had that rotating out, there would be a certain loss. And yes, there's a certain amount of fun that can be had when like say Robin has to go help Batman and comes back and like your experience has changed you. Robin comes back maybe not quite the same person. They've got inside jokes he doesn't know, he's got baggage they don't know. And having that refitting of the puzzle pieces to fit back together into making maybe just a different picture, that can be fun, but it's also really hard and it's a lot to try to throw at a kid. I see all of these emotional damage problems and emotional necessity for having a team of people you can trust who are like you. I see that more now as an adult with how clever that writing was, more so than I did as a kid, but it's definitely still there.
Well, on that note, we're gonna go call some of the people on our team and make sure that they know how much we love them while I drop some promos for a few other things Just in time for Pride Month. Lifeline Comics, the Ringo nominated publisher that brought you Transphoria and Bivisibility, has another queer anthology that's sure to tug at the heartstrings. Aces and Arrows is a collection of 21 short stories across 100 pages from both newcomers and comic veterans. This anthology, spread across the asexual and aromantic spectrum, runs the genre gamut as well, so you're sure to find something that speaks to you. You have until June 26th to help bring this project to life, but don't get tricked by time zone shenanigans. Head over to Kickstarter now and back. Aces and Arrows. That's Aces and Aros.
Welcome to the two ACT Podcast where we delve into cinema, anime and tv. We uncover the hard hidden gems through our reviews. I'm one of your co hosts, Got John, and I'm here to tell you all the interesting movies and anime you've never heard of. In this bi weekly podcast we dive into the world of movies, anime and TV and we are meeting all sorts of super fans tackling the most divisive reviews you've ever heard. If you're looking for something you never heard of, the two ACT Podcast is a show for you. Here we share all the hidden gems tailored for all you cinephiles and all you beautiful weebs.
Those are some great things to check out. But first let's finish up here because eilish, what we are looking at Today is the November 2006 release of the Teen Titans game. Specifically, we are looking at the big boy console ones which came out on PS2 Xbox and Gamecube. Yes, there is a Game Boy advance one. We're not talking about it here because it's different enough that it's going to.
Need its own episode, which I was entirely unaware of. I knew that it came out on Game Boy, but I've never seen anyone play it, nor did I have a Game Boy to play it on. So.
This one was made by Artificial Mind and Movement, THQ and Majesco Entertainment, some names that did a bunch of other things. Mostly who we have seen so far in here though is THQ. They did the danger girl game, which is not 90s at all. Ghost in the Shell, Daredevil, a bunch of things like that. And they will go on to do more things. Artificial Mind and Movement and Majesco we haven't seen a ton of yet here on the show, but we will be seeing them again. Eilish, what are your overall thoughts on this game? Because this one is just really fun, whether you like Teen Titans or not.
One of the things that I love about it that child me is very much clung onto very hard, is that they got the original voice cast to do it. So they sound exactly the same as they do in the TV show. My God, those graphics though.
They'Re really good. If you're looking at it however many years ago it was because I refused to do that math.
