Titans “Ghosts” review: Living in the past

Using the past to foreshadow the main conflict, this week’s episode of Titans includes some spectacular performances and pays homage to the comics (just with a twist).

In the third episode of the season, Titans explores the past while toying with the present conflict. Everything is still ominous before this episode drops more clues about the apparitions in the title.  “Ghosts” is a story haunted by relationships of the past, but it artfully defines the character interactions in the present — namely the dynamic between a mother and daughter. Titans has long since connected Kory and Rachel’s backstories, and this week interjects their respective canon with new stories inspired by classic arcs.

The show has changed quite a few backstories. Angela, whose comic counterpart was a beacon of peace and hated Trigon, was evil and colluded with that demon. Rachel isn’t from Azarath (in fact, the show hasn’t referenced the interdimensional world). While these stories deviate from their comic origins, Titans still draws inspiration from the comics. The writers know that we know about the comics, so they created arcs that we think we can anticipate, only to give us narratives our feverish fan theories can’t predict. In lieu of panel-by-panel comic book accuracy, Titans changes our expectations for a kidnapped Kory arc and switches it with a benevolent story between her and an old crush.

Still shrouded in ambiguity, it’s clear last week’s cliffhanger made us nervous for no reason. We were ready to see Kory fight a Tamaranean guard to prevent him from taking her back to Tamaran. Instead, we saw a cute flirtation that almost made us question our devout Dickkory ship. (OK, we might have exaggerated there because we’d never question our Dickkory ship. They’re too cute.)

Regardless, this ominous tone ties all of this week’s substories together. From Kory’s past on Tamaran to whatever Deathstroke is doing and even what the heck happened to Garth (even though we know he’s probably dead), the theme this week is ominous foreshadowing. And it’s a clever storytelling technique, as it gives us hints of the story to keep us wondering. We only have clues to toy with before the series gives context to the stories about Garth, Deathstroke, and Kory’s subplot.

While the ghost in the titular episode might seemingly be a reference to Jericho, the flashbacks paint the painful story of a fallen Titan, Garth (i.e. Aqualad). Without explaining his death or even formally saying he’s dead, the blips of his octopus birthday cake and the cherished memories with the aquatic hero illustrate how painful this Titans tower reunion is. Garth’s implied death also raises the stake for Rose’s visit. More importantly, it validates the concerns of the old team members. These flashbacks give context to their suspicions and enhance Hank, Dawn, and Donna’s pain.

However, the old Titans aren’t the only characters in pain. Rachel misses mother figure, Kory. The first thing Rach asks when Hank, Dawn, and Donna visit the tower is, “So where’s Kory?” It shows how much she misses her without using dialogue to explicitly tell us. It also shows how strong their bond is, and we have a feeling it’s going to make their reunion even more emotional.

Toying with our emotions is clearly a running theme this season because Rachel was visibility devasted when Donna told her Kory suddenly left. Seriously, Teagan Croft’s emotional cues in this scene demonstrate just how hurt Rachel is. And this reminds us of how being abandoned by her birth mother, Angela, still weighs on her. Yet, it better shows Rachel’s attachment to Kory and how much she loves her real mother.

Moving on from these tragically wholesome interactions (at least for now), can we chat about how utterly evil Deathstroke is? Seriously, he’s such a convincingly heinous villain, and he hasn’t attacked the Titans onscreen yet.

Our theories about Deathstroke being behind Shimmer and Dr. Light’s escape was apparently right. Considering that Deathstroke is on a mission to torment the Titans, and he’s strategizing three steps ahead of them, it seems like Slade planted his daughter in the Titans’ abode. After all, Slade vigorously studies his opponents, so why wouldn’t he know that Dick Grayson has a soft spot for adopting abandoned and misunderstood kids?

Slade is sending a message and trying to draw the team out. He was hoping to get the old Titans with his Dr. Light bait-and-switch stunt at the end of the episode, but he got Jason (and Gar, but mostly Jason right now) instead. While Deathstroke was probably expecting all of the Titans to show up, it’s clear that Jason didn’t learn from getting his butt beat by a third of Rachel’s power threshold earlier in the episode.

