Comics discussions, with flair…
Posts tagged Titans
Who’s Your Mama?
1Revisiting our Titans we see that the Titans are being hailed as heroes after they vanquished the interdimensional demon known as Trigon.
Raven however has disappeared and Kid Flash, now retired again, has returned to Blue Valley hoping his powers do not wind up killing him some day.
This brings us to the point of replacing Raven on the team, and wait just a second, we have a precognitive groovy chick hanging around already in Lilith Clay.
And who would not love the Titans? Come on, they just saved your souls people.. not just Earth mind you, but your very souls from an eternal torment.
So New York City holds a huge parade in their honor and this issue becomes a slice of life moment for a team that does not get a lot of “down time.”
The winged alien Azrael revisits his love for Lilith and well, things get a wee bit out of hand in their romance.
Azrael kidnaps Lilith, but does not really mean to do so, he is being held in the sway of The Children of the Sun, who happen to answer to Thia, the Greek Titan of Fire. Yes, those Titans.
And in a twist that no one saw coming.. at least I didn’t at the time… it turns out that Lilith, who has only had the power of precognition, is the daughter of Thia and Thia wants her daughter back home where she belongs.
Well the Titans object to this because Lilith objected to it and the Titans do not do so well until one of Thia’s servants, Kole, turns on her mistress and helps the Titans win in battle against the angry Goddess. Kole will then leave the Titans of Myth service and join the Titans while Lilith will reluctantly stay with Thia in order to keep the peace and to learn more about her true origins.
Kole has the ability to “weave crystal” or produce crystalline slides, barriers, formations, etc.., and with Raven’s absence she fills a hole in the roster now left by Lilith’s abrupt departure and serves another purpose soon to be revealed in another book.
While Kole steps up and becomes a little enamored of Jericho, as all girls do, the group of ships coming to take Princess Koriand’r (Starfire) back home to Tamaran continues to make its way to Earth.
Are you noticing something here? The covers, not quite like they used to be.
Well George Perez was forced to leave The New Teen Titans shortly after the Trigon saga ended as he had another book he had to being work on, and that book is the book that will become the focus of this blog for the next little bit, but first we have to do some background work.
Next Up: Hero Support!!!
Titans Head to the Baxter Run
0And here we go.. these stories are what I consider some interesting stories but not where a lot of the good stuff in Titans was happening at the time. You see, The New Teen Titans had started its Baxter run, and both Marv Wolfman and George Perez were doing double and some triple duty on a big project that we are going to be spending a long time getting to in a bit.
So I am really going to be Cliffs Note versioning these comics because for whatever reason the stories just did not stick with me compared to what was going on in the other title.
Lilith stayed around the Titans along enough to find a new love interest in a mysterious frozen angel/alien named Azrael. Azrael would grow to become an erstwhile ally of the Titans, though his love for Lilith and his general naivete would get in the Titans way in some pivotal moments later on.
Azrael’s design is very angelic in origins it seems. He can fly, is fairly strong and extremely agile while in flight, but beyond that has no additional powers that we saw when he appeared.
The Trial of the Terminator has begun and it becomes a big media circus, notice the Titans faces above.. the deceased Terra makes an appearance but Raven does not. A telling sign of things to come dear reader.
After all of the nastiness with the Terminator, Changeling decides to take matters into his own.. claws, coils, fangs, whatever.. and exact some vengeance against the mercenary for attempting to kill his friends and for driving the girl he loved insane. However there was ample evidence that Terminator really wasn’t the cause of Terra’s amoral tendencies, he merely exploited them.
Victor Stone has grown very tired of being a Cyborg and has met a new friend in Dr. Sarah Charles at S.T.A.R. Labs. Dr. Charles believes she has a way to turn Victor back into a regular human being again. Vic after a little soul searching, goes for the operation and it is at this point that Psimon, Shimmer, Mammoth, and Gizmo reappear with two new members Jinx and Neutron.
Jinx is the real standout villainess here. An Indian mystic of some significant power, she controls the elements to make bad things happen to others. She will become a somewhat more ruthless villain as time goes on and gains a permanent spot with the Fearsome Five where Neutron fades away.
Cyborg’s operation is not a success however and he is forced back into a metal shell. He accepts this fate and is pivotal in helping the Titans overcome the Fearsome Five. Good thing to, because for what is next on the Titans’ plate it is not going to be pretty at all.
