- Title: Batman Beyond – Meltdown
- wiki: link
Today’s Throwback Tuesday post takes us back to the future for another episode of Batman Beyond. The show made a name for itself with a variety of new or redesigned villains, but in “Meltdown” Batman Beyond pulls in a fan favorite from Batman: The Animated Series. With Derek Powers‘ (Sherman Howard) radiaion sickness growing less and less manageable, he turns to a new scientist who believes she can successfully transfer her boss’ brain to a new body without his affliction. Prior to putting himself on the line, however, the need a volunteer for the experimental procedure. Enter Victor Fries (Michael Ansara).
After spending decades in the deep freeze as nothing more than a head, Fries is given new life by Dr. Stephanie Blake (Linda Hamilton). At first everything works out better than expected. The procedure is successful and Victor dedicates his new life to making up for that of his own. He even brushes off a murder attempt from one of his old victims. However, when his new body begins breaking down and his sickness returns, Lake and Powers decide to kill off the former super-villain in order to dissect his body and find out where things went wrong. Unfortunately for them, Fries escapes. After escaping, Mr. Freeze makes a trip to one of his old lairs and returns with a vengeance.
“Meltdown” highlights some diffrences between Terry (Will Friedle) and Bruce (Kevin Conroy) as the new Batman is willing to give Fries the benefit of the doubt. Eventually Batman is called into action as Victor attacks Wayne-Powers (whose attempt to murder their creation never comes to light). The attack causes Powers to go into full radiation mode as Blight is born, although he’ll skulk off and keep his secret for awhile longer. As for Victor, the villain apparently meets an icy end as the tragic character goes out the only way he knows how.
