New Titans #113

In Dick Grayson's memories, Starfire and Cyborg were Christ figures while Aqualad spent 100% of his time trying to suck his own dick.

When my beloved cat Pelafina died a few months ago at eighteen years old, my eulogy was simply this: "She was the best gift I was ever given." And then the Non-Certified Spouse just sent me a picture of some Lobo socks that our friend Xan wants to give me and I just said, "Now Pelafina was the second best gift I was ever given!" Just in case anybody was wondering just how dedicated I am to my hyperbolic love of Lobo!

How do I show these off? Shorts while wearing long socks?! How gauche!

And just for comparison so you can truly understand the infinite limits of my hyperbolic nature which can declare those socks better than Pelafina, here is Pelafina for comparison. I am not responsible for your hearts melting.

I just ordered Koji Suzuki's Loop, the third novel in the Ring saga. Spiral was so fucking yo-yo bananas that I figured they could never make a movie of it. But I was wrong, being that I think like an American and no like a Japanese. Because they audaciously made a film of it (Rasen) and I watched it a few days ago. Inexplicably, the movie remains completely true to the book. I say "inexplicably" because this is the first time I completely expected a fuck-ton of changes to the premise and the plot. I naively thought, "There is no way they're going to make a film where the curse of the video tape jumps into the journal of the reporter from the first movie because it somehow senses the report will be a more virulent mode of transmission. But then almost immediately, the virus will be all, 'You know what? What if I infect this guy and have him fuck this chick? That means I could spread to her in a much more normal virus-y way!' And because that might make the entire premise of the Ring series less supernatural because now the virus has suddenly decided to spread like a normal virus instead of like some techno-virus spawned in the dank and smelly recesses of some 4channer's basement lair, the story will have to introduce a new twist! Now the virus won't just kill! It will cause the woman infected by the virus to give birth to a clone of themselves except possessed by Sadako, the woman who climbs out of the television in The Ring. Which is a premise no movie audience would ever be expected to swallow! Especially when the plot also asks you to believe the virus can clone anybody one Earth through the Sadako clone as long as you possess their DNA and understand in vitro fertilizaion! Oh, and also the clone is birthed at the exact age the person died? Or the sample was taken? I don't know, it's all so confusing that nobody would ever make that fucking movie." So, anyway, good for you, Japan! You did it! You win again!

Seriously though. How is Loop going to be any crazier than Spiral?! I can't wait to find out!

This issue begins with Dick Grayson helping to rebuild the Amazon village where Kory broke up with him. He's showing some emotional growth as he contemplates the naked chest of one of the villagers, Maria-Theresa. If you're now thinking, "That's an odd name for a native of the Amazon," have you done any reading on missionaries? Whenever anybody tells me all the good religion has done for the world, my entire rebuttal is the word "Missionaries!" screamed at the top of my lungs. I've finally decided to embrace the phrase, "Brevity is the soul of wit." Why should I have to explicate my missionary argument to another grown-ass adult who should understand the whole bullshit idea of spreading their religious dogma to other cultures? How does that help anybody?! Oh wait, I forgot. It lets Jesus collect more souls so he can stick his tongue out at the devil and say, "Nyah, nyah! Hallelujah! Amen!"

Dick realizes that he's been a selfish child and constantly expected Kory's emotional support for his problems while always sighing and rolling his eyes at all of Kory's problems. Which might be a step up from his paternal role model who did all of those things but to a butler because he thought women were just for fucking. Is that a step up? At least Dick was trying not to treat all women as penis cozies? At least all non-red-headed women!

I've lost my train of thought. Again.

Oh yeah! Dick was learning to forget about Kory through emotional growth and new boobies.

The rebuilding of the village ends with a big celebration after getting the cross on top of the rebuilt church. That makes me super sad. How many Amazonian Rain Forest Gods were displaced due to this incursion of Christian bullshit?! I hope they become super villains.