So it is. They are spectacular for that level and especially for a kids game, like for a property that is based on a kid's TV show, they are some of the best graphics that I have seen in a very long and this, this still stands. Like most of the kids TV show video games or kids movie video games, they don't put any money into those graphics. Like as much as I love to the Tim Burton Alice in Wonderland Wii game, those graphics are horrible. And that was several years later. That movie came out in 2010, so we're talking four years down the road. And the graphics are worse. These ones, I will say the fighting graphics, absolutely phenomenal. The cutscene graphics are trying so, so hard to get the squash stretch over the top anime style of the animation that we have in the show. The results vary greatly between being absolutely disturbing and okay, I see where they were going there. There unfortunately isn't much of an in between. It's either horrifying or pretty good. It's definitely something. I remember this being a game. I've never been particularly good at video games, but I remember this being a game that I would play like the fighting mode and it was a good fight game. I'd have my favorite characters I'd want to play as, of course. But I thought that they did a good job of giving you the opportunity to play as all of the Titans so that you didn't just get stuck playing Robin or Cyborg or Beast Boy or Raven or Starfighter. You get to play as all of them. And you kind of need to play as all of them. And it's not a mechanic I feel that we saw very often at the time. It wasn't until the LEGO games that I really noticed you could do that where you could swap between characters so long as you didn't have a second player. And even then you could still swap to a third character within the game. So you weren't chained to this one character the whole time. I thought that was really clever. So it's like, oh, I need to be Robin. I'll just swap over and do that. So then these guys can do this. And it offers a lot more flexibility for single player puzzle solving. And also, hey, I just don't like this mechanic on this one. Or I just want to play Starfire and fly for a minute. Which was generally my answer. I watched a video because it has been a hot minute since I've played the game. I don't remember playing it super often. I was generally trained to my Spyro, but it was definitely one I know that I had and would have asked for. I had anything that they would make for that TV show. But it's got a good mechanic. Each character has a melee attack. They've got a long distance attack of some kind. They're able to pick things up and throw them, which I think is great. Including bad guys, which is a little interesting to watch. Robin lift Android over his head and off the side of the building. It's a bit extreme there, but it's a robot. Watching them hit the ground and then explode was rather interesting. Where body parts go flying. Like, wow, that's a bit violent, but okay.
It's a robot that makes it okay.
Exactly. That's how they were able to get around it. Like I said, I don't remember a lot of the story to the game. I just remember it being a property I loved and a pretty good fighting game and pretty fun. And it walks you through how to do everything pretty simply. So it's not overwhelming of you have to mash five buttons at once and stand on your head while you do it. It was a this is your ranged attack. This is your melee. This is your special move. Okay, I can do that.
I think the plot in this one is maybe the most interesting thing because what you have going on here is Cyborg and Beast Boy are sitting around playing a video game. Because of course they are, they often were. And they get. Everybody on the team gets sucked into the game. So what you have is let's power our way through this game so that we can escape it in the meta concept of being in a game inside of a game, which just opens up the entire world, world that they had for who they could bring in. And some of the villains that they brought in for this one were just great.
Well, I mean it's, it's something that they've done also relatively recently with middling success with the multiverses. I mean, you get them the, the comic that tied into that one, you get them sucked into the video game and they're playing characters from other Cartoon Network and Warner Brothers own properties. So the, the possibilities are darn near endless of having it do that. So it was kind of, kind of before its time, one might say.
And then I'm going to go ahead and spoil this because I don't care. The game is however many years old because again, I'm refusing to do that math. And like, you get to, you go through this game, you beat all the bosses. I'm not going to spoil who all of them are because I need to leave some kind of mystery here. But you go in and then you have your boss Rush at the end and you have who you think is the big bad guy and you beat him. And then he's not the big bad guy because the big bad guy who was putting all of these characters in the situation and having them be in the game and having to just deal with the whims of whatever the big bad guy wanted to have happen. And the big bad guy controlling their every move. It was you. The whole time. It was you. You are the ultimate bad guy.
You killed Robin how many times?
And I can totally see this kind of thing happening in the show because it would take on those silly aspects of everything and you've got the cast there who'd be able to pull it off. And it's just, it's so beautifully done. And I've seen a lot of people say, oh no, like this is really anti climatic. You basically have other games that have done it already. Smash Brothers being the one that jumps into my head first with Mr. Hand. But I don't care. This is Teen Titans doing it. And it was fun.
