Titans Season 4 has revolved around the young superhero team battling the magical Mother Mayhem and her sinister cult while keeping person-of-interest Sebastian Sanger out of her grasp. This extended game of keep-away hits its climax as the season nears its halfway point with the season's fifth episode, "Inside Man," as Mayhem launches her most insidious strategy to seize Sebastian yet. Though there are some solid character moments in the episode, Titans Season 4 is beginning to noticeably lose its momentum as it positions its major players for the next act of the story.

In the aftermath of their harrowing battle against Mayhem and her small army of zombies, the Titans regroup in the safety of S.T.A.R. Labs back in Metropolis, though Conner Kent remains grievously injured from the previous battle. Unbeknownst to his teammates, Conner's wounds run much more than skin deep, and the Titans find themselves on the defensive within their own safe house. With nowhere to hide, the Titans will have to find a way to keep Sebastian away from Mayhem while figuring out a way to restore one of their own back to health and free of the cult's far-reaching control.

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This really is a standout episode for Joshua Orpin and Anna Diop, as Conner and Kory Anders each face their own challenges while the pressure escalates. Orpin is able to seamlessly alternate between Conner pretending to be a victim in an effort to lower his teammates' guard or back to deviously possessed in the span of a single moment, keeping the rest of the Titans guessing. Similarly, Diop gets to continue Kory's handling of her imminent destiny and how it's tied to the potential threat that Sebastian presents, faced with her own foretold tragedy and superhero responsibility and delivering on that expected determination.

Beyond the beginning and end of the episode, there just isn't a whole lot of plot progression that really occurs throughout "Inside Man." There are some cool moments with Ryan Potter's Gar Logan and Jay Lycurgo's Tim Drake that feel like genuinely earned, level-up moments for their respective characters, but much of the episode has the Titans sitting around, waiting for the other shoe to inevitably drop. This is underscored by the fact that it's the first episode in the season without any major action set pieces to speak of, the occasional brief scuffles notwithstanding.

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"Inside Man" feels like a necessary episode to get its characters to their next logical step for the story, but one can't help but feel that these arcs didn't have to be expanded out into an entire episode. The biggest development, involving Mayhem possessing one of the strongest Titans of them all, is largely -- and it could be argued literally -- tabled rather than being given more room to build suspense and menace. Instead, a lot of the characters find themselves seemingly waiting for the next big story beat, and that tedium carries over to the audience.

Though every episode of Titans certainly doesn't need a big action sequence or major plot payoff, a healthy sense of progression helps justify its place in the wider story. "Inside Man" has a promising opening and closes out on an important, if somewhat perfunctory, note but spins its wheels for much of its runtime. Given its conclusion, Titans Season 4 is poised to escalate its paranormal proceedings and superhero stakes considerably, and this development can hopefully reinvigorate the overarching story's sense of momentum.

Developed for television by Akiva Goldsman, Geoff Johns, and Greg Berlanti, Titans releases new episodes Thursdays on HBO Max.