Red Hood and the Outlaws #35

Now I want a scarf that looks like a snake.

Right at this moment, the trending Twitter tags read like the worst Halloween ever: #TrickorMeat #UnwantedHalloweenTreats #BeenRapedNeverReported.

I wish I enjoyed that Halloween story more than I actually did because I'm about to read the scariest thing I'll read on Halloween today: a Scott Lobdell jam!

Mmm. Scott Lobdell jam.

This issue, Scott Lobdell decided to change things up. He still wastes the first page of twenty with a boring, splash page that probably shouldn't even be called a splash page since it's more like a still life. So that's not different. But he does wait until the second page to Narration Box, "My name is Jason Todd." It also means that he wastes the second page with another non-kinetic splash page where nothing is actually happening. This is the equivalent of changing your spacing and font size on college essays. Now Scott Lobdell only has eighteen pages to write after having thrown away two pages with a few Narration Boxes that should have only lasted half a page.

This is one of the things that is wrong with Lobdell. You can tell he's not writing because he loves writing or else he'd pack in as much story as he possibly could in the meager twenty pages DC Comics gives the creators. Instead, he wastes as much space as possible, padding and extending his scripts with bullshit just to get the job done. He seems to like the idea of being a writer better than actually being a writer and doing the work. And he probably thinks he's pretty good at his job since he made tons of money writing the X-men. I never read that shit although many people promise me that he wrote some really good stuff back then. If he did, he blew his load in the nineties and now he's resting on his nice, soft laurels full of X-men money. But I can't judge him on the stuff he wrote which I never read. His Hardy Boys Adventures might be where he's putting all of his effort but I'll probably never read those because everything I've read in The New 52 with his name on it has been asshole flavored. Plus, it's the Hardy Boys.

The story begins with Roy Harper dying of burn wounds. If he recovers, hopefully he'll have lost his ability to Narration Box.

I bet I won't believe the story! I certainly won't believe that DC published it!

Jason's story about the awesome thing that happened to Scott Lobdell's Roy Harper (that's the version of Roy Harper I hate! He's not totally unlikable on Arrow) begins where Issue #34 left off. Kori had just ditched Roy and Jason because they were controlling her life for her own good. They didn't want her to murder some man she had every reason to murder because they didn't believe she was a murderer. They couldn't see their vision of "their girl" blemished in any way, so they kept her from getting revenge on her former slave master. What a couple of douchebag hypocrites. Jason never would have stopped Roy from killing somebody Roy needed to kill! And Roy never would have stopped Jason from killing someone Jason wanted to kill! But Batman forbid Starfire stains her dainty little hands with vengeance.

The two decide that they need to get rid of the body and thankfully Roy Harper is a super genius that can invent anything that Scott Lobdell needs for his shitty plot to keep moving. So Roy developed an arrow that reads the DNA of a victim and then explodes but only destroys everything with the victim's DNA on it. Including his clothing. But not the grass that had his blood on it.

Why did you talk her out of her kill in the first place? Sexist assholes. Also, it's Twat Lobo. Get it right.

Back on the island, they find Kori as understanding as ever. I guess Space Heroin really chills a sister out.

Back in the hospital and back to the present, Oliver Queen visits Roy.

I don't get it. Where is a place he can't reach? On a high shelf?

Oliver Queen might be threatening to shove Jason's guns up Jason's ass but I don't think so. I can reach pretty far up my ass. I'm pretty sure I could retrieve a gun that was holstered there.

Back to Jason Todd's story before he runs afoul of copyright infringement (you know? Suddenly having the name Assholster when that name already belongs to a member of the Graveyard Faction), the Outlaws begin their search for the terrorist that tried to destroy Washington, DC, which, I'm assured by the editor, happened back in Red Hood and the Outlaws #33. Now I'm angry that I was forced to remember that issue!

Oh, you're not, Starfire. You are not the only one.

Roy Harper isn't quite as Batman-brilliant as Jason Todd seems to think he is if he's equating the hatred of a person for the government of a country with the geography and topography of said country. I'm not exactly sure how "I hate the American government!" and "I live in a swamp!" equates to cognitive dissonance. But then I'm not Batman-brilliant!

When is Roy Harper going to burn up like a jack-o-lantern?!

The Outlaws stumble upon a shack with a basement full of thugs boosted by some contraption full of drugs latched to their ankles. Jason Todd, having no experience with the dangers of muscle boosting drugs (why would he, amirite?!) or their possible horrible side effects, decides to remove a contraption from one thug to place on himself. Um. Is he not worried about sharing needles? I'm not even worried about the side effects from whatever drug he's injecting into his system now! I'm worried that Jason now has AIDS or Hepatitis C!

Kori flies off but not far enough way that Roy can't reach her on foot while running through a swamp. It's like she wanted to get caught shooting up with Space Heroin! Or she wanted to make sure Roy was nearby when she took off like a rocket and burned the ever loving Jesus out of him.

Ha ha! I don't even feel bad for laughing. Fuck Scott Lobdell's Roy Harper!

Red Hood and the Outlaws #35 Rating: No change. Scott Lobdell's overall scripting hasn't been as bad as it was when he was on Superman and Teen Titans. I can see a person of average intelligence quite liking this comic book. Or maybe just somebody that hasn't been reading everything Lobdell has written for the New 52 and thus doesn't feel like they've been shit upon month after month by this man. But the best compliment I can pay this comic book is to not drop it in rankings and say, "It's passable." It would be a fine dollar comic book read to distract a person from their mortality for a few minutes. But that DNA destroying arrow? And the trite characterization of Kori's change in personality because she's on Space Herion? And Green Arrow threatening to hold Jason's guns over his head as Jason ineffectually jumps up trying to snatch them out of Ollie's hands? And Jason Todd taking drug filled needles out of a stranger's leg and putting them in his own? I guess if you don't think about any of that stuff, this comic book is okay. But I can't not stop thinking about all of that idiocy. I wish Ann Nocenti were writing this comic book.