Justice League vs Teen Titans (2016)

Justice League vs Teen Titans (2016)

Dir. Sam Liu

While the 'heroes vs other heroes' thing isn't a new concept for DC, it was pleasing to see the Teen Titans included in the continuity of the DCAMU movies because, while I'm not as familiar with the group in comic book form, I loved the 2003-06 animated series. And  their involvement gave the writers an opportunity to address concerns that the Justice League might not be best equipped to tackle alone.

A connection to the Titans is made when Batman, tired of Damian's pissy attitude, sends the boy to Titan Towers in the hope that time spent with crusaders of his own age will help him to learn the value of teamwork. (And secretly he maybe just wanted some time away from the little turd for a while.)

The strategy (ruse) works in the character's favour, with the believable camaraderie of the Titans offsetting the bratty attitude of the new Robin. In many ways, it's an important and welcome step in the angsty teen's personal story arc, and it even manages to make his deep-rooted paranoia and anger work to the team advantage in the latter half of the story.

Robin isn't the only one of the collective to experience parent/guardian trouble, but to elaborate on that would be pure spoiler; not all superheroes are orphans.

There's a crucial scene at a funfair, which is overly clichéd at times but successfully highlights how quickly attitudes can change. It's a light-hearted moment that also has weight. It's a nice break from the adult brooding of previous films. Speaking of which, Cyborg is more fun, too.

Raven has a large role to play in the main story, which means magic and sorcery feature. She's an interesting character, probably my favourite of the Titans, but it was odd not hearing her voiced by Tara Strong. In the DCAMU movies, Taissa Farmiga gets that privilege, instead.

There's plenty of combat for folks that prefer that kind of stuff (some of which is more reminiscent of a Persona or Shin Megami Tensei game than the typical superhero genre) and a mid-credits scene that may please existing Titans fans but will likely confuse most others.

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