Recap / Teen Titans S 3 E 9 The Beast Within

Adonis: What's the matter, wuss? Don't you know how to fight like a man?

Beast Boy: I'm not a man... I'm an animal!

Beast Boy gets drenched in chemicals while fighting the villain Adonis, after which his behavior starts to change dramatically. Not long after that, he and Raven disappear from the tower, leaving the remaining Titans alarmed and worried about their friends.

Tropes:

• Abhorrent Admirer: During the opening fight, Adonis—in the middle of his Manly Man act—pins Raven to the floor and tries to flirt with her, which she responds to by flinging furniture at him.
• Absurdly Spacious Sewer: The Titans encounter the Man-Beast and Raven in a sewer large enough to accomodate pitched combat, and the Man-Beast finds an even larger subterranean structure during the finale.
• Attack! Attack! Attack!: Robin, Cyborg, and Starfire fail to have any interaction with the Man-Beast that does not consist entirely of violence. Literally the first thing Robin does when encountering it in the sewer is to declare "Attack!" despite apparently risky circumstances like Raven's prone form between them.
• Aw, Look! They Really Do Love Each Other: Despite the obvious conclusion that Beast Boy's monstrous alter-ego was the one who attacked Raven, in keeping with their earlier almost-fight, it turns out that the Man-Beast was protecting her from another attacker and had taken her into its care in the aftermath. Raven follows up by comforting Beast Boy over his condition during the Golden Moment.
• Berserk Button:
  • Beast Boy has a lot of these pressed during the episode: the fight with Adonis, losing to Cyborg at their racing game, and finally his confrontation with Raven.
  • Beast Boy starts Suddenly Shouting when Starfire tells him they found Raven in his teeth during their encounter in the sewer.
• Bigfoot, Sasquatch, and Yeti: This episode features the most appearances of Beast Boy's sasquatch-like form, first when he begins he beatdown of Adonis in the opener, then while lifting weights in the gym, then again when he nearly attacks Raven.
• Bloodless Carnage: Raven is unconscious and explained to be in a "healing trance" during the scene in the medical bay to make up for the fact that she has absolutely no cuts or bruises following her ill-fated encounter with Beast Boy's inner monster. Without such evidence, it's clear nobody has any idea what's actually happened to her, but Robin's pretty sure it's Beast Boy's fault.
• Chemistry Can Do Anything: Beast Boy's Rage Breaking Point inadvertently results in him and Adonis getting a nice warm chemical bath. None of the Titans realize it might have any effects on Beast Boy until he takes a spin on the wild side.
• Clothing Damage: Transformation into the Man-Beast manages to destroy Beast Boy's uniform, something none of his other transformations do. Strangely, though, his clothes are fixed when he reverts back.
• Clueless Aesop: The episode clearly tries to deliver An Aesop on manliness, with Adonis pretending to be a Jerk Jock in his Mechanical Muscles-laden Powered Armor and Beast Boy marching through several masculine stereotypes as if he has a case of I Want to Be a Real Man. However, these elements are ultimately tossed aside by the mystery of Beast Boy's emerging Superpowered Evil Side and the apparent kidnapping of Raven.
  
  The episode tries to make up for underwriting the Aesop via Raven telling Beast Boy outright that "knowing when to let the Man-Beast out" is what makes him a man... which is completely irrelevant to what actually happened—Beast Boy only hulks out under extreme stress, didn't know about the transformation to start with, and even once he does has no control over it. Worse, the episode's climax is two Man-Beasts slugging it out until one eats dirt, which looks almost like a validation of Adonis' thuggish behavior.
• Compensating for Something: Adonis runs around in a tall, blood red suit of armor with a prominent Heroic Build and Super-Strength and is at pains to show how manly he is. Naturally, his true form without the armor is actually a shrimpy weakling.
• Conflict Ball: The second act of the episode is largely marred by the Titans and Beast Boy being at each others throats over Beast Boy possibly attacking Raven, the Titans acting much more confrontational than usual, and Beast Boy responding in kind. Justified on both fronts, as the Titans are afraid their friend seriously hurt another of their friends and was a danger to himself and others, while Beast Boy was suffering side affects from his DNA being affected by the chemicals he was dosed in and unable to convey his problems properly.
• Contrived Coincidence: The events of the episode are triggered because the Titans and Adonis just so happen to be fighting at an animal research facility of some kind that keeps large vats of mutagenic chemicals... for some reason.
