Titans a Team of Lesser Criminals in DCU Second Season

The second season of TITANS picks up with -- and rapidly resolves -- the first season cliffhanger, which saw Raven's father, Trigon, take over all the Titans and begin his slow-walk of death to the world. With Gar Logan (Ryan Potter) being the only member unaffected he gets through to Raven (Teagan Croft) who in turn reaches out to Dick Grayson (Brenton Thwaites). One by one Trigon loses his grasp on their souls, as Raven takes out her father with a mighty release of her powers. 

As the adult Titans head their separate ways once more, Dick sees an opportunity to bring Gar and Rachel on as official members, re-forming the Titans, including re-opening Titans Tower in San Francisco. He does so with financial backing from Bruce Wayne (played by GAME OF THRONES' Iain Glen), who offers his support with a caveat: Jason Todd (Curran Walters), the new Robin, has to be brought onto the team as well -- ostensibly for more training, but possibly to get the brash teen out of Bruce's hair.

They're barely getting used to the tower when Dick spots another unusual teenager on the police monitors -- a young girl giving the police a merry chase that leads her to the tower. Dick brings the injured girl in to recover, which happens quickly as she seems to have some sort of metahuman rapid-healing factor, which doesn't do much to replace the eye she lost. Rose Wilson (ANDI MACK's Chelsea Zhang) turns out to be the daughter of Slade Wilson (Esai Morales), aka Deathstroke -- and Deathstroke is the reason the original Titans disbanded in the first place.

Cue the drama.

It would seem Deathstroke had been hired to put a hit on a Themysciran ambassador (no, not that one) and Donna Troy (Conor Leslie) was there to witness it. The bullet missed, but only because fellow Titan Garth (Drew Van Acker) aka Aqualad threw himself in front of the bullet, at the cost of his life. Seeking revenge for their fallen comrade, Dove (Minka Kelly) (who is, at this point in time, romantically involved with Dick Grayson) tells him that now is the time for him to be Batman. Some time later, Dick befriends a mute young man named Jericho Wilson (Chella Man), introducing him to his other friends. But this is a ruse to get information on Jericho's father. However, two things happen Dick didn't foresee. One, the team members actually start to like Jericho, and let him know the truth about them. And two, Jericho shows them he has a super power as well -- he can leave his body and inhabit the body of someone else if he makes eye contact with them.

Confronting his father after finding out the truth about him from the Titans. Jericho lands in the middle of a fight between Robin and Deathstroke, in which Deathstroke's sword accidentaly strikes his son down.

Returning to the current timeline of the season, Robin reveals to the team exactly what went down with Jericho, and they all disband. Seeking to punish himself for his part in Jericho's death, Dick assaults a federal officer to get himself tossed into prison. It's a prison from which he later has reason to escape, taking down multiple guards in the process, when he realizes that Deathstroke isn't going to stop coming after him or the Titans -- and when he has an epiphany about what really happened to Jericho!

During Grayson's trials and tribulations, all of which lead him to adopting the Nightwing identity, Gar Logan has been left alone in Titans Tower with yet another teen that has fallen into trouble -- Conner (Joshua Orpin), a somewhat naive young man who's only a few months old in real time. He's a genetically manipulated clone, the son of two fathers: Lex Luthor and Superman. While trying to be a hero, Conner also assaults a whole squadron of police officers. In fact, it's getting pretty hard to figure out which of the Titans is a real hero, since we saw Jason Todd assault officers last season.

Things are brought to a tragic conclusion as all the Titans are inexorably drawn back together thanks to pyschic manipulation from Raven, which she may not even have been aware she was doing. And in the final battle against Deathstroke as well as the Cadmus Team hunting Conner, another Titan shuffles off this mortal coil, and another leaves the team to help in other ways. But at least there is a team, which means there will probably be a third season.

While we still didn't get to see any of the heavy hitters, per se, in this DC Universe series, we did get quite a few visitations from Bruce Wayne. I suppose it's okay for him to appear, and even be referred to as "Batman" so long as he doesn't wear the suit. I'm not sure I was comfortable with Glen's portrayal of the Dark Knight -- it seemed an interpretation more apropos to WATCHMEN's Captain Metropolis. But it's the start of introducing the wider DC Universe into the show, so I'll take that.

It's a different Titans, a different -- darker -- DC Universe (if such a thing were possible), and definitely an R-rated series were a rating to be applied (there are many F-bombs dropped, and some nudity in a few episodes), so don't make the mistake of thinking your kids can hop from TEEN TITANS GO straight over to this. It's made for adults, and as such is enjoyable for adults.