Artemis Crock: Now, Shall We Begin.

Let us begin with the very start of the well beloved character by many; Artemis Crock. But to truly begin with her character we must start with the tie-in comic; 'Young Justice' #8. We see in the beginning panel that Artemis is waiting for her mother to return from her prison sentence. If you do not have any reference for the episode Artemis is introduced in 'Young Justice' you have no idea why a teenage girl is picking up her mother from prison by herself. We even see when she is talking to her mother, Paula Crock, that her dad chose not to come. While Paula does seem a little surprised by this, she has this expression that she has just accepted the fact that her husband wants nothing to do with her. Why? Again, we will find glimpses of why later.

What proceeds is an admittedly awkward dinner scene with Artemis and Paula just having dinner together. This is something everyone can relate too even if your parent's have never been arrested, which I assume are most of you. Paula tries to ignite the conversation with how Artemis is doing in school, but Artemis lightly reminds her that she has not begun yet. What follows is you see a figure in a hat which is revealed to be Artemis' father, Lawrence Crock. While he and Paula have a conversation about her trying to get him to give up the criminal life since she apparently took the fall for both of them in prison; no he would have to give up this life if he wanted to stay with Artemis. Lawrence reminds Paula that Artemis is going to follow in both their steps because he sees this as inevitable. As Artemis hears this behind closed doors, you can see her expression of frustration and we only see an arrow she is holding break when he mentions invevitability. The scene following shows Artemis' character in a few panels without needing dialogue. You see her run to her room in anger, prepare a costume a costume, and finally see her breaking up a robbery.

We shall end the story hear. But lets reflect on a few bits, particularly those last few panels. What I interpret from this scene is this, when Artemis feels she is helpless or is told something is inevitable, she will do anything necessary to prove them wrong. The fact that she fights those feelings of fate because she knows the line is not very thick. This will be her prevailing theme throughout the entire first season. One last piece about the costume. It is what I wanted the Spiderman 2002 film to be; something that could be prepared with limited resources. As her father prepared her to be an assassin the bow and arrows are not that difficult to attain. The costume itself just looks like a green sports bra, sports pants, and soccer cleats. The mask is the most complicated piece, but that could be relegated to a regular store item in the DC world where hundreds of heroes are just around. Overall, I like the simplicity of the costume.

This is only the beginning of Artemis' journey, stay tuned for more coming soon.