Shiv Part 1 – Director: Lea Thompson/Writer: Evan Ball
This one starts with a montage of the new JSA members doing various things: Yolanda’s working out, Rick is brooding (of course), Beth is singing karaoke with the McNider AI. Courtney and Pat are arguing about the training he promised to give the JSA and Mike overhears them, so they pretend to be talking about Pat teaching
Courtney to drive. That doesn’t make Barbara happy since Pat didn’t discuss it with her first and Pat feels guilty about all the secrets they’re keeping from her. At the hospital, Brainwave still hasn’t woken from his coma and his son (Henry Jr.) is having headaches because his own telepathic abilities are starting to manifest. Cindy drops by to make Henry feel better but compassion doesn’t come naturally for her, so she’d rather talk about the big homecoming dance. She tries to be comforting, but she obviously finds it a chore.
At school, the JSAers look forward to their training, but get distracted by 
Cindy’s asshole behaviour. Beth says Cindy used to be nice until her mom died when she was a kid and she turned into a horrible person. The dead parent thing apparently resonates with Courtney. At American Dream, Jordan (Icicle) Mahkent offers to take Barbara along on a trip to secure a new contract for the foundation and she’s flattered that he values her work. At school, Cindy is snotty to her “best friend” Jenny Williams (who’s really just a glorified sycophant), who tells her to go to hell. After a run-in with Justin the janitor, Cindy insists
Henry take her to the homecoming dance, but he’s not into it and tells her to go with someone else. But no one else will put up with her crap, so she’s shit out of luck. Justin goes to the janitor room and we see some of the tools of his trade: a pipe wrench, mops, brooms … and a rather ancient-looking sword.
In chemistry class, Courtney reaches out to Cindy, offering to be her partner 
for an experiment, and finds Cindy is actually really good at chemistry. In geometry class, Henry’s telepathy really starts kicking in. At first, it’s overwhelming, but he ends up using his power to read other students’ minds and ace the test. Cindy and Courtney’s experiment goes well and Cindy asks if she wants to hang out on Saturday, since neither of them is going to the dance. After school, we get a look at Cindy’s home life, with a stepmother who’s absolutely terrified of her, and a secret entrance in the house that leads to the Injustice Society’s underground lair. At the garage, Pat has set up a
(somewhat amateurish) obstacle course so the young JSA can learn how to work as a team. In the Society’s underground headquarters, the villains discuss the new JSA, who Crock realizes are just kids. Tigress thinks they should get their own kids involved to root out their enemies, but Fiddler disagrees. Cindy overhears them talking about Stargirl before she’s pulled away by her father.
At the garage, Courtney gets impatient and runs the course herself, obviously not grasping the concept of teamwork. That pretty much ends the 
training for the day. Cindy’s dad turns out to be Dragon King and she’s fully aware of his career as a super-villain. In fact, she wants to join the Injustice Society, but her father doesn’t think she’s ready yet, despite Cindy her demonstrating her sociopathic tendencies by killing one of Dragon King’s minions without a second thought. She’s been dating Henry to see if his abilities have kicked in (which she hasn’t noticed) because Dragon King will need a telepath for the machine he’s building. Cindy is bored with pretending to be normal and
says she’s ready to help the Society in their plans, but Dragon King says she’s not ready yet, mirroring what Pat tells Courtney after her less than stellar display. Cameron Mahkent asks his dad for advice about a girl he’s interested in and Icicle tells him how he first met Cameron’s mother. Icicle says Cameron shouldn’t hesitate if he really likes the girl and Cameron suggests maybe it’s time for his dad to think about moving on too.
At the big game, Pat warns Courtney to stay away from Principal Bowin and Mike gets pissed off at the closeness that Pat and Courtney have had lately. 
Cameron asks Courtney to the dance and she says yes, but when she tells Cindy she can’t hang out with her anymore, Cindy gets pissed off. Courtney follows Principal Bowin and sees her go through a secret door in her office, so she puts on the Stargirl costume and follows her, not realizing that Justin the janitor has felt the presence of the Cosmic Staff. Courtney’s so busy making her way through the underground labyrinth, she doesn’t notice she’s set off an alarm.
Meanwhile, Cindy has gotten bored with cheerleading and gone underground to harangue her father some more about being inducted into the Injustice Society. He’s not around, but Cindy sees Stargirl on the monitors and suits up as Shiv, something her father has never let her do. Courtney gets lost and ends up elsewhere in the school, where Shiv attacks her. They engage in a running 
fight that ends up in the gym and we see that Shiv is highly trained. (Her father mentioned that he’d enhanced her abilities and we see that includes fast healing.) Shiv wounds Courtney, but before she can finish her, Justin shows up to stop her (or maybe I should call him Sir Justin). The Staff goes to get Pat and Shiv takes off, leaving Pat to find Courtney all fucked up from the fight.
This is a great episode that gives us a hell of a fight between Stargirl and Shiv, as well as finally revealing Justin’s identity. (For those of you not steeped in DC comics lore, he’s the Shining Knight.) Early in the episode, it looks like Pat is thinking about telling Barbara everything about his and Courtney’s secret lives, but Courtney won’t let him. We also get an interesting
look at Cindy’s home life and learn that she (accidentally?) killed her mother when she was young, which (according to Beth) was around the time she turned into an asshole. I’m thinking her father’s manipulations had a lot to do with that; he calls her his greatest experiment, but I think she’d prefer to just be his daughter. Despite all her arrogance, Cindy is actually very lonely which is why she was happy to hang out with Courtney and why she got so pissed off when Courtney bailed on her, since she’s used to being disappointed and ignored by her father. There are some parallels between Cindy and Courtney, as they both think they’re ready to move up to the big leagues, but there are contrasts too, since Courtney has a loving family while Cindy has a father who cares more about his work than her and a stepmother who 
may not even be human. (Seriously, Dragon King says he doesn’t want to have to “make” another stepmom for Cindy, so I assume she’s either some kind of simulacrum or she’s brainwashed, like Dragon King’s minions seem to be.) I’m not sure if Cindy recognized Stargirl as Courtney during their fight, but she definitely heard Pat yelling Courtney’s name right before he showed up, so I think she’ll figure it out. (Shiv doesn’t wear a mask, so Courtney recognized her right away.) Speaking of recognition, Sir Justin is hiding when Pat shows up at the end and knows he’s Stripesy, so it’ll be interesting to see if he makes himself known to Pat in turn.
Favourite Quotes:
- “At least I got the same answer this time.” Mike commenting on Pat and Courtney’s explanations for their weird behaviour.
- “Why are you such a bitch?” Jenny asking Cindy the question everyone has been thinking.