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1[[quoteright:320:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/young_justice_book_1.png]]
2[[caption-width-right:320:A League of their own.]]
3->"They're the ''Teen Titans''."
4->"No, we're not."
5->"Oh, right! They're the ''Young Justice League of America''!"
6->"No... we're young, but just us."
7->"Oh, okay! ''Young Justice''!"
8->"No, young, '''just us'''!"
9->"Right! '''Young Justice!'''"
10->"Fine, ''whatever''."
11
12In 1996, riding high on the ''ComicBook/JLA1997'''s relaunch, Creator/DCComics attempted to relaunch ''ComicBook/TeenTitans'' yet again. It failed, in part due to editorial interference. Most notably, the fact that no one wanted to let the ''ComicBook/TeenTitans1996'' writer Creator/DanJurgens use any of the major teen heroes running around DC at the time (particularly ComicBook/{{Robin}}/Tim Drake, who won a fan contest to select a new member of the team -- only for the ''Batman'' editors to refuse to honor the contest results, resulting in Captain Marvel Jr. being forced upon Jurgens instead.)
13
14Ending in 1998, DC decided to launch a new replacement book, but coming up with a new name for the new teen book. Meanwhile, Robin's popularity was matched by two other teenage superheroes with ties to Justice Leaguers: ComicBook/{{Impulse}} and ComicBook/{{Superboy}} -- and the trio worked as a PowerTrio. Hence, ''Young Justice'' was born.
15
16Launched out of a FifthWeekEvent tie-in ''Girlfrenzy: Young Justice -- The Secret'' and a Justice League mini-series ''World Without Grown-Ups'', the series was written by Creator/PeterDavid and ran for 55 issues before being cancelled. The cancellation (along with cancellation of ''ComicBook/Titans1999'') was done mainly to launch a ''new'' ''Teen Titans'' comic to complement the then-recently debuted ''WesternAnimation/TeenTitans'' cartoon series, placing the remaining members of Young Justice under the wing of veterans from the classic Wolfman Titans team.
17
18An [[WesternAnimation/YoungJustice2010 animated series using the Young Justice title]] was announced by Cartoon Network during their presentation to the network upfronts on April 21st, 2010. Ironically, the ''WesternAnimation/TeenTitans'' show was originally pitched as Young Justice.
19
20The Young Justice team returned as the flagship title of Creator/BrianMichaelBendis' Creator/WonderComics imprint, with a relaunch in January 2019. The team stars the four most well-known members: Robin, Impulse, Superboy, and ComicBook/WonderGirl, alongside ComicBook/AmethystPrincessOfGemworld and newcomers [[ComicBook/JonahHex Jinny Hex]] and [[ComicBook/GreenLantern Teen Lantern]]. Notably, this marks the team's return after 16 years since their dissolution. See the relevant ''ComicBook/{{Young Justice|2019}}'' page for details.
21
22----
23!!''Young Justice'' contains examples of:
24
25* AllGuysWantCheerleaders: Superboy refuses to go out on patrol with Impulse because he'd rather watch the televised national Cheerleading finals. Sucks to be him as that's where Impulse ends up to stop a robbery and saves the day!
26* AndIMustScream: The [[DownerEnding final fate of poor Slobo]] is to be frozen as a statue but ''still alive and aware'' in the headquarters of Young Justice One-Million.
27* AscendedExtra: Cissie "Arrowette" King-Jones, who TookALevelInBadass after an appearance in ''ComicBook/{{Impulse}}''.
28* BalanceSpeedStrengthTrio: Robin, Impulse and Superboy are considered as this, mirroring their mentors in ComicBook/JusticeLeague.
29* BlessedWithSuck: Mighty Endowed is most certainly ''blessed''. She's so blessed in fact that the weight of her enormous breasts means she can't stand upright under her own power.
30* BrainwashedAndCrazy:
31** The Young Justice team falls victim to brainwashing at one point. ComicBook/{{Supergirl}} helps snap them out of it.
32** [[spoiler:Secret is brainwashed as well, and by Darkseid at that!]]