• Convicted by Public Opinion: Zigzagged. After the first fight with the Man-Beast, Cyborg and Starfire seem fairly convinced that Beast Boy's Superpowered Evil Side is responsible for attacking Raven, but Robin behaves as if there's actually a chance Beast Boy's innocent. Unfortunately, his attempt to find proof is needlessly confrontational and borderline hostile.
• Darker and Edgier: For an episode focusing on Beast Boy, this episode is much darker than the usual flair of Beast Boy centric episodes and can even be considered one of the darkest and most serious episodes in the entire series. The general atmosphere of this episode feels a lot more dark and serious too along with the background music sometimes having a lot more creepy and dark ambience. And outside of the beginning fight with Adonis, there's not that much comedy in this episode either.
• David vs. Goliath: Downplayed. The second Man-Beast enjoys a few inches of height advantage over Beast Boy's version.
• Deus ex Machina: Downplayed with the second Man-Beast, which is never directly foreshadowed^note The Foreshadowing given by Beast Boy's monstrous alter ego only sets up The Reveal, which is itself Five-Second Foreshadowing and indeed contradicts Cyborg's explanation of the first Man-Beast.
• Does This Remind You of Anything?:
  • This episode very clearly draws on the idea of the werewolf, even if the Man-Beast isn't all that conventional.
  • Beast Boy's mood swings, bodily changes, and new stereotypically masculine behaviors bring puberty to mind.
• Dude, Where's My Respect?: Deconstructed. It's clearly shown during the fight against Adonis that Beast Boy has deep anger issues because of the lack of appreciation from the other Titans, and during the fight all of his repressed anger comes out and he totally curb stomps Adonis, much to the shock of the other Titans. His anger only gets worse until he (apparantly) puts Raven into a coma.
• Enhanced Interrogation Techniques: During his interrogation-cum-trial of Beast Boy, Robin threatens that Beast Boy's failure to provide his own explanation of events would automatically result in jail, and repeatedly increases Beast Boy's stress in his attempt to get an explanation. This immense pile of stress only causes the Man-Beast to emerge a second time.
• Fantastic Light Source: While Robin, Cyborg and Starfire tries searching for Raven and Beast Boy in the sewers, Robin and Cyborg uses torchlights. Star on the other hand uses a starbolt.
• Filler: The ninth episode of the third season was originally supposed to be Bunny Raven, which was already mostly produced when they decided to add a musical number. This episode was created at the last minute to fill the gap after the creators pushed Bunny Raven back.
• Five-Second Foreshadowing: After the second appearance of the Man-Beast ends with it departing the tower and the boys giving chase, Raven awakes and delivers The Reveal to Starfire—that Beast Boy was protecting her.
  Starfire: From what?
• Foreshadowing: When the Titans confront the Man-Beast in the sewer, they're apparently too shocked by the sight of it carrying Raven to notice the way it gently lays her down. The second time it appears, they likewise misinterpret its intentions when it goes over to examine Raven's prone body in concern. The Man-Beast was actually protecting Raven, who was attacked by something else. Indeed, once it sniffs Raven and picks up the scent of the other Man-Beast it makes no more attempt to approach her, instead fleeing to track down the one who hurt her.
• Get Out!: Not said word for word, but Robin tells him that if he wants to act out the way he is, then to do it away from them.
  Beast Boy: Look, this is who I am now, you guys don't like it? Tough!
  Robin: Fine, if this is how you wanna act, do it somewhere else, none of us are interested!
• Golden Moment: Raven delivers an aesop about knowing when to let the Man-Beast out during the final scene with Beast Boy, which he follows up with a Moment Killer about adopting a manlier name.
• Hair-Trigger Temper: Beast Boy develops this as a result of the chemical exposure.
• Hypocritical Humor: Raven has the audacity to ask if Beast Boy had "any good Freak Outs lately" after he hits a Rage Breaking Point in the show's opening scene.
• "I Know You're in There Somewhere" Fight: At one point Cyborg tries to talk the Man-Beast down when he has him at cannon-point, and it seems to work for a second when its eyes droop and it lets out a little whine. Unfortunately, Robin's arrival spooked it into taking off once again.
• I Want to Be a Real Man: Deconstructed with Adonis, who mistakenly latched on to a Jerk Jock stereotype as his masculine ideal. Zigzagged with Beast Boy, who spends the next day behaving in similarly stereotypical ways, but that's because he's secretly developing a Superpowered Evil Side.