You see that Raven has been missing from this entire run for the most part.. not on the covers, not in the stories.. that story is about to come to a head in a really nasty way.
Next Up: The Titans vs. Raven and Trigon the Terrible!
Fish Sticks, Anyone?
0Over in the New Teen Titans, that title had already been renamed to Tales of the New Teen Titans during the Brother Blood story and kept the new title through The Judas Contract storyline featuring Terra and the Terminator.
But what does one do after a criminal organization has infiltrated the Titans, duped them, and nearly killed them….
You invite Aqualad and Aquagirl over for a follow up story and take down the H.I.V.E. forever.
Under the sea Garth and Tula were enjoying a swim when they and other creatures of the oceans began to feel weak, poisoned in fact by a plan put together by the H.I.V.E. organization. The H.I.V.E. which had just specatcularly failed in its ability to kill the Titans had another headquarters under the oceans where the H.I.V.E. Mistress controlled the operations of the organization after the death of her husband. In this sense, she became a Queen Bee, however this H.I.V.E. Mistress was clearly off her rocker and her subordinates paid for that dearly.
Lucky for the aquatic teens, Wally West had returned for a visit along with Frances Kane who were able to save the duo. The Titans agree to help Garth and Tula discover what the problem is with the oceans and they discover H.I.V.E. underwater. The H.I.V.E. Mistress had planned to lure the Titans there to finish the job the H.I.V.E. could not complete on land. However it went badly for her and the organization.
The Titans quite fed up with the H.I.V.E. handed them the butt kicking of all time. Garth and Tula went back to the ocean and all things seem right with the world.
A minor battle with some villains called the RECOMbatants take up the next issue while Doctor Light makes a villainous return in the issue after that, setting up a slow burn up to the event of Titans history not to be duplicated since..
Next Up: The Wedding of Donna Troy!
Ka-Boom! Time to Redecorate!
0In the 30th Century.. while everyone else is dealing with the Omen and Prophet story, the Legion left Brainiac Five on Earth who is very close to discovering a cure for Invisible Kid II’s baby sister who turned into a host for the villainous C.O.M.P.U.T.O.
Well, it did not go without a few hitches….
2984? Yes, back then the Legion was always automatically 1,000 years ahead of where we stood now.
As you can tell from the cover, the Legion Headquarters goes Ka-Boom! In it’s place not only do we get a cured Danielle Foccart and a new sleek metallic headquarters, but the villain C.O.M.P.U.T.O. becomes the Legion’s new Major Domo, much to the horrified shock of Duo Damsel and her husband Bouncing Boy.
All in all, the Legion HQ is rebuilt into a sleek new metallic construct that can actually fly (though it hardly ever did) and Danielle Foccart is on the road to recovery.
And because all good geeks love maps of headquarters…
Neato huh? I find it amusing that only the invulnerable members “live” near Brainy’s Multi-Lab for safety reasons… Very nice touch.
Then its up to the Legion to stop a conspiracy within the Science Police, which they succeed of course.
And the Legion of Super-Heroes, in this format, ends.. I know, sad is it not?
But wait, there is a light on the horizon!!!!
You see both Legion and New Teen Titans were amongst DC’s biggest sellers in the 80s, so it was decided that they would be printed in a special format called the “Baxter Format.” Once this was done both Legion of Super-Heroes and The New Teen Titans were renumbered back to #1 with the starting issues. To complicate matters, comic book stores in the direct market would be the only ones to carry these comics. No longer could you find them on the racks at your local gas station or mom and pop store, but for a year, DC printed regular newsprint versions of Legion and Titans with new stories in them.
For one year you had stories in both Legion of Super-Heroes and Tales of the Legion of Super-Heroes going on at the same time. While for Titans, you had Tales of the New Teen Titans happening prior to the Baxter run of the New Teen Titans even though they were being printed at the same time.
Confused? Don’t be. That’s why I am here.
Next up: Tales of the New Teen Titans!
The Judas Contract – Part Two
0The story continues in what presumes is the next morning.
Dick Grayson is sitting in his apartment at his desk when Deathstroke the Terminator crashes through the window.
As Terminator attempts to capture Dick it is Dick’s natural inclination to trick his opponent into thinking he is doing one thing when he is actually wanting the bad guy to do something else. Dick tricks the Terminator into knocking him near the open window which gives him the easiest out as he lands in the garbage dumpster below.
