Teen Titans #29

Whoa, it's been a while since I've been here! I gotta say, I have no idea how I used to post as much as I did all those years ago on the old blog, I mean hell, I was posting like 5 times a night, several reviews a day! Now I can barely scrape up one review a month! Ah well, I'm here now, and look, I've brought a review with me. Anyway, we continue onward with the Teen Titans reviews. This time we get Geoff Johns's take on... Red Hood. Or Jason Todd. Or my boy JT's favorite comic book character. Any of those names will work. Personally, I like Jason a lot as a character, and am terrified to see what John's does with him considering some of the things he did with other favorites of mine in this series... Well, let's check it out.

Teen Titans #29(December 2005):

Summary: Donna Troy is randomly back and asking for Cyborg to help her out on some mission she was doing. Now, considering how important Donna's death was in destroying Young Justice, and how often Johns went back to it early on in this series, you'd think we'd get a little blurb telling us how she came back, or some characters discussing it or something... Instead? Nothing at all... Before Cyborg can head off, Red Hood knocks Cyborg and Beast Boy out of commission. He then drugs Raven and heads to Robin's room. Hood attacks Robin because... From what I gather, Hood wants to test Robin? Probably? The two brawl all over Titans Tower with Hood recounting Robin's history...

So Bruce keeps tabs on potentially thousands of people who may be looking into Batman's secret identity?  That's excessive, but then again, maybe Bruce really does...

Really? We get shit on how Donna came back, but get Tim's entire frigging history?! Frigging Geoff Johns... Also, Zeus is Wonder Girl's father now because reasons. The Robin battle royal ends in the dead Titans statue room, where Hood bemoans the fact that he didn't get a statue... He kind of has a point. I mean, I don't remember him being on the team for more than a handful of issues, but still, you'd think Dick would have asked for one. After complaining, Hood beats Robin unconscious, tags the wall(“Robin #2 was here, yo!”), and leaves. With that, the Titans fawn over Timmy when they find him, and Hood wonders how his life would have been if he had friends like Robin #3 had. This issue ends with Brother Blood returning.

Thoughts: Eh, it wasn't that bad at all. I was expecting horrifyingly awful, so I have to say, I was pleasantly surprised. Sure, there were a few things that were odd, such as Jason's DNA allowing him into a rebuilt Titans Tower, even though he would have still been dead when they had it rebuilt. You'd think Cyborg would have cleared out some old files from the Tower's database, but I guess not. I also don't get how Hood knew that every other Titan would be out of the way except for Tim. I know he was trained by Bats and all, but still. Speaking of odd, Jason's outfit here would fit that bill...

Those tights tho...

Oh, and the fact that Starfire and Cyborg were just outing people's real names left and right REALLY bugged me... I mean, they're talking about Jason Todd and calling Tim, “Tim” right in front of Mal and Bumblebee!

Hey everybody, let's talk in front of strangers using real names!

Also, why Mal is in this I have NO idea, other than Johns trying to show how much Titans history he knew... Mal is a character that should be forgotten, the Titans comics he was in are beyond godawful... Huh, this “Thoughts” section came out a lot more negatively than I thought it would, considering the fact that this wasn't a bad comic... I guess if nothing else, that just proves that I like to bitch for no good reason.

Teen Titans #28

So this is the last issue of my two issue break from the idiocy of Geoff Johns. Unfortunately, Gail Simone didn't seem to bring her A game(or even B or C game...) to this two part story. On the plus side, Rob Liefeld is still doing the art, so even if the story sucks again, I'll be able to laugh at the artwork.

Holy shit, lay of the roids, Bart!

Teen Titans #28(November 2005):

Summary: Okay, last issue Kestrel stole Raven's soul and ran off to the Chaos Realm.

I'd run off too if this jacked son of a bitch was coming after me!

This issue begins with one of those life lessons, super-villains are kind of stupid, as we see that Kestrel left a way for the Titans to follow him to Chaos Land. Upon sensing their arrival, Kestrel sends his sidekicks to attack the Titans. While that fight is going on, Robin smells a distraction, separates from the group, and finds Kestrel. The two fight, but Robin is overmatched and ends up defeated.

Good god is that the scariest looking Robin I've ever seen...  It'll haunt my dreams from this day forward...

By this time the Titans have defeated the jailbait sisters and attack Kestrel in force. They manage to defeat Kestrel, but he tells them that short of death, he'd just come back and attack the Titans and their loved ones due to him being evil. However, the bitter hammer of convenience strikes, when one of Kestrel's sidekicks turns on him and guts him with his own claws, presumably killing him. With that, the Titans collect Raven's soul and head home.

