New Titans #100 (August, 1993)
"The Darkening, Chapter Four: Something Old, Something New, Something Borrowed, Something... Dead"
Writer - Marv Wolfman
Pencillers - Tom Grummett & Bill Jaaska
Inkers - Al Vey, Rob Leigh, Steve George & John Statema
Colorist - Adrienne Roy
Letterer - John Costanza
Assistant Editors - Frank Pittarese & Keri Kowalski
Editor - Rob Simpson
Cover Price: $3.50
Looks like we're in a sort of "wedding week" here at the humble blog. From the sublime to the ridiculous... or more ridiculous, we shift from the nuptials of Wally and Linda to the even-more doomed union of Richard Grayson and Koriand'r... complete with a foil cover that pretty much refused to be photographed!
Hell... if I were this book, I'm not sure I'd want my picture taken either.
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We open with a prologue. Beast Boy... Changeling... whatever we're calling him, has drifted to the bottom of the sea after the Titans latest tussle with a reborn Brotherhood of Evil. In the fracas, he noticed that among their number was... Rita Farr?! Hey, that oughta make the bot who has has searched my site over 200 times the past couple of days for her! Anyhoo, by the grace of his undersea pals, Tempest saves salad head.
Post-prologue, we enter the story proper... where Starfire, and a tiny ape-boy rush into Steve Dayton's estate with some great news. Unfortunately... there don't seem to be any Titans around to share it with! Well, at first anyway. Suddenly a whole slew of 'em appear... and boy howdy, they are quite the sight! Ya know, I've gone on record as hating it when we refer to things simply by their decade of origin... but, c'mon... lookit these geeks.
The Titans share the story of their run-in with the Brotherhood with Dick and Kory... and lament the fact that they seem to have lost Gar. As luck would have it, just then a sopping wet Gar and Garth (oi) arrive. On the subject of "decade of origin", there be some heinous hairstyles in this book.
Gar informs Dayton of his Farr-tastic discovery, but Steve-O ain't buying it... and he probably shouldn't. Dick decides to lighten the mood... and announces that he and Starfire are to be married!
We shift to City Hall where Dick and Kory are attempting to procure their marriage license. The poor clerk isn't quite sure what the protocol is for an inter-species marriage... which isn't what Dick wants to hear. He loses his cool and grabs the civil servant by the collar until he makes with the license. We're learning a lot about pre-marriage blood tests this week... today's lesson: co-habitation allows you to waive them! I suppose that's one way to marry an alien! Outside, the love birds... stumble into a group of protesters, who find their love kiiiiiinda weird. One shouts "Titans are Deviants", which begs the question... did we forget that people don't know that Dick Grayson is Nightwing?
We move over to Donna and Terry Long's New Jersey farmhouse where the blessed event is going to go down (14218 Athena Drive, Princeton NJ... yeah, I saved you a few seconds and Googled it, it's sadly not a real address). Nothing seems to be going right... everything from flowers being the wrong color to... Dick's mentor Bruce not being able to attend (Knightfall, donchaknow). Donna asks if the Team Titans (ew) can attend... but there's some baggage there. Teamster Mirage kinda tricked Dick into gettin' it on not too long ago. As Dick stomps away, Terry and Donna discuss his odd behavior.
Later Donna peeks in on Starfire who is being fitted for her wedding gown. It looks like she's using the same dress-designer Donna did back when she made the worst decision of her life. We get some standard "cold feet" chatter here... which doesn't amount to a whole heckuva lot. Kory's scared... but is still willing to go through with it.
Outside, Dick is on the warpath... shouting at Roy for letting Lian be "in the way". I tell ya what, Dick's acting like a real... well, er... ya know. He swiftly apologizes to the ginger archer... and comments about how despite this being everything he wants... it all feels so wrong.
We immediately leap to the wedding ceremony. Wow, they are moving along pretty quick. The honorable Allan Rothstein is presiding, and we get one of those scenes where we can see all the famous faces in the crowd. Gotta say, this one's lacking.
Just as the officiant is about to announce Dick and Kory as husband and wife, well...
He gets blown to bits! You might be asking, who would do such a thing? Well, some questions are better left unasked... because, you're about to meet the new-look... Raven!
