Season 1 Episode 8 “Danny, a sentient, gender-queer, teleporting street who is being hunted by secret government agency the Bureau of Normalcy, needs help from Niles — but he gets Vic and Larry instead; Cliff and Rita track down Karen, one of Jane’s personalities.”
The Good & The Bad
The Good
1. Danny Patrol begins, and immediately you can tell this episode will be focused on Jane, and Larry. We get exactly that with both characters this episode. My first Good comes with Karen, one of Jane’s 64 personalities. This is fantastic all around. Diane Guerrero yet again displays why she is perfect for the role as she nails another personality. Karen has an ability to make everybody love and accept her decisions. She runs back to a former partner in Doug, and proposes to him after Rita tells her to slow down.
We see Hammerhead force her way through and does what Hammerhead does best, which is kick right off with everything. She does this but Karen fights her way back. This is interesting the way Karen is, we find out early on she’s the worst out of the lot. I don’t think that’s necessarily true because we’ve seen far worse personalities but this one was really good. Doug’s family don’t accept Karen and him being together, but Karen utilizes her powers to make them accept it.
She calls Cliff in to walk her down to aisle near the end of the episode, but Cliff refuses. Karen then tries to manipulate him with her powers but it doesn’t work. Cliff picks her up and tries to take her home but Hammerhead resurfaces again. All around, good ark with Karen (Jane) and everyone else who was involved. At the end we see Karen be dragged down a train track while Jane sits idly in the kitchen. Is this the main Jane forcing her back to make an appearance?
2. Danny Street was the most interesting aspect of the show. A street with it’s own mind, with the ability to jump and move the entire street anywhere in the world. Maura Lee Karupt (Alan Mingo Jr.) acts as a guard to Danny and the street, while being a performer at the theater styled cabaret. The street would communicate by adding signs to walls, or using billboards etc to speak, but would hear others pretty well. I enjoyed this, and I really hope it’s not the last we see of Danny Street.
3. Larry and Cyborg go on their own adventure to Danny Street after receiving a cake at the Doom Patrol mansion with a map. All is good here with both of them. We see a flashback of Larry being tortured by the Bureau of Abnormality, until they see the energy. These are the same people that are hunting down Danny. Danny thrives off the party of his street to keep him going, and BoA try to sabotage that.
Larry and Cyborg have a moment in the street quite early on which for me, was fairly hard hitting. Cyborg explains to Larry that he doesn’t have a spine, and always wants to bail out of situations. This forces a divide between the pair. Larry goes back into the cabaret and has imaginary thoughts of him singing on stage with Maura. I will get into that shortly. All around the chemistry between Larry and Cyborg was excellent. Adding that the street was actually good in this instead of evil peaked my curiosity a lot.
The Bad
1. I will continue adding this now until we literally get a war. I know Doom Patrol is different, and I love the show, but again the lack of action lets these episodes down substantially. We got a small fight between Maura and Darren Jones, with a swift right hook from Larry on Darren but that was it. When they stood across the street from each other, I was gearing up for a battle, but we never got it and it disappointed me so much.
I love the show, but it’s a superhero comic book show, and it needs action. I hope next week we get something. I think for me, I’m just desperate to see Cyborg really go all out.
Holy Shit Moment
Larry getting on stage in his imaginary moment was, just, well, it had me tapping my feet. I loved it! It was a full song, and seeing Cliff and a child do robot dances. This entire 3 minutes was just amazing. If that is really Larry singing, then damn, the guy’s a very good singer! It was also nice to see him in his fully human self.
Verdict
An outstanding episode adding to it’s never ending roster of good episodes. A lot of moments in here and the episode had me fully engaged from the beginning. A lack of action is letting the season down a small bit but overall this episode was gripping, and thoroughly entertaining.
Rating: 8.8/10