Dick loves how quickly the villagers manage to rebuild the village without somebody taking control as leader. Maria tells him, "Yeah, dumbie. Is that the right word? 'Dumbie'? Anyway, we all know what we need to do and we do it without anybody standing back and judging our every movement like some dark controlling knight!" And Dick is all, "Yeah! I wish that would work with the Titans! But how can I trust Changeling to turn into the right creature without me telling him? And how can I make sure Cyborg will synchronize using his white noise cannon while saying 'Booyah'?! And I'm just supposed to trust that Raven won't rape and impregnate everybody we meet with her father's demon babies?! Pshaw! No way!"

What I'm trying to say is that Dick hasn't really fucking learned anything. At least not yet! I'm still just a few pages into his journey!

Dick takes a canoe down the Amazon while contemplating his life. I think maybe Maria slipped him some hallucinogens. Although most of his thoughts are on his friends and loved ones and how they've always been there for him and how he hopes he hasn't let them down and how maybe he should celebrate those who died as heroes while none of his thoughts are about how he's lived five thousand years or how that monkey keeps looking at him or how the number three seems to connect all of reality and explain the meaning of everything and why the fuck is that monkey still looking at him and have you ever wondered why you push pause on the remote to pause a show but then can push pause again to unpause it? Like, is it its own antonym?!

Seriously though. In 113 issues, did Dick ever lead the Titans into battle? Weren't the battles all just relatives and/or old villains attacking the Titans directly, without any say from Dick? Also, I kept in the Starfire side boob for you perverts.

Dick eventually blames his self-absorption for why he was raped by Mirage. He blames himself for not realizing he was with another woman who just happened to be able to shape herself like any woman. I guess maybe when she was all, "I'm going to put this strap-on straight up your asshole, okay?" he could have wondered why Kory didn't realize she was shoving the bat-grapple gun up his ass. So, yeah, maybe it was kind of his fault. I don't think I'm victim blaming when I'm just shrugging my shoulders and letting the stupid victim blame his stupid self. Some son of the world's greatest detective he turned out to be! He couldn't even tell his dick was in the wrong vagina!

Dick's navel gazing causes him to plummet off of a waterfall which pretty much sums up his entire situation over the last hundred or so issues. I'm not sure if Marv Wolfman meant for it to be the case but I guess I have to assume that he did, no matter how much I don't want to.

Oh, also, he doesn't die. He just has a revelation as he falls that maybe he didn't cause Jericho's death or Terra's death or Cyborg's death or Kole's death or Danny Chase's death or whatever other Titan deaths I'm forgetting since there have been so many. Also maybe Kole didn't die. She might just have been super boring.

At the end of Dick's journey, the Narrator declares, "Dick Grayson was once The Boy Wonder. But today he has become a man!" Maybe this was the beginning of the end of my hatred of Dick Grayson! Marv was all, "I'm done writing Dick Grayson as the angry kid trying to live up to Batman's legend! From now on, he'll be his own man, compassionate and thoughtful!" Also, maybe Marv just continued to write him as a bitter asshole and I was right not to like Dick Grayson until the 21st Century.

The prologue features Starfire on a satellite in a garden throwing a snake back to Earth from orbit. Maybe she's the one on hallucinogens?

New Titans #113 Rating: C. I like that Dick Grayson supposedly grew up in this issue but I'm not sure how he really changed. The entire premise that he considered his life and what he should be doing distracted him from the waterfall ahead was just Dick repeating all of his life's errors. But somehow this time, he had a revelation? Whatever, Marv! I guess I just have to accept when you tell me through the narration boxes that Dick is now a man!

New Titans #111

The mystery is who thought sending Arsenal into space was a good idea and also who shit his pants?

