Cartoon Network's cancellation of Young Justice in 2013 was a tough pill to swallow. For two seasons, audiences grew more and more enamored of the covert ops team led by the likes of Nightwing and Aqualad as they basically acted as a mini Justice League, taking on missions the main League couldn't.

Even after it was canceled, the show's popularity never dwindled, and a new home was eventually announced on the DC Universe streaming service. Now, we're literally hours away from the debut of Young Justice: Outsiders, which will pick up where "Invasion" left off, sending both new and familiar faces on a mission to derail a massive metahuman trafficking scheme. But before we get into the new state of the universe in the wake of the dissolution of the Light/Reach coalition, we need to look back to where last season left us.

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THE BIG INFILTRATION

While the expanded Young Justice squad is now operating in tandem with the League, directly out of the Watchtower, Season 3 finds Nightwing, Artemis, Superboy and the new king of Atlantis, Aqualad, clad in black and running secret missions in what appears to be a new spin on the Outsiders. While the overall team is new, their mission actually calls back to the Season 2 undercover job Aqualad and Artemis pulled off, engineered by Nightwing.

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Dick Grayson had Aqualad fake a turn into a villain, even going so far as to trick the team into thinking he killed Artemis. This allowed the Atlantean to officially ascend the ranks in the Light as the second-in-command to his father, Black Manta, granting Dick Grayson inside access to their schemes. To top it off, thanks to Zatanna's glamour charm, Artemis went from blonde archer to the black-haired assassin known as Tigress, acting as Aqualad's main muscle, so Dick Grayson could double up on his eyes and ears on the inside. It wasn't a move everyone approved of, but eventually the goal was accomplished.

GONE IN A FLASH

In the Season 2 finale, "Endgame," Black Beetle tried to destroy the Earth with magnetic field disruptors, which aimed to cause in the entire planet crumbling from the inside out. Divided into 20 teams of two, and aided by Lex Luthor's technology, the Young Justice squad was able to disarm all devices, with the exception of one that would eventually cost them the life of an original member.

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As a disruptor in the Arctic went into its final, world-destroying stage, Barry and Bart Allen raced against it to siphon its energy out. Wally West joined the race to help, but, as he was the slowest of the Flashes, most of the energy was diverted into him and he disintegrated. With Wally dead, and Bart Allen honoring him by becoming the new Kid Flash, Artemis officially became Tigress to help cope with the past. Outsiders will show how they, and other heroes, have moved on in Wally's absence.

A DEAL WITH THE DEVIL

young-justice-vandal-savage-darkseid

One of the reasons Young Justice fans clamored for a third season was because of how Season 2 ended. After hijacking Mongol's Warworld (a gigantic warship not unlike the Death Star), Vandal Savage left his villainous coalition behind and piloted the satellite across the cosmos. He even taunted the League after they were freed for war crimes on Rimbor, making a threat against any alien planet that wanted to attack Earth.

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The season's final scene, though, threw audiences for a loop as we saw Savage arriving on Apokolips, strolling past the likes of Desaad and Godfrey and engaging in a handshake with Darkseid. No words were spoken, but seeing these two allying is truly scary. From what Outsiders hints at so far, Savage is trafficking metahumans and building the galaxy's most deadly army, with Darkseid's Parademons and Furies ready to join them as the new conquerors of the cosmos.

NEXT PAGE: Don't Expect the Light to Stay Out For Very Long

THE LIGHT, DIMMED

While Season 3 has teased Lex, Ra's al Ghul and other members of the Light finding themselves in cahoots once more, the last season left the evil society badly fractured. In the late stages, Aqualad revealed that the Light and Reach were playing each other for control of Earth, effectively ending their evil alliance. This led to Lex turning on his crew and helping the heroes save the world.

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Miss Martian had impersonated Deathstroke in that exchange, so it's clear that Nightwing's team had numerous contingency plans in place to take the group down. However, when the dust settled, it was revealed that LexCorp is still putting the Reach's drink, one designed to weaponize humans into metahumans, on the market. With the Reach taken to Oa for the Guardians to judge, it remains to be seen how Queen Bee, Psimon, Grodd and company continue shaping the Light as a threat, a threat more dangerous than ever considering Lex was lined up to take on the role of Secretary General of the United Nations.

MEGAN'S POWER TRIP

Young Justice Miss Martian

In Season 2, fans were shocked to see Superboy and Miss Martian not coupled up after the previous season spent a lot of time developing their relationship. It was actually quite jarring watching her with Lagoon Boy, and the show made it a point to keep the details of the break-up (like who instigated it, and why) secret for some time.

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Eventually, we found out it was because Megan had been abusing her telepathic abilities when it came to extracting information from the psyches of villains. She even unsuccessfully tried to manipulate Superboy's memory to save their relationship, a move which ultimately drove him to leave her. Unconcerned and arrogant, she'd end up fighting Aqualad and, not knowing his undercover role, left him comatose. She wised up as Season 2 ended and reconciled with Superboy, which has left fans wondering about their current status.

BART'S FUTURE IS STILL CANCELED

In Episode 6, "Bloodlines," we were introduced to Bart Allen (Impulse) as he traveled from the future in 2056. There, Nathaniel Tryon (Neutron) helped send Bart back to the present where his mission was to stop his grandfather Barry from dying in a blast when Neutron -- a villain in that time -- detonated due to his unstable explosive powers.

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Bart achieved his mission, secretly knowing it'd be a one-way trip and he'd be trapped in the past. However, while the future Neutron saw his scars healed, Mount Justice -- and the world they knew in general -- remained a post-apocalyptic wasteland. This indicates Bart didn't quite stop the disaster he was meant to, which means there'll be a lot of scrutiny on him in his new role as Kid Flash as he tries to uncover the actual catalyst that destroys the future.

Young Justice: Outsiders premieres Jan. 4 on DC Universe.