Written by Akiva Goldsman & Geoff Johns & Greg Berlanti
Directed by Brad Anderson
Rachel: "My mom says there's no such thing as monsters. I think she was wrong."
And here we are. A month since their launch, the main selling point of DC Universe was going to be their own original content and with four live action shows in various stages of production, it was time to see if the first one could cut the mustard. Enter Titans.
This opening episode introduces us to a young goth girl named Rachel Roth (Teagan Croft) whom her mother seems to be afraid of and for good reason as Rachel might have a bit of a demon working with her. There's also the fact that Rachel's mother isn't actually her mother, is killed off a little too quickly and Rachel is forced to head to Detroit in order to avoid a creepy man that seemingly needs her dark powers for his own reasons.
Taking the action to Detroit also means the addition of Dick Grayson (Brenton Thwaites) into the mix where he's attempting to forget his past and do his job as detective, which also manages to annoy his new partner, Amy (Lindsay Gort) for good measure, though they do seem to come to an understanding as the episode progresses.
What's interesting is that while Dick seems to want to get away from his past, he also has no problem donning the Robin costume and beating the shit out of some nasty blokes. The "Fuck Batman" lines which has been made into an excessive meme is surprisingly less jarring on screen than it was in the trailer but the episode in itself does seem to go overboard with the swearing at times in some misguided attempt to appear gritty.
The opening episode is certainly dark in places, mainly with the implications of Rachel's demonic powers and the various people trying to get to her as well. Another person we can add into the mix is Starfire herself (Anna Diop) or simply Kory Anders, who has been looking for Rachel and wasted no time in incinerating some more generic looking and sounding baddies as she grew close to her search for the girl.
The main focus of the episode is Dick and Rachel as the former did initially seem reluctant to help the latter (who also had visions of the Grayson family deaths) but by the end of this episode, it seemed apparent that Dick was willing to look out for Rachel while also being a little perturbed by her abilities.
As for Beast Boy (Ryan Potter) - his appearance came towards the end of the episode but it was a rather amusing one as he morphed into a tiger in order to steal a video game. Given the dark tone of this episode, it was a nice little note to end the episode on but hopefully it won't take too long for both him and Kory to catch up with Dick and Rachel.
- The logo for the show managed to show all four of our main characters. DC Universe are releasing the episodes weekly, while UK viewers will get the series on Netflix.
- Kory was in Vienna while Gar was in Ohio. They should be in Detroit by next episode.
- Standout music: Heaven Must Be Missing An Angel certainly got put to good use in this episode.
- Chronology: I'm going to assume it's 2018. Dick has been in Detroit for over a year.
Titans isn't the strongest pilot episode we've had and it definitely did feel like it was trying too hard to be too dark in parts. On the other hand, the cast are solid and engaging, the fight scenes look great as does the cinematography. Overall, the series has potential.
Rating: 7 out of 10
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