If your superhero team needs spacesuits to survive in space, maybe send a different team of heroes on the space mission. It just makes more sense to leave Batman and Aquaman on Earth while Superman and Supergirl solve all of the space crime. I couldn't think of any other heroes that could survive in space. Hell, I'm not even sure if we're currently in an era where Superman is allowed to survive in space. Remember when DC thought it would be a good idea to reduce his powers so that even Superman had to wear oxygen when in space? Although even a Superman who can survive in the vacuum of space retains considerable plot problems. Sure, he can survive in space if he's within range of a yellow sun because that's how he gets his powers. Or was it simply that he lost his powers under a red sun and was just fine under any other sun? The 1986 Who's Who doesn't clear things up as it just says that Superman's Kryptonian cells act like solar batteries under a yellow sun. It doesn't distinctly say that the red sun weakens him so I guess he just grows weaker away from a yellow sun as his cell battery drains. Then again, I'm sure things changed after The Man of Steel series. And then again after Millennium. And then again after Zero Year. And then again after Infinite Crisis. And then again after The New 52. And then again after Rebirth. And then again after Doomsday Clock. And then again after whatever the fuck Bendis is doing.

Why the fuck am I talking about Superman?! I'm not even sure he knows the New Titans exist!

As I begin reading the first page of this comic book that shows Kory once again dressed in fraying threads, I remember that I already ranted about sending the Titans into space! In comic books, sometimes your last hope truly is the last hope. Nobody in the 90s wanted to have to rely on the Titans to rescue them.

The Terraist's satellite blasts the Brazilian rain forest as a means to get Brazil to stop razing their rain forests. I suppose it's a pretty good plan because if the forests are burned to the ground, Brazil won't be able to burn the forests to the ground. Reporters all over the world are asking the tough question: "Will governments give in to the Terraist's demands that they stop destroying the Earth before the Terraist destroys the Earth?!" My guess is that they won't because the Terraist's plan is fucking ridiculous. I wonder if the Terraist is also a landlord? "If you won't put up smoke detectors, I'm going to burn the fucking house to the ground. You have three hours!"

To save the world, the New Not-So-Teen-Anymore Titans have all crowded aboard some kind of space rocket.

The way Erlich is gripping that throttle and reaching for a wedge of cheese on the dash makes me horny.

You might have noticed Gar sitting in the back thinking while everybody else crowds around the controls in what I'm assuming violates several safety regulations. Gar's grieving his boring friend Cyborg. Red Star notices because Gar has made sure to do the contemplative hand on the chin while looking at an unfixed point in the distance pose. Nobody else notices because, I'm assuming, they're capitalists. It's a touching scene of a friend mourning the loss of another friend that isn't actually touching at all. But it does highlight Gar's mullet!

I'm not making fun of Gar's mullet at all. There was a time when we, as a society, accepted the mullet as a valid hair style. But then enough people began making fun of it that everybody had to back off and pretend that it wasn't a valid aesthetic. Maybe it had just too broad a base of people who generally wore the hairstyle. I mean, if you saw somebody with a mullet from afar, how were you supposed to know whether they were a working class butt rocker, a hockey player, or a lesbian?

Red Star brings up how the Titans have lost many friends.

Those friends are Terra (not a friend but a mole), Dick Grayson (not lost), and Starfire (also not lost). Would it have killed him to actually think about Jericho, Raven, and Danny Chase?!

Marv Wolfman intrudes on the fiction, musing about how this comic book is still fucking selling, with the line, "Sometimes I wonder why we're still even here." Me too, Marv! I was 22 and still buying this shit! Although there really was a time in my life where one of my main existential dreads was dying before seeing how different comic book stories ended. Imagine being so naive as to think any of these fucking things would ever have an actual ending!

Red Star says, "If we gave up, then our friends will have died in vain," without ever once thinking about one of their actual dead friends. Also without acknowledging that their friends died in vain. Maybe they wouldn't have died in vain if the Titans looked at their deaths and thought, "You know what? We aren't fucking helping anybody! Jericho was killed not saving the world but battling his father. Raven was killed not saving the world but being consumed by her familial darkness. Maybe we should stop fooling ourselves into thinking we're helping the world rather than harming it and just hang up our capes! That would be a fitting tribute to our dead friends!"

Garth interrupts the emotional stuff by pointing out that the Terraist's space station just launched a missile at them. I'm glad Garth, the undersea hero, is pulling his weight up in space by observing shit.

