Here’s how “Toxic” is described:
Responding to a break-in at Stagg Industries, Batman rescues a security guard named Rex Mason (voiced by Adam Baldwin) who had been exposed to a weaponized toxic gas called Project Metamorpho. Soon, Rex begins to mutate, with the ability to control the elements in his own body. Terrified and unable to control his new abilities, Rex becomes a fugitive. Realizing that this metamorphosis is slowly killing Rex, Batman sets out to find a cure. But Rex is only concerned about the woman he loves — Sapphire Stagg (Emmanuelle Chriqui) — and he’d risk all of Gotham to be with her. But her father — Simon Stagg (Jeff Bennett) — holds secrets of his own and will do anything to keep them apart.
I look forward to your thoughts, opinions, gripes, live-blogging, etc.
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My first thought was that one horrible Britney Spears song.
First Katana, now Metamorpho. Are they working toward an Outsiders?
If they were, who would be next? Black Lightning? B/c I remember he was on the Outsiders in the Brave and the Bold.
This was the weakest episode by far. Full of really lazy holes and things happened only because the plot demanded it. First episode my wife and I didn’t enjoy.
I have a hard time with this computer art style. Seems to be aimed at attracting a younger audience. Hopefully they’ll cancel it soon a give something more in the vein of TAS.
Friendly advice@Sitara119? Please don’t wish for another Batman show. We’ve had TAS, The New adventures, The Batman, Brave and the Bold, and now this. I don’t think anyone on here would miss this show if it went away, but let’s all wish for something new.
I don’t mind the CGI style, GL:TAS used it and I thought that show was awesome, although I did notice that at the beginning Bats was the ONLY one driving into Gotham, and everyone else was driving OUT. it’s pretty cheap so far I admit. But I’d really rather the writing change before the animation.
Sorry. In the future I’ll try not to wish for things I want. 😉
Sorry, I didn’t mean for that to be snarky (if thats how it read). Wish for what you want, but always be careful what you wish for 😉 .
I didn’t find it to be snarky at all. Your comment was well received. I was just having a bit of fun with your choice of words. No worries, amigo. 🙂
I’m open to something new. I’ve really loved the anime-esque art direction of DC’s animated movies here of late. If I could get something like Under the Red Hood or Flashpoint Paradox on a weekly basis, I would be walking on clouds.
Oh good, I’d hate to start a fight with my new online pal 🙂 . I think you’ve watched “Young Justice”? I can’t remember, I think I saw you comment on it in the forums. If not, look it up.
I don’t really mind so much about animation style, so much as writing,tone, and material. Right now, I’m all about DC so I want more of that. Doom Patrol, Flash, Arrow; whatever I can get. The fact that Marvel has 3 different medicore shows on right now irritates me. All DC has is BTB and Teen Titans GO!, and a variety of very amusing shorts (Did you so the 70s esque Wonder Woman grindhouse ones?). I feel like if it was something like UTRH or FP it would A)cost more (MUCH MORE likely to be canceled) and B) have to be darker. I don’t know why, but I feel like B is a automatic.
I like Young Justice quite a lot. Nice animation style.
I agree that story is more important, but bad art can really hurt good storytelling. It can make it more difficult for me to suspend disbelief.
70s grind house WW? That sounds very interesting. I would like to check that out. It’s a short?
Yep, should be on YouTube.
This was, by far, my favorite episode of the series. Really engaging and I love the tragedy of the Rex Mason story.
Pardon the off topic question. Did any of the staff make it to see Kick-Ass 2? Always enjoy your film reviews and special ed podcasts, so here’s hoping.
@ Conor – I totally agree. This show has exceeded my expectations from that cheesy promo art. I love the take on Metamorpho, sort of an Absorbing man mixed with the Hulk. As someone mentioned maybe they will have an Outsiders group at some point? That would suite me just fine.
This wasn’t as bad as the last episode, or the Anarky episode IMO. 2 things that bugged me were Metamorpho’s speech patterns; it seemed to go from normal to Angry Idiot Monster. The other was just how they wrote Metamorpho, he could have been Clayface and everything would be the same. In fact that whole thing was like the Clayface episode from TAS. Not bad, not great; this show’s quality is really inconsistent.
It did gave me a cool idea though; for the New 52, what if Sapphire Stagg went in the gas chamber instead of Rex and became Lady Metamorpho? Could be cool, I think.
Somebody mentioned the Outsiders, maybe they’re trying to set them up instead of the JL, which is fine but theyve GOTTA figure out how to write other characters than Bats, Al, and Katanna competently.
It makes more sense than you think. As he stabilized it obviously became easier to speak.
I also think this suffered a bit because it was like the third or fourth time I’ve seen Metamorpho’s origins in an animated series.
No, because it went from normal to AIM to normal to AIM again and back and forth. It kept jumping between the 2, which I found annoying.
Query: what was the first 3 times you saw Metamorpho’s origin? The only one I recall is from Bruce Timm’s “Justice League” series.
Being unstable means being in flux, does it not? Ups and downs are to be expected.
He was also on Brave and the Bold, but it was a pretty different take and I’m not sure if they ever gave his origins so I could have misspoke.
But it’s pretty clear that someone, somewhere likes Metamorpho, and in fairness he does have a pretty decent origins story as those things go. His power is also pretty cool, if a bit hard to write for without a solid understanding of chemistry.
I mean, I have nothing against Metamorpho. I just think they could have shaken things up a little.
“As he stabilized it obviously became easier to speak.” But his body was deteriorating thru most of the show, yet at random points he could talk normally. Every other time his speech was slow,clunky, and short. It was like the show’s writing, inconsistent. They could have done either and been ok, but not both and skipping back and worth between them.
I remember his on Brave and the Bold too, but I just prefer him from JL much more.
I think he’s a cool character, I think most DC characters are in different ways. Personally I think Firestorm would be writer to write than Metamorpho but that’s just me.
I think compared to JL and BATB, this was a shake up. But a boring one, I said before you could replace him with Clayface and get pretty much the same story. Hopefully Mr.Terrific fares better, but I just think this show needs better writers. I may not have liked BATB but at least that show knew what it was and kept the writing consistent. I can’t say the same for this show.
Oops, I mean Firestorm would be HARDER to write than Metamorpho.
Or so Batman thought. And even if he truly was deteriorating then there would be times of remission. These kinds of things rarely flow in a neat, straight line. You think too linearly, too rigidly and that will certainly cloud your ability to allow for chaos.
On the writing side it was probably deliberate and used to bring home his instability- a physical example of this is when he lost cohesion and turned into a puddle the first time. That probably wasn’t intentional on his part.
I also don’t find the show to be inconsistent in any tangible way. You may feel that way to reconcile the elements of the show you do like with the elements of the show you don’t like, for whatever reason.
Well, which was it? If he was stabilizing than that implies at one point he was unstable. And if his emotional/ mental state was tied to that process, he went back and forth between the two states (stable/unstable, normal/Angry Idiot Monster).
I do find the writing inconsistent, some villains were flat out dumb (“Anarky”) and some episodes suffered as a result (Once again, Anarky, Magpie’s, Humpty Dumpty). And the dialogue can be rediculous too occasionally. But some episodes; like the Mansion invasion, are fine IMO. Also, I’m sure I’m not the only one who feels like the show can be bipolar in terms of quality (shuffling between two extremes).
Really enjoying this series. Pitched just right.
Only slight gripe is how empty Gotham seems. Streets empty of cars/people, restaurants with only one table. Minor thing but a bit noticeable.
Otherwise it’s great – far preferred over the last few incarnations.