The Justice League's newest member Captain Marvel unintentionally endorses Lex Luthor's Presidential candidacy, much to ire of the original founding members of the Justice League (especially Superman). Captain Marvel's naïve belief of Lex's Heel–Face Turn soon leads to a physical confrontation with the Man of Steel.
Tropes in this episode include:
- The Bad Guy Wins: Lex's initial plan is to goad Superman into destroying the power generator, and then prove it is exactly what he said it was, costing Superman and the Justice League the public's trust. Over the course of the episode, Superman not only destroys the generator, but gets into a fight with the idealistic Captain Marvel, completely destroying Lexor City in front of the entire press. Lex rubs salt in the wound after all of this by refusing the League's offer to pay for the damages, stating he "won't allow it" and he'll rebuild Lexor City out of his own pocket. Lex not only wins, but wins bigger than he expected to.
- Batman Gambit: Lex intentionally plays on Superman’s distrust of him to bait Superman into destroying Lex’s generator thinking it a bomb. Not only does Superman fall for it, but he gets into a massive fight with Captain Marvel and destroys Lexor City, unintentionally helping Lex even more than Lex had planned. The Trope Namer himself even points it out in the end.
- Berserk Button: Captain Marvel's Innocently Insensitive comments about using Luthor as an example of how people can reform absolutely sends Superman into an apoplectic frenzy that ends up first going all Mean Boss towards Captain Marvel and then destroying Lexor City out of his own paranoid suspicions.
- Big Damn Heroes: A plane is crashing over the city and Superman swoops in to prevent a crash. Off-screen, Captain Marvel was this for Batman, Elongated Man, and Metamorpho against Parasite.
- Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Lex milks the “reformed benefactor” ploy for everything it’s worth, getting teary during dedication of Lexor City and committing pretty obvious PR moments (“This one’s on me!”). The press mostly eats it up though it’s clear from Lois Lane’s body language that she isn’t buying any of it.
- Broken Pedestal: Hoo boy. Captain Marvel suffers a major one, which is why he quits
.Captain Marvel: My whole life, I've looked up to the League. You were my heroes. Every one of you. (to Superman) And you, you were more than a hero. I idolized you. I wanted to be you. Whenever I was out there, facing down the bad guys, I'd think, "What would Superman do?" Now I know. (to the original seven) I believe in fair play. I believe in taking people at their word and giving them the benefit of the doubt. Back home, I've come up against my share of pretty nasty bad guys, but I never had to act the way they did to win a fight. I always found another way. I guess I'm saying I like being a hero. A symbol. And that's why...I'm quitting the Justice League. You don't act like heroes anymore. - Call-Back: Superman comments to Marvel that "we don't sell deodorants on television" when speaking about the League's role as symbols of justice. At this remark, the Flash looks away with some embarrassment; the speedster himself once learned a very similar lesson in "Eclipsed".
- Casual Danger Dialogue: Superman and Batman are fighting a group of anonymous masked criminals while casually talking about Captain Marvel. About halfway through the scene, one of the heroes suddenly realizes something:Batman: What do these guys want, anyway?
Superman: To take over the world...or rob banks. I forget. (beat up bad guys) But, back to Captain Marvel... - Da Chief: Superman, the head of the Justice League, acts as this, especially when he chews out Captain Marvel for his supporting comments about Lex Luthor at the press.
- The Dog Bites Back: After being accosted and treated harshly by Superman the whole episode, Captain Marvel snaps and actively fights Superman when Supes violently shoves Marvel away to get at the device.
- Downer Ending: Thanks to Superman, the League loses one of its most powerful, popular, and promising members. Superman's PR takes a major hit while giving Lex and his presidential campaign a major boost. Luthor is also confirmed to be secretly working with Waller and Cadmus.
- False Flag Operation: It’s never confirmed but this is the most likely answer on who stole the kryptonite from Professor Hamilton.
