Titans “Rose” review: Inspired plot that should have focused on Rose

The second episode of Titans season two features Rose Wilson’s debut, but it weirdly doesn’t give her much time onscreen. In fact, she only has mere minutes of screen time, and we wanted to see a lot more of her in action.

Titans season two opened with a retroactive finale, but its second episode takes shapes as the archetypal premiere. Though not a true premiere, — seeing as it is the second episode — “Rose” gives us everything we want from an opening episode: action, foreshadowing, and plenty of character-driven exploration. Action-packed doesn’t even begin to describe Titans season two’s second episode; however, Rose Wilson’s intense introduction doesn’t give her the screen time she deserves in her titular episode.

The second episode doesn’t act like a premiere merely because “Trigon” wrapped up last season’s main conflict. It acts as a premiere because it kickstarts the beginning of a new saga and the debut of a new relentless character: Rose Wilson. Along with the promise of her future redemption arc, her titular episode demonstrates her power set and defines her as the bold metahuman she is.

Rose Wilson

Sure, the training sequence at the beginning was a fun and beautifully choreographed way to explain the time jump and the team dynamic. We’re more interested in the best action sequence in the episode — the one that showcases Rose Wilson fighting cops all while injured. It’s a dramatic entrance, but it seamlessly explains her meta-human abilities.

While the origin of Rose’s powers still vary (though we’re pretty sure the series is steering toward the story that she inherited them from her dad), she has a powerhouse of abilities in an incarnation. Titans is the same.  Even while she’s driving away, she uses her accelerated reflexes and probability cognition to veer away from the cops.

Chelsea Zhang’s first fight scene brings Rose Wilson to life in ways that make us feel like we’re experiencing comic panels in live-action form. Even when supposedly “cornered” she continues to fight because Rose Wilson rarely ever stays down in a fight. We can assume her perseverance is a product of Slade Wilson’s harsh training, but her determination is also a canon characteristic and Zhang illustrates that in every kick, punch, and grimace.

To quote Jason Todd, Rose is “a total badass.” It’s no wonder why Jason is already smitten with her.  It seems like the series started brewing some Jason and Rose chemistry (even if it’s one-sided right now) even before Jay officially met her at Titans Tower.

Both Robins (past and present) are clearly infatuated by powerful women who could kill them in a single blow. Honestly, that might be the only valid lesson they learned from Bruce Wayne. And yes, we’re saying that they learned to be hopeless romantics after watching Bruce fall in love with Selina.

Building the backbone for a potential new relationship (or friendship) and a new Titans team member, the series continues to build that plot in the background of Rose’s episode. As the episode continues, the conflict and side story become more and more dominant, pushing Rose to the background of an episode that should have focused on her. While the series needs to continue the theme for this season (i.e. Deathstroke’s evil plot), Titans treats Rose Wilson as a peripheral character in her own narrative.

Even with her limited screen time in her own episode, she’s still a bold new character that the second season needs. Yet, the episode doesn’t frame her story from her perspective. Using a Dick-centric focus, “Rose” is an episode told from Dick’s perception of the titular character, and it lessens the value of a titular episode.

It’s a strange approach to her introduction because, even in most invigorating action scenes, we only see Rose through the lens of the pre-established characters. We only learn about Rose from Dick’s perspective. Because of this, Dick turns to his father and mentor to figure out how to be a pseudo-father figure for yet another child. By doing so, it conflates Rose’s debut into the Batfam’s mess and Dick’s ongoing identity crisis.

Titular episodes on the series can be messy for the characters of colors. Kory only got a little over seven minutes of dialogue in her episode last season (and approximately 10 minutes of screen time with a plot that revolved around Rachel). Garfield still hasn’t gotten a titular episode or proper screen time to delve into his trauma when he was in his tiger form. Now, Rose is the one who got shortchanged on screen time. If Rose’s name wasn’t in the title of the episode, this would read like a standard premiere episode.

The Hawk and Dove dilemma

Hawk and Dove are notorious characters through Teen Titans comics, but they don’t fit on the DC Universe series. As the Titans roster grows, their presence on the show becomes more and more distracting.

