Justice League/Teen Titans Chronicles: Dawn of Freedom is an american Direct-to Video animated superhero film which is part of the Justice League/Teen Titans Animated Universe.
Characters
Featured Characters
- Knights of Rao
- Alpha-Wolf / Milo Chaves
- Blue Lantern / Collin Hill
- New Gaia / Delilah Raymond Snow
- Omega Knight / Jason Burke
- Terra / Tara Markov
- Toymaster / Hiro Okamura
Supporting Characters
- Justice League (Earth 2) (assembled)
- Aquaman / Arthur Curry (first appearance)
- Batman / Bruce Wayne (first appearance)
- Cyborg / Victor Stone (first appearance)
- Flash / Barry Allen (first appearance)
- Green Lantern / Hal Jordan (first appearance)
- Superman / Clark Kent / Kal-El (first appearance) (also a member of the Blue Lantern Corps)
- Wonder Woman / Diana of Themyscira / Diana Prince (first appearance)
- Blue Lantern Corps (Earth 2) (assembled)
- Barbara Gordon (first appearance)
- Chato Santana (first appearance)
- Lois Lane (first appearance)
- Jimmy Olsen (Earth 2) (first appearance)
- Martha Kent (Earth 2) (first appearance)
- Alfred Pennyworth (Earth 2) (first appearance)
- Mera (Earth 2) (first appearance)
- Queen Hippolyta (Earth 2) (first appearance)
- Tara Markov (Earth 2) (first appearance)
Villains
- Steppenwolf (Earth 2) (single appearance)
- Parademons
- Lexcorp (Earth 2) (defunct)
- Lex Luthor Jr. (first appearance)
- Lex Luthor Sr. (as an illusion) (deceased)
- Mercy Graves (first appearance)
- Silas Stone (first appearance)
- Orm Marius (Earth 2) (first appearance)
- Orvax Marius (Earth 2) (hologram only) (deceased)
- Joker
- Lex Luthor (mentioned only)
- Darkseid (mentioned only)
Other Characters
- Batman / Bruce Wayne (appears in computer screen and hologram)
- Superman / Clark Kent / Kal-El (appears in computer screen and hologram)
- Cyborg / Victor Stone (appears in computer screen and hologram)
- Knights of Rao
- Galaxor / Mitchel Davis
- Sun Rose / Esperanza Del Rey
- Static / Virgil Hawkins
- Royal Guard Patrol
- King / Cade Ferguson
- Queen / Sarah Falsworth
- Perry White (Earth 2) (first appearance)
Premise
Set between the Justice League: Knights of Rao episodes Shock and Awe and Enter the Knights, Terra and her teammates make preparations for their hunt against Tyranny by gathering proofs of the injustice the tyrants have caused. Using an inter-dimensional portal projected by Toymaster, they travel across a parallel reality of Earth where the Justice League was not yet formed and Batman and Superman still see each other as hostile foes. The young heroes work their way to convince the two rivals of each other’s heroism and expose the evil of Lex Luthor, who is threatening the safety of his own world with the secret alliance with the Apokolipian God Steppenwolf, who is waiting for Superman’s demise to trigger one of the three Motherboxes on Earth so that he can collect them all and inflict Apokolips' will to the planet.
Concept of Earth 2
The Earth 2 Reality, which Terra and her teammates explore for their objective, is inspired on the DC Cinematic Universe reality and is set in the period of the 2016 film Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice. The story is also given elements of the 2017 Justice League film.
Plot
Many decades ago, Apokolipian exile Steppenwolf attempted to conquer Earth with his army of Parademons and three special Apokolipian Motherboxes which would terraform Earth at the image of New Apokolips. His plan was foiled, however, when he and his forces were vanquished and defeated by an united army of humans, Amazons, Atlanteans, Olympian gods and Green Lanterns, who eventually drove the Apokolipians away from Earth and hid the three Motherboxes in three different areas around the world: one in the humans’ land, one in Themyscira and one in Atlantis.
