Superman: The Animated Series, Season 3, Episode 1: Where There's Smoke
Been some time since we did one of these cartoon reviews. This time around we'll be completing season three (and the very short season four) of Superman: The Animated Series. The third season starts with "Where There's Smoke", which features a villain original to the animated series, Volcana. As much as Volcana can be called a villain, anyway. I didn't think much of this episode when I watched it as a kid (it's one of the few episodes from seasons two and three I caught on Cartoon Network) because Volcana was just a human with fire abilities, what's to make her different from the near-godlike alien overlords like Darkseid, Brainiac or Mxyzptlk?
Now watching it, though, I realize just how actually sympathetic Volcana was. Sure, she was destructive and robs things, but between her motive rant as she throws fireball after fireball after Superman saying how "I'm here to help" or "trust me" are things that her parents, the facility and the military all told her before they sell her out. Between Volcana's rather pathetic attempt at trying to sell her things to the fence (why not just rob the fence?) or when she gets re-captured by Kurt, the military jackass with the eyepatch, poor Volcana alternates well between being a villain and being a sympathetic character. It would've been too easy to simply make Volcana go straight to the side of good and team up with Superman when the man of steel shows up to save her from being dissected, but she doesn't. As soon as she's free, she spends most of her time hunting down Kurt and actually fireballs Superman a couple of times.
While the institute of paranormal abilities or whatever it's called doesn't really come up later, there's also a significant attempt to broaden the DCAU world. We've already had episodes like this before, where Batman: TAS and Superman: TAS had moments where they cross over, as well as having guest stars like Dr. Fate show up earlier, but this is some neat buildup of mythology that'll eventually lay the seeds for the more serialized storyline of Justice League. The fact that the military has been stealing the battle-capable metahumans from the institute is pretty dark, and the director's obvious fear and helplessness even with his own telekinetic powers is pretty well-displayed, too, even if I felt that the particular plot thread was left hanging.
Kurt and his evil eyepatch isn't particularly interesting, but he does play the role of evil soulless power-hungry government man very well, playing on the confident but still outnumbered Volcana. I wouldn't say that Volcana is weak or not confident, but there are moments where she is portrayed like an actual scared girl. (Also, who undressed Volcana from her initial jacket-and-form-fitting-dress into a BDSM bikini? Kurt's a pervert)
So yeah. I liked this episode a lot more than I did because it's not actually black-and-white. Well, Kurt's pretty evil, but Volcana herself is actually a pretty interesting character, and the solution -- putting her on a personal island where she's free and wouldn't bother anyone isn't super original (we did that with the giant monkey) but at least Volcana gets to sunbathe a lot. Thankfully Volcana gets some subsequent screentime too after this.
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