Story by Scott Lobdell
Pencils by Brett Booth
inks by Norm Rapmund
The Solicitation
Are the Teen Titans ready to stage an assault on N.O.W.H.E.R.E.? No way! But as Red Robin explains to the rest of his team, they'll have to rally to save the Superboy from certain death. And through all of this, only Solstice learns a secret Red Robin has been hiding that could tear the team apart just as they have finally come together!
Preview
The Story
Oh, no. I missed something from last issue. No wait, I didn't, I think this was the last issue of Superboy that this book is picking up from. Why did it start to cross over once I dropped Superboy? Why?
Anyhow, has you can guess, this looks like it picks up from the previous issue of Superboy. Superboy is being tortured by the one eyed guy and is about to die apparently. Enter in Kid Flash, Skitter, and Bunker to the rescue. Note to writer: If you are going to have a character describe what has happened that is easily shown in the art - you are wasting valuable words and page space. Stop that.
We do get an explanation about the weirdness outside of Red Robin's house from a few issues back. You know, how they were in the middle of the arctic and then in a village, and then in Red Robin's penthouse, and then not. Turns out it is Danny the Street, a character that apparently can transport people and make streets. He tells the Red Robin about Superboy being in trouble by showing the S-symbol upside down. Once again, Impulse has to describe what the art is showing us and then they realize what is going on.
Back to Red Robin's place, and Wonder Girl (don't call her that) is looking about as buff as a body builder twice her age. Ouch. They all decide, eventually, to rescue Superboy, and we are caught back up with the beginning of the comic.
Kid Flash has some sort of split personality thing happen to him for a minute, which I am sure will be brought up later. We miss out on a fight between Ravager and Wonder Girl that will appear in Superboy #8. I wonder why it was decided again to have this issue of Teen Titans tell you what is going to happen in Superboy. Superboy is published first, you would think that they would have events there, then continue the story in Superboy, then back and forth in a more linear way. Any who, Templar reveals that he is made up entirely of ravenous parasites that make his whole body seem like Medusa's hair. Yea. She takes all of two pages to defeat him. Yea, him who was planted as the big bad over in Superboy, or at least as the mastermind behind it all, was defeated in a few panels. OK.
Solstice confronts Red Robin and ask why they came back. He tells her that he needed to get some info to help build a case against NOWHERE. She seems taken aback by this info. It seems that Red Robin is not understanding that those teenagers are people, not data. They get tortured and kidnapped. And if this was supposed to be some big emotional moment between everyone, it fell amazingly flat for me. What did she expect of him? To go after NOWHERE all alone when he doesn't have powers? That seems to be the case, and the fact that she is this emotional about it just makes me not like her character or understand why she is like this.
Then they all attempt to leave, realize that they shouldn't leave Solstice behind, and then get captured by Harvest, who is apparently some bigger villain than any of the other evil villains before in any other issue. Seriously, there is a villain of the issue theme going on here with this comic that is just crazy. Although this villain seems to have similar powers to another villain that was in last issue. Wait minute, upon reflection all the villains seem to have a similar power set. Coincidence? Maybe not.
Maybe I just overlooked it before, but the dialogue and this story has gotten a little cheesey. I understand that they are teenagers and may react crazy-like to certain situations, but this just seems a bit too much.
The Art
It was decent this round. Besides Wonder Girl looking more and more like a body builder with each issue, where before it just seemed like she was toned, I don't have much to talk about. It does seem like the art has gotten to be more like a one page spread on every other page that highlights one character. And the art does good at bringing in some background details that the characters feel the need to describe, even though we are reading this in a medium that should allow for the art to show something and the words can show something else.
The Cover
Tone down the Green light and the lines everywhere. The combination of both drowned out the background art and I could hardly tell what was going on.
Grades
Words: 3/10 - big hunk of cheese.
Pictures: 7/10 - consistent from issue to issue. I haven't seen too much of a drop in quality, which is nice to have.
Recommend: Confusing, jarring, and not meant for much of anything. I will give it this, though. If you are a new reader, Lobdell does make sure to try and demonstrate the powers and the bits of character for the few characters that he will focus on in an issue. While nice, it does leave a lot of characters with not much being told about them.
Buy Next Issue: I will, but I am beginning to see the trend that Lobdell does with his writing on his books, and it is starting to get stale seeing too much of it at once.
Previous Issues
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