33* BreakingTheFellowship: The team suffer an emotional version of this after the reveal of Batman's files on the Justice League, as half the team- specifically Superboy, Wonder Girl, Impulse and the returned Arrowette- wonder if Robin has similar files on ''them'' (Secret affirms her faith in Robin, Empress points out that Batman would have been applauded if his files were revealed to stop the rogue Leaguers as intended and Lil' Lobo dismisses the idea that Robin could be a threat to him anyway). Even after the initial distrust of Robin is resolved, he steps down as team leader.
34* BreastExpansion:
35** In the first issue, mousy scientist Nina Dowd touched an ancient artifact and became the supervillain Mighty Endowed, with a chest just as large as that name implies.
36** Joked about with Arrowette. When she feels she is destined to become a villain, she bemoans having to get a black costume that shows off her cleavage. Particularly since she doesn't have much in the way of cleavage to show off. Later on we see an alternate universe evil, large-breasted version of her.
37* BrickJoke:
38** For saving his kingdom, Ali Ben Stein offered the boys ANYTHING they wanted. Impulse asked for... well, we never find out, until about 30-odd issues later when the team gets a ''spaceship'', which just ''happens'' to coincide with a friend of theirs needing a lift into space.
39** A cross-title one that ''could'' be an accident...if it weren't for Creator/GrantMorrison's involvement. In the first Young Justice story, a kid gets hold of an all-powerful genie and wreaks havoc. When the team save the world and the League are congratulating them, someone says "So cool!" among the chatter. A year or so later, in a ''ComicBook/JLA1997'' story, a former superhero gets hold of an all-powerful genie and wreaks havoc. The genie here is a revealed to be a 5th-dimensional being like Mxyzptlk, and can be summoned or dismissed by saying his name backwards. His name is Lkz, making his control phrase zkl...pronounced in the comics as "so cool".
40* CaptainObvious: The series dabbed into this at times when exposition was needed to point out something not clear in comic format. Of course, whenever Young Justice did something the author thought was stupid, it got mocked.
41--> '''ComicBook/{{Robin}}:''' The kids... They've turned old! And those other kids are dancing out of control!
42--> '''ComicBook/{{Superboy}}:''' Wow. I can tell '''you''' were trained by the world's greatest detective.
43* CatFight:
44** Issue #7 has a cat fight between the ''mothers'' of Wonder Girl and Arrowette, much to the amusement of Impulse's normally stoic guardian, Max Mercury.
45** Secret and Spoiler were prone to fighting when the latter guest-starred, due to a Secret having a crush on Spoiler's boyfriend Robin. [[spoiler: It becomes a lot more serious in the final arc when Secret ''eats'' Spoiler (she got better).]]
46* TheChainsOfCommanding: Robin's role as the team leader began making him uncomfortable and strained his friendships with some of the members to the breaking point, which is when he stepped down. He was much more happy as Cassie's tactician and stealthy assistant.
47* ChromaticArrangement: The team founders form an arrangement of Superboy (blue), Robin (green) and Impulse (red). The first four girls also fit with Secret (a dusty dull tan), Wonder Girl (black), Arrowette (red) and Empress (purple).
48%%* CloneAngst: Slobo ''really'' regrets being a clone of Lobo for a very good reason. Superboy, on the other hand, couldn't care less.
49* TheCuckoolanderWasRight: Impulse, being the team's (and DC's) resident CloudCuckoolander, gets a few moments of brief "intelligence", particularly during the issue wrapping up Sins of Youth, when he accidentally figures out Robin's real name by reading lips incorrectly. PlayedForLaughs of course.
50* ColorCodedCharacters: The "core four" were each connected to a color they wore and sometimes filled the background of their narration boxes; Impulse was red, Superboy was blue, Robin was green, and Wonder Girl was black/yellow. In addition, Secret was associated with a dusty grey color and Empress was associated with purple and gold.
51* ComfortingComforter: Arrowette requires comfort after she has a mini breakdown when she realizes she just gave the ''Justice League'' an awesome TheReasonYouSuckSpeech while Superboy and Wonder Girl worriedly watch over her.
52* ContinuitySnarl: Mocked in an aside: Red Tornado says he has files on every superhero, with "nineteen on ComicBook/{{Hawkman}} alone".
53* ConvectionSchmonvection: When Robin and Empress don't burn up in the lava fields of Apokolips, it's [[LampshadeHanging lampshaded]] that the heat from the lava should really have killed them.