I don't know about most kids my age But I hadn't played Smash Bros. And certainly hadn't completed it to know what that end was. So for us, it was our first instance of finding it. Yeah, if you played games for years and you were 20 something and you'd already been playing them and you'd run into this trope before, yeah, I could see how it could be like, oh, it's this again. But for us, like I said, this was a game designed for kids because it was arguably a kid's property. Not saying people who are older couldn't enjoy it, but if that was their main focus, this would be the first instance of them coming across that as a twist in the story at the end. And I think that that's really fun. And it also gives something of a nod to the fan base of like, yeah, we see you. You've been here. You bought the game, you watched the show. You wouldn't have bought it if you didn't love it. I mean, video games historically have been far too expensive to just buy all of them for the sake of buying and playing all of them. You pick and choose. So if you picked this, there must have been a reason either you watched the show or someone you're playing to watch, have them watch you. Loves the show. And I think Teen Titans has always had a very good awareness of its fan base, this particular one. And I would even go so far as to say the new Teen Titans go. They know who's watching. They know who's watching. They know it's people my age who loved the original and go, dang it, they're ruining it. And it's a new set of kids. Or it's people my age whose kids are watching it. Because, yes, people my age have children old enough to watch Teen Titans go. And that's horrifying. But they. They acknowledge that and they have their little, little insiders and their fourth wall breaks of, yeah, we know you missed the original. We do too. And I. I could see that being a really fun twist for people to run across of, oh, we were doing this the whole time. Oh, dang.
I mean, there are obviously other great aspects too. You've already touched on the voice cast, the fact that they all came back and they actually sound good. They gave them good dialogue and everything. Like, this is an era where voice acting in games was not right, really a good thing yet. So the fact that they did as well as they did, like, if you take it out of context, then, yes, it's really good. And if you look at it in the context of what was coming out about then? It is really, really, really good.
Oh, sure. And, I mean, I. I have to imagine that all of these voice actors genuinely enjoyed doing this show because not only did they do the TV show, but they came back for the movie and they came back for the video game, and they came back for the new version, and they continued to do their characters over again when the new version had a movie that crossed over with my version of Teen Titans, I always say my version, the original animated Teen Titans, they have to love this. Otherwise, because I can't imagine they're getting paid a lot for this. I really hope that they love it. Anytime I see Robin animated, I expect him to sound the way Teen Titans Robin does. I expect them all to be there. It would be so easy, so easy to just get cheaper actors to do the voices. But the fact that they stuck with them shows a dedication of like, okay, we have to keep these guys because. And maybe it was in their contract, I don't know. But the dedication there between both the studio and the actors, I have to respect it.
Even if it was in their contract, they really easily could have just phoned it in and they didn't. And I appreciate that because we have both seen it when voice actors phone.
Things in many times, Many, many times, and sometimes phoning it in on purpose because I didn't want to do it in the first place. So it's. I hope that they truly love these characters. They should. They should be proud of them. They should appreciate them because they put so much effort into it and it shows. They never have wavered, even when they've got the newer Teen Titans. Even if you love it, it's not to the same age group, to the same maturity, or the same complexity. So that they stayed for that. When it could be seen as lesser, I personally see it as lesser, but when it could be seen as lesser, but they stayed, that's dedication.
As we start to wrap things up, what do you think this one really gets right? Looking at Teen Titans, I think that.
Between the script being good just throughout the way the Titans fight, the fact that. That yes, you can play as one character, but you end up playing as all of them, reinforcing that. They need to be a team. Each one of them has strengths and weaknesses that is compensated by the rest of the team. Like I said, as disturbing as some of the graphics can get, they got the original intent behind it. They got the fun, the silliness. I mean, it starts off like a couple of the episodes do of Beast Boy. And Cyborg playing a video game at home, and everybody else just standing behind watching and pretending not to root for them, but they're really rooting for one person to win over the other. Just really engaged in that togetherness. And the whole idea of the show was working together, supporting each other through whatever comes their way.
That team aspect, I think, is what really jumps out at me. Just knowing that you can go in there and you just destroy everybody with Starfire, and then you flip over and you destroy everybody with Raven, and you just destroy everybody with Beast. Beast Boy, except you're doing it while you're a kangaroo. And just everything in there. This show and this game, I think, are just a great reflection of each other because you have those serious moments, but they take it about as seriously in the game as they do in the show, which is serious enough. But you're also having John Cleese do something seriously, and you know he's going to slip something humorous in there, because of course he is.
