Long running show crossing over with a short running show, what more could you want?
Teen Titans Go! & DC Super Hero Girls: Mayhem in the Multiverse is a direct-to-video animated superhero comedy movie that released on May 24, 2022. Serving as the Grand Finale for DC Super Hero Girls 2019, the film also doubles as a crossover (technically speaking) with Teen Titans Go!, being the third overall after "Superhero Feud" and the "Space House" four-parter.
Sometime after the events of #NightmareInGotham, Lex Luthor has come across an ancient amulet that houses Cythonna, the Kryptonian Goddess of Darkness, Plague and Suffering. With her power, Luthor unites all of the show's supervillains to create the Legion of Doom in a bid for world conquest, unaware that the Goddess is conscious within the amulet and is slowly corrupting and gaining control of him and the other villains. Rebuffed by the Justice League, the Super Hero Girls are soon left as the only ones capable of stopping the power-hungry deity whose own goal is to use Supergirl as a new host body. Thankfully, in their quest to stop the mad goddess and rescue their fellow superheroes from the Phantom Zone, a fortuitous wrong turn leads them to Titans Tower, where they find much-needed allies in the Teen Titans.
The official trailer can be viewed here
, and the sneak peek trailer here.
This film contains examples of:
- Adaptational Modesty: Cythonna wears more modest clothing than her comic counterpart, who wore little besides a leotard.
- Advertised Extra: All the promotional material makes it seem like the team-up between the Teen Titans and the Super Hero Girls against the Legion of Doom is the bulk of the plot. In the actual movie, the Titans' part of the story is just a framing device hosted by Control Freak. There is a minor detour into the TTG universe before the climax, wherein Raven gives Zatanna some advice about her powers, but that's the extent of their impact on the main plot. The Titans themselves lampshade this during one of their interludes, shocked at the realization that they're here purely to increase the ratings.
- Artifact Domination: Cythonna can mentally dominate any villain through her amulet, and further control other villains her thrall brings it to.
- Artifact of Doom: Aptly enough, the Legion of Doom is brought together by Lex after he discovered the Amulet of Cythonna in Krypton's remains. The Amulet produces a seemingly endless supply of pellets that can create portals to the Phantom Zone and effortlessly trap heroes. It also is containment for an evil goddess seeking her freedom.
- Battle in the Center of the Mind: Between Kara and Cythonna in the climax.
- Brick Joke: Aquaman says he got outvoted when he suggested calling the group the "Super Friends" over the Justice League. Later, Aqualad says the same thing, which gratifies Arthur. At the end of the film, the Superfriends universe makes a cameo appearance.
- The Bus Came Back: Cheetah turns up for the first time since very early in DCSHG season 1.
- Call-Back: Robin brings up that the TTG team had a movie in theaters.
- Changed My Mind, Kid: Harley bows out of helping the heroes fight the Legion after defecting to save Diana and inform Babs. She returns in the climax to help anyway, lampshading that she was invoking the trope.
- Chekhov's Gun: The crystal Beast Boy uses to prop up the entertainment system at the beginning of the movie turns out to be Cythonna's crystal, thrown in there by Zatanna.
- Continuity Snarl: Though the Teen Titans remember the Super Hero Girls from the previous crossover episodes, the Super Hero Girls don't seem to remember them, with Jess only recalling needing to babysit their counterparts once. The Titans realize that Fake Crossover is probably in affect and chide the girls for being "continuity snobs".
- Cover Innocent Eyes and Ears: In the Superfriends universe, Batman covers up Robin's eyes when the Super Friends see the Titans in a squabble.
- Crossover: Mayhem in the Multiverse marks the third crossover between the 2019 DC Super Hero Girls series and Teen Titans Go! The girls don't remember these prior meetings though, with Beast Boy quickly deducing that the more continuity-heavy nature of the former show means those adventures were Fake Crossovers from their perspective.Cyborg: Continuity snobs!
- Data Crystal: The data storage medium of choice for Krypton are hologram projecting crystals. Karen rigs up a way to interface with them using Earth computers and completely download their data.
- Deface of the Moon: To show Cythonna's power, the Legion of Doom have her blast the word "Boo!" on the face of the moon.
- Demonic Possession: Cythonna's plan is to gain enough strength from her thralls' evil to break free from her prison and possess the body of the strongest Kryptonian and conquer the world.
- The Dreaded: Cythonna was so feared that the legend of her amulet drifting through space inspired stories on Krypton that shooting stars, instead of things you make wishes on, were her returning to get naughty children. Kara is notably fearful as she recounts this to the Girls.
- Dude, Where's My Respect?: Hal Jordan sort of implies this wanting to be the Green Lantern in the Justice League, Aquaman kind of implies this when his opinion of Super Friends is hated and of course Robin gets this when Wonder Woman exposes him for the mug, By Batgirl calling him even more annoying then the Robin from her universe.