The scene shifts to the Terraist's satellite where I discover I'm not entirely sure if the bad guy is named The Terraist or Teraizer. What I am sure of is that his right-hand man is named "James." The Terraist states that public reaction is still on their side and I have no idea how that's possible. He's burning the fucking rain forests in an effort to save the rain forests. How the hell is anybody supporting this...oh fuck. I just remembered Donald Trump is president and the Republicans are burning this entire country to the ground in order to line their own pockets. Never mind. I totally buy it.

While Starfire flies toward the space station, she philosophizes about freedom. She's all, "It's ain't free, bitches! Some motherfuckers are going to have to die!" I'm not sure what this story has to do with freedom. It's more about saving the world from the most wrong-minded ecoterrorists to ever threaten to chop down the tree they're hugging. Maybe she's still hung up on her relationship with Dick and how she was never free while with him because he of his constant moralizing.

Meanwhile back in the burning rain forest, Dick Grayson comes to terms with his father/son relationship with Batman. Is this the exact moment Dick Grayson began to become a compelling character? Is this when he truly becomes Batman's equal? Instead of the whining brat trying to distance himself from Batman, he finally embraces what Batman represents and what Bruce taught him, both as a son and sidekick. I fucking hated Dick Grayson for so long because of this comic book, because Marv Wolfman needed to concentrate on the drama of teens rebelling against their parents and/or parental figures. But this might be the moment Dick matures. Which didn't mean I was ready to like the ungrateful turd. But I can see this as the experience needed before I could begin to change my mind about him.

Also, it probably helped when Dick began being written by writers other than Marv Wolfman.

The Terraist blasts Starfire into unconsciousness so it's up to Red Star to save her. Mostly because none of the other Titans have any real helpful super powers. I mean, Garth might try to summon a dolphin, or Roy might shoot an arrow with a rope tied to it, or Gar might transform into a space bunny rabbit. But mostly that shit would just waste time.

Look. I don't need my comic books to absolutely adhere to believable scientific standards, but what the fuck is Kory breathing?

The Titans invade the space station and defeat The Terraist as he inevitably winds up revealing that he's not interested in saving the world at all. He just wants cash. And since most of the world supported his terrible scheme, Starfire uses his camera link to the world to scold everybody on Earth. That probably won't help the Titans' reputation. Although she scolds them while practically naked, so my guess is not many people turned off the broadcast.

New Titans #111 Rating: D. The Terraist concocted this entire plan to make money. Why couldn't he be happy with the billions of dollars he apparently already had?! I'm fairly certain you can't build a space station of death while employing dozens of trained killers without having a pretty hefty bank account. It would make more sense if he did care about the environment even if his plan was completely contrary to helping the environment. Anyway, I hope the Titans decide to take care of his cat. That cat didn't choose to be owned by a huge dickhead.

New Titans #110

DC has been "unleashing" characters for over twenty-five years!

Twitter might be a smoking rectum of a filth and despair but let me tell you what it's given to me. I signed up to Twitter nearly ten years ago, mostly to secure the name Grunion Guy. I think my first tweet was "Why are they called Sixlets when there are only five colors?" Fucking insightful stuff, that. Anyway, at some point, a junior high school girl from Missouri followed me on Twitter. I followed her back and she lost her fucking mind because Grunion Guy started following her. It turned out, her and two of her best friends loved A Really Scary Story and some of Grunion Guy's other stories that were online (I say "Grunion Guy's other stories" and not "my other stories" because some of them (some of the best of them and certainly the first of them!) were not written by me. I just sort of took over the persona). Apparently the stories had been something fun they shared and they were excited to be acknowledged by Grunion Guy. They were funny and clever and I enjoyed reading their tweets and following their lives. Since then, I've watched them grow into compassionate, hilarious college students. I'm proud of them like I would be proud of my actual nieces if they were the kind of people to make me proud (ha ha! Just kidding, actual nieces! Whatever your names are!).

