Red Hood and the Outlaws #29

We'll get to Red Hood and the Outlaws after a short piece I found in a stack of papers on my desk. I have stacks of papers everywhere, covered in words, words, and more words. Some are covered in maps of text adventures and old school computer role playing games. But mostly they're covered in words and arrows and edits, margins filled with revisions, whole sentences scratched out with a note to ignore the omission and include the words underneath the ink. Dozens of half filled notebooks can be found all around the house with short pieces, thoughts, comics, beginnings of stories, middles of stories, endings of stories! Unfinished projects abound all around me. As I was moving some Fortean Times magazines about, I found three crumpled pages of yellow legal paper with something I was writing probably ten to twelve years ago. That's when I was writing on the yellow legal pads taken from the office supply closet from the job I was working at the time. Anyway, I'll shove it in block quotes so you can skip it if you just want to get right to the stupid shit Roy Harper does this month.

First, an apology. Most Writers can't stand reading stuff from their past but I find most of the random things I dig up, at the very least, interesting. Maybe just interesting to me because it's a peak into the mind of essentially a different person at this point. Although a person I still have a lot in common with! Anyway, here's some old school Eee! Tess Ate Chai Tea, complete with grammar errors, redactions, and amateurish turns of phrase! Not like those things have changed anyway.

Is Horatio Alger's 'Rags to Riches' dream fable still part of the American consciousness? Or has working hard to make something of oneself been replaced by get rich quick schemes or money for nothing lottery prayers? In these The ^build up of^ cynicism built in to within of the minds the Generation ^of^ the generations raised in the seventies and eighties was built through the eyes of was caused by seeing parents trying to suck happiness from the work your way up from the bottom mentality. Sure, dad was suddenly bringing home near six figures. But when he was home, he was hardened and cracked. Emotions drained by ^office^ politics never showed up emerged around the kids. But the new video game system and the cable TV made up for that, right?

So we saw working toward retirement as a sucker's deal. And after the divorce, mom's love turned bitter and resentment became her aura. And suddenly the things TV was telling us about love were exposed as hollow lies. Mom's life was gone because she had planned it around the love and affection of a man whose job drained him of all spirit and vitality. But for awhile there, when the checks were rolling in and the pension was growing and dad actually was actually at the dinner table as opposed to the strip bar, it seemed to be working.

Maybe than you're of that generation and your family wasn't like this. Perhaps your parents drowned themselves in drink instead of engaging in cacophonic [sic] conversations. Maybe booze saved the marriage but did it still save you?

Or are was your family life perfect? Did you grow up believing dad was happy and mom's love could save the world? Maybe it is you who is the one raising a family formed by the example you deludedly believed were deluded in believing. And you will be the father ^or mother^ most of us had and your children will join our ranks as just another dead baby left in the wake of our parents shattered illusion.

What were we to do?

When the smoke cleared and we were handed our high school diploma, where were we supposed to go? No matter what my dad's father's bank account implied, he failed. Work would not rule me. And mother may have thought the tight control she didn't use on dad was an appropriate the way to train her children. But the venom verbose venom that dripped from her tongue taught me love was harmful as career. When one finds life cannot be lived through love or career, where is one to go?

Well, college could kill a few years, anyway.

The breakfast bong hits and weekend keggers may have worked for awhile but the problem with opiates is when they wear off, the real world is worse than it was.

And did you learn anything while lost in those hallowed halls? Did Middlemarch and math problems equations expose to you the meaning of life?

(I've got a secret. I know how to stay happy. I know how but I just can't do it.)

All we've I've been taught is emptiness hunger and emptiness. We I strive to find something to satiate but all we I find is empty and unfulfilling.

I realize the primal need to propogate [sic] our species is the only point in and I can't abide children. I look forward to the years and years of this lost and empty despair and sometimes suicide seems a a succinct summation of worthwhile way of saving myself from that fate. But the fear of not existing makes desolation a long desolate life look satisfying. And besides, Because what else is there?

(And the secret of happiness trembles on the tip of my tongue. If I could only accept it convince myself to believe, if my brain hadn't been hardwired to think rationally, I might be happy.)

