Ultra Violet & Black Scorpion S1 E1

## Plot

I'm only ten episodes in, and I already ***love*** this show so much. Sure, *The Villains of Valley View* is fine, but it reminds me a lot of *Good Luck Charlie*, but with a high concept instead of the low one that arguably made that show more relatable and engaging, not just for kids, but the whole family. This show reminds me of *Andi Mack* a little bit, but again, the relatable low concept is traded in for a high one, but I'm okay with it here because I'm a total nerd when it comes to superheroes, especially any version of the quippy, Web Swinging Wall Crawler themself, and I do mean any version. No, this show doesn't have as big of a special effects budget as a Disney+ streaming show like *Ms. Marvel*, but it actually looks like it's set in a real city with actual skyscrapers instead of in a random suburb (most of the time at least). The outdoor scenes actually look like they're set outdoors instead of on a sound stage (again, most of the time), there's no laugh track, and instead of being filmed with multiple cameras capturing different angles like how sitcoms are shot, it uses a single camera, so we get shots that we never have and probably never will see in a situational comedy show, ever. I know this was filmed in New Orleans, but I'm not sure if that's where it's set, like *Cloak & Dagger*. I was going to guess Los Angeles, but unless a character explicitly says it in the show, I'm not going to make any assumptions. I love that the Latino characters speak in Spanish to each other and also sprinkle it in with English, even if I had to look up numerous words and didn't understand what most of them were saying when they fully switched to Spanish, which wasn't helped by the fact that they interrupted and talked over each other. Ustedes hablan muy rápido. For context and transparency, I'm a white woman, I live in a white suburb up north, and I'm the only person in my family that can speak any amount of Spanish, so I lose most of it pretty quickly, just like my music comprehension skills from middle school. I did keep my college textbook though. I'm literally incapable of rolling my r's. I swear it's a genetic thing, since no one else in my family can do it either. No matter how much I practiced or how many tips I looked up, they always sounded the same, so I just tried to slur/run them together, or at least linger on them a little to make it sound like I could roll them. I have no idea if that fooled my amazing bilingual college professor though. At least the last semester was fully online because of the pandemic, so I could just cheat and look up the answers. I love when they use Latin music in the show. My jaw dropped when I saw who the composer was: Tony Morales, who previously worked on Elena of Avalor. One of the *very first shots* goes from looking straight on at a place called the Del Mar Hotel down to the street level, where two thieves are trying to steal a car, or at least a specific part of it called a catalytic converter, but they didn't cut the alarm, which is blaring. Side note here, but catalytic converters are actually real parts of cars that, according to Wikipedia, "convert toxic gases and pollutants in exhaust gas from an internal combustion engine into less-toxic pollutants by catalyzing a redox reaction." Yeah, those were… words. I'm only mentioning it because I heard about a national theft ring that steals catalytic converters on November 4th, 2022, so I was curious. Anyways, these two fictional thieves/assholes are both beaten up by a masked luchador vigilante superhero called Black Scorpion. I feel like he's a parody of dark, brooding, loner heroes like Shadow the Hedgehog and Batman (even though Batman probably has the largest family of any superhero ever). Granted, most of the city could just be green screen, or blue screen, but I don't care. I normally can't really tell the difference between CGI and real environments in movies, but again, even though they usually provide far more content than one movie, TV shows don't have as big of a budget. Since I already brought up *Ms. Marvel*, I'll also mention that this show does something similar with animation that echoes a comic book style, but again, far less budget and with less creativity, plus I think they only heavily lean into it for this episode. Anyways, while Black Scorpion stands on the rooftop of a theater, a teenage girl with purple hair in a purple superhero costume runs up to him. She saw him stop the criminals. Her luchadora mask is magical and makes her super fast. His mask is also magical and gives him super strength. We go back two days to see how she got here. Her civilian identity is 13 year old middle school student Violet Rodriguez, a Mexican-American girl who only has one friend for some reason, even though she's very pretty. She reminds me of Rowan Blanchard. Then again, Rowan was bullied by people. Violet's best friend is Maya Miller-Martinez. Her actress looks white, and Miller is/was a common occupational, American of European origin, and also Jewish surname, but Martinez is clearly Spanish in origin. The actress could just be white passing, or the character could simply have one last name be from a non-biological parent or