• Idiot Ball: Beast Boy gets doused in chemicals and nobody thinks to examine what kind of chemicals they are, run any tests, or take any safety measures until after he's turned into a monster.
  • When the Titans first encounter the Man-Beast in the sewer, Robin immediately declares an attack once the monster puts Raven down; he does this while Raven is still between them and in harm's way.
• Involuntary Shapeshifting: Beast Boy is positively grief-stricken at the thought he might have turned into a monster and hurt Raven.
• Inspector Javert: Robin during the medical ward interrogation; it's clear he wants Beast Boy and Raven to be okay, but must "assume the worst" if Beast Boy can't give him any information, and deliberately piles stress on Beast Boy in the hopes of getting that information.
• It's Personal: Adonis' Man-Beast form breaks into the tower to attack Beast Boy (presumably in revenge for getting his butt handed to him the night before) and Raven accidentally ends up in the way when she investigates the commotion.
• Jerkass Ball: Beast Boy following the fight with Adonis, being variously rude, surly, hyper-sensitive, and generally loutish in every encounter he has with another Titan. Vaguely justified, despite his claim that "this is who I am now", by the fact that his change in personality is tied into his chemical exposure and transformation into the Man-Beast.
• Malignant Plot Tumor: Beast Boy having a Freak Out over losing a game to Cyborg is right about where the episode stops being about Beast Boy possibly trying to be a "real man" like Adonis and starts being about how his chemical exposure is giving him a new Superpowered Evil Side.
• Misplaced Retribution: Beast Boy blowing up at Raven is this. While it's true that Raven often belittles him, she does that to all of her friends, not just him, and nobody had a massive issue with it before, not even Beast Boy. Even then, that particular instance was caused by Raven bumping into him by accident while reading and apologizing for it, only taking back the apology because Beast Boy rudely told her to watch where she's going. It didn't help matters that BB was looking ahead and could have moved out of the way, but chose not to.
• Moment Killer: Beast Boy accidentally ruins a Golden Moment between himself and Raven, who lampshades it with a sigh.
• Monster Delay: The episode holds off from revealing the existence of the second Man-Beast until Raven recovers, with only the sparsest Foreshadowing indicating that Raven's injuries weren't caused by Beast Boy.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Robin accidentally causes the second reappearance of the Man-Beast by antagonizing Beast Boy during the interrogation.
• No Name Given: The episode never gives Beast Boy's monstrous new form a real name, but the TV Guide refers to it as the Man-Beast.
• The Not-Love Interest: Raven for Beast Boy—the sole Personality Remnant of Beast Boy's when in Man-Beast form is the desire to protect her (he doesn't appear to even recognize the other Titans), and Raven is the one who comes to comfort Beast Boy during the denouement.
• Not-So-Harmless Villain: As it turns out, it was Adonis, not Beast Boy, who assaulted and hurt Raven, having fallen victim to the same chemical in the beginning.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business:
  • Adonis' taunts push Beast Boy past his Rage Breaking Point, provoking Beast Boy to initiate a Curb-Stomp Battle. Beast Boy remains uncharacteristically curt and surly when talking to Raven afterwards.
  • Zigzagged the next day, when Beast Boy continues to act strangely, but nobody seems to recognize the behavior as symptomatic of deeper issues.
• Our Werebeasts Are Different: This episode features the premiere of the Man-Beast, Beast Boy's Superpowered Evil Side, which is fast, furry, and ferocious.
• Pay Evil unto Evil: Downplayed and zigzagged. Robin's two major attempts to deal with Beast Boy's issues are harsh and in one particular instance downright cruel, but he also thinks Beast Boy might just be innocent.
• Perp Sweating: Inverted with Robin's interrogation of Beast Boy: rather than getting Beast Boy to confess to his guilt, Robin's trying to find proof of his innocence. This backfires rather spectacularly.
• Personality Remnant:
  • The Man-Beast doesn't exhibit any conscious thought, but it does manage to recognize and relate to one of the Titans—specifically, it cares for Raven and desires her well-being.
  • The second Man-Beast has another example, apparently seeking the first out for a rematch for the Curb-Stomp Battle Beast Boy gave Adonis, which was the fight Raven was caught up in.
• Plot Hole:
  • The facility where Adonis and the Titans fight at the start of the episode, what the vats of chemicals inside are, and why anyone is even there in the first place are never detailed.
