Following the Titans Season 4 midseason exploring things like Nightwing, Starfire and Raven being trapped in the hidden town of Caul’s Folly and Superboy venturing into “uncomfortable” territory with exploring his Lex Luthor side, “Dude, Where’s My Gar?” focused exclusively on Ryan Potter’s Garfield Logan learning about The Red from Nyambi Nyambi’s Freedom Beast. In addition to being the source of Gar’s shapeshifting powers, this cosmic force also connects and pervades all animal life in the Titans universe and many others, and Gar eventually found a way to head into The Red itself to see, hear and even visit different universes. This resulted in an epic DC multiverse sequence that Potter had a hand in putting together, which included an appearance from comic book creator Grant Morrison.
I had the pleasure of speaking with Ryan Potter alongside actor Joivan Wade, as this episode also delivered a long-awaited crossover between Titans and Doom Patrol by finally bringing these versions of Beast Boy and Cyborg face to face. But in addition to his time on screen, Potter also co-crafted the story for “Dude, Where’s My Gar?” with executive producer Geoff Johns, and the actor explained how they figured out what Gar would see and hear while in The Red:
Geoff and I had figured out which ones those would be. So I fought for Swamp Thing and the animated version of Beast Boy, and then the rest were a surprise, and once I read them, I found them to be… they fit. It’s this last ten years of DC content giving you glimpses of fan favorites and glimpses of individuals that people might not be as familiar you’re with. And there’s that special thanks at the end of the episode to Grant Morrison because he kind of penned this idea first. So to go back to this idea of multiversal theory and really be able to explore that, you gotta give credit where credit is due. Yeah, we got to do it in our own way and not on the cinematic, big screen level, but I think it’s tongue in cheek enough that… did it even happen?
After going back in time and comforting his younger, pre-Beast Boy self, Gar got his first taste of the multiverse when he saw Grant Gustin’s Barry Allen from The CW’s The Flash racing along, but the speedster’s lightning knocked the Titan into Earth-2, which led to him meeting Brec Bassinger’s Stargirl, as had been teased last September. After a brief conversation with her, Gar headed back into The Red, where he saw visions of Swamp Thing from the same-named DC Universe series, Shazam from the DC Extended Universe and a TV set showing the Beast Boy from Teen Titans Go!, as well as hearing audio from the animated Harley Quinn series, Smallville, Superman: The Movie and the 1960s Batman TV series.
But perhaps the most unexpected appearance in the sequence was from Grant Morrison, who not only delved into DC Comics’ multiverse through their The Multiversity project from last decade, but also famously broke the fourth wall in their Animal Man series. Both of these things came into play in HBO Max’s Titans, as Morrison, who was shown drawn the map from Multiversity, looked straight at Beast Boy and said “I can see you. Do you see me?” When I asked for clarification from Potter about if he’d known ahead of time that Morrison would appear in the episode, or if that came as a surprise to him, he said this:
So all the appearances were planned ahead of time, but the ones that I didn’t know about were ones that Geoff had penned in and I discovered when I read the script. Whether or not we would get all of them, that was open to debate, and there was quite a few others in there. We get some audio clips of other ones that we might have seen, but there was so much content to put into that sequence, and it was already such a massive CGI moment that it’s just like, every second is money, so we needed to be very particular with which ones we showcased.
Whether the Grant Morrison shown in Titans is from “our” universe or just another reality analogous to it, at least we know the creator has the powerful ability to recognized when he’s being spied on from The Red. By the end of “Dude, Where’s My Gar?”, Beast Boy ended up in an overgrown version of the Doom Patrol’s mansion and was discovered by Cyborg moments after collapsing unconscious. Next week will see these two finally interacting, as well as Gar reuniting with Brendan Fraser’s Cliff Steele/Robotman and Matt Bomer’s Larry Trainor/Negative Man, both of whom he lived with before joining the Titans.
Alas, our time with these DC characters will soon come to an end, as both Titans and Doom Patrol will end after their fourth seasons. Still, you can keep up with former show using your HBO Max subscription, and keep your eyes peeled on our 2023 TV schedule to learn what the latter show will air its final episodes.