Thoughts: This was a comic book that happened. That's about all I got here... It wasn't a good story, it was kind of bad, but at least it wasn't insulting. I don't really get why Hawk and Dove were involved at all, especially since they added nothing to any aspect of this issue.

Hey look, it's that kick I mentioned in the last post!

Hell, you'd think Hawk would have at least killed Kestrel, but no, it was Random Villain #1 who did the deed. Meh, I guess it's on to the next issue and the return of Johns...

Teen Titans #27

Huh, now this is an interesting issue... It seems Geoff Johns took a two issue break, meaning we get a different writer! Yay!!! And, to really make things good, that writer is Gail Simone! So everything is right in the world... Or is it??? See, this is still DC I'm looking at, so they naturally found a way to screw things up... “But X,” you ask innocently, “That awful Superboy story is over, Johns is taking a little break, and Gail Simone is writing the next two issues, what's wrong?” What's wrong? One word... Liefeld... Yep, the next two issues are drawn by... Rob Liefeld himself... If you are wondering why this is a bad thing, you can either read the rest of this post or quickly google “Rob Liefeld Captain America” It's cool, I'll wait........... Yep, the guy who drew THAT is doing the art here... May god have mercy on us all...

Teen Titans #27(October 2005):

Summary: Well this was weird. Okay, it's Father's Day, and the Titans decide to go bowling to help Robin deal with his father's recent death. However, some scrub baddies decide to hold hostages, which gets the Titans after them. The Titans free the hostages and have the villains locked up. From there, we get that bowling scene... And it goes on for a surprising length of time... Like, it was way longer than you'd expect. Next, an enemy of Hawk and Dove(or so I guess) named Kestrel breaks two of the bad guys from earlier out and takes them under his wing(heh heh... It's a bird pun!).

It that guy holding that cube with his middle finger?  Is he holding it at all?

After learning that Kestrel was about, the Titans and Hawk and Dove hook up at Titans Tower and wait for Kestrel, who they assume is going to go there because... I'm not really sure, I think Hawk and Dove's parents are there and Kestrel wants to kill them? Sure enough, Kestrel attacks with his minions, and manages to capture Raven for his masters, the Lords of Chaos. And that's a wrap.

Thoughts: I didn't get this comic at all... It was kind of all over the place... The Titans are fighting no name powered losers, they beat them and go bowling. And then, this issue turns into a Hawk and Dove comic. I could care less about Hawk and Dove, and that goes for all of their versions. So yeah, this was definitely not what I was hoping for... This issue actually made me miss Johns, which is both sad and horrible at the same time... You know what, let me take that back, I can't possibly mean that. On the plus side, the art wasn't overly distracting like I thought it would be.

Ever notice that people always do that kick when Liefeld is drawing?

For the most part, people seemed to have ankles and chests looked to be in the proper proportion. It was still pretty bad, but not as bad as I was expecting.

See what I mean?

So there, we ended on a compliment... In a way...

Teen Titans #26

Okay, we're past the abomination that was the Superboy/Luthor storyline, so it's clear sailing from here on out, right? Hmm, let's see what the cover of this issue is... Oh Christ... Here we go again...

Teen Titans #26(Sept. 2005)

Summary: So Superboy is back on the Kent farm, and has quit the Titans. Plus he's bemoaning the fact that he doesn't have a soul. Raven shows up and takes him through his life, along with Lex Luthor now randomly being a part of Project: Cadmus because of course he was... Granted, Superman was dead, meaning he had no reason to fret over Supes anymore, and as such had no reason to make a Superman/Luthor clone, but why let facts get in the way of a sucky story. Also, back when Supes bit the big one, Lex had long flowing hair and a beard, but naturally he's the regular bald Lex in the flashback because Johns just doesn't give a shit.

What the hell does he mean, "This project needs a name."??!!  It had two names, in this panel!!!

So Superboy goes through his life and fights off evil, bald Superboy, at which point Raven tells him he had a soul after all. And that it was hidden(the fuck?!) until he broke free of Lex's control... I hate to say it twice in one review, but what the flaming fuck?!?

So his soul was always there, or he made it, or it was hidden, or some bullshit...  This frigging comic...

Anyway, Raven tells Superboy to come back to the Titans, but he's just too damned angsty to return just yet, which ends this mess.

