Episode 59

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This week, Edwin Alva, Jr. makes a mess of his father's businesses ("Junior"), a former child actor uses Static to wreak havoc ("Replay"), Virgil fights a purple monster while trying to come to terms with the death of his mother ("Tantrum"), the Joker shows up in Dakota ("The Big Leagues"), and Richie and Virgil come to odds when the former gains superpowers of his own ("Power Play"). [ 1:21:35 || 37.4 MB ]

The above is from: http://www.worldsfinestpodcast.com/episodes/wfp_059.mp3

[Doug]

This week, Edwin Alva, Jr. makes a mess of his father's businesses ("Junior"), a former child actor uses Static to wreak havoc ("Replay"), Virgil fights a purple monster while trying to come to terms with the death of his mother ("Tantrum"), the Joker shows up in Dakota ("The Big Leagues"), and Richie and Virgil come to odds when the former gains superpowers of his own ("Power Play"). [ 1:21:35 || 37.4 MB ]

The above is from: http://www.worldsfinestpodcast.com/episodes/wfp_059.mp3

The character, Richie Foley, did not appear in the Milestone comic book "Static", although he is based on two of Virgil's best friends. Superficially, Richard "Richie" Foley is identical to Richard "Rick" Stone - who was blond, wore glasses and had the same first name, although Rick Stone had far longer hair. In the comic series, Rick Stone played an important role in the arc "Between a Rick and a Hard Place", when he came out to be gay. After the cancellation of the TV series, Dwayne McDuffie stated that the cartoon character Richie was gay, but due to the rating was never brought up in the show. This led several fans to speculate whether Richies obvious affection for Virgil was purely platonic, or more romantic

[James D.]

As promised during the "Replay" review...the legendary, always-entertaining hardcore dancing kids:

[Erin B.]

A thought about the memorial service for Virgil's mother. Support groups set up to help people through the process of grief in some cities sometimes hold services for the victims of violent crime on a specific date. The families gather and comfort each other and talk about the loved one they lost. Maybe one such service was being held not just for Virgil's mother, but for all victims of violent crime in Dakota. The video that Pops and Sharon were making might have been part of a massive video featuring special moments in the lives of the victims that would have been playing throughout the service.

Either that or it was the one year anniversary of Mrs. Hawkins' death and the Hawkins family and friends were gathering once again to remember Mrs. Hawkins.

Anyway just a thought.

Good show guys!

[grahamvidger]

Joker designs in the DCAU

BTAS

Gotham Knights

Return of the Joker (Batman Beyond)

Static Shock

Justice League

So really there are four different joker designs but Static Shock and Batman beyond Return of the Joker were basically the same, and the Justice League one was different because the teeth and the eyes were more yellow.

[Molly]

I might be the only one, but I love Gotham Knights Joker.

[Missy]

I might be the only one, but I love Gotham Knights Joker.

You are not alone.

[dc20willsave]

My thoughts on the Gotham Knights Batman are simple: It's nicely minimalist and gets across a lot of the Joker's cartoony nature. I don't see some of the Gotham Knights Joker facial expressions seeming half as endearing with the BTAS design. The Return of the Joker and Justice League designs are more than a little more creepy as all fuck because they almost feel more alive to me at times. Regardless, all have awesome pluses and minuses to them and all work for a character with a multiple choice background. It gets across the Joker's need to reinvent himself, to be a being of chaos, never quite the same.

[Molly]

I just love the black eyes.

[James D.]

When I was referring to the Return of the Joker design, I was speaking of the design at the end of the movie when he "shapeshifts" from old Tim Drake's body. It's a different design than the JL one.

[Guest DCAUFan1051]

Great episode guys..... I so wish there were more Static DVD's because Disney XD doesn't do it justice

[grahamvidger]

Basically, all the joker designs got better and better.

I think you guys were unsure or something about Virgil's age and other stuff so I just decided to post some stuff to tell you exactly who he is.

And numerous sites and different sources have all confirmed that he is 15 years old, the creators also have said that this is true.

[Missy]

Normally I'd wait to address an e-mail on the air, but this one has to be shared now because it brings up a good point:

In the last episode of WFP (episode 59) when you guys were covering the episode "the big leagues" you had mentioned that you liked the fact that robin looked a few years older then he did the last time we saw him in the DCAU which I agreed, but than when you guys motioned something about the joker in "batman beyond: return of the joker" I immediately thought of "the flashback" that explains what happens to Tim Drake. During this flashback Tim Drake is shown having the same character model as in Gotham Knights (or very close). This bothered me because [...] Static takes place [...] a few years after Gotham Knights. So my question to you is how can Tim Drake look "Older in Static" when he still had the old character model when he was taken by The Joker and Harley in "Return of The Joker"?