But we get it. Jason isn’t just a rebellious nuisance. He went after Light to try and prove himself to the old Titans. After a couple of years of living under Batman’s spotlight and Dick Grayson’s repertoire, the character development makes sense. The situation doesn’t look great for Jay, but we don’t think the series will kill off Robin 2.0 just yet. After all, Jason’s comic incarnation gets beat up a lot and makes a lot of overly courageous mistakes before he finally meets his explosive (but temporary) demise.

Dangerously defiant Leo energy runs deep in Robin. It’s OK, Jason, we know how difficult it is to defy the stars — no matter how much your stubborn Leo sun wants you to rebel against astrology itself.

We really wanted a romantic reunion between Kory and Dick, but Faddei and Kory’s side plot really stomped on all our fan theories. But we’re not necessarily mad about it. The writers are slowly starting to build up Kory’s backstory. With Blackfire’s name-drop, we know that this season is slowly building up Kom’s nefarious plot.

Even with Faddei’s friendly-turned-romantic visit, this subplot still carries the essence of the classic kidnapped Kory arc. Blackfire wants Kory back for a reason, and her intentions make us nervous. Though we can trust Faddei for now, that doesn’t mean Blackfire might not exploit his obvious feelings for Kory in the future. Theories aside, even in this side arc, Anna Diop’s Kory still rightfully steals the spotlight.

Every episode, Diop reminds us how her portrayal of Kory completely embodies the Tamaranean Princess’ canon characteristics. From her fighting style, her friendships, and even her reactions to people in distress, Diop’s incarnation of the character is undeniably Starfire. It’s easy to get lost in Diop’s performance, but after watching the screener for the third time, Kory’s innate empathy shines in this episode.

Their impending reunion mirrors how Kory and Rachel met, but it also enhances how strong this mother and daughter duo truly is. Family is everything on this series. While the entire Titans team is one big found family, Kory is a critical mother figure to Rachel, and Rachel’s harrowing phone call to Kory backs up that assertation.

With an entire tower full of people she trusts, Rachel didn’t turn to Garfield or Dick or Dawn when she was in crisis. She turned to Kory. She called Kory because she trusts Kory enough to help her and to understand what she’s going through. Even when Rachel doesn’t understand what she’s experiencing, she turns to Kory, and that speaks to their family dynamic.

The phone call itself is such a bitterly beautiful scene because Teagan Croft’s performance shows how desperate Rachel is for help. The strain in her voice doesn’t just portray Rachel’s apprehension, it shows how truly exhausted she is from fight her internal demon. Croft shows this well before she ever utters the word “tired.” Maybe we’re just too invested in this mother-daughter relationship, but this character interaction broke us and made Kory’s decision to return to her family more impactful. After all, our personal investments in these characters is what makes us sob and shout during these raw emotional scenes (and yeah, we definitely cried during this one).

Kory’s decision to ditch Faddei to help Rach parallels the first time the duo met. Even when she had amnesia, Kory saved Rachel from those weird culty assassins last season. Though she didn’t know who she was at that time, Kory knows who she is now, and she still chooses to persistently help those in need. It’s because she knows what it’s like to feel helpless. It’s hard to capture Koriand’r’s persona, but somehow Diop continues to exceed our expectations in every episode.

The third episode of the season gave us a glimpse of Kory’s backstory, without any influences from the team, but we’re ready to see more of her character arcs without the ambiguity. Hearing Blackfire’s name in this episode gives us hope that those stories are on the horizon.

Beyond impatiently waiting for some more Kory-specific arcs, we have a few lingering thoughts on this episode:

• Clearly, Jason knows Deathstroke. He recognized his face last week and he seems to be familiar with his repertoire this week. While he didn’t meet Dick until midway through last season, we can assume Jason must have encountered Slade while fighting alongside Bruce.
• Can we please acknowledge that H.I.V.E. name-drop? We have no productive commentary to make about it, but we’re just excited to hear that evil organization name-dropped.
• Apparently Jericho is “dead” in the current timeline, but we’re not buying it. This seems like a classic comic twist because we all know joey has played dead in the comics before to avoid his father and other enemies. Heck, even when Joey died in the Teen Titans runs, his soul possessed people until Raven brought him back for real in the 2003 run.

What did you think of this episode of Titans? Let us know in the comments section!