Brainwave – Director: Tamra Davis/Writer: Colleen McGuinness
This one starts a few decades ago, with a young Henry (Brainwave) King working in a lab and suffering from debilitating headaches. As he leaves work late one night, a mugger accosts him and Brainwave realizes he can hear the mugger’s thoughts. His fear makes his telekinesis kick in and he disarms the mugger, then uses his powers to kill the guy. Later, he goes home and makes a videotape about what he’s just done.
In the present, Henry King Jr. has found his dad’s secret room and his stash of video tapes documenting the progression of his powers. As he watches his father talk about getting headaches, reading minds, and killing the
mugger telekinetically, Henry realizes he’s been undergoing the same thing (although he hasn’t killed anyone). At home, Courtney tells Pat how she could hear Henry’s thoughts and feel his emotions, which makes her believe he’s not as bad as Cindy or Brainwave. She wants to ask him to join their side and help fight the Injustice Society. Pat is more worried that the Society seems to be in Blue Valley to carry out some master plan. He mentions how he was in another 
group (the Seven Soldiers of Victory) and how they stopped Dragon King from destroying New York. Pat wishes he knew where the other Soldiers are, since they need all the help they can get against the Injustice Society, and Courtney brings up Henry again. At the school, we see Justin the janitor (aka Shining Knight) mopping the floor and he has some kind of weird mind glitch where his mop turns into the Cosmic Staff.
Beth goes by Cindy’s place and finds it empty, while the McNider A.I. informs her that Cindy has left school to “study abroad”. We see Cindy is actually being held in a dungeon cell in the tunnels beneath the town by her father, who ignores her pleas and threats (although he does gas her to shut
her up). Dragon King is happy that Henry’s powers have emerged, since the Injustice Society can use him to power Dragon King’s machine instead of his father. Meanwhile, Henry is binge-watching his dad’s tapes, seeing the discovery of his powers, as well as his growing sociopathy. He also finds out that his father was psychologically abused as a kid by his own father, but his powers gave him a new confidence. Courtney mentions her idea about Henry to the others, but Yolanda and Rick are both against it. In fact, Yolanda says she’ll quit if 
Henry’s on the team. Henry keeps watching the tapes and sees how his father began to use his powers to punish people he thought deserved it. Brainwave came to the conclusion that humans in general are horrible, filled with vile thoughts and not worth caring about. When the maid comes in and Henry reads some negative passing thoughts she has, he begins to see what his dad was talking about. In fact, he thinks he hears his father’s voice inside his head.
In Injustice Society headquarters, Dragon King reports that their plan can go ahead since Henry’s powers have emerged. We finally learn what the big plan is:
the Society are going to use the stolen broadcast equipment and the hacked satellite in combination with Henry’s powers to broadcast a signal that can take control of every fully-developed mind across six states. Later, Barbara apologizes to Jordan (Icicle) Mahkent, who’s in bad mood because he has no more people to kill to avenge his wife. Of course, Barbara doesn’t know why he’s in a bad mood, but invites him and his family over for dinner that night. At the hospital, Henry is overwhelmed by all the thoughts around him, many of which don’t 
show people at their best. He tries to get through to his father, who’s still comatose. The stray thoughts of a nurse piss Henry off and make him think his father was right about people being assholes. At the garage, Beth and Rick show up for training but Pat wants them to do some research on the tunnels that apparently exist under the town. Rick’s not happy about that, but Beth is into it.
At the hospital, Courtney asks Henry to join them, but when he finds out she’s responsible for his dad’s condition, he’s not too happy. He tells her
how he can hear all the terrible stuff people are thinking, but Courtney argues that people can be both good and bad inside, not just one or the other. She says that just because someone thinks terrible thoughts in a bad moment, that doesn’t mean they don’t have goodness and love inside them. She points out how Henry still cares about his father, despite the fact his dad treated him like shit. That 
pisses him off and he almost lets a telekinetic blast go, but Courtney tells him to get in touch when he decides to do the right thing. At home, Barbara is losing her shit trying to make dinner, so Pat takes over. He’s ready to tell her the truth about everything (which Courtney is still against), but the Mahkents show up and he has to put it off. At the hospital, Yolanda attacks Henry, threatening to kill him if he bothers her or her friends.
At the garage, Beth finds evidence that a weird offshoot of the Freemasons (the Other Founding Fathers) first settled Blue Valley in 1876, so they might have been the ones who built the tunnels under the town. At home, the
Mahkents and Dugans have dinner and make awkward small talk. When Courtney hands Jordan a scalding hot plate straight from the oven and he doesn’t react, she figures he’s probably Icicle and tells Pat. If Jordan is Icicle, Courtney wonders if Cameron will turn out to be an asshole like Cindy did and like Henry might. Later, Courtney and Pat are talking in the basement when Barbara shows up 
unexpectedly and sees the Staff. So I guess they will be telling her the truth after all. At the hospital, a lawyer shows up to get Henry to sign some papers about cutting off his father’s life support. But Henry reads his mind and figures out he’s trying to rip off his father’s money, so he lashes out telekinetically and kills the lawyer. That freaks Henry out, but it apparently rouses his father from his coma.
This is a pretty good episode, with lots of stuff going on. Courtney’s idea to recruit Henry seems strange, but I think she really does believe there can be good in anyone, which is why she reached out to Cindy before she knew she
was Shiv. It’s cool to see the parallels with Henry and his father, both discovering how to use their powers, and both accidentally killing someone with them. It’ll be interesting to see if Henry keeps following his father’s path to villainy, or if Courtney is right about him. Courtney and Pat realizing Jordan is Icicle was well done, but I can’t tell if Icicle knows about them or not. He must have seen Pat’s face years ago (as Stripesy) and he’s faced Courtney in battle, so he might recognize her too, especially since Stargirl’s fight with Shiv and Courtney’s car crash happened on the same night. It was cool to see the Seven Soldiers of Victory (complete with photo) and learn that Green Arrow and Speedy are 
canon in this universe. And yes, I know there are eight members not seven … Courtney even pointed that out. But in the comics Wing was always referred to as the “unofficial eighth soldier” since he was Crimson Avenger’s sidekick. Pat says he lost touch with all of them, so I’m wondering what happened to them and if we’ll see any others besides Shining Knight. Speaking of whom, something weird is definitely going on with him, as he’s apparently seeing things that aren’t there. We also see the villains’ big plan, which seems like a lot of other master villain plans, so we’ll have to wait and see if this one has some twists to it. And I’m looking forward to Pat and Courtney explaining things to Barbara; it’s past time she knew the truth.
Favourite Quotes:
- “And you had a cowboy, like the Village People.” Courtney’s reaction to seeing the Seven Soldiers of Victory photograph.
- “At their very core, people are monsters. I hate them.” Brainwave’s thoughts on humanity.
- “What the hell is that?” Barbara’s reaction on seeing the Cosmic Staff floating and glowing.