After Batman foils Inque's latest act of industrial sabotage, her angered employer injures her with a particle destabilizer. Injured and needing a place to hide, Inque goes to the one person she feels she can trust: Deanna Clay, her daughter.
Tropes:
- Actor Allusion:
- Bait-and-Switch Comment: Dana comments that she's not worried that Terry blew off another date because she knows "what's really going on." While it's hinted that she's learned Terry's Secret Identity, Max reveals that she actually meant that, from her point of view, Terry now sees Bruce as Parental Substitute; Terry admits she's not wrong.
- Body Horror: When Inque learns too late that the stabilizer also contained a solution that would evaporate her body, it's not exactly pretty watching her gradually fizzle out and die.
- Call-Back: The ending sequence with Deanna paranoid about Inque's return to enact revenge for what Deanna did to her mother for the sake of getting more money, is similar to what happened with Mockridge after surviving his encounter with The Riddler in the old series.
- Calling the Old Man Out: Deanna's not impressed with the way Inque treated her. See Eviler than Thou.
- Continuity Nod: Terry recalls how it was his fault Inque got into the Batcave and Bruce nearly died saving Terry from her.
- Corrupt Corporate Executive: Mr. Winchell, the businessman who hired Inque to do the dirty job she's doing at the beginning of the episode.
- Even Evil Has Standards: Inque is appalled that after everything she ever gave her daughter, Deanna would turn out so greedy that she would go out of her way to kill her own mother for money.
- Eviler than Thou: Inque underestimates just how greedy her daughter is. This bites her in the end.
Deanna: You never gave me anything except money, Mother. How did you expect me to turn out?
- Freudian Excuse: As Deanna points out to Inque, a life of getting money for nothing from an absentee mom is only going to make her care more about money than family.
- Give Him a Normal Life: The episode reveals that, before her mutation, Inque gave birth to a daughter she subsequently gave up for adoption. When the two reunite, Inque explains that she had grown up poor and let herself become Inque all for the money, and she wanted to give her daughter an easier life with normal parents and a large trust fund. When Inque reveals just how much money she has, however, her daughter tries to kill her in order to get control of her bank accounts. She points out that Inque never gave her anything except money, so why is Inque surprised that she is just taking more of it?
- Greedy Jew: Mr. Winchell, who is voiced by Jewish-American character actor Peter Mark Richman and is a Corrupt Corporate Executive.
- History Repeats: Like in "Ascension", this episode features a villain being double-crossed by their own offspring; said offspring justifying this by how the villain treated them, and Batman telling the offspring not to be sure the villain is really dead.
- Ink-Suit Actor: Mr. Winchell bares a great resemblance to his voice actor and a Long Runner of a veteran Villain of the Week character actor Peter Mark Richman, right down to the lip design.
- Insurance Fraud: Inque's latest act of industrial sabotage is this.
- It's Personal: Terry is determined to stop Inque due to his prior failures against her.
- Meaningful Name: The credit counselor whose number Deanna gets is Lester Dett.
- Meaningless Villain Victory: Deanna betrays her mother, seemingly succeeds in killing her, and acquires all the money from her bank account...only for Batman to reveal to her they Never Found the Body. The girl's now living in constant fear of a shapeshifting assassin that could be anything and anywhere.
- Never Found the Body: At the end of the episode, Terry drops by Deanna's place to warn her of this.
Batman: After the police got the remains of Inque, they looked back later and saw the pieces disappeared.
Deanna: What do I care? She's dead.
Batman: She's been dead before.
- Parental Substitute:
Terry: So how mad was Dana that I blew off our date?
Max: Actually, she wasn't mad at all. Since she understands the "special nature" of your job.
Terry: What?! She found out?!
Max: Relax. She was talking about your relationship with Mr. Wayne. She says that with your dad being gone, it was important for you to have a positive father figure. Bruce Wayne. Some father figure.
Terry: [smiles] Maybe she's not so far off.
- Paranoia Fuel: An In-Universe example. After Deanna seemingly kills Inque and strikes it rich with Inque's assets, Batman informs her that the sample of Inque that the police took for evidence is gone. After Batman departs, Deanna looks around at the shadows of the plants, at the water, and the last scene is her fearfully clutching her knees as an eye forms out of the shadows. Whether this is really happening or just a representation of Deanna's fearful imagination is left as an exercise for the viewer, but considering Inque returns and Deanna doesn't...
- Shock and Awe: After previous confrontations with Inque, Terry and Bruce installed electroshock circuitry into the Batsuit to help ward her off.
- This Is Something He's Got to Do Himself: Terry keeps Bruce out of the loop because he doesn't want him to be in harm's way, as he was during both previous confrontations with Inque.
- What Happened to the Mouse?: Inque returns but the viewers are never told if she exacts any sort of revenge on Deanna. (At least, not in the animated series. In the comics, Inque holds no grudge against her daughter and even still does what she can to help her from the shadows.)
- Written-In Absence: Bruce is said to be out of town.
- You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: The businessman who hired Inque to do her latest act of industrial sabotage tries to kill her instead of paying her.
