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The Siege of Starro! Part 1
Original Airdate - September 17th, 2010
Led by Faceless Hunter, the Starro Invasion comes on full swing. Only Batman and a handful of unlikely heroes remain uninfected to thwart the alien parasites and their mind-controlled hosts before all of Earth is sucked dry.

Written by Joe Kuhr
Directed by Ben Jones
Animation by Lotto Animation
Review by Andrew
Media by Warner Bros. Animation
Cast
Diedrich Bader as Batman
Jeff Bennet as Captain Marvel
John DiMaggio as Faceless Hunter
Bill Faggerbake as Ronnie Raymond
Kevin Michael Richardson as B'Wana Beast / Starro
Tom Everett Scott as Booster Gold
Tara Strong as Billy Batson
Cree Summer as Vixen
James Arnold Taylor as Guy Gardner
Billy West as Skeets
Tyler James Williams as Jason Rusch / Firestorm

Music
Theme Written and Performed by Andy Strumer
Music by Michael McCuisition, Lolita Ritmanis, Kristopher Carter
Media


Video Clip



Review
The trilogy of teasers that led up to this point was easily some of the best teasers that have been attached to any episodes of this series. It was a brilliant way to lead up to this episode, although poor scheduling probably diminished most of the hype the teaser trilogy had managed to build up. But, it finally got here, and right away you realize they really put a lot of effort into making this live up to the mysterious and dramatic flair that was wrought in the related teasers. This episode’s teaser does a different approach; this time around it’s not so much exposition for the Starro invasion, or for his herald Faceless Hunter, but chronicles humanity’s ongoing confrontation with supervillainy. Of course, that is until a hero inevitably steps forward, and depicts the evolution of humanity’s heroes. Admittedly, this threw me off during the stone age depictions, since Kru’ll (Menace of the Conqueror Caveman) was a bland villain that I had forgotten about, and his heroic foil was a new character that hasn’t been previously introduced - and looked a bit too much like Kamandi. Other than that, however, the entire teaser is a very well done bit of epic superhero chronology.

Despite being a two-parter, it doesn’t take long for the episode to delve immediately into introducing Batman to the fight that he’s been missing, which is both a good and a bad thing. I was glad that it didn’t drag it out further after such an excruciating wait for the episodes to finally air, but at the same time it does feel as though there should have been more mystery added to it. We were teasingly fed nuggets of suspenseful buildup in order to raise our anticipation for this episode, and so I was expecting that to be carried on further here to take full advantage of the two parts. As mildly disappointing as that was, however, the episode is still well crafted with being laden with action that never ceases to be enjoyable. I was a bit worried that it would get to a point in which it would seem as though the storyline was solely crafted to forcefully saturate Brave and the Bold with some hero vs. hero action, but fortunately it never feels that cheap. There is plenty of decent dialogue to be had, especially between Batman and Booster Gold, along with comedic moments and well placed exposition for the mysterious villain, Faceless Hunter. They really could have come up with a better name than that, though.

B’Wana Beast, surprisingly, is a prominently featured character but is fortunately far more interesting than from his previous episode, “Gorillas in the Midst,” and not whining about how he’s a lackluster hero. Joining him and Batman in the fight against the invading alien starfish, Starro, is Firestorm and Shazam. Firestorm is confusing, Jason Rusch apparently now has the ability to willingly split with mentor Ronnie Raymond, and it’s only in combining can Firestorm be made. In Firestorm’s origin episode, however, it seemed to imply that Ronnie Raymond was stuck in the head of Jason Rusch. It’s not a major issue, but hopefully that will be addressed at some point.

Overall, the episode was thrilling with brilliant combination of action and storytelling aided by well written usage of the few characters that weren’t under Starro’s influence. Undoubtedly it would have been better if the better part of a year hadn’t been separating the trio of teasers related to the storyline and its final debut, but it has been worth the wait. Highly Recommended that you catch this!


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