Superman on Television

Superman: The Animated Series - Episode Reviews

Season 2 - Episode 2: "Blasts From the Past (Part 2)"

Original Air Date: September 9, 1997

Reviewed by: Jeffrey Taylor

"Almighty Rao!" - Jax-Ur

The concept of the Phantom Zone villains is unique, ironic and certainly one of those plots that could only come out of a Superman story. Take an advanced society like Krypton where there were no death penalties for even the most heinous, genocidal acts imaginable. By creating a prison in another dimension, the worst of the worst criminals were actually saved from their planet's explosive fate. For many Superman fans, the story has become classic. It's been done in the comics as early as 1950 and many times after that. It was probably done best in Superman II, which was likely also the most widely seen. So the trick is to find a way to take the old concept and make it new, fresh and interesting. Smallville, for instance, made it new and fresh, but the interesting part is still debated by fans, so I'll leave that up to the reader.

Action Comics #310 In "Blasts From the Pasts" we have two Phantom Zone villains, Mala and Jax-Ur. Mala's comic book origins were spotlighted in the review for Part 1 of this episode. Jax-Ur first appeared in Action Comics #284 in 1962 when the Aurora Borealis on Earth tore a hole in he Phantom Zone allowing him to escape to Earth, where he had the same powers as Superman. Jax-Ur was described as the worst criminal in the Phantom Zone. He was imprisoned for destroying Krypton's inhabited moon and was to serve a life sentence (although in the first story it was 30 years). He later introduced "Jewel Kryptonite" in Action Comics #310 in 1964. Jax-Ur came into the comics much later than Mala, but there is little difference between the original characters.

3Rating - 3 (out of 5): By teaming up, Jax-Ur and Mala were an animated version of Zod and Ursa (no need for Non - say that 5 times fast) as seen in Superman: The Movie and Superman II. The creators even made Jax-Ur a general. That wasn't from the comics. He also wanted revenge on the son of Jor-El, which was from the comics since Jor-El invented the Phantom Zone. Just like Superman II (and other stories) the villains discovered that Superman's greatest weakness was that he cared for these "Earthlings."

So it's not really new, hardly fresh, but the interesting part is how the writers got there. Mala appeared to be conflicted in Part 1, but resolved by the end. It's unclear just how evil she was. In fact, one could argue that her lashing out at civilians in front of Jax-Ur in this installment was motivated by a desire for praise. That's not to say that she was innocent, just not purely evil like Jax-Ur. Unfortunately, most of what made this particular Phantom Zone villain story interesting, ended with Part 1. After that, it was mainly a lot of fighting.

The upside of having other Kryptonians to fight is that Superman can go all out and the audience can enjoy some good old fashioned destruction. Normally, he'd have to fight robots or other non-living enemies to see him fight without pulling his punches.

Another first for Superman: The Animated Series: Superman allowed an outsider, Professor Hamilton, access to his Fortress. Hamilton even offhandedly named it "The Fortress of Solitude." Superman seemed to think the title was too majestic, humble as he is despite the gaudy costume.

Since Mala had stolen the Phantom Zone projector in order to release Jax-Ur at the end of the previous episode, Superman needed Hamilton to learn from Brainiac how to make a new one. Brainiac began by explaining "Interdimensional teleportation operates on the principle that each dimension in the cosmos vibrates at its own unique frequency." Could this be the beginning of the animated multiverse? Not likely, we'll see other dimensions eventually in this series. Hamilton eventually worked out how to make one, but would need a very specific crystal to create the vibrations needed to send a person to the particular dimension that makes up the Phantom Zone.

The villains called out Superman by terrorizing civilians on the street, which of course led to a big fight. During that fight, Mala held Superman down while he used his heat vision on a traffic light, causing it to bend and hit Mala, knocking her off him. There's a part of me that can buy into the idea that Superman is such a geometry whiz that he could pull that off, but I don't believe for a second that the force it created could have been enough to knock Mala over. She's as strong as Superman by now.

So the bad guys kidnapped Lois. Superman showed up in a lead suit, complete with an octagonal "S," toting some Kryptonite. Lois screwed it all up be dropping the green K and allowing Jax-Ur to vanish Superman to the Phantom Zone and destroy the projector. Mala and Jax-Ur tried to take over the world, again much like Superman II, but there's still a loophole to get Big Blue back (try that 5 times fast).

Through a more-than-convenient loophole, Hamilton explained that Superman's lead suit had a radioactive coating that would help them locate him. Although it didn't appear easy, they managed to bring him back from the Phantom Zone without the ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY CRYSTAL as was described earlier. Superman then found the crystal from the original projector that was destroyed and sent the villains back to the zone, stating, "Parole revoked." Why they couldn't cover that little plot-hole by having Lois or Hamilton find the crystal before rescuing Superman, I just don't know.

This was not a bad episode, in fact it was pretty fun, but it was certainly flawed. The animation improved over Part 1 and people seemed a bit more real. We finally got to see Perry White again, who is a completely underused character in this entire series. Plus Ron Glass (Serenity, TV's Firefly) made a guest appearance as the News Anchorman.



Back to the "Superman: The Animated Series - Episode Reviews" Contents page.

Back to the main TELEVISION page.