In one world, one we're more familiar with, Jonathan Crane has died. What essentially amounts to a cosmic filing problem leads to the former supervillain being offered a deal: He can be reborn into the world and become a hero, or he can die.
Well, it was considerate of the Powers That Be to make the choice simple, in any case.
He accepts, and in another time and another place, Johnny Crane is taken in by his previously unknown great uncle on his mother's side: one Alfred Pennyworth. In another time and another place, Johnny Crane moonlights as a vigilante known as Scarecrow on the streets of Gotham, and the team known as Young Justice is a very different group. (Somehow, though, everything important has stayed exactly the same.)
As the story goes on, events have steadily gone off the rails in an increasingly spectacular fashion. (Oh god.)
Can be found here
on the Young Justice Anon Meme. Has a character sheet that is under construction... and is very useful in keeping track of who is who, what is where, and what's decided to change.
This work contains examples of:
- Affirmative Action Girl: Straight at first because the author thought there wasn't enough women in canon Young Justice (2010). Then inverted with Secret because she added too many women and started tip the gender balance.
- Badass Family: The Batfamily, as per canon. We've got Bruce, Johnny, Dick, Jason, and Maureen, with others such as Stephanie Brown, Carrie Kelly, Cassandra Cain, Tim Drake, Damian Kyle, Damian Wayne, Terry and Matt McGinnis joining in the near future, and the author has implied that there are still more to come.
- Blunt Metaphors Trauma: Icicle Jr. ended up making one when asked about the Light.Icicle Jr.: "N-no, but I heard Shakespeare didn't write the Great Gatsby until he was almost ninety!"Artemis:"...Cameron, almost every word in that sentence was wrong."
- Covert Group with Mundane Front: Heroic example, the Birds of Prey disguise themselves as roller-derby/cheerleading squad. Apparently their front is so good, they're internationally famous.
- Everyone Went to School Together: Kid Flash, Pied Piper and the Trickster all go the same high school. Kaldur, Johnny and Roy go to the same college.
- Fantastic Racism: the discrimination against meta-humans varies from city to city. Star City is pretty liberal while in Gotham, a meta is called "Deader-Than" for Batman's very famous and public hatred of meta-humans.
- Give Him a Normal Life: Subverted. Cheshire gave Jason away in an effort to evoke this trope, but CADMUS found him and took him. She was more successful with Lian, if leaving her with her vigilante aunt is normal
- Good Is Not Soft: Johnny is a very nice person, doesn't mean Scarecrow is any more merciful. Artemis and M'gann have shades of this as well.
- Guile Heroine:Artemis, who at the age of ten made and followed a two-year plan to escape her father's clutches. M'gann, who lied about who she is inside her own head, on a planet of Telepaths, since she was Six.
- Interrupted Intimacy: When the world was separated into adults and underage, Roy and Kaldur were having sex. Roy disappears before finishing Kaldur and Kaldur is promptly angry.
- Literal Metaphor: Played partially straight: it was raining cats and dog in Fawcett city, that part is the metaphor. It was also raining frogs, toads and goldfish, this is literal. (Magic screws up the weather patterns in Fawcett.)
- The Maze: Star City and Gotham's streets are this because the architects had a feud and made the streets the opposite direction of each other. It makes getting lost a near-certainty, and telling who is from where a breeze. Magic seems to be involved as well.
- One Degree of Separation: Johnny Cranes is the nephew of Alfred Pennyworth, who is the butler of Bruce Wayne and Dick Grayson. Dick Grayson knows Mr. Skeevers from Haley's Circus, who is Maureen Conners/Permafrost's father. Johnny Crane is friends with Kaldur and Roy Harper, who was cloned from the original Roy Harper who impregnated Cheshire, Jade Nguyen, who birthed Lian Tan and Jason Wayne and Artemis Crock, who is Cheshire's sister and is Huntress's sidekick, who runs the Birds of Prey in Platinum Flats, which has Scarecrow, Aqualad and Red Arrow as members.
- Open Secret: The Rogues know Kid Flash's identity and vice-versa. Both sides chose not to disillusion each other.
- Percussive Maintenance: Subverted for laughs by Kaldur and Johnny.Johnny: Kaldur, if it doesn’t turn on, you have to check that it’s plugged in, and that it’s turned on. Shocking it, while cathartic, is Not. Helpful.Kaldur:… I will keep that in mind.
- Politically Motivated Teacher: Roy and Johnny bond over making a successful rebuttal against anti-meta/super hero college professor. The teacher had them both arrested in retaliation and they bonded in campus jail.
- The Talk: Bruce gives the Boys the talk in one of the interludes. The Boys are traumatized, Bruce is embarrassed and Alfred is smug.