We love Hawk and Dove, but they really should exist in their own spin-off show so their cut scenes stop distracting the main Titans continuity. This episode focuses more on Hank and Dawn’s fallout from Trigon’s illusions and their general relationship woes than necessary. The duos’ screen time was unnecessary. While it did slightly help build the conflict between the Titans and their old foe (Dr. Light), Hawk and Dove’s screen time did nothing to enhance the episode. In fact, they brought the episode further away from the central point: Rose Wilson.

I guess Hank and Dawn’s scenes gave us a gradual approach to Dr. Light’s ambiguous plot. However, there are plenty of other hypothetical scenarios that could have introduced that first explosion. The only tangible contribution Hawk and Dove made to this episode was creating indirect drama for Dick and Kory.

“Rose” implicitly extends the same tired love triangle trope from the first season. If you notice, Dick contacts Dawn during the three months the team is weirdly separated. But what about Kory?

After instantly falling in love with Kory and a season (and some) worth of mutual pining as they raise a horde of kid heroes together, we’re made to believe Dick and Kory haven’t contacted each other once in the last three months. No sappy texts. No makeup sex. Not even a letter.

This no-contact subplot is disingenuous to the bond Dick and Kory established in the first season. More so, it just brings in unnecessary conflict when we already have a season-worth of conflict and unresolved question. (Uh hello, Kory and Gar’s origin stories. Why the Titans originally disbanded. And whatever Slade is planning now.)

While Titans took a step back with Dick+Kory and held their pure romance hostage, we’re still hopeful Dick+Kory will reunite in the near future. After all, we miss Kory being apart of the team.

Dick and Kory

Somehow, Dick is both confident and conflicted in this episode. He’s brooding less (thankfully), but he’s still figuring out his heroic persona. Apparently, he’s also trying to figure out how to be an adoptive father and a boyfriend because he hasn’t called Kory since everyone split. However, watching him ponder over his identity reminds us why Kory and Dick are such a great couple.

The slight Nightwing tease reminds us that Kory better be a part of that character development. Starfire’s comic counterpart helped Dick Grayson become Nightwing. Without Starfire, there would be no Nightwing, and there’s no way to adapt Dick’s rise to Nightwing without Kory.

We’re obviously still bitter that Dick hasn’t called her, but we’re going to not-so-subtlely point that out again because we need to emphasize our pain.

As per usual, there is a lot that happened this week, especially in a 40-minute episode. And we want to point out some of the other cool tidbits that happened this week:

• First, can we please talk about Kory’s special effects glow-up? Because her fire bolts were amazing this episode, just like her synchronized fight scene with Donna.
• Also, Kory being kidnapped means we might see Tamaran soon and Blackfire (because we already know who’s behind her kidnapping, let’s be real).
• If Kory goes back to Tamaran does that mean we might see Dick and their kids travel through space to save her? Please say yes, DCU Titans writers!
• Clearly, someone had to break Shimmer and Dr. Light out of meta-human prison, and we’re pretty sure that’s part of Deathstroke’s nefarious plot. So, basically, Dr. Light was being manipulated or forced to plant all those bombs as a message or a distraction.
• We have a feeling Rose Wilson is also wrapped up in this scheme. Seeing as Slade cuts out her eye in the comics, she might join the Titans to gather intel.
• Roy Harper and Donna might be a couple on the show (just out of frame, where their relationship belongs). Or at least they’re on texting terms.

Clearly, “Rose” has contains a trove of fan-theory material. The decretion with Rose’s screentime aside, Titans incorporates a lot of dynamic subplots and new characters in one short episode. Connecting Dr. Light, Shimmer, and the Wilson family into a likely slow-building evil scheme. Basically, Slade is behind everything in this episode. While Deathstroke is already a formidable villain without officially fighting the Titans onscreen, we’re more concerned with Kory’s wellbeing and what next week will bring.

What did you think of this episode of Titans? Share your thoughts in the comments below!