Hobbling Dick Grayson makes his way into the midst of a race going on, one could presume this is the New York City Marathon, and Deathstroke loses his quarry. It is at this point where we run across a woman with medium brown hair with a huge flower in her hair and her chauffeur, a young blond man with mutton chops who are observing the events.
After Dick loses the Terminator in the crowd, he signals for the other Titans, no one answers.
Dick Grayson is alone.
He enters detective mode determined to discover what happened to the other Titans.
Heading first to Donna Troy and Koriand’r's apartment he discovers the apartment a smoldering mess and a package that says “To My Darling Kory… With all (my) love,. Dick”, of course Dick did not send any gifts and the gift was a trap overloading Starfire’s natural energy absorption abilities and knocking her unconscious.
At Wonder Girl’s studio, Dick discovers turned over stools and trays of chemicals and deduces that Donna mixed some chemicals together that created an ether that overcame her.
In Hell’s Kitchen, Cyborg sat right down in a chair rigged to give an electrical charge that would overload his systems.
Dick heads to Titans Tower where he sees columns of rock trailing through the building leading to Raven’s room. There Dick Grayson is confronted by the strange woman and her assistant who have been watching the detective do his work.
It is here that the woman reveals that her name is Adeline Wilson and her assistant is Joseph.
In addition she offers this revelation…Raven was not defeated by Deathstroke, but instead by Terra.
And the other shoe has dropped. Terra, the sweet little girl who was captured by terrorists, taken in by The Titans, groomed to be a new member, who was flirting with Changeling and had saved them all numerous times had betrayed them.
In a flashback scene we see Raven in meditation and Adeline praises Terra’s skills
“She’s a clever little girl. A natural actor. I am certain her face didn’t betray her emotions even as she brought her powers to bear.”
Terra had always wanted to kill Raven, for being the one Titan who could reveal her, but instead knocked Raven unconscious to fulfill the contract.
Dick didn’t believe the woman and in this exchange Terra’s purpose is revealed to the reader who had held out any hope that Terra was a pawn.
Dick Grayson: “Terra couldn’t be a traitor.”
Adeline Wilson: “Quite so, she would have had to BE one of you to turn traitor. From the very beginning she belonged BODY and SOUL to the Terminator.”
Desperate to prove the woman wrong he calls Steve Dayton’s house looking for Changeling, who is nowhere to be found. Once again in flashback we see Garfield Logan licking envelopes to send signed photos to his fans. The glue was drugged. Child’s play again for an assassin who is well prepared.
After this is confirmed, Adeline lets the Terminator’s name slip.. His name is Slade, Slade Wilson, her ex-husband.
Meanwhile the Terminator has arrived in the Rockies with a very special package as he delivers the unconscious Titans to the H.I.V.E.
In the next chapter we get the origin of Deathstroke the Terminator. Grant Wilson met Adeline Kane when they were both serving in the Armed Forces. Adeline was a Captain charged with the training of special operations forces and Major Wilson was one of the finest combat soldiers ever to go through the training. They fell in love, married, and had two children. Slade also had a best friend in an older gentleman from the British service named Wintergreen.
In a twist on a tale from those folks over at Marvel, Slade volunteered for an experimental drug for testing truth serums, but instead the drug allowed him to expand the use of his brain to enhance his physical reactions. When Wintergreen was captured in Vietnam, Slade was compelled to help out and he did.
Slade had retired from the service and became a big game hunter. The couple hosted parties which in retrospect was how Slade got his.. clients for his new profession. A profession that Adeline became aware of when four armed assassins crashed into their home. Adeline managed to kill two, but the others got the drop on her with tear gas and she fell unconscious only knowing her new infant had been kidnapped.
That infant was the man standing in front of Dick Grayson now, whose silence had grown deafening.
Dick confronts Joseph about it and Adeline informs Richard that Joseph is mute due to his vocal cords being cut in a hostage exchange scenario. After this situation, the naive veil that Adeline had worn faded away and a mother’s cold rage took over. She shot Slade, but didn’t kill him, she only took his eye, which explains his half mask and his eye patch.
At this point we get a change to Dick Grayson that will begin a slow trend of growing up of the sidekicks.
