"Let us Focus on the Mission at Hand".

Alright guys, now we get into the era where Artemis is barely shown in the episodes she appears in. Nonetheless, there is still plenty of material to cover for a post, shorter than usual though they may be. Just be warned that these posts will likely be more theory based, at least for the next few. So let's start this brief, but detailed, journey into 'Darkest'.

According to the timeline, it seems that Kaldur brought Artemis to Black Manta and he never questioned where he found her; or at least trusted him enough to find his own lieutenant with enough fake credentials to be believed. I say this because it was only a matter of days between Kaldur bringing Artemis on board and sending them both on the mission to the cave. To that argument that it is a little unbelievable for Manta to accept Artemis so readily, at least they have the terror twins questioning if she is legitimate as they have never heard of her before. To defend herself, Artemis goes for an intimidation tactic, saying that if they are questioning Manta's decision in his son's choice of a right hand, take it up with him. This seems to quiet both of the twins for a while, but they will later question Kaldur later on during the mission, so, it's up in the air whether they really believe or trust Tigris during her time with Manta, let alone a mission.

Once the attack on Blue Beetle and Impulse begins, Artemis immediately ties up Bart with net weapon. This doesn't hold Bart long, of course, but it does raise the question on how much did Artemis know about him and how much of a part is she playing for this entire mission. Because of course Wally likely told Artemis everything about Bart after his mission with him. But Bart has not been on the team nearly long enough for the team to know his limitations, least of all Wally, unless somehow Dick has been slipping information to Kaldur about more knowledge of these newcomers. But, let's take away what Artemis might know, and let's see what her entity Tigris would know. Maybe if Tigris was really in the know, she might know something about this Impulse character, but would clearly not be fighting him so she wouldn't know his limitations; and like I said earlier, Bart hasn't been around long enough to be on the radar yet. Either way could be viable. I could go into a whole tangent about the Blue Beetle scuff, but too many points from above would repeat.

A point of notice is that after Kaldur and his group start infiltrating the cave, that we get a scene where Artemis goes to put a collar on Wolf. Wolf smells her and does not detect a threat and goes back to sleep, giving Artemis time to put the collar on him. It may not be a point needing to be mentioned, but it does show that Artemis is still on the level; which will be important for her crisis of belief later in the series. Kaldur gets a scene similar with Sphere before this, which accomplishes the same effect for later this episode.

As the sneak attack on the team begins, we get the scene where Artemis disables Dick with these moves likely taught to her by her father; which is how she could become this entity in the first place, but more on that later in the series. Again, this could be Dick playing the part, but it does get me to wonder if Artemis could still beat Dick in an honest fight. Because in a sequence in season 1 where the team is training, Dick and Artemis are sparring and we see her beating him. To be fair Artemis does have a few more years on Dick and may have even been training longer than Dick given her background, but we don't know if she was training when she and Wally left. Again, pure speculation, but interesting to note nonetheless.

One more thing to note before this post is wrapped up. When Kaldur brings: Blue Beetle, Bart, and Garfield onto his ship, he tells Artemis to blow up the cave. The only time in this episode we ever see Artemis from his perspective; by that I mean appearance with her blond hair and normal voice. The point may be obvious, but the point still stands that it is her former leader telling her to blow up her former house and potentially harming her family. The breath shows that neither know if all the team is out of danger and wonder how much of herself she is willing to sacrifice for this mission.

That's it for this one guys. I know I said this one would be shorter but from my perspective who cares. Next time we will be discussing 'Before the Dawn', likely the length of this post. Thanks for reading guys.