The heroes in attendance (including Tim Drake) all instantly suit up and prepare to fight off this gaudy gaggle of wedding-crashers... and we get about a hundred pages to witness the battle. Perhaps the most interesting bit features Dick fighting off Deathwing... a sleeper-agent of the Time Trapper with his own memories implanted. This gets into Zero Hour and Team Titans stuff... that I don't have the brain power to parse at present.
Then it happens... we get a shift in artist from Tom Grummett to Bill Jaaska. Hooooooo boy. For his first trick, Raven erects a forcefield around she and Starfire... and we get a very unfortunately-angled scene of the two. Without getting too crude there's, um... a shape... around Raven's inner thigh. Ummm... that's all I'm gonna say, I'll just leave the image here and let y'all decide.
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| It's not just me, right? |
Now, Raven's gig at this time is... well, same as it ever was. She's the daughter of Trigon the Terrible. At this point, she has one-hundred of Trigon's children inside of her (yeah...). And so, she plants a big open-mouth kiss on Kory... implanting her with one of the Seeds of Trigon.
With her mission complete, Raven assembles her remaining forces... well, force... looks like just Deathwing made it... and skadoos. Emergency responders arrive to collect the riff raff, and load Starfire into an ambulance. Donna rushes up to console Dick... and we can see that while her friends were battling, Mrs. Long went off to change dresses and cut her hair short. Continuity!
We close out in Washington, DC where Roy Harper is talking to our old friend Sarge Steel. He's been tasked with leading the Titans in a more... ugh... government entity sort of way. Anyone else tired of the government superhero trope yet?
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Wow... not a whole lot to like here, innit? This was supremely unpleasant all around.
Before heading into the story... let's tackle the art. Tom Grummett's usual top-quality work doesn't really work here. We can see from the credits that there were a slew of inkers involved... perhaps this was a rush job. Hell, maybe (considering the story) nobody's heart was really in this one. All throughout, Dick looks overly "jowly"... and as I joked above, ape-like.
That's nothing, however, compared to the back-end of this bad boy. Welcome to the Bill Jaaska era. I guarantee you're not going to make it through the experience. Well, maybe that's not fair... I'll just say that I know I won't. I've tried... trust me, I've tried. It's weird to compare his sequential work with his pin-ups... I've included a Jaaska pin-up below that is worlds better than anything in the story... almost looks like a completely different artist! So, he's got the chops... but just doesn't work (for me) in "motion".
Now... the story. It's not all bad... I actually kinda like Dick's behavior here. Well, maybe not "like", but appreciate. I think we've all been in situations where we really want to do something... and despite all evidence that it's the wrong thing (or wrong time), we press on anyway. Maybe we do it to assuage our own doubts... maybe we do it to prove everyone else wrong... point is, I think this kind of behavior is relatable... and human. Though, that might be more telling of me than the human condition.
Dick and Kory being referred to as "deviants" when applying for their marriage license was... I dunno... weird? Felt a little bit like we had a page from an X-Men comic fall into our Titans book. For all the Mr. and Mrs. Superman stories we've had over the years, you'd think the DC Universe might be a bit more open-minded about human/alien relations. I dunno... just feels like manufactured oppression... didn't really work for me.
Also... it comes a bit too close to outing Dick as Nightwing for my liking. I mean, we've got Starfire getting married to a mullethead Dick Grayson. Everybody knows that the Titans leader is... well, also a mullethead. I don't think it'd be terribly difficult to put two and two together, right? Maybe it's just me.
The Raven reveal (if it weren't ruined by the cover) might've been something. Then again... I think if we showed this cover to a more casual fan and asked who the dark-haired lady on the cover is... "Raven" might not be in their first five replies. Her gig of passing on the seeds of Trigon isn't a bad one. I think it's actually interesting... it's just too bad that the shift in art ruined all that. It was just too distracting... too many jagged lines... just... blech.
You don't need to read this one... so do yourself a favor, and don't. By this point DC, editorial, and the creative team appear to have all checked out. This reads like a fulfillment of a contract and nothing more. There doesn't appear to be any more passion for this team/property from any of the contributors... a feeling which will remain for the next couple of years worth of stories as New Titans limps toward its conclusion. I mean... compare this to the wedding of Donna and Terry. For as much guff as I give the curly-one, that felt special... this feels lame. For Titans-completionists only.