54* CoversAlwaysLie: The covers generally have little to nothing to do with the story (the Halloween issue, for example, has Robin, Superboy, and Impulse trick-or-treating as their mentors, and the issue where the girls join up has them trying to get into a boarded up Young Justice HQ), but they are usually unrelated enough that one can get the idea that the images are simply sight-gags. Some issues do fall under this, though; one issue has the team jumping out of the A.P.E.S. headquarters (which is located in Mount Rushmore, up Abraham Lincoln's nose), with Robin shouting "It's gonna blow!" and carrying a detonator, connected to various bombs that are stuffed in Lincoln's nose. Within the comic, however, it's ''Superboy'' who defaces Mount Rushmore, and he does it to George Washington, rather than Lincoln. He also does it out of necessity ([[spoiler:well, [[TheMole sort of]]]]), and does not use dynamite. Furthermore, the line about blowing Lincoln's nose is said when ''entering'' the nose, not exiting, and is just an offhand remark made in reply to Impulse's pun about them running up the nose, instead of the nose running.
55* CoverupPurchase: In one issue, Robin mentions he was able to bury the expense of producing and shipping a Batmobile across the country in "the Batarang budget".
56-->'''Robin:''' It's bigger than you'd think.
57* CrazyPrepared: Robin shows that he has inherited [[ComicBook/{{Batman}} his mentor's]] propensity for preparation. When the crew went camping, a game of Truth or Dare came up. He was dared to pull his mask off... and so he did, revealing that he had a SECOND mask on underneath! Yup, you can tell he was "[[PhraseCatcher trained by the world's greatest detective!]]"
58* CrisisCrossover: In addition to relatively minor contributions to most {{Crisis Crossover}}s that went on during the series' run, Young Justice was also the center of one crossover of their own: ''Sins Of Youth'', featuring FountainOfYouth and OvernightAgeUp applied to most of the DCU.
59* DealWithTheDevil: The source of Harm's powers involved the sacrifice of his younger sister [[spoiler:resulting in the creation of Secret]].
60* DickDastardlyStopsToCheat: In one issue, numerous supervillains participate in [[{{Pseudolympics}} a sports competition legally distinct from the Olympics]], during which former Young Justice member Cissie King-Jones is competing as part of the U.S. Archery Team. After successfully breaking the arm of one of the U.S. Team Members (who happens to be an AlphaBitch) and pinning the blame on Cissie's mom, they try the stunt again when Cissie is up to shoot, only for her mom to throw her lighter at the would-be perpetrator, throwing off their attempt and disqualifying the villains from the competition.
61* ElectrifiedBathtub: [[spoiler:Secret was originally killed by her brother throwing an electric appliance into her bathtub.]]
62* EliteAgentsAboveTheLaw: The All-Purpose Enforcement Squad ([[FunWithAcronyms A.P.E.S.]]) has [=IDs=] belonging to every major law enforcement agency on the planet, including the FBI, the CIA, Interpol, and Scotland Yard. They're able to walk into an archaeological site and instantly declare it government property while having full clearance to kill anyone who gets in their way. As Agent Donald Fite puts it, "We have more clearance than '''God.'''"
63* EvilTwin:
64** Inverted with Slobo, the degenerated clone of Lobo who contained all of the Last Czarnian's "repressed" traits: he was intelligent, good-natured, responsible, monogamous, self-sacrificing... [[spoiler:oh, and slowly dying from not receiving any of Lobo's superpowers.]]
65** Played straight with Match, who secretly replaced Superboy for several issues in order to destabilize the team from within and make sure they got bad press.
66* FanService: Surprisingly averted for a '90s comic. Helped by the fact that artist Todd Nauck drew the characters with the proportions of ACTUAL teenagers (as opposed to other artists working on "teen" books where they drew everyone looking like 20-something underwear models). However, played a bit more straight straight whenever a guest-artist showed up, and later on in the series as Wonder Girl ditched the terrible wig and grew a cup size. Not to mention Empress showing up naked a couple times...
67* FoulFirstDrink: One event saw all the teen superheroes being turned into adults while the adult superheroes were all reverted to childhood. During this time, Tim Drake (who was Robin at the time) became an adult and took advantage of the situation to visit a bar and hang out with his dad, who is unaware that it's Tim. He decides to try having a beer but immediately spits it out all over his dad.