Dick Grayson, formerly Robin and now Nightwing begins his career to save his friends along with a new ally, right after accepting their old new ally was plotting to betray them all the time.
Just a quick note here, you’ll notice that Dick Grayson now is wearing a more Batman pallette costume with the dark blue and the yellow, gone are the red and green. The bikini bottoms have been traded for the disco collar and the mask has gone from a domino to a more “bat” like one.
Joseph Wilson does have powers as Jericho. He is able to lock his eyes with another combatant, turn into an astral form, and then possess that person, taking over their motor functions. Together the two heroes head off to the H.I.V.E. hideout to free the Titans and confront the Terminator and Terra.
Next Up: The Conclusion of the Judas Contract
Growing Pains
0There comes a time when it is time to put away the items of childhood and become grown adults in our own rights. For Robin, the Boy Wonder, created in 1940, his puberty and subsequent adolescence had lasted until this comic book. His contemporary, Kid Flash, created in 1959 joins Robin as the two former kid sidekicks divest themselves of their previous identities and become men.
In this rather short tale it starts out with the Titans raiding a hideout of Brother Blood’s only again to wind up looking as if they are the bad guys when they know Brother Blood’s sect is planning some deviltry, to come to pass in the next story actually.
As the Titans return home they reconvene at Titans tower except Kid Flash becomes the first Titan to reveal his secret identity to Terra as he gains entry to Titans Tower in civilian clothing. Explaining that his powers seem to be hurting him when he uses them, his confusion over Raven’s manipulations of his emotions, and stating he wants to finish college, Wally leaves the Titans his Kid Flash ring and claims that Terra should take his place on the team.
It is at this point that Robin makes a surprise announcement as well. He has donned the costume of Robin for the last time. The Titans assume he is quitting his adventuring days as well and Robin.. I mean Dick Grayson, now corrects them. He wants to spend some time figuring out who he is and what new identity he will have. Until such time as he makes his costumed return he nominates Wonder Girl for field leader.
At the end of the issue, Frances Kane is there to drive Wally back to Blue Valley and Dick Grayson wishes him well.
You have to love a super villain who takes his hot tubbing this seriously.
There is no time to rest however as the Titans find themselves embroiled in a plot of Brother Blood’s making as Dick Grayson goes undercover in the Church of Blood only to be discovered and brainwashed by Brother Blood and after nearly killing the Titans several times (with Terra to provide the timely save, of course), the Titans return home to lick their wounds, believing Brother Blood to be dead, again…..
Little do they know what is waiting for them is a story that will go down as not only one of the best in Titans’ history, but in the history of comics itself.
That sweet little new member of theirs, Terra.. the one who keeps saving them, time and time again?
Yeah.. that won’t go bad for them, now will it?
Next Up: The Judas Contract!
Just Who Is Donna Troy?
0In a continuity of almost fifty years at this time, some errors are going to occur and most readers understand this and let the minor things go.
Some flubs are too huge to let go however and they necessitate a fix if you will.
In early stories prior to the Teen Titans appearing, Wonder Girl, was actually Wonder Woman as a girl. So, Diana Prince had adventures as a teenager prior to leaving Paradise Island and becoming Wonder Woman. The stories of Superboy being so successful, this was a no brainer right?
Well, when the Teen Titans came along it was Robin, Aqualad, and Kid Flash at first and then Wonder Girl joined them. The problem with this? Wonder Woman was already active in the DCU and fighting alongside contemporaries like Superman and Batman, while this Wonder Girl was fairly new and is a member of the sidekick generation about the same age as Robin and the others.
The solution, a little sister named Donna Troy. Donna being close to Diana and Troy, one of the famed areas of Greek mythos and for a long time no one seemed to mind that Donna’s origin story was rather, well, unfleshed out.
Donna was discovered as a baby in a burning building along with two dead bodies. Donna was saved by Wonder Woman and after a thorough search to determine if there were any relatives turned up fruitless, Diana took the orphaned girl to Paradise Island and there the Amazons blessed her with their own strength and talents via the Purple Ray of Healing. Raised as a “little sister” to Diana, Donna is the ersatz heir to the Wonder Woman mantle.
When it came time for Donna to get married, the story took a turn that most individuals who are adopted get to at one point or another. Where do I come from? What happened to my parents? Do I have any family out there?