My response:

That's an excellent point! I'm surprised neither James nor I caught that during the recording. There are two possible suggestions:

01. I don't remember all of Barbara's narration during the scene, so pardon the question, but did she say Tim retired right away? Maybe he tried to return to action as Robin, but couldn't handle it. If so, during that period he could have hit a serious growth spurt, met Static, then retired. (Okay, I admit that's a stretch.)

02. It's not Tim, but a third Robin. Jason Todd, maybe?

He wrote back:

the one major problem with the first suggestion is that if Tim returned to action, than met Static, the joker would have already been dead, because Tim killed him, right? so how can the joker be in static? the second suggestion is definitely more plausible.

And I finished with:

The Joker is alive in JL and JLU, so the flashback scene in Return of The Joker has to take place after the last time we see Joker in a JL / JLU episode. Since that's the case, Tim should have looked older in the flashback, because many years (at least three) would have passed between the end of Gotham Knights and Joker's last appearance in JL / JLU.

So you'll have to mark it up as a retroactive mistake. Meaning, when they made the movie, they weren't yet thinking about JL and JLU, so Tim's age / design wasn't taken into consideration. Whenever we see the flashback in ROTJ, we'll just have to imagine that Robin's a little older.

[SuaveStar]

Well, another way it could be taken is that it is Terry's image of Tim Drake, the images we see in the flashback could be his take on the situation.

Bruce may have pictures of Tim when he was a kid in his files, and Terry just filled in the blanks from the pictures.

That would be proven false though, if you take into the scenario the Joker scenes Terry sees Bruce watching.

Lets just say it was the force.

[Guest DCAUFan1051]

Well, another way it could be taken is that it is Terry's image of Tim Drake, the images we see in the flashback could be his take on the situation.

Bruce may have pictures of Tim when he was a kid in his files, and Terry just filled in the blanks from the pictures.

That would be proven false though, if you take into the scenario the Joker scenes Terry sees Bruce watching.

Lets just say it was the force.

suave the only problem with your theory is that in the flashback it wasn't terry's images of what happened it was Barbara's.

[grahamvidger]

I don't think it was quite meant for Tim to look older in "The Big Leagues". He sort of gets the old Gotham Knights look in a later episode of Static Shock.

Robin in Gotham Knights.

Wikipedia:

Tim Drake as Robin appears regularly in the animated series The New Batman Adventures, voiced by Mathew Valencia.

Robin in Batman Beyond Return of the Joker.

Robin in "The Big Leagues".

Robin in "Futureshock". He has his Gotham Knights look in this episode for some reason. but yet again he has that voice actor that makes him sound older.

Some info on the voice actors and his appearances in Static Shock:

Wikipedia:

Tim Drake appeared as Robin in two episodes of Static Shock. The first episode was "The Big Leagues", where Batman and Robin team up with Static to stop The Joker. Robin's other appearance was in "Future Shock". He was portrayed by Eli Marienthal in the first, and by Shane Sweet in the second.

But in Gotham Knights, Tim looks shorter than he does in both of his appearances in Static Shock. But in "Futureshock", they bring back his old hair style from Gotham Knights and his costume looks more like his Gotham Knights one. His design in "Futureshock" still doesn't make that much sense cause in Batman Beyond Return of the Joker, he looks the same as he does in Gotham Knights.

Let us also not forget Batman Mystery of the Batwoman. Do we know where that is in Tim's life?

Wikipedia:

Eli Marienthal voices Tim Drake/Robin in the animated movie, Batman: Mystery of the Batwoman.

Robin in Batman Mystery of the Batwoman

In Mystery of the Batwoman he looks a little bigger like he does in Static Shock. He does have the Gotham Knights hair style. But he looks bigger than he does in Return of the Joker. He also sounds older than he does in Gotham Knights and Return of the Joker, but that is probably just because of the different voice actor.

My guess is that they made Tim taller and older sounding and older looking so he could sort be friends with Virgil.

Static Shock's part in the DCAU is fucked up.

[omnidragon]

I seem to have a problem as a loyal fan of this and other podcasts at earth-2 when i try to play this one (and in really wanted to here what you had to say about Static and the Justice League. Instead of playing I get Codex missing, AAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHH!

[Missy]

Every now and then I get that with Earth-2.net: The Show, but this is the first time I've seen it with WFP. Hmm... have you tried re-downloading it?

[James D.]

Mike, I had the same problem. Windows Media Player couldn't play it because of some mysterious missing codec.

[Missy]

Someone buy me a Mac. Please!

