Chronic Review: Teen Titans # 88!

Teen Titans # 88
DC Comics
Script: JT Krul
Pencils: Nicola Scott
29 pages for $3.99

Teen Titans # 88 is a landmark issue in the history of the comics medium, and no, I'm not even close to kidding. Maybe some historian like Mark Evanier can correct me, but I'm pretty sure that this is the first time the medium has ever featured a group of incredibly sexy women with tiny boobs.

Let me repeat that, folks. This comic's B-cups runneth over with wonderful, delectable, proportional tiny boobs. I'm tearing up as I type this inspiring fact. They're so.....beautiful. {snfff} And it's not just Cassie, either. Neither Ravager nor Raven have back problems in their future. Consider me amazed and delighted.

I can think of maybe four artists that would cause me to pick up a book regardless of writer, and Nicola Scott is one of them. She is a rare treasure, and not simply because of her skill in rendering attractive, reasonable breasts. Everything looks good. She should be immediately inducted into the hall of fame for her Cassie alone. I laughed out loud when I saw this expression of Beast Boy's face.

The news gets even better - Krul turned in a really nice script as well. Listen, the Teen Titans is a soap opera book. There's nothing wrong with that when executed with some subtlety and craft, and nearly every note Krul played in this issue was pitch perfect.

Everybody with the exception of Connor has something interesting to do. Cassie's trying to sort out how she can be an objective leader when her emotions make her Connor-centric, Beast Boy got bit by something that just has to be virile and horrible for him down the road, Rose has daddy and mommy issues, Bart's trying to hold his future knowledge that slips from his brain like water through fingers, Raven's got Gar problems, and there's a new character introduced being subjected to all the classic "outsider" issues one associates with the plague of being a teenager.

Has this ground been trod before? Sure it has. Does it smack a little bit of "Days of Our Lives?" Of course it does. It's supposed to. There is a fine line between the iconic and the cliched, and Krul walked it quite deftly in this issue. Of course this is also the guy that had me raving his praises for Green Arrow # 31 and then cursing his lineage exactly one month later with Green Arrow # 32.

I really liked this issue, but can I trust Teen Titans to continue at this level? Maybe. Maybe not. This one really popped, though, and when you throw Damien into the mix - superhero fun is about to have a new headquarters. Nicola Scott might be worth the trouble even if Krul falters.

This franchise has hit a bit of a rough patch lately, but if you like these characters and the old classic soap opera schtick, I think the waters are safe again.

- Ryan

Chronic Review: Green Arrow # 32

Green Arrow # 32
DC Comics
Script: JT Krul
Pencils: Federico Dallocchio
22 pages for $2.99


Boy, was I excited about Green Arrow # 32. You may recall I read the last issue and was pleasantly surprised. Krul was writing the story of a man gone too far with real emotional gravitas. There was blood on Ollie's hands, he was irritating everyone around him, and he was clearly not done with his vendetta.

The promise was for months and months of bridge-burning, moral choices, and a fresh ballsy take on a character I had previously been uninterested in. Green Arrow # 31 set quite a banquet. Green Arrow # 32 pulled everything off the table and then whizzed in my mouth.

I have never seen any book kill so much positive momentum so quickly. This was a runaway sports car that inexplicably hit the emergency brake and spit its smoking transmission out onto the pavement.

I don't want to give too many of the spoilery plot points out. To be clear, there are "happenings" in this book. It isn't that it lays still. Far worse than that, it reverses everything it was headed toward just 30 days ago in such an abrupt and unfulfilling manner that I half feel like filing a complaint for emotional abuse.

Ollie's quest for vengeance takes a left at Albuquerque.....hard. I won't say that his decision made no sense. In many ways, it made perfect sense, and sort of salvaged him as a heroic figure. But then why go through the sham of being interesting in the first place?

Ollie Queen went from a compelling man on fire to mopey-ass wet fish before you could turn the page. Gone was all the rage, all the intriguing possibilities, all the months of drama that could have been milked. Instead we get self-esteem problems and apathy. How wonderful.

Green Arrow turns himself in and heads to trial. That's where the only interesting item in the issue occurs - what Ollie does to Superman during court is actually entertaining. But this is also where the story gets disingenuous. If you're going to pull the rug out from your readers, at least make it sensible.

Queen is declared "not guilty" for the murder of Prometheus by a jury of his peers, and now insufferably self-pitying Green Arrow chastises the jury in his inner monologue. But waitaminute.....if Oliver so desperately wants to be punished for his sins, why didn't he...oh, I don't know....plead guilty??? If that's how he really felt about it, it makes no sense to put it in the hands of a jury. The decision is bullshit, patently transparent bullshit that serves preserving the status quo instead of the story.

I would have preferred one of two things. Either:

A) Go forward with where things were headed, and let Green Arrow's path of vengeance churn out months and months of potentially relevant and certainly entertaining stories about a hero gone bad.

B) Go forward with the new and not so improved Depressive Arrow, plead guilty, and run wild with a comic book preview of that "Supermax" Green Arrow prison movie they've been whispering about for years. You want action? You want redemption? Throw that dude in the clink and let him duke it out with the riff-raff. Sure, Brubaker just did it with Daredevil. You try to top him, out do him. I would respect that.

