The New Titans #69 (September 1990)

This is the second half of a story by Barbara and Karl Kesel. That’s right. It was not written by Marv Wolfman. He’ll be back to ruin this comic book next month. But for now, I will just sit in amazement and think about how much better this book was during the two issues not written by Marv Wolfman. The Royal Flush Gang had bad guy motivations which had nothing to do with being one of the Titans’ mothers or fathers. They even had some internal intrigue in their gang as The Gambler posed as The Joker to fuck with their shit. And Danny Chase’s story arc made sense and he wasn’t completely annoying (just slightly annoying). Oh, and the Titans actually stopped some bad guys for once.

I bet Marv Wolfman read this story and screamed, “That’s it! I’m never taking a month off of this book again! Fucking scabs making me look bad! Now I’ve got to bring back Deathstroke the Terminator so that fans instinctively think I wrote a better story than one with the stupid fucking Royal Flush Gang! I wonder if I can get the Kesels blacklisted?!”

The New Titans #68 (July 1990)

This two-part story (continued next issue) wasn’t written by Marv Wolfman so I don’t think it’s in continuity. I mean, obviously it isn’t in continuity anymore since it’s a Preboot story. But I mean even when it was published, nobody thought of it as in continuity! It was a good idea to add the Joker to the Royal Flush Gang though. Even if it’s not really The Joker. That was a spoiler for a twenty-six year old comic book so I think it’s okay to say it without a warning.

It's a fair summation of the JLA at the time. But it's also a delusional view of the Titans at the time. "Real heroes." Who the fuck is paying this jerk?