But there's a dark side to this other aspect of Twitter, this allowing instant access between writers and their audience. For the most part, it's what makes Twitter truly terrible. But long before Twitter, fans already felt entitled to the stories they expected. But if they didn't get them, they actually had to write a letter that would almost certainly only be read by some person whose job was to act as a firewall to the creator. Now when Tom King writes Batman stories where Batman actually has to deal with the existential ramifications of taking on the role as sole arbiter of justice to the universe, Batman fans can tweet directly at him saying, "You suck! Batman is about punching things, idiot!" I would like to believe that most creators ignore what the audience claims they want and just continue to express what they feel they need to express. Art isn't about feeding the masses what they want; obviously it's about stroking one's ego as if it were a massive cock that just needed orgasmic release. Mostly when people scream at me for writing shit they don't agree with, it doesn't bother me. On the other hand, there's a part of me that feels proud that when those three young kids from Missouri found something they enjoyed in my writing and subsequently followed me on Twitter, they were able to find that the person behind those stories was somebody they actually enjoyed interacting with, somebody whose beliefs they could respect and agree with. I can't imagine how disappointing it must be for, say, a Dilbert fan to get online and follow the douche that does that comic book only to be greeted by his terrible politics and inane philosophies. Actually, I can't even imagine somebody being a Dilbert fan so that was probably a poor analogy.

Ultimately I know that who I am doesn't matter when somebody reads A Really Scary Story (a story which, might I add, was once read out loud (by Daniel Heath Justice, no less!) before an audience that contained Connie Willis. So I'm practically a Hugo Award winner myself!). But I'd rather be seen as a somewhat enlightened, mostly compassionate moron than a selfish asshole who thinks they're the smartest fucker in the room.

While I'm rambling on about Twitter, here's a little free advice for debating online: only respond to the person angrily responding to something you've written if your response makes you laugh. And never respond more than twice (only once if at all possible. I just say twice for a little bit of latitude). I generally don't engage in "discussion" on the Internet. I "write" posts. If somebody responds angrily, I'll either ignore it, say something whimsically stupid in response, or will clarify once and leave it at that. Most people having debates on the Internet seem to think that they're arguing their side and that they really have to make sure their point is understood. But that's a huge mistake! Because nearly 100% of the time, the angry respondent has intentionally misunderstood what you've written, and will continue to believe that what they said you said is what you said. So even one clarification is probably too much but I like to give people the benefit of the doubt. Very occasionally, the misunderstanding isn't intentional and we can part on good terms.

Anyway, Dick is traveling through the rain forest looking for Kory this issue.

Dick seems shocked by the acrobatic oral sex customs of these indigenous peoples.

Dick finds Kory in the jungle telling stories of her homeworld to this Amazonian tribe. If Dick doesn't stop her, Starfire's stories will soon usurp the stories of the native tribe, being that they're far more exciting and filled with more aliens and space lasers. She's going to destroy this entire culture nearly as fast as a white Christian missionary!

Before Starfire can supplant the basis of the village's cultural understanding of their place in the universe by telling space operas, the stars of one of her space operas attacks the village! And just as the story begins to get exciting, the scene changes to the bureaucracy of Checkmate running the Titans.

Now that the Titans need the government's help to battle lawsuits brought against them for their familial disputes causing citywide destruction (which the Titans deny but, I mean, have they been reading their own comic book? Eighty percent of their battles are against family members and the other twenty percent are against villains who have a grudge against the Titans themselves), they're being given political missions by the government. On one hand, it's despicable that they're going to be used as pawns for political and corporate interests. On the other hand, there's at least a 50% chance they'll actually be helping to make the world a better place for once.

What a surprise. There first mission is against a guy who wants to make the world a better place by saving the environment! I wonder if the Titans uniforms will have Shell, Mobile, and Exxon patches added to them.

How do I not remember this guy? That was a rhetorical question that means "I love this guy! Why didn't I have a shirt with him on it?! Why did I spill so much semen over Lobo when this guy existed?!" What I really meant to say was "Terraist? No wonder nobody remembers this guy!" You know when something clever goes a bit too far into clever so that it becomes fucking idiotic instead? That's the name "Terraist." But he's cradling a cat and a rose and he's battling for the environment! How is this guy the bad guy?! Just because he lives in Zandia? Fucking racist, man.