Enter, Robin, in his last official detective story as he tries to put the pieces of Donna’s life back together again and give her some peace.
It is determined by Robin’s hard work that the two individuals in the fire with Donna were not her parents, but were part of a baby selling racket. Instead, what had happened was Donna’s original mother was a woman named Donna Hinkley, she gave birth to Donna but was forced to put her up for adoption as she was dying and could not care for the child.
Donna was adopted by Carl and Fay Stacey, who were forced to give her up for adoption again when Carl was severely injured in a workplace accident. After the years had gone by Fay had remarried to a man named Hank Evans and had two other children named Cindy and Jerry.
Just repeating that story reminds me of all the episodes of talk shows where adopted kids are reuninted with their parents, however, what really is striking about this story and what brings to mind why comics is a co-storytelling process is the artwork of George Perez.
Most aspiring comics artists learn to draw heroes, villains, explosions, and striking scenes of outer space daring do. It is those little moments, those moments when there is no action that truly shows the talent of the comics artist.
Right away from this cover you can tell this is not going to be an ordinary story. No villains fighting, just Robin standing solitary in a burnt out building, his costume mostly concealed by his trench coat, and posters of Donna Troy as she was in her debut and as she is now. The colors used are muted and the inks are heavy giving a sense of foreboding to the story. Romeo Tanghal and Adrienne Roy were the inker and colorist for this issue among many Titans issues and here their work truly does shine through.
And I cannot add anything to that, except to say, this is not the end of Donna’s origin, not by a long shot.
Next Up: Is this the End of Kid Flash and Robin? Yes. Yes it is.
Robin Flies The Nest
0As the Outsiders marched on in their own title, Batman had grown fairly fond of his team, though he would never admit to it. Perhaps it was Batman’s first time of being completely in charge of his teammates as opposed to having to explain his plans in details to his compatriots in the JLA.
The Outsiders proved victorious in battles against an ex-military man who was a victim of Agent Orange and now wished to infect the rest of the world with the same affliction he suffered.
and one of their many nuclear themed foes, the One-Man Meltdown.
As the Outsiders grew closer and closer as a team, and as this put strain on the Batman/Robin dynamic, it was bound to happen that the Outsiders and the Titans would meet in a conflict of the Fearsome Five.
- Mammoth – An Australian juggernaut incredibly strong and with almost limitless stamina, he is brother to his fellow Fearsome Five member, Shimmer.
- Shimmer – Sister to Mammoth, can transmute elements if she can touch them.
- Gizmo – The Dwarven gadgets expert, he can build any sort of gizmo, and his size gives him an advantage in combat for those who underestimate him.
- Psimon – Perhaps the most dangerous of all, Psimon is a thin, gaunt man with a transparent skull. His psionic powers know few rivals.
- Doctor Light – The old, somewhat inept foe of almost all the DCU, the Titans had humiliated him before and it was only with the promise of money that Mammoth frees Dr. Light from jail.
From l to r, top to bottom: Doctor Light, Shimmer, Halo, Gizmo, Starfire, Geo-Force, Terra, Psimon, Metamorpho, Mammoth, Robin, Batman, Kid Flash, Cyborg, Black Lightning, Raven, Katana, Changeling (Green Cobra), and Wonder Girl
Upon the end of their breakout from jail, Mammoth and Shimmer discover that Dr. Helga Jace, who is responsible for giving Terra and Geo-Force their powers, is also in town and was responsible for Mammoth and Shimmer’s powers as well. The Fearsome Five are intent upon kidnapped Jace now.
Inside Titans Tower, the Titans are assembled when Terra’s wrist starts buzzing, an alarm put in the costume by Dr. Jace. Terra goes to see where Dr. Jace is and discovers the Outsiders on Titans Island. A fight breaks out until Kid Flash and Wonder Girl realize that they are also fighting veteran heroes like Metamorpho and Black Lightning.
Bruce Wayne and Dick Grayson are discussing recent events and the formation of the Outsiders when they are both summoned by their teams to lead them into battle as the Titans have deduced that the Fearsome Five are involved in Jace’s kidnapping.
Psimon forces the good Doctor Jace to cooperate with the Fearsome Five and she constructs “mud men” to do the Five’s bidding. When the Titans and Outsiders confront the Fearsome Five, they do rather well, until an army of sentient “mud men” come out of nowhere to turn the tide. Psimon protects the Fearsome Five and destroys the lab they are in sending all the others crashing into the sea.