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Pin-Ups (including a "Swimsuit" page... because those are a thing that used to happen!):
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Letters Page:
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Flash (vol.2) #142 (October, 1998)
"Get Me to the Church on Time"
Writers - Mark Waid & Brian Augustyn
Penciller - Pop Mhan
Inker - Chris Ivy
Letterer - Gaspar
Colorist - Tom McCraw
Assistant Editor - L.A. Williams
Editor - Paul Kupperberg
Cover Price: $1.99
Working on a wedding-themed feature for an upcoming episode of the Cosmic Treadmill, and figured I oughta try and kill two birds with one stone... so, today we're going to discuss the wedding of Wallace Rudolph West and Linda Kiyo Park.
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We open with Flash lamenting the poor timing of Kobra's latest attempt at supervillainy. Ya see, it's the eve of his wedding to long-time girlfriend Linda Park... and the last thing he wants to do is b-tier terrorist clique. Not that there's ever a good time for that. After swiftly saving the day, we get a good look at Wally's singed marriage license... which requires a blood test. Not sure about any of you, but I didn't need one of those when I got married.
With the riff-raff out of the way, Wally heads home to Linda... who is fretting because their cake hasn't arrived yet. Thinking quick, Wally rushes off to Paris to fetch a baker... so fast in fact, that he misses the news that their cake was simply sent to the wrong address. Whoops. Little bit of a hair-trigger there, Wallace.
Overcome by the sentiment, Linda embraces Wally and they both fall to the ground... just as her parents walk in. Thankfully, they don't seem terribly uptight. They do, however, ask if Wally's parents will be gracing the event with their presence. He gives a noncommittal reply... doesn't seem like he's looking forward to visiting with his post-Crisis 'rents. I'm not looking forward to seeing them either!
We jump ahead to the morning of the wedding. Wally is shocked to learn that Linda made Impulse their Ring Bearer. To assuage his fears, Linda describes the act of "ring bearing" as being some sort of militaristic exercise. This brings Bart to attention... and halts him from shoving a fork into a wall socket.
The guests begin arriving... and among them, Wally's folks. They're separated... and with their current "mates". Wally asks his father (a... Manhunter, lest we forget) how much his date cost... which is kind of a jerky thing to say. Speaking of cost, Wally's mom heads over with a wad of cash for the happy couple... courtesy of her new beau. It's an uncomfortable scene... but a bit too cartoony and cliche to give any actual "cringe".
Next we meet Wally's Best Man... Jericho?! Well, no... it's actually Dick Grayson in a very "bowl of buttered popcorn"-looking wig. You recall Dick's like doubly-cautious when it comes to his secret identity... since Wally is "out" (his dual-identity is public knowledge), he can't risk being seen at a metahuman wedding... especially in such a prominent role.
Speaking of Metas, our next arrivals are the Titans... Donna, Garth, and Roy. Wally welcomes them... and in the foreground we can see a stack of wedding gifts... which includes one with an "urgent" tag on it. Hmm... what could be the urgency of a wedding gift? Must be one helluva toaster!
Still speaking of Metas... the next guests are Wally's teammates on the JLA... minus Batman, of course. This was only four years after Zero Hour, so he might still be in "urban legend" mode... though, they did play fast and loose with that.
Our next guest... straight from the future, Wally's favorite aunt, Iris Allen-West! She didn't get an invite... because, really now... how do you send an invitation to the future? Luckily, she figured it out from historical records. Unluckily... she doesn't seem to know how this issue's going to end.
After a brief "cold feet" scene between Wally and Linda... it's time to get hitched.
It comes time to read their vows... and Wally realizes he forgot to write any! He speeds off to grab a pen, and thinks over his relationship with Linda to come up with the right words.
He gets it all figured out... and rushes back to his bride's side. He tells her that she will always be his "beacon"... something that is still mentioned to this day. No matter where he winds up, Linda will always be his "lightning rod". With that, he slips the ring on her finger, and...
