Psimon

Psimon says show me who or what you really are!

Miss Martian

No. NO. NO!! This is who I am!

In order to keep things straight this synopsis refers to the Martian girl called M’gann/Megan throughout as Miss Martian. Any reference to Megan is a reference to the character from the sit-com.

Nov 22nd – Batman, Martian Manhunter, and Red Tornado have called Oliver Queen (alias Green Arrow) and Dinah Lance (alias Black Canary) to Mount Justice to discuss an issue relating to the Team. Batman plays them a video of what appears to be Superboy sparring with Black Canary, just one of their usual training sessions. However, the match ends with Canary rewarding Superboy with a romantic embrace. Dinah is horrified and protests that it never happened, but Batman tells her to continue watching. The Canary in the video morphs into Superboy’s girlfriend, Miss Martian. Oliver laughs, but Dinah is indignant. The Manhunter tries to assure Dinah, but she angrily counters that “We’re not on Mars, J’onn” and says she will make the girl understand that things are different on Earth.

Miss Martian is in her room watching a recording of an old TV sitcom. The lead character in the show is called Megan, uses Miss Martian’s “Hello Megan” catchphrase, and is identical to Miss Martian’s Caucasian alter-ego Megan — she is even wearing her human form to watch the show. Dinah call causes Miss Martian to hurriedly closes the video and resume her normal green-skinned appearance (a change which only affects her skin colour). Dinah has just about calmed down and warns her that what she did was unintentionally hurtful. The Martian girl responses defensively when Dinah says that she should “just be yourself.” However, a mission alert from Batman prevents Dinah from pushing the issue further.

Rumaan Harjavti, the democratically elected leader of Qurac, has been praised as a fair and wise leader. However, 5-days ago Harjavti allied himself with his dictatorial neighbour, the Queen Bee of Bialya, and announced that in two-days their two countries would be “unifying” under the rule of the Queen Bee. There have been protests, but Qurac is now under martial law. The Queen has some mind control ability, but nothing of this range and she is allegedly still in Bialya. Batman tells them to find out what is going on. Robin will be the team leader for this mission as Aqualad is busy helping Aquaman.

The bioship reaches the Bialya/Qurac border, but Bialyian military forces are already crossing over and spooking the local wildlife. They are passing over the “Logan Animal Sanctuary” when they spot wildebeest stampeding towards a woman and a boy. Robin worries about compromising the mission, but lets the Team rout the soldiers and save the civilians. The little boy is excited to be saved by Robin and Kid Flash, but his mother is worried that there will be retribution. Miss Martian stays invisible until prompted to become visible by Kid Flash. Garfield Logan, the boy, appears to recognise Megan. The woman is his mother Marie Logan.

Miss Martian blurts that out Marie’s name before she finishes introducing herself and tells Marie that she a fan. She then gets embarrassed when Superboy questions her behaviour telepathically and hurriedly volunteers to help Marie mend her fences while Garfield and the others take the wounded animals to the Logan’s compound. They make it to the Logan homestead at day breaks. Garfield points out that it’s pretty weird about Miss Martian and his mother. He points out that she looks exactly like his mum, “just greener”, from back when Marie was a TV star in a sitcom called “Hello, Megan!”. Miss Martian helps Marie mend the fence with her telekinesis while bombarding Marie with questions about the show. Marie cuts her off by saying that it was just an old job that she she isn’t really Megan.

Superboy hears unmanned drones approaching the house. Robin tells Garfield to stay put while they investigate, but he doesn’t listen and goes to the barn to release the animals that they had rescued earlier. One of the drones strafes the oil tanks next to the barn creating an explosion that throws Garfield into the air. Miss Martian catches him, but he’s been injured. His upset mother tells Robin that she warned them there would be consequences for their intervention. The drones come around for another pass, but their are rapidly destroyed by an angry Miss Martian and Superboy. Marie has some medical training and makes Garfield comfortable, however, he needs an emergency blood transfusion. Miss Martian volunteers to morph her own blood at the cellular level into the right type and the desperate Marie accepts her assistance.