68* FriendshipFavoritism: Tim has to field some accusations of favoritism and deal with Kon and Bart fighting over his time on occasion. Evidently that's just the deal if your two best friends are YoungerThanTheyLook failed attempts to create [[TykeBomb Tyke Bombs]] one of which was raised by virtual reality and the other by implanted memories as they're both still trying to sort out some social norms.
69* FreudianTrio: The original 3 members of the team form a trio (Impulse=Id, Superboy=ego, Robin=super-ego), explicitly lampshaded by Red Tornado when he agrees to mentor them.
70-->'''Superboy:''' Hey, how come HE gets to be "Super-Ego"? I mean, Super IS in my name, after all!
71* FunWithAcronyms: The name of the '''A'''ll '''P'''urpose '''E'''nforcement '''S'''quad is frequently the subject of jokes.
72* GenreThrowback: The series, with its [[YoungerAndHipper younger cast]], [[DenserAndWackier emphasis on wacky villains]], and character based comedy, can be seen as a return to the tone of the original [[UsefulNotes/TheSilverAgeOfComicBooks Silver Age]] [[ComicBook/TeenTitans Teen Titans]], occasionally balanced out with the serialized drama of the Wolfman/Perez run.
73* HeroicBSOD: Arrowette goes into a nearly catatonic state after [[spoiler:the death of her therapist, leading her to quit being a superhero]].
74* IHaveBoobsYouMustObey: Mighty Endowed has hypnotic breasts as her superpower, besides [[MostCommonSuperPower the obvious]].
75* ILied: Spoiler, after suggesting to Secret that Robin has talked about Secret a lot, later admits to having lied about it. (Secret, having a crush on Robin, found the idea pleasing.)
76* IwoJimaPose: The tie-in to the "Our Worlds at War" event featured on its cover a few members of the team (and infamous criminal The Persuader) raising The Persuader's atomic axe in victory.
77* HeroesUnlimited: The team manages to recruit every hero under ~23 to help invade an island of supervillains.
78* HollywoodVoodoo: Lampshaded by Empress, who states her displeasure at how pop culture has depicted Vodun.
79* KnightOfCerebus: Harm is introduced impaling Arrowette with one of her own arrows, with she herself stating "But that's n-not funny."
80* KnownOnlyByTheirNickname: Secret's real-name, [[spoiler: Greta Hayes]], isn't revealed until late in the series' run. Prior to the revelation, she goes only by Secret or Suzie, a nickname picked out for her by Cissie.
81* LandmarkingTheHiddenBase: A.P.E.S.'s headquarters is inside Mount Rushmore.
82* LeaningOnTheFourthWall: The characters usually refrain from outright breaking the fourth wall, but they come close to it several times.
83** In one issue, a few characters talk about their comic books being canceled. In-story, they're each talking about their [[ShowWithinAShow favorite comic books]] being cancelled (this is the only mention ever of them being comic book fans, and the comic books in question are never named or described, [[RuleOfFunny but so what]]), but to the reader it's clear that they're talking about the characters' solo titles. Two of which were recently cancelled, a third was cancelled years before, and one was still going strong.
84** Another example: when Arrowette and Wonder Girl were attempting to connect to the Internet apparently using AOL, Cassie started complaining about the unreliability and slowness of the service...only to be quickly hushed by Cissie who hurriedly whispered something in her ear, prompting Cassie to smile falsely at the reader and start talking about how wonderful AOL was. Guess who'd just entered into a corporate partnership with Creator/WarnerBros and parent company Time Warner at the time..?
85* LensFlareCensor: When there wasn't something conveniently in the way, a lens flare was occasionally used to hide Mighty Endowed's boobs.
86* LighterAndSofter: The book took itself less seriously than ''Teen Titans'' was at the time. This served as the "light" book for DC Comics (or the whole superhero genre) as well. It had its share of grim or dark storylines, but it also had lots of {{Bizarro Episode}}s, LeaningOnTheFourthWall and HilarityEnsues storylines. During one CrisisCrossover they spent a little time possessed by demons [[AuthorAppeal harrassing the NRA]] before moving on to a recurring villain who vaguely fit the crossover's theme, and when they were at the center of another CrisisCrossover, it involved [[FountainOfYouth turning all the world's adult heroes into children and vice versa]], and TheMenInBlack who were recurring antagonists had [[MeaningfulName Joke Names]].