In present day, Terra and her teammates are keeping the Joker, who was abducted by New Gaia sometime after Batman and the Justice League stopped a gang war between Bang Babies and the Royal Flush Gang[1], as a prisoner in their headquarters’ catacombs. The young heroes manage to ‘break the Joker’s Smile’ (which was his main weakness as they discovered previously[2]) and leave him physically and mentally paralytic. As the others prepare to send him back to Arkham Asylum as Delilah promised Batman[3], Terra overviews Toymaster’s latest work: using a Motherbox they acquired during the Element Shadow incident[4], Toymaster has built an inter-dimensional Teleportation Device which will allow them to travel across alternate realities of Time and Space. Seeing this as another brilliant idea which will help with the end of Tyranny, Terra and her teammates decide to travel in one of them to gather proofs of the injustice the tyrants have caused.
Their stop is in an parallel reality where the Justice League was not yet formed, Batman is active for one year and Superman is roaming free to protect the innocents, although in this reality, some humans, including Batman himself, feel that Superman may become a dangerous threat if he is not kept in check. Terra and her team infiltrate a Lexcorp Facility where they discover that Lex Luthor (here, a younger Luthor - yet as sadistic and corrupt as the one they know - and the son of the late founder of Lexcorp Foundations) is planning to manipulate the Man of Steel and the Dark Knight against each other to achieve his own corrupt goals, including faking his own "heroic deeds". Toymaster poses himself as a Lexcorp prodigy student and, aided by Wonder Woman (who is taking on the secret identity of Diana Prince and is also determined to expose Luthor’s crimes), passes every single Lexcorp file to him and his teammates before deleting the original ones within Lexcorp itself and leaving. The young heroes also learn of the existence of the three Motherboxes which Steppenwolf plans to gather and they come up with the objective to destroy them.
Using the files, the young heroes become determined to find the metahumans registered in Luthor’s files and convince them to join forces for the greater good. New Gaia encounters Victor Stone (who had suffered a freak lab accident involving an experiment with a Motherbox which had been scavenged by Lexcorp scientists led by Victor’s father Silas). Assuming that Victor’s father is also as corrupt as Luthor himself, Delilah exposes him for using his own son as a weapon before the Motherbox generates an Boom Tube which summons a hulking Parademon to attack the scientists. Victor makes his first use of his bionic components to fight the beast and, with help from Delilah, Alpha-Wolf and the alternate Flash (here a College student, but still a speed running hero like his Prime counterpart), defeats it and the four destroy the Motherbox. After Silas is arrested, Victor helps the young heroes by granting Delilah and Alpha-Wolf information of Luthor’s plans and, inspired by the facts about his Prime Earth counterpart’s story, decides to roam free as the new superhero Cyborg.
Omega Knight finds the second Motherbox on Atlantis (which is being ruled by the tyrannical king Orm Marius) before he encounters Arthur Curry, who is still working to learn of his origins on both the surface world and Atlantis. Right after an Parademon/Trench hybrid monster goes for a rampage looking after the triggered Motherbox, Omega Knight and Arthur defeat it and destroy the Motherbox before Omega Knight finds an holographic evidence of Orm's father Orvax having once used surface world's submarines to kill a squadron of Atlanteans to frame the surface dwellers, damaging Orm's reputation and stripping him from the Throne of Atlantis as Arthur is accepted as their new king. Terra finds the third and last Motherbox in Themyscira, where she encounters Queen Hippolyta, who is convinced of Tara’s innocence as well as the good on most men on “Man’s World” (including Superman and Batman) and allows her to destroy the Motherbox. Luthor’s bodyguard Mercy Graves, who was posing as one of the Amazons to keep the Motherbox in check, attempts to stop them, but the young heroine and the Amazon Queen defeat her and stop her from alerting Luthor before taking her as a prisoner in the catacombs of the island. Convinced that Steppenwolf's army is returning to Earth, Arthur, Princess Mera and Hyppolita assembe their Amazons and Atlanteans to help the humans stop the invasion.
As she is about to gather with her teammates, Terra encounters Batman, who admits his knowledge of hers and her teammates' origins as metahumans from another reality of Earth. Just as he questions about her Earth’s Superman, Terra convinces him that he is a hero and a good man with a family to protect while showing him a image of Clark Kent with his wife Lois Lane and his daughter Lara. Bruce is further convinced of Superman’s heroic nature when Terra reveals to him the identity of Clark’s adoptive mother Martha, who shares the same name of Bruce’s own deceased mother. Blue Lantern encounters Superman and also convinces him of Batman’s heroic nature when Collin shows him an image of his Earth’s Superman and Batman as allies alongside the Justice League against common threats. The two heroes meet up in the same place where Terra reunites with her friends and the two end their rivalry right before it begins.