- Even Evil Has Standards: Harley is all about anarchy and wanton destruction, but she draws the line at the Legion's ambition to destroy the world. After helping Diana hide from them, and informing Babs of their plan, she bows out of the story until the climax, where she returns on the heroes' side to help them win.
- Finale Movie: This movie serves as the series finale of DC Super Hero Girls, having the Super Hero Girls and their universe's version of the Justice League engage in a fight against Lex Luthor and the Legion of Doom as well as Cythonna.
- Framing Device: The Titans just got a new, rather shoddy, TV display, and Control Freak decides to show them the crossover on it. It turns out this was because he was possessed by Cythonna and was trying to retrieve the new crystal she was trapped in.
- Here We Go Again!: After Cythonna ends up in the TTG universe, Raven sends the crystal to the Superfriends universe. The Super Friends plan to send it back, but they take one look at the Teen Titans fighting over the remote and decide not to.
- "I Know You're in There Somewhere" Fight: As Cythonna takes over Kara's body, the girls and Superman egg her on to try and fight it. In fact, Kara lets herself get possessed to invoke this, thinking that having Cythonna inside her mind gives her a "home field advantage."
- Lampshade Hanging: When revealing to the others that Harleen Quinzel is Harley Quinn, Barbara admits that the similar names should've made it easy to figure that out much sooner. Likewise, the Titans comment on the Framing Device, the fact that they're Advertised Extras and the fact that the Super Hero Girls don't recognize them despite having had two crossovers.
- Late-Arrival Spoiler: The movie takes place after the events of the season two episode "#NightmareInGotham". As such, Barbara and Harleen are fully aware of each other's double lives as Batgirl and Harley Quinn respectively. This serves as a major plot point, where Babs tries to convince Diana that Harley isn't as bad as she thinks, and later on Harley declares herself to be an unaffiliated Wild Card. Harley ends up joining the Super Hero Girls in the film's climatic battle with the Legion of Doom.
- Leaking Can of Evil: The Kryptonian goddess of darkness Cythonna was sealed away by her brother Rao into an amulet that was flung into space. She can enthrall anyone who is truly evil that touches it and it's apparently an endless source of pellets that open temporary portals to the Phantom Zone.
- Legion of Doom: The Lex Luthor of the DCSHG universe has made his own, featuring most of that show's villains, and they managed to successfully defeat every hero of that world with the exception of the main heroines.
- Mythology Gag:
- Aquaman wants to call the team the Super Friends, a reference to the show of the same name.
- Batgirl mentions her fight with Bane, and asks how Batman's first fight with Bane went, in reference to Knightfall.
- Batman wants Batgirl's help due to Robin being in his Nightwing phase, a call forward to his future identity.
- When Batgirl declares Harley her new sidekick, Quinn insists that she's "a headliner"; a reference that she's been the title star of her own solo comics and her own series.
- The kryptonite cube Superman and Supergirl get imprisoned in has symbols on it resembling the insignia of Brainiac.
- Post-Final Boss: The Titans act as a rare, heroic version of this to Cythonna. The real climactic battle is between Kara and Cythonna. After that's over with, Cythonna confronts the Titans in a final, slightly less climactic confrontation to wrap up the plot.
- Precocious Crush: As with the show, Zatanna has one on Aquaman.
- Remember the New Guy?: John Stewart Green Lantern debuts here in the Super Hero Girls universe, and Jessica points out that he was her Lantern instructor.
- Self-Deprecation: Control Freak points out that DC Super Hero Girls is superior to TTG due to actually having plot-driven continuity and less toilet humor. On the other end of the spectrum, Robin forces Control Freak to admit that DC Super Hero Girls isn't doing as good in the ratings.
- Spoiler Cover: The alternate poster for the film (pictured above) shows Harley Quinn on the cover alongside the Super Hero Girls and the Teen Titans.
- Spotlight-Stealing Crossover: In the movie, the Super Hero Girls, their supporting characters, their supervillains, and their world gets more of the focus than the Teen Titans of the Go! world, with the Titans themselves and Control Freak being the only people from TTG to have any kind of prominence.
- Suddenly Voiced: After always being The Unintelligible whenever he appears, Batman is heard speaking coherently for the first time... once.
- Superpowered Evil Side: Zee's dark magic powers come up again, and become a plot point when she needs to tap into them so the Girls can rescue the heroes from the Phantom Zone. After a mishap with it drops them in the Titans' universe, a pep talk from Raven helps her make peace with her dark powers and gain greater control.
- The Worf Effect: The Invinci-Bros, the Justice League, and Katana get defeated quickly by the Legion of Doom so that the Super Hero Girls can take care of it. The Load: Robin does this as he really doesn't do much everyone has a moment to shine and help even his teammates take out Cynthonia but Robin just watches