I've (seemingly) fixed the problem and have re-uploaded the file.

[grahamvidger]

Mike, the computer you currently have is it a desktop? If it is, than you could buy a cheap little Mac Mini, and hook it up to your PC. But then your just kind of using the PC as a monitor, so you wouldn't be able to sell it to make money for a new computer. But if you did get a Mac Mini, you could use your old PC as a regular Windows running computer, then if you want to work on a Mac, you can power up the Mac Mini and hook it up to your PC and use your PC as a monitor. The one down side about Mac Minis is that they small hard drives of like 80GB or something, but that is no problem if you have an external drive. This is the cheapest way to get a Mac Mini. (Used I'm afraid, but Amazon has other cheap ones too).The link I just gave has one for as low as $445, you can't get many computers cheaper than that, especially for a Mac.

[Missy]

Erin also suggested I get a Mac mini, so I'll look into these. However, if I get one, it will be new. I don't want a used / refurbished machine.

[GoFlash]

A thought about the memorial service for Virgil's mother. Support groups set up to help people through the process of grief in some cities sometimes hold services for the victims of violent crime on a specific date. The families gather and comfort each other and talk about the loved one they lost. Maybe one such service was being held not just for Virgil's mother, but for all victims of violent crime in Dakota. The video that Pops and Sharon were making might have been part of a massive video featuring special moments in the lives of the victims that would have been playing throughout the service.

Either that or it was the one year anniversary of Mrs. Hawkins' death and the Hawkins family and friends were gathering once again to remember Mrs. Hawkins.

Anyway just a thought.

Good show guys!

As I recall, in a later episode (at least season 3, because Gear is present), it's stated that Mrs. Hawkins (Jean, I believe) had died 5 years prior to the events of the series. It definitely felt like more of a city event, rather than a family one. It may be that this was the 5 year anniversary of the riots, and since the community center was involved heavily, they took the opportunity to put her in the spotlight, but that doesn't sound like the Hawkins family. Sometimes one person does end up taking center stage - think about that shot of the Marines raising the flag on Iwo Jima. She may have been representativve of all those who lost their lives. Of course, it's possible that there were a lot of injuries and property damage, but she was the only person who lost her life (or at least, the only one not in the gangs causing the riots).

I reference to the e-mail, I'm to lazy to check, but I'm pretty sure that Ryder made a comment in his reporting in "Beware the Creeper" about how the Joker had many aliases. I had taken taht to mean that Jack Napier was one alias, but true name unknown. Maybe the casino owner only had one of the multiple choice answers, and that's why his file said Napier.

Also, with the discussion of Tim in ROTJ, I had just noticed something. When Tim (in flashback) swings into action, there's a great Robin theme - bold and kind of cocky, it fits. So I finally got around to finishing the last season of Teen Titans. In "Go", the one that shows the origin of the Titans, when we first see Robin, the same theme plays. (And if you're wondering, I'm firmly on the side of the argument that involves more WFP 'cause I don't really care about most of the rest of the arguments).

Chris

[grahamvidger]

I believe, in one of the time travel episodes of Static Shock, Static goes back in time to stop his mom from dying. He admits to her that he will become a super hero later in his life. She had a job where she worked with ambulances, basically she was a doctor that helped get people into ambulances and cared for them. But she died doing this. And Virgil is trying to stop her from letting that happen, but she dies anyways because she still risked her life for others in what was going on (basically Dakota's version of the Los Angeles riots of 1992). But anyways, it says on wikipedia that he traveled 5 years in the past, meaning the events of the Static Shock series are 5 years after the death of Jean Hawkins. But that means Virgil was ten years old then, because in Static Shock, he is fifteen years old. This must be true, because in that episode ("Flashback"), there is a five year anniversary memorial for Jean Hawkins and others who died in those riots at the beginning of the episode. So the memorial service in "Tantrum" is not a five year anniversary thing. The occasion in "Tantrum" could have either been the birthday of Jean Hawkins or the day she was married to Robert Hawkins.

YODA EDIT: Please use the spoiler tags in the future.

GRAHAM EDIT: Sorry Mike!

Edited August 11, 2009 by grahamvidger
Added spoiler tags.

[TDK_theBatmaN]

Okay, I've been sitting out on WFP until Mike and James review JL and JLU, but I took a look and noticed Batman and Robin were appearing in a Static Shock episode so I listened in.

At one point, Mike and James comment about Static in the batwing and how he does a funny "accent," as if a bad impression of an Australian or something. LOL. However, I watched the episode via youtube and in the batwing voice recognition scene, I'm pretty sure Static is doing a horrible impression of William Shatner's Captain Kirk from STAR TREK.