The Breed
Episode #03 (385-553) - The Breed
Original Airdate - October 10th, 2000
Virgil's friend Derek, a track athlete, is transformed into an ionic
energy being recruited by Ebon, the malevolent leader of the
Meta-Breed, and it's up to Static to convince his friend to resist
joining the group before it's too late.
Media by Bird Boy
Review by Matt Zimmer
Sketch: Ebon |
Credits:
Supervising Producer Alan Burnett
Producer Scott Jeralds
Associate Producer Shaun McLaughlin
Written by Christopher Simmons
Directed by Denys Cowan
Music by Stanley Clarke
Animation Services by Koko Enterprise Co., LTD.
Voices:
Phil LaMarr as Virgil Hawkins/Static
Jason Marsden as Richie Foley
Bumper Robinson as Derek Barnett/D-Struct
Gary Sturgis as Ebon
Danica McKellar as Frieda
Telma Hopkins as Mrs. Barnett
Michele Morgan as Sharon Hawkins
Kevin Michael Richardson as Robert Hawkins
Tia Texada as Talon
Brian Tochi as Shiv
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Review
Static meets Ebon and the Meta-Breed for the first time.
Virgil is tutoring a popular athletic kid named Derek when Derek starts
to get cramps. He leaves and then transformed into a bang baby with a
monstrous appearance. Not knowing how to control his new powers the city
of Dakota runs away from him frightened after he accidentally causes an
a police car to crash. Derek runs away and meets a metahuman with
shadow-based powers named Ebon. Ebon renames Derek D-Struct and
convinces him to join his gang, the Meta-Breed whose members include
Shiv, who is able to create light based weapons and Talon, a girl who
has been turned into a half-bird metahuman. Ebon then tries to recruit
Static too but Static turns him down flatly and soon realizes that D-Struct
is, in fact Derek. After visiting Derek's mom's house Virgil and Richie
learn than Derek has been missing for four days. Meanwhile the Breed
commits a robbery and Static is nearly killed by D-Struct who feels
incredibly guilty afterwards. Static turns out to be okay and visits the
Breed's lair in an abandoned subway system and convinces Derek to go
home to his mother. Ebon tries to stop him and is jointly defeated by
Static and Derek.
At the end of the episode Derek and his mother are reunited and Derek
lets doctors study him for research on a Bang Baby cure.
I really like this show even if this wasn't the strongest or most
exciting episode. Ebon is a great villain whose return appearances are
even better than this one. I liked the rubbery animation style used to
animate Ebon's early shadow tricks. This episode also had a few nice
touched like a Lois Lane reference (which to nitpicking geeks could show
that Superman is fictional in the early Static-verse) although I prefer
to think that Lois is simply so famous that even kids in Dakota High
knoew who she is. I also like that two of the streets in the episode
were named Milestone and Cowan, after the company that published the
Static Shock comics and one of Static's creators, respectively.
Besides Ebon the animation wasn't very good in this episode and the
story is nothing we haven't seen before. I liked the episode but I've
seen this show achieve really great heights and am going to grade it
accordingly.
Story: ***1/2
Animation: **1/2
Average: ***
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