Oh, yeah. And, I mean, I feel like the video game itself did better in a lot of ways than the online game that they had on the website. They had mini games on the website for Teen Titans, and I will miss them to this day. But it was always pick a character and do a level. Not everyone's together doing something. I mean, part of that is that, yeah, it was cartoonnetwork.com trying to manage a game on there, and sometimes it would crash even then. So there was only so much that Mechanic could handle. And it's free, so. But I feel like that togetherness, that family, that we'll touch on some heavy subjects. We're not going to talk down to our audience, but we're also not going to overwhelm them so much that we're taking them out of their depths. There was never a point where I felt overwhelmed by anything that we were covering in the episodes. As far as someone's backstory or emotional predicament. It was not only was it always solved by the end or close enough, but it was addressed in a way that you could handle as a kid.
Don't jump straight into Young justice, though, because that will ruin you emotionally.
Yeah, Young justice does not do that. Young justice just throws you into the deep end. All of these children need therapy and none of them are getting it. And you're their therapist.
It is a very good game. It is a very good show. We will touch on it later because there is specifically a Young justice game. But I do want to just make sure, like, everybody knows Young justice is not like the Justice League Unlimited continuation. And it's the same thing with a new name. It is very much like, okay, we're going to jump into R rated. And it's not. Not really R rated, but that's basically what you're doing. Jumping from a kid's thing to a. Definitely don't just let your small child watch this.
Yeah, it definitely takes some more. It's the difference between kid section versus young adult section of. We're going to cover some topics that are definitely for an older group, but also not inappropriate. It fit better.
So what do you think this game gets wrong looking at Teen Titans?
No, to be honest, I feel like it did a really good job. Maybe things were a little more limited creatively with like, say, what animals Beast Boy could change into. And we didn't necessarily get into some of the emotional depths that we do in the show. But that is also looking at it as a whole of five beautiful seasons that should have been continued but. And definitely had room to continue if they ever choose. But maybe that and having it be more of about the fighting than about some of the teamwork. But I still feel like it was really well balanced. I mean, it's also, again, it's a video game. Curb your expectations there. It's a video game for kids, but I think there's a certain level of it that, I mean, if we're still talking about it and there are still reviews out there saying this is a very underrated game. It's actually really fun and good. I feel like much like the show, it kind of got lost a little bit in time of wait, this is actually really good. What. How did this, what perfect storm came together to create this and why hasn't it happened since?
Or again, everything that I can think of is getting really nitpicky. Like you could have had some more iconic environments or something. Like there was no space and you have an alien in Starfire, so, you know, you could have had space.
We didn't have that in this show though, either. The closest we got was, let's see, going to her planet when she was betrothed to someone else and then when she went through puberty, basically, that was it. We didn't really go into space or.
You know, the Beast Boy and his limited animals. Okay, that's a gameplay limitation. Like you can't have every animal that exists on the world. Like that's just impossible. Or, you know, little things like that. Maybe the biggest one that jumps out at me is it's always those Five people that you're playing as you know, maybe you could have had some other characters come in. Maybe you make it be six people all the time. And each level adds a different person who is on the team in the comics or showed up in the show. And you just kind of rotate through who you get there. But I'm being really nitpicky to get all of those. Like, essentially, this show is about those five Teen Titans, and that's it, and that's who you get in the game. And if that's where I'm going for to get my things that are wrong, like, that's pretty good.
I mean, if you're also looking at it as the Teen Titans get sucked into this video game, why would Aqualad be there? Why would Speedy be there? Why would Kid Flash be there? Unless they were also sucked in. So now it becomes a bigger problem. Like, if you get some of the kids from the hive, like Bumblebee, like, did she get sucked in as well? Is this a version of her made specifically for the game? Now we're getting into an even bigger story, which honestly may have detracted from the story they were going for. Plus, when you sell a Teen Titans video game, you don't want to lose the playability of those five characters that are in the show. You want those main characters. Like, if I get a Teen Titans video game and I'm suddenly playing. Playing Zatanna, while I would be thrilled, I would be looking for the Teen Titans.
And finally, you know, we're gonna force this and add a sixth person to the game. But that sixth person is a Muppet. Who are they and what is their power set?
