ANI-MOVIES, *Teen Titans: The Judas Contract

After nearly a decade on the schedule, Warner Bros. finally got around to coming out with what was going to be one of their first few DC animated made-for-video movies. The Judas Contract was one of the big story arcs from The New Teen Titans comic series during the mid-80's by Marv Wolfman and George Perez. This has the teenage superheroes finally butting heads with the hitman Deathstroke(aka: Slade), which was played out during Season 2 of the Teen Titans TV series.

The movie starts out during the early days of the Teen Titans which is lead by Dick Grayson as Robin, along with Beast Boy, Kid Flash, Bumblebee, and Speedy as they rescue the alien Starfire from an army of space thugs. Cut to a few years later(sometime after Justice League Vs. Teen Titans)where Starfire is now leader, plus Beast Boy, Raven, Robin(Damien Wayne), Terra, and the current Blue Beetle. They collaborate with Dick Grayson who now goes by Nightwing to take down a criminal group called HIVE, secretly lead by cult televangelist Brother Blood. Blood hired Deathstroke who is apparently still alive after Son Of Batman and stronger than before with the purpose of capturing the Titans so he can absorb their powers. Deathstroke planted the earth-manipulator Terra in their ranks to learn their secrets. First capturing Robin, Terra then proceeds to help Slade take down the rest of the Titans, but Nightwing managed to escape. Deathstroke betrays Terra by giving her to Brother Blood who hooks the Titans up to his power-sucking machine, and turns himself into a DC Comics version of the Super-Skrull. Nightwing busts in freeing the Titans, and Raven uses her magic to remove the superpowers from Blood. Terra ends up burying herself resulting in her death. The story changes to sometime later with Beast Boy doing a podcast with the actual Kevin Smith about Terra's impact on the team, plus a certain new member whose joined the team. There's also a post-credits scene of a certain kid with a blonde afro!

The Judas Contract was a much better Teen Titans movie than the previous Justice League crossover, especially with the flashback at the beginning with the original Titans. Hopefully, this will lead into at least one more Titans movie with the bonus characters teased at the end of the film.