The transfusion is done behind closed doors while Robin worries about their rapidly dwindling chance to stop the Queen Bee. Kid Flash is searching for a news channel on the TV when he accidentally starts the “Hello, Megan!” VHS tape that Garfield had lined up. Superboy, Kid Flash, and Robin watch transfixed as the video shows them a sitcom featuring a girl that is to all intents and purposes the Megan they know as Miss Martian. The TV Megan’s boyfriend is even called Conner, the name Miss Martian suggested for Superboy. They hurriedly change over to the news when Miss Martian reappears. Harjavti is giving a press conference and stood behind him is Psimon, the telepath who Miss Martian and Superboy fought the last time they were in Bialya.

The teen heroes waste no time in breaking into the Presidential palace. They find Harjavti, but are suddenly surrounded by soldiers carrying Apokolitian weaponry. Miss Martian is still invisible and breaks off when she senses Psimon’s presence. He is prepared for her and floors her with a telepathic assault. Psimon pushes her trying to peel back her greatest fear, the knowledge of who she really is, he continues telepathically pushing and forces Miss Martian back into her native Martian form — an alien, almost monster like shape of a White Martian. Robin, Superboy, and Kid Flash rush to aid Miss Martian, but she knocks then unconscious with a telepathic blast.

Psimon congratulates Miss Martian on her desperate attempt to protect her secret — that she has been so terrified of how people would react to true form that she’s buried that part of herself inside a shape and a persona copied from her favourite Earth TV show. Psimon gloats that she needn’t have bothered as their confrontation is being recorded. He forces Miss Martian into a telepathic confrontation inside her own mind. Psimon taunts her with images of the Team, the Justice League, and most hurtfully Superboy rejecting her because of her frightening appearance. However, Psimon pushes her too far and she retaliates with a powerful telepathic blast that leaves him catatonic. By the time the rest of the team come around, Miss Martian has resumed her “normal” form.

The Queen Bee arrives to find that the Quraci guards are not as friendly as they had been under Psimon’s control. Harjavit tells her that the Quraci people will never suffer her tyrannical rule. However, this is another ruse. This Queen is actually Miss Martian in disguise, Robin’s plan to pin the blame squarely on the Queen’s shoulders. Shortly afterwards Bruce Wayne arrives to promise Harjavti help in rebuilding his country. There meeting is watched from the Logan Animal Sanctuary where Garfield is alive and well, albeit now with green eyes.

Kid Flash confronts Miss Martian about her resemblance to Marie’s younger-self in the sitcom. She admits that growing up on Mars was difficult, but she found joy in the cultural broadcasts that her uncle sent from Earth. These included “Hello, Megan!”. Her memories of the show were so happy that she used Marie’s image as the basis for her human form when she first came to Earth. However, Miss Martian cannot yet bring herself to shown them her true White Martian form and creates another version more like her uncle J’onn’s public face to plicate them with. Superboy tells her that she does have to wear a mask with him. She says that she does it for herself as it is who she feels she is inside. Marie then tells Miss Martian that she is honoured and thanks her for saving Garfield, Marie even calls her family.

Miss Martian goes to check on Garfield. He’s asleep, but the real Queen Bee is waiting in his bedroom for her. The Queen warns Miss Martian not to try anything otherwise her hypnotic command will cause Garfield to harm himself. She also says she knows about Miss Martian’s true form and that she’ll reveal the secret unless Miss Martian cooperates.