Thoughts: I'll be honest, I think I summed my thoughts of this issue up pretty well in the summary... The story was bad, it was executed terribly, and made zero sense, even by bad comic book standards. Now, I like good comics. Good comics can make you think, they can make you feel, good comics are like a piece of good art. They ARE good art. I like bad comics. Yes, that's right, I do. Bad comics can be fun to pick apart and laugh at. I'm the kind of person who can watch terrible movies repeatedly, just to laugh at them. Hell, JT and I have done that for YEARS! But I hate... Let me emphasize this, I HATE insulting comics. Comic books that just ignore the past, rewrite things for no good reason, make no sense, and are, well, insulting. The last three issues of this series? Insulting. Totally insulting. It was the frigging insulting comic book trifecta. It ignored Superboy's past, it rewrote his entire origin for no good reason(there were plenty of other ways to put Luthor in this series), and made no real sense... So Lex made a clone of Superman and himself, to betray Superman, even though Superman was dead?!? Ugh. I hated this storyline. I really, really hated it...

Teen Titans #24-25, Outsiders #24-25

Okay, this is the storyline I have been dreading the most out of this entire Teen Titans run. And that's really saying a lot! Long story short, I hate the way Geoff Johns altered Superboy's entire history, just so he could feed his fanboy ego and make the character the way he wanted. After reading all 100 of Superboy's original series, as well as the 50 issues of Young Justice he starred in, seeing that character torn up for no good reason vexes me to this day. As such, I'm going to knocking out all 4 parts of the stupid, “Lex Luthor is randomly Superboy's father and/or god” storyline in one post. So yeah, this one may be a bit on the long side, although, due to my disdain for this storyline, I'm going to try to make it as short as possible. Also, for some reason, this storyline ties in with the Outsiders, so I'll be looking at those here as well.

Teen Titans #24-25, Outsiders #24-25:

Summary: Now possessed due to a audio file sent to his computer by Lex Luthor, Superboy beats up the Teen Titans with total ease.

What the!?  This entire series all Johns did was hammer home the point that Superboy was destined to be evil because of his genes!

Robin calls the Outsiders for help(???), which leads to Outsiders member Indigo randomly turning into Brainiac 8. Brainiac 8 beats up the Outsiders, but leaves before striking any killing blows because reasons. The Outsiders meet up with the Titans and compare notes, but get attacked by a mess of Superman robots. Brainiac 8 meets up with Lex Luthor, Superboy and Brainiac. The Titans and Outsiders wind up destroying the Superman-bots(why they couldn't do that during Graduation Day, I have no idea), which leads to Lex and Superboy popping up to attack. Wonder Girl manages to get through to Superboy for a moment, but that gets shut down by Lex. Brainiac and Brainiac 8 arrives to kill Wonder Girl, as she seems to hate Wonder Girls, I guess. However, the heroes rally, Superboy goes back to normal, and Brainiac 8 is killed. Who the hell knows what happened to Lex or Brainiac... The end.

Thoughts: Now THAT'S how you review four comic books! I did that even faster that I imagined I would, the length is pretty much the same as a regular review. Okay, back to this mess... This entire storyline exists because Geoff Johns always thought it was a good idea for Lex Luthor to be Superboy's human donor. Before he was involved with DC, he wrote in to the Superboy comic book and put his idea forward, before Superboy's human donor was revealed. However, in the years that followed, DC went in a different direction, and Superboy's donor was revealed to be Project Cadmus Executive Director, Paul Westfield. That stood until Johns was able to get his hands on Superboy, at which point he immediately implemented his own ideas for Superboy, even though it made little sense and flew in the face of Superboy's previously revealed origin. That's what pisses me off the most about this story in particular, and Geoff Johns in general, I find it extremely disrespectful to disregard the past work of other creators, whether you like their work or not. But then, Johns's entire career has been spent pissing all over the work of past writers, see: Hal Jordan suddenly being absolved of all of his crimes while Parallax, Batrry Allen suddenly NOT being dead after 25 years, and of course this damned Superboy story. I mean, it's one thing if you have an actual GOOD plan to do these things, but Johns never does... Contrast this story with the Winter Soldier story over in Marvel to see what I mean about having a good plan for altering a characters' history. *sigh* Well, I have made my way through the story I was most dreading in this series, so it's gotta be smooth sailing the rest of the way, right guys?

Yeah, I doubt it too...

Teen Titans #23

Okay, we've reached the end of the Dr. Light storyline, which has, thus far, made the Teen Titans look like a bunch of scrubs. The Titans spent all of last issue being dominated by Dr. Light, who had been the whipping boy of... well, everybody in the DCU before his upgrade in Identity Crisis. With the Titans thoroughly dominated, every single prior living member of the Titans shows up to lend a hand. Let's see if Light beats them all up too!

Teen Titans #23(June 2005):

Summary: All of the Titans attack Dr. Light, with Nightwing falling comfortably into the role of leader.

Check this out!  This is the first time in the series Johns didn't make Wally out to be a giant douche!

