DC's Stargirl Recap: 'Infinity Inc.' Conclusion Teases Villainous Team-Up
DC’s Stargirl this week closed out the “Infinity Inc.” two-parter that hit pause on Season 3’s murder mystery storyline. What fun Easter eggs were to be found amid the otherwise verrry serious episode?
I have probably said before on these here pages that I am no great fan of “mindscape” episodes that deposit characters into other planes of existence to sort through their stuff. Between Stargirl, The Flash and Titans, to name just DC series, such episodes seem to come at a pretty steady clip.
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Yet here we were again, and again in the Shadowlands, from which a glitchy Shade is unable to free himself and Pat. Instead, as they wait for Jennie to expunge the darkness from her Green Lantern ring and in doing so get everyone back to full power, Richard Swift and Pat are faced with haunting images/faces rooted in their deepest fears and anxieties. For Swift, that came in the form of The Gambler and then, more devastatingly, his sister, whose dying bedside he had been unable to rush to years ago, due to his otherworldly obligations.
For Pat, the gut punches were manifested by the spectre of his grossly disapproving father (Hey, Major Crimes‘ GW Bailey!) and the suggestion that Mike will one day hate Pat as much as Pat seemingly hated his own pop. But as Pat maintains, he never actually hated his dad.
While Swift and Pat deal with their black-and-white demons, Courtney and Jennie at the Helix Institute try to power down Todd from his ominous Obsidian form, only to get KOd again by an angry, inky energy pulse. (Of note, as the cameras then cruise the facility’s halls, we peek in on DC characters Tao Jones, Penny Dreadful and an unseen Corcharo the Man-Shark — all of whom in the comics were part of the supervillain team called Helix.) Jennie lands in a power-dampening cell, while Court comes to in the office of Nurse Love, who endeavors to make clear that whereas Jennie’s unpredictable powers might start a fire here or there, Todd’s could consume the whole world in the void of the Shadowlands. In short, brother and sister must never be united.
Courtney later learns more about Helix from Mister Bones himself, who explains how — having been born with translucent skin and what got dubbed a “cyanide touch” (that killed his own mother) — he sees the institute as a way to teach people with similar, isolating powers to live “alone.” Courtney, though, argues that no one should have to be resigned to being alone, so she urges Jennie to take one more shot at dialing down Todd, despite her brother’s own protests. This time, Jennie’s careful outreach works, Todd resumes human form and absorbs the darkness that had infected her ring, Swift and Pat return from the Shadowland, and everyone is happy.
Afterwards, Pat convinces a reluctant Swift to serve as mentor of sorts to Todd and Jennie, teaching Green Lantern Alan Scott’s kids to fine-tune their respective powers. The twins agree, though Jennie notes that she does have a prior commitment to get to New York and help out Sandy Hawkins aka Sandman Wesley Dodds’ nephew. (Sandy, it seems, has been suffering the same prophetic nightmares that plagued his uncle — including one that led Jennie to find Todd.)
Meanwhile, Mister Bones suggests to Nurse Love that maybe the Helix Institute is better suited to form its own “team” of powered individuals….
At episode’s end, Courtney and the audience are left to wonder anew who has been spying on the people of Blue Valley if it isn’t , as the Helix bosses insisted, Mister Bones and Nurse Love. The camera then slips into the town sewers, into that room full of monitors, and we see a caped figure hurl a fist into the screen into which Hourman Rick stared last week.
What did you think of “Infinity Inc. Part Two” and its assorted name drops?
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