• Rumaan Harjavti “allied” himself with the Queen Bee on Nov 17th (“5-days ago”). The episode starts on Nov 22nd with the team reaching the Quarc/Bailya border at midnight local time. They reach Dhabar, the capital of Qurac on the evening of the 23rd.
• The snow has completely cleared away from Mount Justice following the events of “Coldhearted”.
• Neither Zatanna, Aqualad nor Artemis appear in this episode.
• Qurac is a democracy led by President Rumaan Harjavti. He is a “fair and wise leader” and a humanitarian who has been fated by Bruce Wayne’s Foundation. Bialya is an absolute monarchy led by the Queen Bee. At one point Harjavti says “Queen Bee [pause] Beru”, with the possibility that Beru is her surname. There are spurious claims from ancient history for the two countries were once a single entity. The capital of Qurac is Dhabar (possibly the Hebrew word for “to speak”, in particular divine words). The capital of Bialya is Al-Qawiyah (possibly something meaning female strength in Arabic).
• Martian shapeshifting takes place at the cellular level. M’gann has a poster of the Martian Manhunter in her room. Martians play a game where they take another person’s appearance.
• “Hello Megan!” is a sitcom that ran for one season back before the teens were born, it isn’t available on DVD or online. The title character of Megan Wheeler was played by an actress called Marie Logan. She later became a conservationist and the owner of the Logan Animal Sanctuary in Qurac. Her son is called Garfield Logan. He is eight-years-old, has o-negative blood type, and has an poster of Aqualad on his wall. The blood transfusion from M’gann turned his eyes green, he calls himself her “blood-brother”.
• Kid Flash knowingly mentions Bruce Wayne to Robin implying that he knows or has worked out that Batman is Bruce Wayne. Kid Flash quips to Robin about saving an entire country mirroring a similar quip that Robin had made to him the previous episode (“Coldhearted”).
• Superboy mentions that he’s not a fan of the Queen Bee. Her forces tortured him in “Bereft”. He again mentions that he doesn’t like monkeys.
• Queen Bee has the power to enthral “most men” and “some women” which suggests that her power is based on sexual preference.

The Queen Bee, Bialya, and Quarc

The original Queen Bee was an alien monarch who first appeared in Justice League of America #23 (Nov 1963). She fought the League once and then vanished. Her name was picked up for a character introduced 25 years later in Justice League International #16 (Aug 1988). This second Queen Bee was the consort of Rumaan Harjavti, the ruler of Bialya. He was a lampoon of Libya’s Muammar al-Gaddafi who was desperate to secure super-human resources for his country. This was a case of the female being more deadly than the male. The Queen killed Harjavti and took over control of Bialya. Her secret police were experts in mind control and conditioning, although his was a result of good old fashioned espionage techniques and not a superpower as such. The Queen was finally over thrown in coup led by Harjavti’s brother.

This episode only makes use of Harjavti’s name and turns him into a respected and honourable character — a distinct departure from his DCU counterpart. He is now the ruler of Qurac instead of Bialya, where the Queen rules. The take over of Bialya and the scenes of protesters shown by the Batman parallel the Arab Spring, the wave of popular uprisings and protests which changed regimes in countries including Libya, Egypt, and Tunisia.

The Queen Bee is voiced by Marina Sirtis. She is best known as Deanna “I sense great pain” Troi from Star Trek: The Next Generation. Like a few other TNG actors she has worked on Greg Weisman’s Gargoyles where she played a character called Demona. YJ’s Queen Bee does look a little bit like Maria Sirtis, but this may just be that both Sirtis and QB are of Mediterranean descent and of approximately the same age. Jerome Moore also created the mural of the Queen Bee that is seen in the background of some scenes.

I’m not terribly sure how the geography works out here. Qurac and Bialya appear to be Arab countries either on the North African Mediterranean coast or on the Arabian Peninsula. The timezone of UTC+2 would support the North African coast theory. The animals at the Sanctuary include an oryx, wildebeest, and a monkey. There are North African and Arabian types of Oryx, but they are virtually extinct in the wild. The most common type is found in Southern Africa alongside the wildebeest. Is the Sanctuary looking after native animals or is this an artificial reserve?

“Hello, Megan!”

The Sit-Com Hello Megan! was invented for the Young Justice universe, but the actors and crew who worked on it are not new. The cast as listed in the clip shown in this episode are:

Marie Logan – Megan Wheeler
Paul Sloane – Conner
Rita Farr – another cheerleader, Megan’s friend
Sandra Stanyon – Mrs Wheeler, Megan’s mother
Jonathan Lord – Mr Wheeler, Megan’s father
Created By Greg Vietti and Brandon Weisman

Marie Logan, who played Mega Wheeler, is the woman they encounter at the Animal Sanctuary. Her love interest in the show was Conner who was played by Paul Sloane. In the original Earth-2 Universe Paul Sloane was an actor hired to play Two-Face in a movie about the tragic villain’s origin. However, there was an accident and Sloane was scared in an identical manner to Two-Face. That sent him insane and he took up Two-Face’s motis operandi and identity. For the first 9-episodes of Young Justice Superboy had no secret identity, he was just Superboy. Then in “Targets” he had to pick a name to use while attending Happy Harbour High-School. It was Miss Martian who suggested the name Conner, we now know that this is a reference to Paul Sloane’s character from Hello, Megan!