Using one of Toymaster’s devices, Terra and her team, with help from Lois Lane, blackmail to the Lexcorp staff with a false realistic footage of Superman and Batman fighting each other to death, distracting Luthor enough for the young heroes and the assembled heroes to free the metahuman prisoners, including Terra’s younger counterpart (here an homeless orphan), from their containment cells. With help from the incoming Green Lantern, they transport the prisoners to another planet where they can live without persecution. Luthor rejoices over his nemesis’ supposed death until he realizes what was happening. Enraged, he triggers a Motherbox prototype to summon Steppenwolf himself. Luthor’s plan backfires when Steppenwolf betrays Luthor and destroys the facility before summoning a swarm of Parademons to attack the Earth, which are then held back by the assembled Amazons and Atlanteans. But with the original Motherboxes destroyed and Superman still alive to fight, Steppenwolf finds himself more vulnerable than he had been for decades and the united heroes defeat him. Overcome by fear, Steppenwolf is attacked by the Parademons and dragged back to Apokolips to face Darkseid himself.
In the aftermath, Luthor, having been exposed for all his crimes against his kind, is arrested in Arkham Asylum, but not before Omega Knight and Alpha Wolf scar him and hit him with a Tartarus Dart in his brain, which causes him to lose his hair and hallucinate of his father (in the image of the Joker), tormenting his mind for the rest of his life. With their objective complete, Terra and her teammates return to their dimension, where they watch in their monitors as the alternate heroes together become their Earth's own Justice League. The alternate Superman forms the Blue Lantern Corps alongside Lois Lane (who is now married with him), Barbara Gordon and Chato Santana. And the Amazons and Atlanteans have formed a new bond of peace with humans. While her teammates prepare to use the collected files to expose their Earth's tyrants, Tara also watches with a smile as her counterpart trains with Superman and Lois, who are heard to have adopted her as their own daughter, reminding her in tears of joy of all the hope her Earth's own Superman had brought to her.
Voice Actors
- Ashley Johnson as Terra / Tara Markov
- Eric Bauza as Toymaster / Hiro Okamura
- Mae Whitman as New Gaia / Delilah Raymond Snow
- Troy Baker as Earth 2 Batman / Bruce Wayne
- Roger Craig Smith as Earth 2 Superman / Clark Kent / Kal-El
- Lacey Chabert as Earth 2 Lois Lane
- Catherine Taber as Earth 2 Wonder Woman / Diana Prince / Diana of Themyscira
- Matthew Mercer as Earth 2 Aquaman / Arthur Curry, Earth 2 Chato Santana
- Robbie Daymond as Earth 2 Flash / Barry Allen
- Bumper Robinson as Earth 2 Cyborg / Victor Stone, Static / Virgil Hawkins
- Josh Keaton as Earth 2 Green Lantern / Hal Jordan, King of the Royal Guard Patrol / Cade Ferguson
- Yuri Lowenthal as Alpha-Wolf / Milo Chaves, Earth 2 Jimmy Olsen
- Colleen Villard as Blue Lantern / Collin Hill, Earth 2 Barbara Gordon
- Dante Basco as Omega Knight / Jason Burke
- Jessica DiCicco as Sun Rose / Esperanza Del Rey, Earth 2 Tara Markov
- Jennifer Hale as Earth 2 Queen Hippolyta, Earth 2 Princess Mera, Queen of the Royal Guard Patrol / Sarah Falsworth
- James Arnold Taylor as Galaxor / Mitchel Davis
- Misty Lee as Earth 2 Martha Kent
- Martin Jarvis as Earth 2 Alfred Pennyworth
- Mark Hamill as Earth 2 Steppenwolf, Lex Luthor Sr., the Joker
- Jason Spisak as Lex Luthor Jr.
- Dave Fennoy as Earth 2 Perry White, Earth 2 Silas Stone
- Nolan North as Earth 2 Orm Marius
- Gwendoline Yeo as Earth 2 Mercy Graves
- Dee Bradley Baker as Parademons, additional voices
Transcript
See also: Justice League/Teen Titans Chronicles: Dawn of Freedom/Transcript