87* LuckilyMyPowersWillProtectMe: Especially at the beginning of the series, Superboy explained his powers ''all the time.'' Almost always lampshaded.
88-->'''Impulse''': "See?! There he goes again! Talking about his stupid powers like we don't know how they work!"\
89And also....\
90'''Superboy''': "Don't worry ladies, you're safe now, thanks to my-"\
91'''Girl''': "Tactile Telekinesis!"\
92'''Superboy''': "...Oh. So, you've, uh, heard of it, huh?"
93* MagicIsFeminine: The book's magic and mystic characters were all female; Cassie Sandsmark, a demigoddess; Anita Fite, a Voodoo priestess; and Secret, a ghost. All the other characters either had no powers or had abilities of a more scientific origin.
94* MeaningfulName: Attempted by Superboy when he suggested "Victoria" as a possible name for LaserGuidedAmnesia sufferer Secret; thwarted by Wonder Girl.
95* MoreDiverseSequel: The team was originally formed with ComicBook/{{Robin}}, ComicBook/{{Superboy}}, and ComicBook/{{Impulse}}, who were all white and male; there was even an issue which parodied the "boys club" nature of the team when they were later joined by three girls: ComicBook/WonderGirl, [[ComicBook/GreenArrow Arrowette]] and Secret. Again, all white. Later member Empress was African-American and [[TokenMinority the only non-white]].
96* MostCommonSuperpower: Parodied with Mighty Endowed, whose breasts are so large she requires men to hold her up when she stands.
97* NowOrNeverKiss: Superboy and Wonder Girl finally kiss when a Darkseid-trained Secret comes [[RoaringRampageOfRevenge roaring back to earth with revenge on her mind]].
98* OneSteveLimit: Wonder Girl and Arrowette's names are "Cassie" and "Cissie" respectively, Secret gets dubbed "Suzie", and [[Comicbook/Batgirl2000 another Cassandra]] shows up in an issue of the series. She's usually called "Cass" though.
99* PowerOfFriendship: While Young Justice isn't the equals to the JLA or JSA in sheer power, their ability to work as a ''team'' and the fact that you mess with one and expect ''any and all past and present members'' to show up looking to kick your butt that makes them frightening.
100* PowerPerversionPotential: When Secret manages to partially solidify to catch Superboy from being flung around, he remarks that he didn't know she could do that. Her response? "Oh, I can do all sorts of things you don't know about". Not that Secret normally made such innuendos, but the look on her face sold it as such.
101%% ZCE? * PowerTrio: Specifically pointed out by team chaperone Red Tornado in the first issue to convince Robin the three boys ARE a good team together.
102* PunnyName:
103** A.P.E.S. agents Donald Fite and Ishido Maad form a pun on "fighting mad." Originally they were to be named Nuck and Futz, but ExecutiveMeddling squashed that joke...
104** Also, Empress' name is Anita Fite.
105* QuirkyMinibossSquad: The Agenda's six man Point Men team are recurring ineffectual adversaries of Young Justice.
106* RottenRoboticReplacement: The team once got replaced by a team of poorly-made robotic duplicates created by Ivo Jr. Impulse lived with them for a week before he noticed that something was wrong.
107-->'''Tim:''' Well... they weren't ''that'' bad...
108-->'''Cassie:''' Tim, mine was ''smoking.''
109* SecretIdentity: Thanks to ExecutiveMeddling, Robin was under editorial mandate to keep his real identity a secret from his friends, having been ordered to in-universe by Batman. This was because the series came out during the period when Batman was supposed to be an "urban legend" no matter how little sense it made, and this extended to his partners. This went to ridiculous extents since the team was pretty public and they had to write around this by everyone outside the team awkwardly avoiding mentioning Robin.
110* SelfDeprecation: Multiple in the first issue:
111** In one aimed at DC in general, Red Tornado says he's updated about various heroes and has [[ContinuitySnarl/{{Hawkman}} 19 files on Hawkman]].