Terra takes the opportunity to save her own hide and her teammates by forming a mini island herself while Geo-Force lifts it to the surface.
Batman immediately asserts more and more control over the Titans group, to Robin’s increasing frustration until it all boils over in a confrontation between the two of them that dressed Batman down in front of his own team.
Batman: “Robin, you’re out of line–”
Robin: “The HELL I am! I know the Titans better than you, and I know more about running a TEAM than you! I won’t let you endanger us all, just because you like to be In CHARGE!”
With that salvo, Dick Grayson sets into motion his graduation from the Batcave and while the end of the story has the heroes wrapping things up quite nicely with Bruce and Dick showing admiration towards each other in front of the team, Dick Grayson’s days as Robin, the Boy Wonder, are numbered.
Other moments to notice…
- Katana’s sword is impervious to normal heat damage and she considers herself a Samurai following the Bushido code.
- Kid Flash’s debate about leaving the team intensifies.
- Terra is still playing a game at being the good little heroine, although she seems more caustic here than in the past when dealing with other heroes like Metamorpho.
- Halo is easily subject to suggestions from others and can enter a trance like state where she appears to not be in control of her actions.
Next Up: A question that will haunt DC fans forever.. Just Who IS Donna Troy anyways?
First there is Thunder, then Lightning, then Betrayal…
0The Titans book would settle down for just a little bit after the Brotherhood of Evil story.
Speedy left the Titans to go back to his spy work and Frances Kane left to go back to Blue Valley, realizing hero work was not for her. She did ask Wally to come with her, something Kid Flash seriously begins to consider in light of Raven’s behavior in the last adventure.
Raven is seriously beginning to doubt her powers and wonders whether her ability to detect evil is working or if it just her inner evil she feels growing.
Newscaster Bethany Snow is becoming an increasingly loud voice against the Titans, of course, the Titans and everyone else do not realize that Ms. Snow is a disciple of the Church of Blood, doing the bidding of her chosen messiah on Earth. Even so, the New York City Police and especially District Attorney Adrian Chase are fast allies of the Titans.
The Titans come back and celebrate the new news that Wonder Girl is engaged to be married to her boyfriend Terry Long. Terry is fully aware of Donna’s life as a Titan and the two begin to plan a wonderful wedding, however, first there is trouble…
Two teenagers of Vietnamese descent show up in the sky and start wreaking havoc and its up to the Titans to get to the two and stop their reign of destruction. It turns out the teens are very confused and upset at being abandoned by their father. Robin and the Titans agree to search for their father, a military man who served during the Vietnam Conflict.
While this conflict is going on, mobster Anthony Scarapelli, is put under arrest by D.A. Chase for drug distribution thanks to the Titans’ work in the Runaways case. Scarapelli goes free due to legal technicalities thanks to his well paid lawyers and he swears vengeance on Chase.
Meanwhile, old Titans Aqualad makes an appearance as he fishes something out of the bay for the Titans…
Trident was a villain who had plagued the Titans, but what was puzzling to the Titans is that each of their Tridents seemed different and the trident did different things each time. It turns out that Trident, was three different criminals, with one betraying the others hoping to keep their haul for themselves. A simple case for the Titans all in all and a bit of a breather, because one of their greatest foes was soon to resurface.
Deathstroke, the Terminator, is the preeminent mercenary for hire in the DCU. Deathstroke’s son was Grant Wilson, and Grant had volunteered for a process from the evil scientist organization known as H.I.V.E. to gain super powers in order to get revenge on the Titans for ruining his life when the Gordanian invaders came in pursuit of Starfire.
This process gave Grant powers and he became known as Ravager. Ravager was beaten by Raven, who allowed Grant to see his heart’s desire which was the Titan’s defeat. The process that gave Grant his powers was burning through his body’s chemistry and Grant died shortly thereafter.
Grant’s father, Deathstroke, took over the contract to H.I.V.E. and Deathstroke never fails at a contract. Deathstroke ambushes the Titans and they fight him off, but it is the new Titan, Terra who manages to get Deathstroke on the ropes and it appears that Deathstroke dies at the end, however, no body, no death.
The Titans are very thankful that they made Terra a member of the team. A feeling that readers knew they should have second thought when this panel appeared.