guardian. Despite already being a young teenager, Violet hasn't found anything that she's good at yet, but she's determined to find out and show it to the world, so she signed up for every event at Field Day, despite not having any training whatsoever in any event. She just tries new things and waits to see what sticks, instead of actually trying and training in an area that she enjoys, even through the ups and downs. I've written some truly awful things before that will never see the light of day in their current form, but I think I've also written some great stuff too. Good enough to win a small scholarship at least. Now I just need to practice and network a whole lot more. Then again, I didn't decide that I wanted to be a writer until 8th or 9th grade, because I assumed that I wasn't talented enough or good enough, and that everything worthwhile had already been written about, even though that's not at all how inspiration or imagination works. Violet is out after she hits herself in the face while trying to shoot an arrow. Her mother is the principal, Nina Rodriguez. She feels overshadowed by her older brother Santiago, a.k.a. Tiago, who wins at life so much and is so talented at everything that they can't even keep track of all of his achievements, accomplishments, trophies, plaques, ribbons, etc. They're having a celebration dinner tonight to congratulate him for winning two soccer trophies, champ and Most Valuable Player. Violet decides to invite her uncle Cruz, but her mom doesn't want her to be disappointed when her little brother doesn't show up again. Cruz runs a gym and coaches aspiring luchador wrestlers. Also, I loved the transition from Violet hitting herself and falling over to her falling onto the couch. That's the kind of editing that I expect from more big budget or animated shows, or even movies. I'm not a huge fan of all of the split screen they use in this episode, but I get it, they're trying to make it resemble comic book panels. And some of the animated stuff is rather impressive, like the TWO DAYS AGO one, which they totally didn't have to do, but they did it anyways, or the stars that appear near Violet's head after she whacks herself. They look more hand drawn. Also, apparently the school's mascot is some sort of hornet or bee. Tiago is an amazing and supportive big brother to his little sister. He tells Violet that she just hasn't found her things yet, and when she does and wins her trophies, she'll have to cook his favorite foods. Given her comments about him starving and her making chicken nuggets though, it seems like she's not good at cooking either. Their dad, Juan Carlos, gets home from work. Given his clothes, I wanna say he's a nurse, but I honestly have no idea. When he tells his wife that they made the perfect child, she corrects him and says they made two perfect children. When Violet sets out another plate, her dad asks her if they're expecting someone. She tells them that she invited Uncle Cruz, and he said yes. He actually said "I'll see what I can do." She realizes that he's not coming. He used to love family dinners, but something changed a few years back, and none of them know what it is. That night, Violet has a nightmare about the purple luchadora mask. The next day, while trying to help Maya find the perfect birthday gift for her mom, who is stationed in Germany, she sees the mask at a vendor's cart, but Maya calls her over before she can take it, and when she looks back, she sees that the cart is actually full of bags and shoes. I don't know how they did that in one shot, or at least made it look like one shot, but it was cool. When she gets home, she sees the mask on her bed. But it only appeared after she walked in front of the camera. Seriously, how? I know the answer is probably cleverly disguised cuts and/or CGI, but still. When she puts it on, she gets her superhero hair and outfit, as well as super speed. She tells Maya about it and realizes that it has to be magic. When Maya tries on the mask, nothing happens. She records Violet using her super speed, and it blows up on social media. She claims that she picked the name Ultra Violet because it just sounded cool, but it was actually because she saw Ultra laundry detergent when she was helping her mom with the groceries. She thinks this could be her thing, but she wants it to really blow up first, so she decided to do a collab with Black Scorpion, leading into that first scene. He ditches her by using an ability to travel through shadows, kind of like Tyrone Johnson/Cloak from *Cloak & Dagger*, but he either needs it to be dark for it to work, or it causes the environment to become dark for a second. He also jumps from one building to another. That has to be CGI, but it's so cool. Ultra Violet follows him into a building. Specifically, her uncle's gym. When he unmasks himself, it's revealed that he's Cruz, and she reveals and unmasks herself to him. This is why he's never around. He didn't have anyone to guide him when his mask showed up, so he's going to do that for her, and train her to be a superhero. She thinks that's cool, but he says it isn't. The mask chooses its wearer, but it also reveals more of who you are. It takes a lot to be a hero, like courage, hard work… and