112** One aimed directly at writer Creator/PeterDavid himself saw the PowerTrio dream about being subjected to things David himself put other characters through: Superboy becoming an angel with fiery wings a la fellow Super-family member Supergirl, Robin losing a hand and replacing it with a batarang a la ComicBook/{{Aquaman}}'s then-current HookHand, and Impulse having Dissociative Identity Disorder a la the [[ComicBook/TheIncredibleHulk Hulk]].
113* SensibleHeroesSkimpyVillains: Lampshaded when Arrowette fears she's turned evil.
114-->"I'll have to get a tight, skimpy black leather outfit that shows off my cleavage. Oh god. I'll have to get cleavage."
115%% ZCE * ShootTheRope: Arrowette does this in the ''Young Justice 80 Page Giant''.
116* ShoutOut: This book utterly ''indulges'' with its references.
117** Perhaps the most blatant is when Snapper Carr is all but revealed to be talking on the phone with Rick Jones, who was currently starring in another Creator/PeterDavid written book, ''ComicBook/{{Captain Marvel|MarvelComics}}''. This is only the tip of the iceberg.
118** One notable ShoutOut goes to DC's [[Creator/MarvelComics main competitor]]; more specifically, to their [[ComicBook/SpiderMan poster boy]]'s origin. A cop chases after a crook, shouting for someone to stop him before he gets to the elevator, and Cissie lets him pass. The cop then chastises her, hoping he doesn't shoot someone's mom...or uncle. (In case you're wondering, she ends up stopping the crook before he gets too far.)
119** Regular series artist Todd Nauck tends to cram in tons of references to ''Series/MysteryScienceTheater3000''. Fittingly, he was later an artist on ''[=MST3K=]'''s comic miniseries.
120* ShowWithinAShow: The characters often watched "Wendy the Werewolf Stalker", an expy of ''Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer''. There's even a story where a few members of the team travel to the set and appear in the series.
121%% ZCE * SlumberParty: The boys have one in the first issue to get used to their new base. The girls have one themselves a while later.
122* TheSmurfettePrinciple: Averted: the series went from boys only to 50/50 very quickly.
123* StalkerWithACrush: Secret harbors feelings towards Robin and comes off as invasive in her [[{{Yandere}} worst moments]].
124* StarkNakedSorcery: Empress performs a skyclad ritual to try and divine the location of who killed her father.
125* SubbingForSanta: The 40th issue has the heroes take up Santa's job of delivering Christmas presents after he sacrifices himself to save the Earth from a Khundian suicide bomber. They aren't able to deliver all the presents until well after Christmas Day has passed and the people given the presents aren't grateful due to the late deliveries and not getting what they wanted, so the young heroes hope Santa Claus is reborn to resume his gift-giving duties by next Christmas.
126* TakeThat: Wonder Girl mentions to [[ComicBook/{{Shazam}} Captain Marvel]] Jr./[=CM3=] that "[[Creator/MarvelComics The Marvel]]" would be a lousy name.
127* TemptingFate: While on New Genesis, Empress wonders if the gang has any normal adventures, "Something involving some monstrous incarnation of evil, or something?" Who shows up? [[spoiler:Darkseid]].
128* TrappedInTVLand: The 80-Page Giant has them fighting Bedlam, who sends them through different genres of fiction-- FilmNoir, Spaghetti Western, Giant Mecha Anime, Silent Film Horror, etc.
129* TrueCompanions: The team is nearly inseperable, especially the first six members. Cassie even transfers to the same school as Secret and Cissie after the latter two retire from superheroics and the "core four" (Tim, Kon, Bart, and Cassie) remain each others closest friends and stick together even after joining the Teen Titans.
130* VerySpecialEpisode: The gun control story gets a little preachy at times, but doesn't take over the plot. A less dividing example is the episode that indirectly, but very clearly, refers to 9/11.
131* VignetteEpisode: The 80-Page Giant, featuring genre-hoping, is half TrappedInTVLand, half vignette-- each genre gets its own story.
132* WillTheyOrWontThey: Superboy and Wonder Girl left fans wondering whether they would get together. [[spoiler:They do (only in the series' last issue, but they still do).]]
133* WitchWithACapitalB: Arrowette refers to an AlphaBitch and her GirlPosse as "rhymes with witches."
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