Megan Wheeler’s best-friend is played by Rita Farr. Rita was also an actress in the normal DC Universe. She was a B-movie actress who was transformed into Elasti-Woman of the Doom Patrol. After the DCU Garfield Logan was orphaned and gained his powers he became a hero called Beast Boy and was adopted by Rita. Megan Wheeler’s parents are played by Jonathan Lord and Sandra Stanyon. These are the names of the male and female lead from Silverblade, a fictional film that exists in the DC Universe and in Earth-16. This has been referenced previously in “Secrets” — the Zeta-Tube terminal in Manhattan is hidden behind a poster for the Silverblade movie. In real world Silverblade comic book, Lord was an older has-been actor who was transformed into a youthful super-heroic version of his most famous role from Hollywood’s Golden Age. Sandra Stanyon was the actress who played Lord’s love interest in the original black-and-white movie.

The “Creators” of Hello Megan are listed as Greg Vietti and Brandon Weisman, these are of course the mixed up names of Young Justice producers Greg Weisman and Brandon Vietti. If “Hello Megan!” had played on the 1979-1980 US TV season it would have been up-against Mork and Mindy, Happy Days, and Taxi on ABC, Archie Bunker’s Place, M*A*S*H on CBS, and Diff’rent Strokes on NBC (to name a few). There were over a LOT of sit-coms airing on US TV at the time so its quite conceivable that a forgotten one-season show was slotted in there somewhere.

Garfield Logan

The character of Garfield Logan is better known as either Beast Boy or Changeling. He first appeared in Doom Patrol #99 (Nov 1965) as a boy who had contracted a rare disease from the bite of a green monkey. His parents were conservationists and scientists who managed to cure him at the expense of giving him superpowers and turning him green. His powers allow him to adopt the shape of any animal, but he’s always green – a green elephant, a green bee, a green whatever. His parents died in a freak accident and he was adopted by Rita Farr of the Doom Patrol and her husband Steve Dayton. Beast Boy later joined the Teen Titans. He was picked up by the Teen Titans cartoon as one of the lead characters.

In this episode the pre-Beast Boy Garfield Logan is voiced by Logan Grove, who may be best known as Gumball from The Amazing World of Gumball. Garfield Logan returns in Young Justice: Invasion, the show’s second season, as Beast Boy. His appearance here — the blood transfusion from Megan — sets up the shape-shifting (one of her powers) and the green skin colour (her adopted skin colour). The Logan Animal Sanctuary shown here is a reference to the comic book Logan’s parents. His pet monkey keeps biting everything, including Garfield’s shirt. In the comics it was a monkey bite which passed on the illness that eventually led to his powers.

Its almost something of a clich�, the actress/models turned conservationist. Real life examples include Tippi Hedren’s Roar Foundation and of course Brigitte Bardot’s animal activism. The animals at the Sanctuary were designed by Jerome Moore who tired to keep the animals from looking too “Disney”.

Weisman speaks

“Hello Megan” aired in 1979/80. Marie Logan is 47.� (Ask Greg)

On making Hello Megan!:

Doing “Hello, Megan!” was a TON of fun. Writer Nicole Dubuc even made us “Hello, Megan!” crew t-shirts, which a bunch of us wore to SDCC in 2011.

On M’gann’s ethnicity:

J’onn always knew his niece was white. But J’onn is also open-minded enough to know that her whiteness is only skin-deep (and often not even that). The differences between White, Green and Red Martians are CULTURAL. From a biological standpoint, they are INSIGNIFICANT. And although I think I’ve stated this before, M’gann IS J’onn’s niece. M’gann’s mother is J’onn’s sister, and she is green. M’gann’s father is white. Most of M’gann’s siblings are green, though she does have one brother who is white.

Highlights

• The titles for “Hello, Megan!”

Oddities

• Just where is Qurac? It has South African flora and fauna, but Arab North African politics.

My Thoughts