- Heel–Face Door-Slam: To Superman of all people. Before he can admit he was wrong and apologize, Captain Marvel delivers a harsh rebuke to him and the rest of the original seven before quitting.
- He Who Fights Monsters: This episode showcases how Superman is starting to go down his route due to his paranoia and lashing out on Captain Marvel for his press comments and even bordering on Never My Fault and Tautological Templar when being questioned by Batman for being hard on Captain Marvel.
- Hero with Bad Publicity: Superman's overreaction of Luthor's power source running Lexor City to be a threat and causing the destruction of the city. All part of Luthor's plan.
- Jerkass Ball: It’s clear that Lex’s campaign, coupled with Cadmus specifically targeting him and his cousin has pushed Superman into a dark place to the point of lashing out at Captain Marvel and even sniping at Batman for not immediately assuming the STAR Labs heist is Luthor's doing.
- Jerkass Has a Point: Superman is extremely paranoid and hostile in this episode, but his suspicions about Luthor being up to no good were spot on, just bad timing and being Right for the Wrong Reasons.
- Jerkass Realization: Superman admits at the end of the episode that Captain Marvel's What the Hell, Hero? is dead on. Batman softens it a bit by telling Clark they (meaning Luthor and Cadmus) set him up.
- Let's You and Him Fight: The penultimate confrontation between Captain Marvel and Superman, and leaving the destruction of Luthor's city; in which Luthor was counting on all along to bolster his growing popularity and paint the Justice League in a bad light. The results causes a disenchanted Captain Marvel to leave the Justice League for good.
- Mean Boss: Superman reaming Captain Marvel for his comments to the press.
- My God, What Have I Done?: Superman is left thoroughly ashamed of himself by the end of the episode.
- Mythology Gag:
- The fight between Superman and Captain Marvel is a Shout-Out to Kingdom Come. In both accounts, Captain Marvel uses his magic lightning to attack Superman, Superman manages to make one of the bolts strike Marvel and proceeds to gag Billy.
- The fight is also a nod to Mad's “Superduperman!” where parodies of Superman and Captain Marvel fight each other and cause massive property damage.
- Luthor's actions in rebuilding Lexor City to garner favor and support for a possible presidential run are similar to his actions at the end of Batman: No Man's Land, where he offered to rebuild Gotham City and received much public support as a result.
- One of the buildings destroyed during the Superman/Captain Marvel fight is the Lena Luthor hospital. In the comics, Lena is Lex's mother, or sister, or even daughter, depending on the version.
- "Lexor City" is a small tribute to the planet Lexor from comic book stories of the 1970s and 1980s. Lex Luthor became a heroic figure to the people of a distant planet, so much so that the planet was re-named in his honor. Luthor would soon retire from crime to benevolently guide the worshipful populace of Lexor to prosperity. However, Lexor (much like Krypton) was destroyed; an event which Luthor would unfairly blame on Superman, re-igniting their ongoing rivalry.
- Billy Batson goes to "C.C. Binder Elementary School", named for Captain Marvel creator C.C. Beck and longtime collaborator Otto Binder.
- Billy/Captain Marvel lives in Fawcett City and even refers to himself as "a Fawcett boy at heart." These, of course, are nods to the company that originally published his comics.
- Never My Fault: When Batman calls out Superman for being too hard on Captain Marvel, whom Batman referred as a sunny boy scout, Superman replied that he thought he was the boy scout despite acting anything but that in this episode and believed he did not do anything wrong. Subverted at the end when Superman has a Heel Realization and a Jerkass Realization after Captain Marvel had enough of Superman's Jerkass Ball that goes against everything the Justice League stands for.
- No Celebrities Were Harmed: Phil O'Bannon and his show, The O'Bannon Agenda, are an obvious parody of the real-life political talk show The O Reilly Factor and its host Bill O'Reilly.
- "The Reason You Suck" Speech: Captain Marvel delivers one to the League announcing his resignation, as seen in Broken Pedestal above.
