Titans season 2 episode 7 review: Exploring superheroes’ mental health
“Bruce Wayne” is a rough episode of Titans to watch based on the nature of the content alone, but it does provide some powerful character arcs (with the exception of a couple of scenes).
Content warning: Titans season 2 episode 7, “Bruce Wayne,” features intense mental health themes revolving around PTSD, suicidal ideations, and a suicide attempt. Due to the nature of these topics, we reference some of these character-specific themes throughout this review.
Found-family themes tie DC Universe’s Titans together. However, there are various other elements that the series — as well as Teen Titans, New Teen Titans, and related comics — thrive on. Romance. Self-discovery. And most notably tragedy.
All of these are just a few components to any Titans-related narrative. Though the series hasn’t explored Garfield or Kory’s complicated healing processes through their respective trauma, this week’s episode expands on the side effects of guilt and surviving torture and a near-death experience. Bleakness overruns this Titans episode as “Bruce Wayne” takes on an unorthodox approach to developing a resolving Dick Grayson and Jason Todd’s traumas.
Mental health and superheroes are intertwined — so much so that superhero therapy is used in talk therapy to help people cope with trauma. And with two characters navigating the lows of their mental health, the series takes on two drastically different approaches to Dick and Jason’s PTSD.
Realism is questionable when it comes to how this episode interprets mental health depictions. These imperfect mental health depictions set up messy plights for Jason and Dick, which creates relatable content that is difficult to watch, especially for the key audience that relates to Dick’s grief-focused post-traumatic stress and Jason’s depression.
PTSD impacts both BatFam members differently, just like PTSD impacts everyone differently. Jason is in the perils of reliving his free-fall and torture. Whereas, Dick is most impacted by the guilt of his latent PTSD. Guilt can be a prominent symptom of PTSD. Seeing as he still feels responsible for Jericho’s death, that same guilt resurfaces after his decisions nearly killed Jason.
Indicated by multiple time jumps followed by the repetitive building-freefall scene, we watched Jason dissociate as he became consumed with his most traumatic moment. As supportive as the team was to save Jason in “Deathstroke,” the original Titans disavowed their own moral compass and logic this week. Even though Jason didn’t know how to annoy the original Titans (Donna, Hank, and Dawn), they still used the opportunity to shame him which dropped him down to the lowest level of his vulnerable state.
It’s uncharacteristic of the Titans to treat a young hero like that, especially immediately following a deeply traumatic event. However, it’s upsetting that the writers depicted Hank Hall — who has PTSD as well — as an aggressor. During the moment leading up to the rooftop scene, Hank verbally berates Jason as the others join in. It’s still unrealistic that Kory didn’t stop them during this situation. Nonetheless, this out-of-character performance on all accounts (save for Jason’s dialogue) acts as a lackadaisical way to expedite the climax.
Erring on an interpretive side of mental illness, “Bruce Wayne” offers an overall messy approach to Jason’s suicidal ideations. Though Jason’s arc is all too relatable for many viewers, Titans uses Jason’s attempted suicide as an episodic capstone. Because Dick’s rooftop chat reads as a resolution to this climax, the episode inadvertently turns PTSD into a somewhat exploitive plot device (even just on a character development level).
The visible suicide attempt is the most jarring moment. Implicit hints to Jason’s attempted suicide could have enhanced this final scene while still delivering the same emotional impact. The episode already illustrated the different symptoms of PTSD through Dick and Jason. Taking a creatively ambiguous approach to Jason’s suicidal ideations and that raw pain that every people with PTSD knows all too well would have alleviated some of these — all while upholding these realistic comparisons to real-life PTSD survivors.
Although we’re still sifting through our post-episode emotions, it was empowering to see Dick help Jason in his moment of crisis. While many series, episodes, and feature films depict characters with mental illness as weak or helpless, “Bruce Wayne” made Dick a hero just by using his lived experiences with his own PTSD to save his brother. However, we hope this isn’t a cold-end to this superhero therapy session because it’s just starting.
Every character on the show has their own trauma. Establishing an ongoing mental-health-focused subplot is a genuine way to transform Dick’s empty remarks to Jason at the end of the episode. You know which remark we’re talking about, the one where Dick told Jason he’s OK when he’s clearly not. And they both still need legitimate professional help. At the very least they need to do what few comic book characters dare do: Talk about what they’re going through with one another.
Admittedly, this episode is not for everyone, and it can be painful for anyone who has depression or any related mental health condition to watch the last several minutes of the episode. Though the mental health representation this week is open to interpretation, it’s clear that Curran Walters (Jason Todd) and Brenton Thwaites’ (Dick Grayson) performances drive the harrowing tone this week.
Given the poignant focus of the episode, wholesome and lighthearted moments help break up some of these scenes. Kory showcasing her ability to go supernova, Rachel helping her mom (Kory) as they use their powers in unison, Rose attempting to console Jason, and Conner and Kory speaking Kryptonian — all of these moments help vary the pace of the episode to make each character-specific plot seem interesting. It also helps uplift the episode from its overwhelmingly dreary content.
We’ve spent the majority of our review dissecting the mental health themes in “Bruce Wayne” because the episode itself focused on them. But there are a few other interesting moments we noticed this week:
- Komand’r (aka Blackfire) made her DC Universe debut under an alias and an alibied backstory. Something tells us the Titans (old and new) will be too preoccupied with Slade Wilson to notice Kom tracking down her sister Kory. You know, which will probably happen at the end of the season.
- Bruce Wayne thankfully wasn’t actually in the episode. Sure, we saw Batsy put on a show. However, the character isn’t apart of Titans lore, so it makes sense why he didn’t have a conventional cameo this week.
- Something tells us a different Wilson (other than Slade) was skulking around the Titans Tower planting self-sabotaging props in each other’s room. After all, Wilsons are calculating, and we’re still unsure if Rose is collaborating with Deathstroke or not.
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