Freedom Fighters: The Ray

A new DC comics animated movie. Featuring the Ray. Not a character non comics readers will know much about, save for his appearance in the tv show crossover Crisis on Earth X. Ray Terrill, the Ray, can harness light. So he can fly, shoot rays, and do a few others things with it.Comic book wise, the Ray has at times been part of a group called the Freedom Fighters. Who at times have been depicted as being on Earth X. A parallel universe where the Nazis won world war two, and they lead the resistance. This of course was all seen in Crisis on Earth X. Some of this movie takes place there. Some characters from that appear in this. Some are voiced by their usual voice artists. Some are not. If you think of this as being an Earth X story that takes place prior to those tv episodes, then it just about fits in with that continuity.Or you could just watch it and not worry about any of that at all. Whatever you prefer.After a battle on Earth X, the Ray finds himself on Earth one. Where the Ray Terrill of that world is a mild mannered young man who works for a housing charity. Has very conservative parents. And who tries hard to live up to the legacy of his late brother. He doesn't think he's as brave as his brother. Which is one of the reasons why he hasn't come out to his parents.But when this Ray gets the powers of his Earth X version, his life changes forever. Becoming a superhero opens many possibilities for him. But he has been tasked with a vital role that he must find a way to fulfil. Otherwise he might get a visit from Earth X....This is a twelve certificate, because it's quite violent at points and because it deals with adult issues such as the coming out. It handles that very well indeed. As it's all part of the character arc Ray has to go through. He has to find how to be brave in several different ways, so it's nicely paralleled. And Russell Tovey does make him such a likeable, down to earth, and affable character that you can't help but root for him. The greatest thing about his performance, doing an American accent as well, is that it takes a surprisingly short amount of time to find you forget it's a British actor doing this voice, and you just find you are totally used to the character.The animation is colourful and eye catching and really does catch the eye. And the whole thing does zip along at a very decent pace. You do have to get used to the aforementioned change in a few of the performers, but that is only a minor complaint.This just falls a little bit short of five star as, after an excellent first two acts, the third doesn't feel quite as focused, and the fourth does of course have to go the big action set piece finale route. But this is, all in all, a very watchable and entertaining superhero animation - which does as well give a few lesser known comic characters a brief chance in the spotlight - so it's well worth four stars.The dvd has the following language and subtitle options:Languages: English, Castilian Spanish.Subtitles: English, Castilian Spanish, Danish, French.The disc goes straight into the main menu when loaded, with no trailers or ads.Extras: no trailer for any other animations for once. Just an interview with Russell Tovey. Which is half clips half him talking and runs for just under a mere two minutes. But the talking bits are good.

Hats off to DC and Blue Ribbon for knocking all conventional comic book story telling out of the park!!! You want a gay superhero?? U got it. U want alternative universes where the Nazis rule and are lead by a Nazi ‘supergirl’ Boom!!! It’s here u want a clever story which covers male homosexuals (and as far as I know this could be the first ‘animated’ all male kiss and so the lesbians don’t feel left out there’s an all girl kiss!!) I’m gonna be honest here and just seeing ‘any’ form of bodily interaction within a animated context looks uncomfortable to me but what makes this particular entry into the extremely awesome DC animated movieverse is the way it all feels very natural and doesn’t detract from our main pratagonists character or indeed his like ability my only gripe with this movie is just the same as with every other DC animated movie and that is ‘The Flash’ (I’m already terrified as to what WB are going to do with ‘Flashpoint’ ) it’s as though there is this ‘problem’ with how to portray and place him, easily one of the greatest and intriguing ‘heroes’ of them all, please don’t continue to throw him into a movie and say ‘two lines’ in ‘Ezra Millers case do us all a favour and scrap him altogether!!!’ But I digress as a long standing DC follower ‘Freedom Fighters:The Ray’ is a completely unique and refreshing animated movie and well worth you’re money and time if you love all things DC if you prefer playing it safe and you like every movie to be a carbon copy of the other take a trip back over to the MCEU you will be way more at home over there hahaha!!!

A good animated movie set in the arrowverse and works as a prequel to the crossover titled Crisis on Earth-X, That tells the story of how Ray Terrill got his powers and traveled to Earth-X to help the resistance fight the he New Reichsmen on Earth-X.

this movie is barely about superhero action (5%), but over-infested with virtue signalling liberalism. Especially coming out of the closet, and the bashing of social conservatism.

great exploration of a obscure character

Interesting but a bit disjointed. Not as good as Young Justice, but then the bar has been set very high. 😎

Another one for the collection

I didn't not disĺike it as it puts the ray in context with other dvd hero's