Unfortunately for the 20+ Titans, it doesn't matter, as Light is able to stand up to them... Really, all of them!? Although, the more I think of it, the Titans are probably all just getting in each others way, seeing as that most of them have never worked together, they didn't have any real time to plan, etc. Light downs the gathered heroes and goes back to where he laid out Green Arrow, who is being slowly dragged away by Speedy. Light threatens Speedy, who prepares to fire the super special, one of a kind mystery arrow she was given by Arsenal for her birthday. Before she can fire though, Cyborg jumps in and attacks and defeats Light. After that... Wait, rewind a second, he BEAT him?!? On his own, one on one?!?! The same Dr. Light who defeated the entire Teen Titans team last issue AND downed all of the Titans from the past this issue?

Why the hell didn't he just put the shields up once he saw Light??!?!?!

Uh-huh... Moving on, Batman and Batgirl show up to take Dr. Light to prison... Or so the Titans think, as it's a swerve, and Batman and Batgirl were actually Deathstroke and Ravager in disguise, and were taking Light to join the Injustice Society. Later on, we get a team bonding scene with Speedy telling the Titans that she was HIV positive, which leads to a few of the other Titans spilling their secrets.

Um, good to know?

Even though he has the perfect opportunity to spill his own secret, Superboy chooses to remain mum.

Thoughts: Sometimes this series really makes me wonder... And not in a good way... So Dr. Light becomes an evil god among men, and just beats the hell out of like 25 characters. Just pulverizes everybody, leaves everybody laying. And then gets beaten by Cyborg over the course of a few panels... Cyborg, who is running on electricity, beats Dr. Light. We've seen Light pull Superboy's heat vision out of his eyes, as well as seen him manipulate the electricity from Wonder Girl's lasso, and yet he couldn't just power Cyborg down?! What the hell kind of stupid ass bullshit is that?! Somebody like Raven or Superboy/Wonder Girl, or even Speedy's mystery arrow would have made more sense than what we were given... Speaking of not making sense, why bother introducing Hawk and Dove last issue? They were an afterthought last issue, and were practically invisible this one. Why not wait until an issue where they can actually shine? As it is now, they're just two loudmouths who got smacked around by Light. Not the best storyline here, but we've had way worse, so I guess I shouldn't complain.

Teen Titans #22

Next up, we continue with the Dr. Light/Identity Crisis tie in. Last issue was a whole lotta nothing, I have to think we'll get a little bit more action come this one. Or I hope... Well, then again, it doesn't really matter to me, if it's another quickie, that'll give me more spare time to play Zelda, so I win either way!

Teen Titans #22(May 2005):

Summary: So, as expected, Dr. Light trounces the Titans because reasons. Oh, and on top of that, he seems to randomly be an energy manipulator of the highest power, once again, because reasons.

What the hell??

He shows that he can manipulate Superboy's heat vision, as well as the lightning given to Wonder Girl by Zeus. After disposing of the Titans, Dr. Light drags Speedy to Green Arrow and gloats that he's going to kill her right in front of him. Green Arrow insults Light, so he smacks him around a bit as well. And then Hawk and Dove show up... But it's definitely not the Hawk and Dove I remember, it's an all-female team, which I honestly have no recollection of... I'm not sure I get the purpose of gender swapping both of them, but here we are. Hawk and Dove try to beat up on Light, but he squashes them as well. You know, in a well run company somebody like Dr. Light would be a huge villain coming out of this storyline, the type of guy who could easily battle with the Justice League for a few months time. But then, this is DC, and I'm pretty sure this was about as high as Light would get before fading back into obscurity. With Hawk and Dove grounded(heh heh), Light looks back and sees every single living Titan there to oppose him, which ends this one.

Thoughts: I have to say, I'm not the biggest fan of the way this one went down... First off, Light was made TOO powerful here. I mean, he's manipulating energy like it's nothing! Not just light, but ALL energy! He utterly silenced the Titans, in their own book, with the Titans getting only the briefest of rallies before being put down for good. He's so powerful something like 20 people are going up against him. And with there being a zillion Titans hanging around, that means the main Titans from this comic probably won't be the ones to take Light down. Which sucks for this book. Also, it really bugs me that Light was given such a huge push right off the bat, and then just sort of fizzled out. I remember him being in this story, and then I can't say I recall him doing anything until he's killed in Final Crisis. Now, although I don't remember him showing up anywhere else, that doesn't mean he didn't humble some other heroes between this issue and his eventual death. But if I'm right, and he really didn't do anything else, that just goes and makes the Titans look even worse, as they got their asses handed to them by a guy who gets beat next issue and then does nothing.

I can't!  There's just too much!!!