... she vanishes?! Wally is suddenly back home... with a feint memory of a "Linda Park". He calls Nightwing to ask him if he can remember anything... and he can't! Dick asks him to repeat the name... and Wally can't... he's completely forgotten. He shrugs, figuring if he can't remember it... it couldn't have been all that important. He rushes off, and we can see that one "urgent" gift in the background.
We wrap up with Linda, still in her wedding dress, sitting in the middle of a spotlight in an otherwise darkened room... and, she's not alone.
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I think one of the "chestnuts" of this humble blog... and likely other humble blogs that sometimes discuss DC Comics in the 1990's... this was an era in which the DC Universe felt as though it had forward momentum.
Here we have the wedding of a character who was brought in as a kid sidekick! This is the culmination of Wally's maturation over the years. Even as recent as Crisis, Wally was never really depicted as a "grown up"... more of a petulant, selfish teenager. I feel it was through his relationship with Linda that he truly became a man.
If we look at Wally circa-1998... he's the trusted hero of the twin cities of Central and Keystone, and he's a founding member of one of the most elite lineups in Justice League history. Hell with the introduction of Impulse, Wally sorta has a sidekick of his own! All's I'm saying is... it was neat to see a character become "seasoned"... these days, it's more common to see our characters de-age.
For the story itself... it's pretty good. It's all just there to facilitate the wedding ceremony... and the twist ending. It was nice to see the old Titans and the JLA show up... it was also cool to get an Iris appearance. Gotta wonder if she knew how this was all going to unfold. Here's another Chris-chestnut... It's been a long time since I read this run... so I don't know if that's yet to be revealed.
For complaints... I've got two. I really don't like the post-Crisis take on Wally's parents. I found his idyllic pre-Crisis family dynamic to be rather refreshing... it's not often (outside Superman) that we see a hero come from a normal, loving, supportive family. It was a shame to lose that... giving Wally some cliche "baggage". Their depiction here was so cartoonishly cliche I thought for a second Judd Winick wrote it!
My second complaint... is the art. It's not bad or anything, it just, to my mind, doesn't fit the story. Pop Mhan feels more like an Impulse artist... doesn't fit the main Flash book, at least to me.
Overall though... this issue is definitely worth picking up. I had a good time with it. The wedding bits are solid, and it ends with a pretty shocking cliffhanger (which then-readers would have to wait two months for the next part... as the next issue to ship would be #1,000,000). Good stuff!
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Action Comics #810 (February, 2004)
"Walking Midnight"
Writer - Joe Kelly
Pencillers - Pascual Ferry, Kano, Duncan Rouleau & Renato Guedes
Inkers - Marlo Alquiza, Keith Champagne, Jorge Correa, Jaime Mendoza & Cam Smith
Colorist - Guy Major
Letterer - Comiccraft
Associate Editor - Tom Palmer, Jr.
Editor - Eddie Berganza
Cover Price: $2.25
HAPPY NEW YEAR, friends! I hope everyone had a nice, safe, quiet? New Year's Eve... me and mine did for the most part. Hadda handful of neighbors acting like it was the Fourth of July... but nothing I couldn't (mostly) sleep through. Drove the dogs crazy though!
Anyhoo... today we're going to ring in the New Year several times over as we tag along on Superman's yearly ritual of visiting every time zone on the planet as the clock strikes twelve!
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We open with Superman and Lois flying over London, just in time for the "ball to drop". Lois asks why Superman does this every year... and doesn't want to hear any "because I can" sorta stuff. She convinces him to let her tag along for some of the trip... and promises not to turn it into a story. He hands her a stack of letters... which tells me it's going to be one of those Superman stories.
Our next stop is... let's get a running start... Ittoqqortoormiit, Greenland... which, I'll be damned, is a real place! The letter is about a pregnant woman with no access to proper medical services. New arrivals are a pretty big deal in the Ittoq... because their population is only 500 (actually, 452 as of 2013). Superman delivers an ambulance full of medical support just in time for her Baby New Year.
Then, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. This letter is from a man who is looking to propose to a woman who had one helluva year. She lost her family in a car accident... which tells me, this fella moves pretty quick... probably didn't need Superman for any of this. Anyhoo, Superman swoops the widow off her feet and delivers her to the foot of Christ the Redeemer so this dude can propose.