Deathstroke the Terminator and Terra the Earth Mover, a deadly combination as the Titans will soon discover.
Meanwhile, across town, in the apartment of D.A. Adrian Chase, the family is relaxing and the apartment explodes. No bodies are recovered.
Next Up: The New Vigilante and the Cheshire Cat smiles darkly.
Drug Prevention, Corporate Licensing, and Evil Brotherhoods
0Wow, that’s an odd title for a post about the Titans isn’t it?
Well hang on folks because we are about to enter into one of the weirder worlds of comics. Character licensing.
After the success of the Runaways story, DC was asked to produce a few “kids don’t do drugs” comics featuring the Titans. These issues would be educational give aways to warn kids away from the dangers of using drugs, and as this was President Reagan’s era, his wife Nancy’s big deal was “Don’t Do Drugs.” A slogan so pervasive you could not get away from it if you tried.
So here’s the first special’s cover. Notice anything, out of place?
Here, let me help.. there’s Cyborg, Raven, Speedy, Starfire, Changeling, Wonder Girl, and who’s that guy in the blue, red, and purple outfit with red hair in the front row????
That’s the Protector, Jason Hart, created specifically for these specials.
Did you notice that the most famous Titan, Robin, is missing? Well, he’s not really missing, let me explain.
The elf at the top of that cover begins the trail, as in all things, follow the money. The Keebler Company was helping to sponsor these drug issues, you’ll notice the absence of a UPC code or a price tag. The problem is that Robin’s image, along with that of a few other key DC players was licensed out to Nabisco, a direct rival of the Keebler Company.
Robin is safely nestled between Batman and Aquaman and is barely larger than Penguin. Heck, Joker is bigger than he is. But, that’s how the stories break and comic book legend is that artist George Perez had already drawn Robin in the drug issue, so all the pages had to have Robin erased and his colors changed and redrawn to make a distinct character, but all of the Protector’s poses, body language, etc.., looks exactly like what Dick Grayson looks like in an issue of New Teen Titans. The Protector has all of Robin’s abilities and equipment, minus the “bat” motif.
You’ll also notice in this photo, Starfire’s costume has been given a bit of a modest look with a fuller bathing suit top which she only wears in these drug specials. One more omission, Kid Flash was dropped from these issues, most likely due to space considerations and keeping the stories simpler.
This story is not considered part of the Titans’ continuity, but the Protector does eventually show up in the DCU in cameo roles as a wink and a nod to old time fans.
Meanwhile, when we had left the book, old time Titan Speedy had returned briefly after the Runaways story, the Titans had just helped an earth-moving girl named Terra escape from her captors, and Frances Kane had returned from Blue Valley with magnetic powers. All these extra characters around means that someone must be joining the Titans soon right? Right you are.. but first villainy is afoot!
The new Brotherhood of Evil attacks the Titans setting off their plan to attack the Church of Blood on Zandia. Led by the evil Brain, literally a brain in a containment unit, and his bodyguard Monsieur Mallah, an intelligent ape and weapons expert, the Brotherhood’s membership is rounded out with some of the vilest villains in the DCU.
Houngan is a voodoo priest who combines old fashioned hoodoo with cyber technology. Phobia has the ability to mentally probe you rmind, pull out your fears, and manifest an illusion of that fear. Plasmus is a man transformed into a creature of burning protoplasm, his touch means death. Warp can create warps in space that can open up almost anywhere.
A formidable group to say the least.
In the midst of this the Titans elect Terra to membership, while Speedy wants to remain in his capacity as a spy for the U.S. Government and Frances is a bit too reticent in using her powers to be truly effective in combat. The Titans wind up in the clutches of the Brotherhood of Evil and make a mistake that almost proves fatal by provoking Raven to the point where she loses her control over her self and her father’s influence begins to take her over.
Yeah, its not pretty for the Brotherhood. The Titans aren’t really pleased either. Kid Flash is especially troubled by this turn of events and is torn between bad girl Raven and good girl Frances. The Titans survive the encounter with the Brotherhood and the Church of Blood, but wind up looking like incompetent children persecuting a calm religious order in the press.
Next Up: We continue our look at the Titans… An engagement. Thunder & Lightning. Vigilante! Deathstroke! and the beginning of the story that would rock the Titans for a while.