Oh wait. Maybe I should have listened to the rest of The Terraist's rant. He plans on destroying the world quickly unless government's stop all pollution immediately. That doesn't seem insane and unreasonable at all! But I don't think his cat is into it. The cat just wants a few nice chin scritches and a plate of fancy food.

The lasers that hit the rain forest were part of The Terraist's attack to save the world by destroying it. Maybe I was wrong about judging the people of Zandia. Maybe they are all fucking assholes.

"We know you can't get into space but we need the Titans to stop Terraist and his death satellite!" "You know there are heroes that can fly into space?" "WE NEED YOU!"

Red Planet declares that they will help and Arsenal is all, "Are you fucking nuts?! I don't have a rocket arrow!" But Flash is all, "I used to hate you because you were a Communist and Russian, Leonid. I just wanted you to know!" Fucking Wally. Although in Wally's defense, I once said this same kind of bullshit. I once told Mistina La Fave of The Prids how I didn't really like their music the first time I heard them but that I loved the show I had just watched before saying that horrible thing to her. Now in my defense during Wally's defense, the first time I saw The Prids (way back in like 2000 or 2001, I think? Yeesh), I also saw The Faint for the first time (touring for Danse Macabre) and I can't be responsible for comparing everything else poorly in relation to that glorious spectacle. But I still suck for saying that thing.

The Titans decide to accept help from Alexander Luthor since he's the only private citizen with a ship that can get them into space so they can stop an eco-terrorist from saving the environment in completely the wrong way. This was twenty five years ago. It's like nothing ever changes! Why does anything we do matter if we're just repeating the same shit over and over again?! Oh God, I'm so tired!

New Titans #110 Rating: B-. If you were paying attention to the cover, you might be wondering when Baby unleashed his beest. It happened over one panel where he attacked Steve Dayton but Dayton instantly downed him with some neuro-laser. I'm not sure why Checkmate didn't hire Steve Dayton to take down The Terraist since, using the transitive property, if Dayton can defeat the Titans, he should also be able to defeat The Terraist. Also, he probably has a ship that he's not letting the Titans use because he's tired of being used by them. Also he might still be insane seeing as how he's working on another Mento Helmet. Maybe going insane is the cure for being insane? So a second Mento Helmet is the cure for a first Mento Helmet! Man, no wonder I'm not a genius. When I break my arm, I rarely ever think the cure is breaking it again! But then, I know I've heard doctors talking about rebreaking arms to help fix broken arms! So I really am stupider than I thought!

New Titans #109

"I wish she'd go back to sleep!"

According to the cover, Kynasf'rr is a reverse skin moisturizing ritual.

It was this cover that began my theory that Tamaraneans evolved from insects. It's not a very complicated theory; I pretty much stated the whole thing in this paragraph's opening sentence. And maybe I didn't think up the theory when I first saw this cover but when I just pulled it out of the stack two minutes ago and screamed. This cover is so traumatic that I actually remember buying it on the stands and thinking, "Why am I still buying this series?" That's a pretty serious critique seeing as how I was in my early twenties and could probably jerk off over nearly anything in a bikini.

I probably didn't need to add "in a bikini." Loose shorts and a nice breeze was a good time at that age.

Not that I ever bought New Titans because I was attracted to the characters. That was a joke! I bought New Titans because I'd purchased the first twenty or so and they just kept putting more and more issues out. What was I supposed to do? Stop collecting them?! Fucking nonsense, mate!

Also, did you ever see Jericho's ass? Me-ow!

The issue begins with Starfire describing Kynasf'rr and I'm beginning to suspect it's anal: "The Initiator led me down through tunnels black as the great dark hole just before our solar system's rim. I had no idea where I was. None who have submitted to Kynasf'rr speaks of it to those who have not. It's very mystery made it all that more alluring to Komand'r. And foreboding to me."

Komand'r is my kind of princess!

Ugh. No wonder 90s Batman didn't respect Nightwing!

That isn't really Dick saying those pathetic things. It's actually worse! It's Starfire hallucinating what she feels lame-ass Dick Grayson would say to her! She doesn't want to hear this sappy shit! She wants you to tell her how your thick dick is going to ruin her mighty Tamaranean vagina!