What we get is a judge who reads the "not guilty" verdict and somehow decides to gulag the man from Star City. Correct me if I'm wrong, here, but "not guilty" means "free to go". You can't just disagree with a jury and make up your own punishment if you don't like it. I know this is comics, but how am I supposed to buy into ANY of this?

This wasn't a story. This was a complete demolition of a story in the name of creating a fresh new re-booted # 1 issue. Fuck that. Fuck that in the face. This could have been special, folks. But we'll never know how special, because a whole year's worth of good comics were absolutely GOAT-ASSED inside of 22 pages. I'm guessing it's an editorial edict. Maybe Krul just lost his balls and bailed. Whatever it is, it sucks.

The sad thing is, this is probably a decision built on dollars. "We can't make this beloved character legitimately human and edgy, what will people think?" Well, they might actually buy your books. There's a novel concept. It's so weak, and right now I'm embarrassed for DC over their ridiculous bait and switch, and I'm embarrassed for myself for still buying into it.

Green Arrow just hit the chopping block.....NEXT!

- Ryan

Chronic Review: Green Arrow # 31

Green Arrow # 31
DC Comics
Script: JT Krul
Pencils: Federico Dallocchio
22 pages for $2.99

As I've previously stated, I'm not a huge DC guy, not because I have any passionate dislike for DC philosophically. It just takes a lot of continuity knowledge to understand anything these days, and I grew up a Marvel guy, continued with it, and I have more back story in the data banks to help me process what's going on.

Never been a huge Green Arrow guy, either, although I certainly have respect for Mike Grell. I'm pretty much "evented" out at this point, as well. So what the HELL am I doing chasing down part 2 of "The Fall of Green Arrow" for?

Well, I made the "mistake" of listening to the latest episode of Raging Bullets, pretty much the premier podcast if you're into DC. Nobody likes anything as much as Sean Whelan and Jim Segulin dig DC comics. So the mistake isn't listening to their show, because the passion is infectious and they dig deeper into these books than most shows would dare attempt. It's funny actually, that in episode #199 they claim to be doing "rapid fire bullet" reviews instead of their usual developed treatments.....and the show ran 150 minutes!

No, the mistake is that when you get done listening to Raging Bullets, you understand enough of what's going on where you find yourself wanting to read some of the damn books they cover! Such was the case with Green Arrow after listening to the Ragers cover Justice League: Rise and Fall, which represents chapter one in this Oliver Queen downward spiral.

It has always seemed to me that the best concepts and the best "event" books are based on things that are just dirt simple and matter. Now James Robinson has been penning this little mini-series called "Justice League: Cry For Justice" which has been met with mixed reviews. At the end of that thing, (spoilers coming) Green Arrow has suffered trauma to the point where he's crossing lines in the name of vengeance. Like...putting arrows in people's faces until they don't breathe any more lines.

That's the hook, and it's dirt simple, and it's compelling. "What would happen if a guy with already creative moral principles gets pushed to the brink and starts going postal?" I'm not saying this is an unprecedented achievement in storytelling, nor should it have to be.


What I'm saying is, this is organic storytelling that builds off of past events, remains true to the spirit of the character, and makes for good drama. How do you react if you're this guy's teammate? Friend? Wife? This is what I believe Brian Hibbs was getting at in his last "Tilting at Windmills" column on Comic Book Resources, in which he laments the rise of plot-based storytelling.

This Green Arrow plunge into darkness is not a plot-based storyline focused on the death of Prometheus and the almost certain impending demise of the Electrocutioner. That's not where the juice is. The juice is how this plays out for the man inside his tortured skull, and whether or not he's going to have anyone or anything left when he's done with his vendetta. This is character-based drama, and to me at least, it doesn't feel manufactured or artificial.

Things are shaking down in this book that matter. Forget leaving your toothbrush out or your dirty sock on the floor, this cat is drawing arrows on his wife:


That's just not bound to play well with her. I like this so much better than the "deaths" these characters routinely survive, because this will be playing out on screen. So many times we're promised "this time everything will change forever", usually because somebody dies. And then they're gone, and nobody cares, and the whole thing is forgotten until the character's improbable return from the grave. Lather, rinse, repeat. (I would say Brubaker's Cap is a notable exception to that formula, though. That character's disappearance was handled with care and depth on the page)



Well, Green Arrow isn't disappearing. He's murdering people, he's burning bridges, and one would think this is going to have to be dealt with on the page for a good long time to come. So I'm in for the duration, because this is bloody fascinating to me.

What's extra beautiful about the scenario is how organic it is. Eventually, this sort of thing would happen, would happen quite often, really. Reasonable people can come to very different conclusions about whether Ollie's actions are justified. I think he's dead wrong. I understand it, but I could never condone it. I don't think. That would be a deal-buster on the friendship thing, I think. My podcast partner would give him a high five and help him out, on the other hand. This whole thing is just more fun than most comic books allow themselves to be these days. Kudos to J.T. Krul for handling the whole thing with drama and respect for the character, and kudos to the DC braintrust for letting him run with this.

- Ryan