Young Justice

Man remember when Metamorpho and Katana were in S3's poster? Good times.

In fairness, they got one focal episode with Batman in "Exceptional Human Beings". But it was still just one, and it turned out that the Outsiders were actually Beast Boy's own iteration of The Team (but public).

Just a friendly reminder that the trade paperback for Young Justice: Targets is out now. It has the Director's Cut of all six issues plus bonus concept art with commentary and a guide to every character in the "big gathering" scene.

This thread led me to create a poll on my DeviantArt page last month asking if this series ended up being a "The Emperor has no clothes" moment for Weisman. Because... well, a lot of the criticism in his writing and adaptation choices are valid; hell, I've had issues with some of his creative decisions with The Spectacular Spider-Man years before.

So, am I right in calling this series an moment of "The emperor has no clothes" for Weisman and his rep?

For me personally, it did disenchant with a lot of Weisman's writing, though people forget he didn't work alone on this a lot. But i wouldn't say it did for fandom as a whole.

Which issues are we talking about?

As far as I’m aware, the show isn’t widely panned enough for that to be the case.

Saying it’s an “Emperor has no clothes” moment implies it’s something awful created by someone with an overinflated an opinion of themselves, when the worst you really hear about the show is that’s a good series with some clear issues.

Edited by KnownUnknown on Jul 19th 2023 at 12:27:09 PM

Which issues are we talking about?

Okay, I might've overthought this post a bit, but some of the posts here do criticize not just the show itself, but some of Weisman's work in general.

Edited by Anicomicgeek on Jul 19th 2023 at 12:18:40 PM

Though I dont think the character bloat is really a problem exclusive to the revival seasons, that very much was already starting to be a thing in season 2.

The show is flawed, like just about any other show. Saying it proves "the emperor has no clothes" is incredibly hyperbolic.

Again I’ve interacted with members of his fan base who really do put Weisman on a pedestal.

That happens a lot with fanbases.

Unless we've heard that Weissman has done anything to encourage this, lets give him the benefit of the doubt.

This is not to say he's perfect. He's gonna make mistakes, but I don't want to declare fandom war on his quiet yet. The man who's given us Gargoyles, Spectacular Spiderman and Young Justice deserves a little breathing room.

If that's the actual wording of the question in the poll, it's pretty leading, ngl.

Edited by M84 on Jul 22nd 2023 at 1:10:05 AM

I used to be a bigger fan of Weisman, but I've become more critical of him over the years. My major problem with the way he does things is... I've come to feel he writes the way he does mainly because he feels it lets him off the hook from ever having to write a satisfying conclusion to anything, give proper closure or pay off anything.

Because if you always keep all your balls juggling in the air, never put anything to bed, you can shift the blame to "the suits" when the show ends and fans feel empty. It's incredibly convenient that this keeps happening "to" him. So much so I've concluded it's by his own design.

Face it; even if they "gave him just ONE MORE season" of YJ/Spectacular/Gargoyles/whatever, he wouldn't use it to wrap things up, or to satisfy. He'll just kick the can down the road because that's what he always does. He's a tease who never finishes to completion, and I feel it's mainly for *his* benefit, not the fans, and I've grown tired of the game of keep-away.

I kind of wish he'd just end his works even if it's with an And the Adventure Continues ending.

The issue is that he seems to keep having new ideas for the settings he creates and thus will never really be satisfied. He keeps them open-ended because he wants to always have the option to bring those ideas to life even if it's unlikely any studio will greenlight such a project.

I agree it’s a bad model for YJ, which based its entire story off the Light Myth Arc but I don’t see why every series needs an endpoint. I didn’t really expect that from Gargoyles or Spectacular.

Edited by CheapMarzipan on Jul 21st 2023 at 12:50:45 PM

Weisman’s a lore enthusiast. He’s ultimately more interested in exploring and introducing lore surrounding the works he’s writing than bringing those various threads together.

This is both his greatest strength and greatest weakness as a writer.

It means his stories tend to be very engaging, with new mysteries and avenues to explore around every corner, and since he’s very good at characterization it means his characters always have new and unique things to engage and grow through. For a comic book adaptation it’s also very good because it means he will definitely capture and try to incorporate everything he can about the source material in a way most adaptations won’t: this was one of the best things about Spectacular - that it made the effort to understand and show what’s so great about Spidey’s wide cast. Not strictly resolving stuff can also be good for a superhero series sometimes, since it’s a big And the Adventure Continues genre.

On the other hand, basically every show he’s ever made has the issue of having a ton of stuff introduced that the show just doesn’t have the time or place to actually suitably explore, hanging plotlines, and stuff that sometimes just feels like it’s there just to be there. His shows do have a bad streak of getting cancelled, but at the same time there’s always just stuff in there that probably could’ve stood to not be there in the first place.

I don’t think those faults outweigh his strength as a creator, and imo he’s still one of the greatest animation writers in history - a field where career writers tend not to get to shine much - but they are there and it’s an issue with most of the things he creates.

Edited by KnownUnknown on Jul 21st 2023 at 11:20:26 AM

Well besides his good points being more plentiful, well playing it safe or taking chances can lead to failure just the same, but taking a chance and failing (especially letting time move forward) at least can lead to more memorable stuff.

And:

And as some storybased anime show (i.e. Detective Conan), you get popular and not prepared for such, you now how to stretch out a story for basically forever or years.

Main character notably went from being a gifted, but flawed individual who now is a bit more of a Gary Stu.

I always saw shows like Young Justice, Gargoyles, or even Avatar: TLA as works where they have story and character arcs with definitive endings, but their respective universes aren't necessarily bound to them.

The episode "Evolution" also changed my perspective of the conflict between The Light and Apokolips by widening its scope as much as it did. I don't know if it's eternal, but it certainly won't be "wrapped up" that easily.

He did mention having a specific plan for spectacular - 5 seasons and then 3 movies to wrap it up. Gargoyles did try to have other shows and one of them was supposed to be the final battle (with the space spawn invaders).

It also helps that in THAT case he really was screwed by the suits

WITCH was open ended in that it hinted at a possible future storyline but because the main threads had been resolved it wasn’t as annoying (kinda like Daredevil season 3)

Edited by LordYAM on Jul 22nd 2023 at 3:15:36 AM

He also wrote and produced for Star Wars Rebels, but only on the first season

I've got a vague recollection, though it may just be fanon, of hearing the same thing about every other cancelled Weisman series? If we only got one more season, everything would have been nicely wrapped up!

Honestly WITCH's ending is pretty fulfilling.

The bad guys are imprisoned. The good guys win.

There doesn’t seem to be any sign of a renewal yet

Yeah uh I think Quietly Cancelled. Which ngl kind of Weissman's fault if so because he was given two whole seasons to finish up the show.