Oh, my gosh. Oh, see, I've got kind of two answers, and they're for different reasons. I would say animal, just because he's an unstoppable force that I think that they would still accept. But also Gonzo, because he's a misfit, and he's always long for that family unit, which is basically what all of the Titans have, is they have a family unit issue, and so they make their own. It's that found family type feeling. And I guess for Gonzo, we would say that he would be trying to fire himself out of a cannon, but he'd always be missing is the problem. I know Muppets have had a couple games, including the PC one you're trying to aim his cannon to fire. And so maybe there'd be any level of that, or Camilla would somehow be popping out exploding eggs or something. I don't know, I don't think he'd appreciate that. Say if you just had Animal, he'd just go through and destroy everybody in two seconds flat.
See, now I just want to see Gonzo and Raven both like, they have their adventure and they both help get each other pulled out of their emotional, like, danger zones.
They would be the best of friends because Gonzo is so sweet and trusting and innocent and Raven would want to protect him and he would see that she was hurting and he would want to protect her and cheer her up. So basically he'd be an extra Beast Boy at that point of I see there's something hurting you, but the only thing I can think to do is make you laugh. So he'd be doing things to try to cheer her up. But Gonzo also has those really sweet personal moments. Aw, that would be so cute.
But Gonzo also has something that Beast Boy can never have. Cookie Monster's phone number. Yes, Eilish, it has been great talking to you about all of this. If people want to hear more from you, where else can they find you? Around the Internet?
Not really anywhere in particular. I'm on Tumblr aliceheart247. I mostly write and read Eddie Munson fanfiction right now, but been known to do some fan Twins. The opera fanfiction. Not really the plug you were expecting, was it?
Let me write that one down for later.
Oh my God.
As always, we'll have links to that down in the show notes. Because clicking links is so much easier than trying to remember how to spell things. Especially because I'm going to have to go dig through Tumblr and if I'm going to dig through Tumblr, the link is going to be right because it's Tumblr and I'm an old man.
It's a hell site, but we love it.
It's not the most hell site anymore, I'll give it that. As always, if you want to hear more from me, the best place to do that is over on playcomics.com where there's links to all the social media things. It's mostly blue sky. It's a little bit of threads, but it's mostly blue sky. So yeah, that's just how things are. Because I am an old man and old men get set in their ways because they're old and are too lazy to find anything new. If you want to be a guest on the show, then there's a list of things on the website that I'm looking to get booked the soonest There's a link to that down in the show notes and you can also sign up for a newsletter there that gets released. I'm going to say like at most once a month. But you know, whenever I make big old additions to that list, then you can get told what got added. You'll see that a little bit before the page goes live for everybody else. A little bit of a sneak preview on there. Just a way of me to say thank you for caring enough that you want to get first dibs. Or at least the first chance at dibs. I'm not really sure what a dib is, but you can get a first chance at it. If you'd like to help support the show. Then you can be like the patrons that I have at oh no lit class and Dan McMahon and give the show money because unfortunately it does cost money to make a podcast. But really just share it with other people. You know, if you know somebody who you think would be a good guest, share it with them. Share it with random people on the street. All the crazy things like that, you know, just that's the main thing. I do this because I want to. And if I happen to get hosting coverages covered and everything from people, that's nice. But I'm going to make the show anyway because it's fun for me. Don't forget the Play Comics is a part of the g dot com network, home to such other wonderful shows as Legends of SHIELD where we look at other things in the greater Marvel universe, whether they be new stuff or old stuff or anything like that. We're probably going to look at it. Unless it's made for little two year olds, because even I didn't want to look at Spidey and his amazing friends, my one chance to look at a ghost spider thing. Carrington and I mostly have our tech issues figured out for sugar spite and everything is fine. So that should be coming around pretty soon. If you want to hear me and him talk about things that we saw in children's media with lessons that probably should get carried into our adult lives. If you like the music that I'm really talking on top of right now, head on over to backing track GG to check out all the great music over there and maybe find something for you, your own project. But most of all, just grab a game, grab a stack of comics, go find yourself a new favorite character.