'Titans' Season 2 just gave us the show's most heartbreaking moment - the tragically unfulfilled love story of Donna Troy and Aqualad
DC Universe's 'Titans' has had its fair share of love stories, from the lovely relationship between Dick Grayson (Brenton Thwaites) and Koriand'r/Starfire (Anna Diop) to the toxic yet loving one between Hank Hall/Hawk (Alan Ritchson) and Dawn Granger/Dove (Minka Kelly). But none of those compare to the absolute tragedy that is the romance between Garth/Aqualad (Drew Van Acker) and Donna Troy/Wonder Girl (Conor Leslie) and it all comes down to a bottle of orange fizz, a clownfish, and Deathstroke the Terminator (Esai Morales).
Episode 4 took us back to the time when the old Titans team was still together, kicking a** and taking names as a close-knit group, a family almost. Though she is undeniably attracted to the easygoing Atlantean hero, Donna refuses to let herself love Garth because she is preparing to leave for Themyscira so she can train to be a true warrior and fulfill her destiny as Wonder Girl.
While they are trying to track down a rogue metahuman, Garth brings Donna a bottle of orange fizz, the same brand they used to drink as children, reminding her of the time they both snuck out to see the fireworks on New Year's Eve when they were kids. They talk about how Donna went looking for a clownfish (hoping to "find Nemo") and miraculously found one even though Garth told her they're only found in tropical waters. It's only in that moment, years after the incident, that Donna realizes that the only reason she found the fish was because Garth brought it there for her.
Though the moment exposes a chink in her armor, Donna continues to struggle to choose between her destiny and her love, culminating in her sharing a steamy night with Garth just before leaving to catch a plane to Themyscira without saying goodbye. Garth confronts her just as she's about to board her flight, telling her that she doesn't have to choose between loving him and following her destiny because maybe they're both the same thing.
Taken out of context, it might seem like he's trying to get her to abandon her dreams but that's not what's happening here. What Garth wants for Donna, what he's always wanted since they were 12-years-old, is for her to choose her own path instead of living the life that's been picked out for her.
When Donna finally decides that she can't bear to leave Garth and her life in San Francisco behind, it's a beautiful moment; the start of a love story that's been waiting to happen for nearly a decade. Which is why it is all the more tragic that that is the moment when Deathstroke shoots and kills Aqualad.
Though we did guess from the trailers that Garth may have been killed in the past of the show, it's still heartbreaking that it had to happen under such circumstances. To think that he waited and fought for so long to get Donna to love him back, only for the assassin to come in and kill him before he ever got to have that love fully, makes the dark turn the Titans would take after his death perfectly understandable. Here was a man whose only desires were to live his life to the fullest, to be with the woman he loves, and to help the friends he considered his family. His death was untimely and unnecessary but at least we know that it won't go unavenged.
'Titans' Season 2 Episode 5 'Deathstroke' will air on DC Universe on October 4.
