Saturday, 6 July 2024

New Teen Titans #38-44 + Annual #3

New Teen Titans #38-44 + NTT Annual #3

Originally released in 1984

Written by Marv Wolfman

Art by George Perez



This batch of issues contains the Judas Contract, a famous Teen Titans story where one of the team betrays them.  First, though, Dick Grayson needs to investigate Donna Troy's history and discover what happened to her birth parents.



It's a shame that this backstory would partially be rendered invalid a very short time later as a result of Crisis on Infinite Earths. Still, it's touching to see how far Dick will go for his close friend Donna, painstakingly going over what few clues he can find to determine who Donna's birth parents are, what happened to them, and who adopted her since then.



The next two issues bring back Brother Blood, who is coming into conflict with the leader of Zandia, the nation where he has his church. The Titans get involved, though Brother Blood does a good job at planning ahead.  His schemes aren't perfect (he seems to be crushed by his laser cannon by the end, and he doesn't take the Titans' powers for himself), but by the end of the story, he's bested the Titans in front his followers, spread his religion throughout the world, and discredited politicians who opposed him. (And even his supposed death seems like it's setting the stage for him to have a miraculous "resurrection" months later)



Throughout this time, Terra has slowly been building up trust with the Titans, and now she is trusted enough that she knows their identities and has a budding romance with Beast Boy. However, as revealed previously, this is not a good idea, as she's working for Deathstroke.  She's also doing more than that - it's never stated that they're in a relationship, but it's heavily implied to a skin-crawling extent.



Deathstroke uses the information that Terra gathers to attack the Titans when they're unprepared and vulnerable, though he's so focused on the Titans that he fails to see his ex-wife Adeline and his son Joseph trailing him. The two of them fill Dick in on Terra's betrayal, though several details work in Deathstroke's favour - Kid Flash quit the Titans, while Terra attacks Raven rather than Deathstroke doing it.



Dick has been going through some changes of his own - he's not quitting like Wally, but he no longer feels like he can be Robin.  Once Adeline tells Dick about Slade's backstory (Joseph can't say anything, as he's mute thanks to a kidnapping attempt by Deathstroke's enemies) and how she learned about his mercenary ways (which led to her becoming his ex-wife), Dick suits up as a Titan once more - not as Robin, but in a new identity inspired by both Batman and Superman - Nightwing.  The costume seems like it could use some work.



Deathstroke's son suits up as well, taking on the identity Jericho as he is prepared to stop his father's revenge-fueled mission.  Jericho was mutated and has the ability to possess others, though Adeline kept this a secret from Deathstroke.  Now, Nightwing and Jericho have set out to save the rest of the Titans from Deathstroke, Terra, and H.I.V.E., the organization that originally contracted Deathstroke.



Despite being one of the central characters of this story, we don't get much of a look into Terra's motivations.  We know that she hates the Titans, and finds their ideas of heroism sickening, but beyond Deathstroke referring to her as a sociopath, we don't get any indication as to why that's the case.  With Deathstroke, we learn that he became a mercenary because the military was the one thing that he was good at, and the accident that gave him his enhanced reflexes and strength caused him to be discharged from the military when it initially caused him medical issues, but Terra doesn't get any kind of backstory like that.



By the end of the story, the series has been rebranded as "Tales of the Teen Titans."  I'm not sure why that was the case, though I supposed that after forty issues, they can't really be called "New" any more.  The third Teen Titans Annual serves as the finale of the story, focusing on Nightwing and Jericho infiltrating the H.I.V.E. base to rescue the team.  Between Joseph's powers and Terra's betrayal, there's a lot of confusion among the assembled people, and things only get worse when Joseph takes control of his father's body, causing Terra to believe that Deathstroke betrayed her.



By my understanding, most stories after this present Terra as being utterly evil and completely insane, lashing out wildly and causing pain to others with no real motivation for doing so.  The Other History of the DC Universe goes the opposite route, painting Terra as a victim of Deathstroke, who's portrayed as a pedophile and a rapist.  The actual story leans more towards the former depiction, with Terra's ranting and raving giving her no real reason for wanting to kill the Titans beyond annoyance that they don't use their powers to rule over normal people, but Deathstroke's disturbing aspects are plainly highlighted as well - he may not have manipulated Terra into her cruel nature (it's established that she was like this before meeting Deathstroke), but he definitely took advantage of an underage girl in more ways than one in his efforts to target the Titans.



It's tragic to see Beast Boy desperately trying to rationalize that Terra couldn't have really betrayed the team - that she was hypnotized, or brainwashed, or that she was a double agent who was trying to stop Deathstroke - but in the end, she did everything of her own free will.  Her motivation was disappointing in my eyes, but the rest of this story was well-written while also being disturbing at times.

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Hawkman (1964) #1-9

Hawkman #1-9 Originally released in 1964 Written by Gardner Fox Art by Murphy Anderson