no matter what, not telling anyone who you are, in order to protect yourself and your family. See, that's the one thing I dislike about the superhero genre: The secret identity trope. I totally understand not letting the general public or bad guys know, because no one wants a *One More Day* situation, but not even telling your own family, close friends, other people you trust with your life, etc.? That's just always felt like a dumb move to artificially inject drama into the hero's relationships and take away the agency and choice of their supporting cast, which feels disrespectful. Sure, they don't have superpowers, but so what? That doesn't mean that they can't be smart, resourceful, helpful, or able to defend themselves. I especially hated Pixal doing this in part of season 7 and 8 of Ninjago, because that reasoning was extra stupid in a world where all of her friends can defend not only themselves and others, but have also literally saved the world, or at least a city, half a dozen times before, and they have extremely rare elemental powers that are basically magic, which they will only lose if or when they have kids, or pass on their powers some other way. Sure, they've also lost said powers at least five separate times (losing the Golden Weapons, losing the elemental blades, Chen stealing their powers, Lloyd being possessed, and sacrificing them in the series finale), but it was always temporary (even the series finale one), and they're still badass ninja without them. Pixal's enemies were also their enemies too. Anyways, Violet tells Cruz that she already told her best friend Maya about the mask. The next morning, Juan, who is a fan of Black Scorpion, learns that he stopped another car theft, and tells his wife that he loves having a Mexican superhero in their city. Nina points out that even though he's dressed like a luchador, it doesn't mean that he's Mexican. She's seen lots of non-Mexican people dressed like luchadors. That new masked hero, Ultra Violet, could be anyone. Violet sees Tiago's trophies on the table and assumes that they're the same ones, but they're actually for debate and Academic Decathlon, despite the fact that he's not even in Academic Decathlon. They needed a substitute, and somehow he knew all the answers. He also made plates in pottery class. Okay, what educational institution in the U.S. actually has an entire class dedicated solely to pottery? Does Tiago go to a private school or something? The only way I could see that being taught in a public school is if an art class does a unit on pottery and has a kiln. And then my little brother took pottery in his junior year at our public high school, proving me wrong. I love the transition from Violet staring at the trophies on the table to her staring off into space at school until Maya gets her attention. She told her about being trained by Black Scorpion to be a superhero. She'll get a ton of views, but she doesn't see the point if no one knows that it's her. She decides to unmask herself after stopping a crime, since she feels like the rules are optional. However, Cruz wants her to stay in the gym and train. She's not ready to fight crime. He explains that luchar means to fight, but it also means to struggle, and the life of a superhero is a struggle. It also means to strive, vie, grapple, tussle, and wrestle. In lucha, there are two sides: Técnicos, the heroes, who are good and follow the rules, and rudos, the villains, who are bad and break the rules. They'll do anything for their own selfish gain. Violet still wants to go out and fight crime immediately. She points out that she has superpowers, and the criminals don't. Everyone has two opposing forces inside of them, good and bad, but the only person who can decide which one wins is yourself. She claims that it's abstract and she doesn't understand it, so she should learn by doing. Cruz finally agrees to patrol together, but if they run into anything, she is to hang back and observe. Black Scorpion beats up some more car thieves at a chop shop. Violet uses gumballs to fight while livestreaming herself. This is where the episode goes full on comic book. One guy runs and tries to escape in a van, but Black Scorpion uses a special move that makes his fist glow blue to punch and total the car. That definitely looks like a lightweight foam prop. Violet names the move Scorpion Sting and tells him that it would make a good hashtag. He doesn't do this for fame, and tells her off for not listening to him. She asks him why he uses a different voice as Black Scorpion, since she knows who he is, and he claims that he doesn't. He goes back inside to tie up the (all male) criminals. Before Violet can unmask herself though, he appears in the doorway, which she sees. He can't stop her, but if she does this now, then she'll only be doing it for her own selfish gain, and will have picked the way of the rudo. The next day, she goes to Cruz's gym and tells him that she didn't do it, and she's not a rudo. She wants to train to be a real hero, even if it means that no one will know it's her. He's proud of her, but then he gets angry and annoyed again when she says she's not going to stop her livestream, which leads into the next episode, at least thematically.