Green Lantern and Young Justice

So guys, I haven't posted in a while.

Like...a REALLY long time.  I've been meaning to do so but every time that I sit down to work on a post I sort of, well, don't.

But now there's something that's been brought to my attention that I've been trying to play ignorant of for the past week, which unfortunately I cannot do so anymore.

Cartoon Network has canceled both Green Lantern: The Animated Series and Young Justice.


Most of you probably don't care nearly as much as I do about this, and some of you even more so than I- but to be frank I'm supremely pissed off.  I mean, sure- apparently neither quite as well as Cartoon Network had hoped lest they wouldn't straight up cancel a series.  But really now?  Have you seen the fandom for GLTAS?  Not that I'm on Tumblr, but do you know how much that shit exploded when AYA was hit by the Anti-Monitor and DIED for a week? (sorry for the spoilers)  And then again, when she turned into a cataclysmic universe ending robot bent on annihilating all life from time?

Yeah.  Shit got really deep for those 2 weeks.

Hell, AYA had the power to end the universe and what does she do?  She stages metaphorical battles between the emotions.

I won't totally destroy the ending for anyone who hasn't seen it in it's entirety, but I feel really discontent with it's ending.  It only barely touched upon a sense of closure while simultaneously touching all of your feelings and leaving you feeling both better for having experienced the whole adventure and sad to see it end (or in my case: partially enraged)

On the other hand:  Young Justice.

Personally I liked this show right from the start.  It had elements of Teen Titans without being so silly or campy and actually had a really decent deal of character development.  The plot was similarly complex enough to keep it interesting and enthralling.  At the same time though, it did have it's flaws- as argued by this one chick here.

Paraphrased:

1. Chronic "Stop-n-Go" Syndrome 
• This one I can understand: this show took way too many hiatus's (which technically Green Lantern Animated is also just as guilt of) to the point where it made it difficult to keep up with and really immerse yourself in the story.
2. It was set in a parallel universe detached from the standard DC Universe
• So what?  Yes it's detached from the canon world of Earth One, but why is that a bad thing? It gives the writers room to build their own lore while borrowing from established canon to create their own storyline.  It's called "appropriating" and every artist does it. 
3. It didn't provide a solid jumping off point for getting into comics
• Not the show's fault.  To be honest: DC Comics really likes to troll their readership by resetting their universe whenever shit gets just a little too heavy.  They had a good thing going with Blackest Night, which lead into Brightest Day.  But by that point most of their A-List heroes had either died and become a zombie only to be resurrected, or just flat-out died off.  Brightest Day sort of provided some damage control that attempted to add in some reason behind the seemingly random choice of which heroes came back from the dead while others didn't (hell- it even gave us our first look at Kaldur), but at the same time sort of complicated the timeline.  So what did DC do?  Flashpoint.  The Flash runs back in time (God I hate The Flash...) and winds up messing up the entirety of the time stream and effectively hits the giant reset button on the blinking VCR clock.  And thus the New 52 was born- a new timeline in which many of the classic heroes got total overhauls and new origin points/stories while others carried on as if nothing had happened. 
• Many people saw this as a cheap cop-out, but DC did it as a means of boosting business by making the comics more accessible to new readers.  As a new reader myself, I was sort of happy the New 52 happened because it let me get back into the comic world after a many year hiatus by providing me with a fresh start (for the most part).
• So yes: while Young Justice didn't really give viewers a good point to jump into the world of comics it's more it's parent company's fault for changing everything so frequently.  I love you DC, but you really do complicate things for yourselves sometimes.
4. Expanded cast in season 2

• This one I really agree with.  While it is really fun to see all of our favorite characters "alive" on the screen, they really just started adding characters in just to expand their market while only barely keeping a lot of the level of characterization that they had established in the first season.
• Let's compare Season 1 with Season 2:
• Season 1
• Robin (Dick Grayson)
• Aqualad (Kaldur'ahm)
• Kid Flash (Wally West)
• Miss Martian (M'gann M'orz)
• Artemis (Artemis Crock)
• Superboy (Connor Kent)
• At this point in the series you had a smaller cast who each had their own level of development, their own issues to deal with, and a greater dynamic between them. 
• Season 2
• Nightwing (Dick Grayson)
• Robin (Tim Drake)
• Batgirl (Barbara Gordon)
• Superboy (Connor Kent)
• Impulse (Bart Allen)
• Miss Martian (M'gann M'orz)
• Wondergirl (Cassandra Sandsmark)
• Blue Beetle (Jaime Reyes)
• Beast Boy (Garfield Logan)
• Bumblebee (Karen Beecher)
• Guardian (Mal Duncan)
• Lagoon Boy (La'gaan)
• ...whatisthisIdon'teven.  Too many people to really keep up with and not enough of the original team that you grew to love in the first season and too large to effectively give everyone the proper level of character development.

   5.  Five year time jump between seasons 

• Y...yeah...that was sort of cheese-out.  By skipping those 5 years worth of character development and plot the series started making references to characters and events that happened during that time jump that really only serve to confuse and upset the viewer.
• "Aquagirl died?  There was an Aquagirl to begin with?  When did that happen?"
• "Superboy and Miss Martian broke up and now she's going out with Lagoon Boy?  Seriously?" 
• Yeah, I get that's what time jumps are for but overall it's sort of a cheap way of adding a level of shock value to the series.

To sum it up: My Saturday mornings suddenly got a whole lot shittier now.  You know what's replacing these rare gems of animated excellence?

Teen Titans Go

Beware the Batman

 ...

The latter looks like it could be okay...if you squint at it.  And turn your head sideways.  During an eclipse.  But the first one sort of captures everything that I DIDN'T like about the Teen Titans originally and rolls it up into a really crudely drawn toy commercial. 

So my friends, here's to hoping that Green Lantern and Young Justice are picked up again at some point in the future (perhaps on Adult Swim...because Superhero Zombie Apocalypse).

All will be well.