  • The nature of the Man-Beast (and really, Beast Boy's problem in general) is never really explained. The episode originally suggests it's a side-effect of the chemical bath on Beast Boy's Unstable Genetic Code... and then throws that explanation right out the window by showing Adonis can also become a Man-Beast... and turns right back around when the episode's denouement behaves as if the "something primal" is unique to Beast Boy.
• Power Incontinence: After his chemical bath, Beast Boy spends an extended amount of time in the gym working out... and spontaneously shifts, mid-routine, into animals, that rampage around the room, hurling barbells through walls and tearing punching bags to shreds. Absolutely no one notices and it's unclear whether Beast Boy himself knows.
• Rage Breaking Point: Beast Boy hits his when Adonis asks if he knows "how to fight like a man".
  Raven: Have any good freak-outs lately?
  Beast Boy: I just got sick of being pushed around.
• Real Men Eat Meat: Invoked by Beast Boy the morning after the fight with Adonis, stealing Robin's ham and egg breakfast.
• Rebus Bubble: One of the first things that Beast Boy does after the fight with Adonis is to steal Robin's breakfast. It takes Robin a few moments to process this, as "Ham plus Eggs equals Beast Boy" does not compute.
• The Resenter: Under the effects of the chemical, Beast Boy goes on a private and destructive tirade in his room, primarily about Raven's historically poor treatment of him, which ultimately triggers his Superpowered Evil Side.
• The Reveal: Raven finally awakens from her healing trance after the Man-Beast escapes from the tower during its second appearance and explains to Starfire that the Man-Beast didn't hurt her but was protecting her.
• Rewatch Bonus: On a repeat viewing it becomes more apparent that Beast Boy's Man-Beast was trying to protect Raven from Adonis' Man-Beast, particularly with the scene in the infirmary, where once it sniffs her and picks up Adonis' scent it makes no further moves to approach her.
• Rule of Symbolism: Beast Boy repeatedly transforms into his less often seen Sasquatch form prior to his first transformation into the Man-Beast, all while acting more and more like a jerk. This represents him slowly giving in to his more aggressive, monstrous impulses before finally transforming into a monster for real.
• Shout-Out: Beast Boy and Adonis's Man-Beast forms greatly resemble Blanka, being feral, muscular monsters with long hair and, in the former's case, green fur. BB even does a Rolling Attack akin to Blanka's at one point.
• Slap-Slap-Kiss: Downplayed. Beast Boy and Raven reach an unusually high pitch of animosity in this episode (mostly due to Beast Boy being Not Himself following his chemical bath), but once the Man-Beast actually manifests, its chief concern is to protect Raven from harm.
• Slow Transformation: Zigzagged. Beast Boy being a shapeshifter, his slow transformation into the Man-Beast is displayed not by a gradual transformation, but by periodic bursts of increasingly violent animalistic behavior over the course of the day.
• Subtext: Inverted — this episode adds subtext to other episodes by making it clear that Beast Boy is well aware of Raven's demeaning behavior towards him, even if it takes the chemical exposure to bring his acknowledgment of it to the surface. On its own, the episode is pretty blatant about the conflict and what the characters are thinking.
• Superpowered Evil Side: Downplayed. The Man-Beast never quite reaches "pure evil" status, but is a purely animalistic being with no apparent conscious thought. It can and will attack whatever threatens it, but it also obviously cares about Raven. The second Man-Beast, existing in Adonis, is closer to a full example.
• There Are No Therapists: Beast Boy has a sudden onset of intense aggression, loutish behavior, and abandons his die-hard "vegetarianism". After attacking Cyborg and on the brink of a superpowered fight with Raven, the Titans confront him about how he's Taken A Level In Jerkass and all he has to say for them to take it at face-value is "This is who I am, now." Robin responds by telling him to isolate himself because they don't want to deal with his attitude problem.
• This Is Unforgivable!: Downplayed. Beast Boy nearly attacking Raven in the hallway is the last straw for the remaining Titans before they confront him as a group.
• Visual Pun: Beast Boy turns into an overly macho and aggressive jerk because he got doused in toxic chemicals. It's toxic masculinity.
• Voodoo Shark: The episode reveals that Raven was attacked by a second Man-Beast, but doesn't explain how the second is even possible given that the only explanation for the first one is that it's the result of the chemical bath on Beast Boy's unique Unstable Genetic Code.
• What the Hell, Hero?:
  • The Titans take issue with Beast Boy's misbehavior the day after the fight and Raven jabs at him over his Freak Out during the fight itself.
  • Beast Boy gives one to the team (mostly Raven) for always underestimating him and never giving him any respect.