Written by Rich Fogel
Directed by Yukio Suzuki
Animation by Dong Yang
Original air date: April 10, 1999
Rating: ***1/2 of 5

Description: An increasingly violent school sports scene leads Terry to a villain of the past.
Highs: Good message, reveals secrets about the past, a very, very good fight scene at the end.
Lows: The ep is still somewhat corny, bit of bad dialogue, unfortunately this ep paves the way for a whole ton of "teen issues" eps.
Overall: Came off as an ok episode with a good supporting theme.

Using cartoon characters to blatantly support some kind of public service message is nothing new; faint memories back to the days of after-school Ninja Turtles and Flintstone Kids anti-drug specials come to mind. I didn't expect such a thing to happen on Batman Beyond, seeing as how the old series never really did. However, it has finally happened, and in the end it turned out to be quite allright.

The sporting events at Terry's high school have become more and more brutal lately; opposing players seem to fly out of the arena like baseballs. The players are using some kind of fast-acting steroid patch called "Slappers" to give them an edge, and the coach seems to be aware of this but is purposely ignoring it. On patrol one night, Terry spots three thieves breaking into an electronics store. He corners them pretty quick, and hears one of the thieves shout the name "Mason". Mason however, uses a slapper on himself, and easily hurls Terry into a wall of TV's. The criminals then make their escape.

Mason is a kid at Terry's school, and he's not looking too good. Terry tails Mason for the day and finds that the cash he and his jock friends obtain from the robberies is used to buy these slappers from a mysterious dealer. A quick trip and a battle with the coach nets Terry the drugs, hidden in a school locker. Terry decides to go home before handing off the slappers to Bruce, and his mother find out...bad thing. Very bad. The poor grades and absences are a result of this, she thinks. As Bruce himself says after Terry gets grounded, "Arch criminals I know how to handle. Mothers are somthing else." Terry manages to weasel out some time to work with Bruce. A quick analysis of the slapper patch reveals none other than......Venom.

Well Venom can only mean the old villain Bane. Bruce has kept track of his old foe's activities for the last 20 years and sends Terry out to the estate where Bane currently lives. There, he finds a declining old man, breathing on an artificial respirator. Bane can't even move, let alone manufacture these drugs. Then who? Terry follows the drug dealer the next time Mason buys them, which leads him to the old Gotham Herald building (Who reads newspapers anymore?" Terry says). There he has a very intense battle with the true villain behind this whole Venom event, ending this very convoluted fiasco.

I commend the producers of BB for sending out the message that drugs are bad. However, the episode can't help but have it's share of corny lines. When the doctor says "That's what this stuff will do to you", in reference to Bane, that quote could've been ripped straight from one of those old "This is your brain on drugs" ads. Also, looking back on this ep, it really led the way to a whole TON of teen-problem episodes, it really gets repetetive after a while. But that aside, this episode really had some good moments. We found out what happened to old Bane after all these years, and the fight scene at the end was a real bad-ass one. Terry kills off two henchmen by cutting loose some thick metal presses on them, comeplete with bone crunching sounds. Terry vs. the Big Bad Guy is very hard hitting, but I wish the guy had better lines..."I'LL KILL YOU!!" just doesn't cut it.

I can personally relate to such an issue though, I can recall my school experiences in which coaches would have that "must-win" attitude, as well as students who emphasized their sports above anything else. Never mind that only a minute percentage of student athletes go on to make money off their skills, but they still endanger themselves and others by doing such things. Overall, this ep wasn't a landmark event or , but it still was very watchable.

The Overseer