Young Justice: From Sidelines to Front Line

Written by: Rebecca Davenport

What is Young Justice?

Young Justice is yet another superhero team consisting of some superheroes that are considered “young”, one might say. This team was founded by Robin (Tim Drake), Superboy (Kon-El), and Impulse (Bart Allen). This team is also called The Junior JLA (Justice League of America). Surprise, but probably not so much a surprise, this team has a show that aired on Cartoon Network in 2010-2013, on DC Universe in 2019, and the most recent one is on HBO Max in 2021-2022. Almost three years passed by already!

Members of Young Justice

These are the members of Young Justice! However, since there are several universes in DC comics, we will list two versions of the team members!

New Earth’s Young Justice

This version of the team showed up in the comic books. The first appearance was in Young Justice: The Secret #1 (June, 1998), and last appearance was in Titans/Young Justice: Graduation Day #3 (August, 2003). The members are as follows:

Robin (Tim Drake)
Superboy (Kon-El or Conner Kent)
Impulse (Bart Allen)
Wonder Girl (Cassandra Sandsmark)
Arrowette
Empress
Secret
Slobo
Red Tornado (John Smith)
Ray (Ray Terril)

TV Series’ Young Justice

This version, just like its name, shows up in the TV Series. The team members are:

Robin (Dick Grayson)
Aqualad (Kaldur’ahm)
Kid Flash (Wally West)
Superboy (Conner Kent)
Miss Martian (M'gann M'orzz or Megan Morse)
Tigress (Artemis Crock)

… along with some additional members that differ from season to season.

History of Young Justice (New Earth)

It all started with Robin, Superboy, and Impulse working together for a mission involving the Department of Extranormal Operations (D.E.O.) and a toxic entity. After this mission, they realized that they worked together really well. They met again another time to defeat Bedlam, a teen supervillain who attempted to move all adults to an alternative world. Once Bedlam was defeated, the three decided to form a team called Young Justice. They used the old Justice League’s headquarters, the Cave, as their base. They were mentored by Red Tornado, and later on, Wonder Girl, Arrowette, and Secret joined the team.

During their time as a team, they successfully did these:

Freed metahuman teenagers held illegally by the D.E.O.
Saved Mount Rushmore. In the process, however, they accidentally defaced it.
Defeated Match, the villain who replaced Superboy for a time.
Fought and won against threats like Harm (Secret’s brother) and the Mighty Endowed.
Participated in the Imperiex War on Apokolips.
Teamed up with other young heroes in an assault on Zandia. They also defeated Empress’ grandfather who was a villain.
Defeated Bedlam again in a distorted reality version of Earth.

At one point, Wonder Girl became the team leader. She was really well-respected by her team members.

Young Justice: The TV Series

As mentioned before, the TV series ran for a few years on various platforms. The first season is titled “Young Justice”, has 26 episodes, and ran from 2010 until 2012. This season was immediately followed by the second season that is titled “Young Justice: Invasion”, has 20 episodes, and ran from 2012-2013. Both of these seasons were aired on Cartoon Network.

One can say they took a bit of a break to start with the third season, “Young justice: Outsiders”. This season has 26 episodes divided into two parts, ran in 2019, and was aired on DC Universe Streaming Service. Two years later, they released their fourth season, “Young Justice: Phantoms”. This season again has 26 episodes divided into two parts, ran from 2021-2022, and was aired on HBO Max.

Storyline of The TV Series

The first season focused on how the team was formed and their first mission. One can say that it started with pettiness, actually. Robin, Aqualad, Kid Flash, and Speedy wanted to prove themselves to the Justice League after being sidelined by them. They investigated a fire in Cadmus Labs and freed Superboy. After this, Batman helped the base of operation for the team, who was then named Young Justice. Miss Martian and Tigress later joined the team. One of their first missions was fighting a secret villain group called The Light (Vandal Savage, Lex Luthor, Ra’s al Ghul, etc.). This group became their nemesis for the rest of the show.

The story continued in the second season, but the setting was five years after the end of the previous season. They also have some new team members along with a new team leader: Nightwing. The new members included Blue Beetle, Batgirl, Wonder Girl, and Impulse. In this season, the story focused more on alien invasion, which Young Justice managed to prevent. The Reach was the alien group that wanted to invade Earth. The Reach actually worked together with The Light, but at the same time, posing as allies to Young Justice.

Another time skip occurred (two years) and we finally arrived in the third season. This time, the main problem that Young Justice had to face was metahuman trafficking. They had new members joining: Geo-Force, Halo, and Forager. However, The Light also had some new members: Deathstroke, Ultra-Humanite, and Gretchen Goode. We also had a new team here: The Outsiders, formed by Beast Boy.

A year later–another time skip–was the fourth season. We had more character-focused stories here for each member of the Young Justice, even Beast Boy. Superboy presumed to be dead after their mission to Mars, and that messed up the members’ feelings. However, Nightwing found out that Superboy was still alive in the Phantom Zone, so they teamed up once more and attempted to save Superboy. In the process, they also had to fight General Zod.

Another superhero team to be discussed! Not only a team, but also consisting of young and fresh members! What do you think about Young Justice? Share with us in the comments about your experiences and thoughts to earn a Limited Edition Comic Book Pack for your collection!