Next stop, Metropolis. Superman has... nothing planned. This affords he and Lois the opportunity to properly ring in their own New Year.
Then, off to Smallville. Inside, Ma and Lois eat pickled herring on swiss cheese crackers... a New Years tradition from Jonathan's side of the family. Lois deep-sixes her triscuit into a potted plant. Outside, Clark and Pa watch the snow fall while sipping a warm beverage out of their Totoro mugs.
Off to Sydney, Australia... where Superman answers the letter of a man who appears to be preparing to commit suicide by leaping off the Sydney Harbor Bridge. Superman swoops in and carries him off to watch the fireworks... and I suppose we can assume that he's no longer wanting to kill himself?
In Marioka, Japan... Superman ignites some trademarkable fireworks for a group of children.
In Hong Kong, an Aryan terrorist triggers some explosives. Why he'd write a letter to Superman telling him this really defies logic. Maybe he wanted to get caught? Maybe he's just an idiot. Either way, Superman arrives... and we can assume everything goes hunky dory after that.
Since this is a Joe Kelly story from the early 2000's, we're going to need to get his thoughts on the Iraq War... so here we go. A Marine stationed in the Middle East writes to Superman expressing that the fighting forces have been forgotten. It isn't hard to discern which side of the aisle our writer sits... from this, and a lot of his writing at the time. Thankfully this is a bit more subtle than usual. Superman arrives to assure the Marines that they haven't been forgotten.
Toriano, Italy... a ninety-nine year old man refuses to die until he sees Superman with his own two eyes. He's very sick, and has been on death's door for a long time at this point. His doctors are baffled as to how he's made it this long. Superman flies up... and brings him peace.
We wrap up back in Metropolis... where Doctor Spectro has just finished building a "heavy photon distillation unit" with which he hopes to take over Metropolis. Superman dashes those dreams with the quickness... but doesn't take the baddie in. Guess he's still got a bit of the "holiday spirit" in 'im. We close with Spectro asking how it feels to be able to do "everything", to which our man says it's "the greatest".
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This was okay... but kinda fell short for me.
It's like, you know that this is trying to be a heartwarming issue... and, I dunno... sometimes you just can't set out to do that. There's very little in the way of subtlety... it's just page after page of "Awww".
I mean, the scenes were decent... but didn't have the heart of previous Metropolis Mailbag type of stories. It just felt like it was trying too hard... which, I dunno... is something I also associate with Joe Kelly's writing. I get the feeling he believes he's far more profound than he actually is. Don't know the fella... and for the most part, really enjoy his stuff... but there's that air about his writing.
The issue is gimmicky, but it really is the perfect way for a Superman New Year's story to go. The "people in need" all requesting Superman's presence exactly at midnight is a bit "eh", but I like the idea of our man visiting every time zone... even if it is simply "because he can".
The Iraq War commentary... I could've done without. I'm guessing that bit was chock full of projection... which, ya know... is fine, I guess. It gets his point across... and, I'll hand it to Mr. Kelly... this was far more subtle than that hamfisted JLA story he cranked out on the subject. I'm very rarely happy to see real-world stuff in my comics... especially when it's the first war of the "Internet era". I mean, it was wall-to-wall Iraq War from 2003-2005.
You couldn't escape it! We had dozens of 24-hour news channels... every website giving their two cents. The last thing I wanted to see was comics giving a (highly politicized) view on the subject. Plus, there's that whole "Why wouldn't Superman get involved?" thing that we try to ignore. I'll tell ya what, it's far easier to ignore if we quit mentioning the War in comics.
The ending didn't quite work for me. More on my perception of Kelly's profundity... it's as though he knew the final line of the book (and, as it happens his run on Action Comics), and worked backwards. Leaving Doctor Spectro to stew on the roof feels completely wrong. Seconds earlier he built a doomsday device to take over the city... and now he's just free to go? Not buyin' it.
Overall... I don't know that this is an issue you need to rush out and grab... but if you come across it in the wild, I suppose you could do worse. It's really pretty to look at!
Before we go... I want to raise my rapidly-cooling cuppa coffee and wish everyone a Happy, Healthy and Prosperous 2018!
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