Perhaps you know the secret of happiness too? Maybe you are more earnest and naive than I am? And if so, maybe you could teach me how to do it. How do I convince myself to believe in the illusion? How do you learn to see that which you know to be untrue? The ability to believe the illusion is the secret to a happy, carefree life.

It doesn't matter what the illusion is.

That's it! Everybody back to work! Comic book commentary begins in three...two...one....

This is the first page of Red Hood and the Outlaws by new writer Will Pfeifer. It might be my favorite page of this entire series so far.

First off, I love the idea of some aliens getting their information not just from a science book half a century old but one aimed at kids as well! Old books that purport to answer questions and to teach children the mysteries of the world are one of my favorite things. Sitting next to me is my copy of Charlie Brown's Super Book of Questions and Answers that I owned as a child. The publication date is 1976 so it isn't as incorrect as I'd wish. But it's still fascinating to see how scientific questions were answered nearly forty years ago. Here's how the book answers the question about why the dinosaurs died out. It doesn't even mention the reason we commonly accept today!

See? No mention of Noah's flood at all!

At the end of last issue, it seemed like Red Hood and the Outlaws were going to hunt down Midas and destroy his international crime organization. This issue begins with Starfire swimming with the dolphins, Jason Todd training, and Roy Harper building shit. He's currently chasing down a tiny robot that escaped his lab.

Last issue, I swore I'd never be able to like Roy Harper after what Lobdell did to him. But fuck it all, I'm already changing my tune!

The aliens from the first page materialize on the ship that the Outlaws use as their island home and proceed to hijack it. They blast into space with Roy still on board and Jason and Kori left to wonder why the fuck Roy would run off in their home. They don't immediately voice their suspicions that he's back on heroin but I know that's what they're thinking.

The guys who hijacked The Outlaws' ship look somewhat Omega Mannish. And since the Omega Men were last seen in Deathstroke by Rob Liefeld, that appearance technically doesn't exist any more. Or they were imposters and these are the real Omega Men. The Twat Omega Men.

Roy's little robot escapes his clutches and winds up in the clutches of the least familiar member of the alien group. Which is good because when it blows him up, that still leaves the Tigorr and the Broot looking guys! Although the one that blew up is a shapeshifter named Grak, so he's still around as well. I don't remember any Omega Men named Grak. But then, I'm not exactly familiar with the entire team.

While Roy ponders a way to defeat three aliens he knows nothing about (except that one can survive a small nuclear explosion), Kori and Jason have a visitor to their island.

Well, at least he brought booze. He can't be that bad.

This is the fourth member of the alien group, the one that was busy being passed out when the rest went on their shipjacking excursion. He's a bit confused and getting chopped up by Jason and burnt to ashes by Kori doesn't help him. But he is a shapeshifter as well, so he just reforms back into his normal form, a drunk Tyrannosaur. Since Kori can speak his language and Jason knows a few things about making people speak their language against their will, it looks like the Outlaws will soon be back together.

In space, Roy discovers the aliens are demonstrating a weapon that can wipe out all life on a planet while simultaneously branding the planet with a logo that can be seen from space. That seems like a pretty decent product. But does it come with a knife that can cut through a can and still remain sharp?

Finally, Kori and Jason know where they need to go but they still need a ship. And Jason knows where to find one.

S.H.A.D.E. Ships Here Aren't Defended Ever.

Red Hood and the Outlaws #29 Rating: +4 Ranking. This was the most entertaining Red Hood and the Outlaws issue of the entire series. Roy Harper didn't make me vomit! And I even began to enjoy his Narration Boxes! I'm fairly certain the cover was meant for the story about crushing Midas's criminal organization. But that's okay because I'm just glad to have a bit of a new beginning for these guys! Although I think I heard a rumor that Lobdell was going to get another shot at writing this thing. DC, that would be a horrible decision. It's probably too late to stop it, isn't it? All I can hope is that the rumor wasn't true! I'll take Will Pfeifer as writer for this if he simply maintains this level of character likability.