- The Resenter: It's implied that part of the reason Superman gets irritated by Captain Marvel is that he's become (in Batman's words) more of a boy scout than Superman, and is easily loved by people, both in Metropolis and within the League (with Batman of all people remarking that Captain Marvel is "sunny") the way he used to be. Superman, still burdened with the memories of Darkseid brainwashing him, and Cadmus' research, takes it out on the Naïve Newcomer. However, after realizing Captain Marvel is really a child, Superman lightens up towards him and at the end tries to apologize for his hostility, only to be rebuffed as the former announced his resignation, while the latter has a Heel Realization.
- Right for the Wrong Reasons: Superman is absolutely right about Lex, as Batman affirms at the end, but his reasons for that (paranoia, suspicion) are wrong; the result is he alienates Captain Marvel, ruins his reputation, and plays into the villain's schemes. At the end, Batman sympathetically laments:Batman: They set you up, Clark.
- Rule of Symbolism: At the near-end of Superman and Captain Marvel's fight, Superman's Chest Insignia is destroyed by Captain Marvel's lightning bolt to symbolize Superman failing to uphold his values and Captain Marvel's loss of respect of him.
- Spanner in the Works: One that actually works in Lex's favor. His plan was to just make Superman look paranoid by tricking him into destroying the generator, only to then prove it was legitimate. He didn't expect Captain Marvel to show up and get into a fight with Superman that would destroy the entire building complex and make the hero look even worse.
- Superdickery: Superman exhibits this the most in this episode. Invoked in-universe by Luthor's ploy to draw out Superman to commit vandalism out of paranoia to make Superman look bad in the press and Luthor look good.
- Tautological Templar: Superman has an attitude problem towards Captain Marvel and is paranoid about Luthor, but he denies he's doing anything wrong, until the end of the episode.
- Took a Level in Jerkass: Superman is notably more spiky, hostile and paranoid towards Captain Marvel (whom he doesn't know is really a child) than he normally is. What's worse that there is no mind control involved unlike previous episodes, it was Superman's own will alone that caused him to act like this. He eventually comes to realize what a jerk he's being, but by the time he does it's too late; he's alienated Captain Marvel, humiliated himself in front of the world, and made Luthor's Villain with Good Publicity act much easier.
- Villain with Good Publicity: Luthor gains public sympathy following Lexor City's destruction due to Superman's obsession with stopping him... which is all part of his plans.
- Xanatos Gambit: Luthor sets up a situation where either Superman will humiliate himself and the League by destroying Luthor's prototype fusion generator...or he won't and Luthor will get great free P.R. himself as a philanthropist and inventor. In getting into such a destructive fight with Captain Marvel over the whole ordeal, Superman unwittingly gets Luthor the best of both worlds, as Luthor commits to paying for the damage himself.
- Warts and All: For both Superman and Captain Marvel. It goes to show that at the end of the day, their Ideal Hero image and Hope Bringer status does not mean that they are perfect people in general. Superman isn't immune to being paranoid and jealous at times and Captain Marvel, while an idealistic and wise kid, is still just a kid, who's vulnerable to the same flaws as other children like naivety and impulsiveness.
- What the Hell, Hero?: Captain Marvel chews out the Original Seven before resigning from the Justice League for their paranoia and arrogance.
- Wide-Eyed Idealist: Captain Marvel firmly believes that someone like Luthor can turn good. Superman, who has come to blows with the businessman/supervillain throughout the DCAU, believes it's not so simple. Although at the end of the episode, Marvel reveals he has faced his own fair share of nasty bad guys but stooping at their level to win is one he wasn't going to cross.
- Would Hurt a Child: Until the end of the episode, Superman (who in general Wouldn't Hurt a Child) was being absolutely oblivious that he was bullying a child beneath the Captain Marvel exterior until learning his secret identity; to learn that he was being abusive towards a kid throughout the episode horrifies Superman, and his attempts to make up for it are rebuffed by Captain Marvel at the end.
