Eminent Threat

"**Eminent Threat**" is the third episode of the third season of *Young Justice*, and the 49th of the overall series. It debuted on January 4, 2019 on DC Universe, along with the first and second episodes, "Princes All" and "Royal We".

## Logline

Conner Kent and Prince Brion Markov are in the clutches of Count Vertigo, leaving Dick Grayson, Artemis Crock and an emotionally damaged Jefferson Pierce to save them and put an end to the Bedlam Syndicate.

## Synopsis

A pair of Goode Goggles starts up, and the TV show *Star Girl* is selected. Courtney Whitmore interviews Garfield Logan on the set of *Space Trek 3016*. The two discuss Gar's relationship with Queen Perdita of Vlatava. Gar says they met during a "funeral for a fast friend." The two also discuss Gar's concerns about meta-human trafficking.

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In the Bedlam operations facility beneath Markovburg Children's Hospital, Brion Markov is trapped inside a pod filling with a dark substance and begs to be released.

Tigress informs the Quraci teen that she and Black Lightning are heading through the sewers to rescue Superboy and tells her to stay with the Super-Cycle.

Nightwing enters the hospital and disguises himself as a doctor so he can get into the morgue. There, he changes into stealth gear and gets through the secret door into the underground facility. Though he loses contact with Oracle, he is able to contact Tigress and Lightning while they are in the sewers.

Nightwing slips into the facility and overhears Count Vertigo telling his crew that the facility will be shut down and to move the pods. Lightning asks Nightwing to save the kids, but Nightwing says Bedlam won't move anything fast on rails and focuses on finding Superboy.

 File:Vertigo punishes Jace.png
He discovers Superboy, Brion, Helga Jace and Simon Ecks in the subject room. Nightwing is about to enter but stops when he notices Vertigo. Vertigo confronts Ecks about experimenting on Brion, saying that "his highness" did not approve of this. Ecks questions Jace, who says "his highness" is out of control, but now there is someone with the power to stop Bedlam. Vertigo uses his powers on her, saying this was his plan to deliver control of Markovia to "his highness."

Lightning, Tigress and Nightwing, who assume Vertigo is referring to Gregor Markov, conclude that in exchange for Vertigo giving control of Markovia to Gregor, that Gregor will give Vertigo control of Vlativa and both countries will fall under the Light's dominion. But Frederick DeLamb shows up at the facility and Jace identifies him as Baron Bedlam, the actual person scheming with Vertigo.

 File:Halo's red aura.png
Plasmus attacks Tigress and Lightning, but Lightning still can't get his powers to work. The Quraci teen, who Tigress now identifies as "Halo-Girl," shows up with Super-Cycle to help them. They fight their way up into the Bedlam facility, where Vertigo and his henchmen quickly move the pods. DeLamb orders Ecks to kill Jace, but Nightwing takes Ecks down.

Jace frees Brion while Nightwing frees Superboy. DeLamb notices them escaping and grabs a digital copy of the security camera footage.

Tigress, Lightning, Halo-Girl, and Super-Cycle aren't faring well against Plasmus, but Plasmus gets knocked away after Vertigo opens a boom tube to transport the kids in the pods. DeLamb escapes on the railway while the heroes, who have burned all materials in the lab, escape through the sewers.

 File:DeLamb frames Brion.png
DeLamb returns to the Royal Palace and proclaims that Brion experimented on his Meta-Gene and is thus the one responsible for meta-human trafficking in Markovia, the abduction of his sister and the deaths of his parents. He shows the footage from the facility, which Oracle notifies Nightwing is being broadcast on GBS. Nightwing, who has regrouped with the rest of the heroes near the spillway, shows everyone the broadcast. An outraged Brion, who is unable to control his powers of manipulating geological forces, heads back to the Palace.

 File:Halo heals.png
Vertigo, Ecks, Henchy, and Plasmus arrive to confront the heroes. Nightwing sends Superboy after Brion while the others engage in battle. During the battle, Ecks is revealed to be a meta-human himself, able to create duplicates of himself. Plasmus apparently kills Halo, but she generates a violet aura and heals herself. But her apparent death is enough to spur Lightning, who regains his powers and holds off Plasmus.

He eventually discovers a device that is controlling Plasmus and removes it. Plasmus is revealed to be Otto, who Ecks convinced had a heart problem similar to his sister's, but was taken captive and underwent Meta-Gene experimentation. Plasmus joins the heroes in their fight and Nightwing locates the real Ecks, taking him out. Seeing the tide has turned against them, Vertigo and Henchy escape via boom tube.

 File:DeLamb pummels Brion.png
Brion arrives at the Palace and confronts DeLamb. But DeLamb easily fends off Brion's attack and reveals he is a meta-human, too. The two fight, despite Superboy's attempts to calm him down. Gregor observes the fight and, after DeLamb takes down Brion and orders the guards to kill Brion, Gregor delays the order. Though DeLamb claims to have activated his Meta-Gene to counteract Brion's schemes, Gregor observes that DeLamb has better training than Brion, thus DeLamb activated his Meta-Gene first.

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Gregor concludes there is enough evidence to investigate DeLamb and orders his guards to arrest him for treason. DeLamb charges Gregor, but Superboy takes DeLamb down. Zviad Baazovi tells Gregor that Markovia has suffered enough at the hands of meta-humans, so Gregor reluctantly tells Brion he must leave Markovia. He asks Superboy to take care of his brother.

A Markovian man who noticed the battle kills Plasmus, thinking he took down a monster, but Lightning informs him he killed a kid and will regret it once he realizes that. As Superboy and Brion return, Tigress asks Nightwing what they will do now.

**End credits scene:** The Bio-Ship spends the night parked outside Conner and Megan's garage in the form of an SUV.

## Title

"Eminent" is a person of high rank, thus it could be referring to Frederick DeLamb, who is revealed to be Baron Bedlam, the leader of the meta-human trafficking ring. It can also be a play on the turn of phrase "imminent threat", which is alluded to by Count Vertigo, when he tells Helga Jace about a scheme grander than the Bedlam Syndicate.

## Continuity

* Garfield says he met Perdita at the funeral of a "fast friend" of theirs, referencing Kid Flash. Wally saved both Gar and Perdita's lives in "Image" and "Coldhearted", respectively, and died in "Endgame".
* Artemis remarks that Superboy won't be happy about being podded, referring to his origins at Cadmus, where he was force-grown inside a pod.

## Trivia

* *Hello, Megan!* is among the shows displayed in the Goode Goggles headset.

## Goofs

* Unless the high-tech computer on Nightwing's lenses can determine the sequence in which each keypad button was pressed, there would have been twenty-three other possible combinations for those four fingerprinted numbers, assuming none of those buttons was pressed more than once.
* When Halo uses her shield to protect Artemis and Black Lightning a second time, her eyes do not change to match the color of her aura.

## Cultural references

* Artemis refers to Superboy as "Super-Friend", a possible nod to *Super Friends*, a show which the writer of this episode and series' co-producer, Brandon Vietti, has cited as a major influence and his main introduction to the DC world.
* Simon Ecks proclaims that he is "not only the meta-trafficking doctor, but also a client," which refers to 1980s ads for the Hair Club, in which founder Sy Sperling said he was "not only the president, but also a client."

## External links

* Buy this episode in HD on iTunes
* Buy this episode in HD on Amazon.com