While Dick continues to mewl about how much he needs Kory, a hallucination of Komand'r appears to tell Starfire that anal fucking rocks. But Kory is all, "I don't want to be with a weak jerk that can't give it to me hard the way I imagine Bruce Wayne could give it to me, but I'm not sure if I'm ready for the dirty deed!" Komand'r makes some pretty solid arguments and I'm not just saying that because I think Kory should take it in the ass. Komand'r has historical evidence on her side! Their grandfather was bold enough to be rammed up the shit chute, so he fought off the Gordanians when they wanted his son. But his son was like Nightwing! He was all, "That's not the proper way to fuck! That's an exit only hole!" And because he wasn't strong and powerful, Starfire suffered. And now she's weak too!

I can't believe Cyborg is too dead to enjoy this!

A website must exist that's simply out of context panels of DC characters yelling, "DICK!"

X'hal and her son, Auron, appear to Starfire as she accepts herself and finally completes the ritual of Kynasf'rr! It's not as graphic as I thought it would be. It might not have even been anal! But then the images could have just been metaphor, seeing as how this isn't an x-rated comic book. I mean, this kind of looks like it could be a visual, non-sexual representation of anal, right?

I'm so aroused right now!

Starfire declares she is now a Shaman of Tamaran walking the Way of the Warrior! Oh yeah baby! Me too!

New Titans #109 Rating: A solid B. The best part was how it left out all of the terrible characters, like Red Sun and Wildebeest and Changeling and Pantha and Danny Chase and probably a few others that are so boring that I forgot about them. Oh, Arsenal! The most important thematic element of this issue was that a person shouldn't blame themselves for being raped. That's a pretty tough thing to come to grips with. But what's even tougher is learning that even when you overcome that feeling, you still realize that a stupidly large percentage of the population will continue to blame you for the rape. Assholes.

New Titans #108

I can't believe we had to wait 108 issues for Marv Wolfman's take on the trauma of rape!

The advertisement on the inside front cover is for the movie Blue Chips and I've never hated past everybody more. Shaquille O'Neal starring in a movie directed by William Friedkin with the tagline, "In your face." Maybe I'm judging this movie too harshly simply because my first thought was, "What fucking world were we living in where we decided Shaq needed a movie career?" But then, he's playing a basketball player in this movie so he probably nailed the role. I'm sure there's no difference between the way he performed his role and the way he answered press questions after a game. And I guess he was kind of funny and charming, so what Hollywood bigwig wasn't getting on the horn and yelling at casting directors, "Get me Shaq! I've got a script here for a basketball movie and he'd be perfect! Also maybe throw this genie script at him!"

Anyway, the Internet and Roger Ebert seem to think this movie wasn't too bad so maybe this isn't a hill I should die on. Not that I haven't died on a whole slew of hills that weren't worth dying on. Maybe not as many as Deathstork fans but I've still had my share. I don't remember any of those hills because I purge my memory of all the times I acted foolish so that I can continue to believe I'm the epitome of the perfect human being.

Also, maybe I shouldn't trust Roger Ebert's judgment as much as I do seeing as he began his review with this word: "Alot". Unless that indicates he despised editors too in which case I'm back to being his #130,503,227th biggest fan!

The issue begins with Starfire visiting Councilwoman Alderman in an insane asylum. Kory is dressed in torn rags because fuck you. You don't deserve a comic book that makes sense if you stuck with New Titans this long! My first thought was, "Is this a nightmare?" But I skipped ahead a few pages so that I wouldn't write a bunch of shit that didn't matter when it was revealed to be a dream and I don't think it is a nightmare. My second thought was that Kory broke in to confront Alderman but Kory mentions things the guard said to her, and references waiting for the guards to open the door leading to Alderman's cell. So she went through the proper channels for a visit and nobody seemed to care she was barefoot and wearing a torn sheet that was skimpier than her superhero costume. But then I remember this is a comic book from 1994 and even when a hot female character is dealing with the trauma of rape, the artist still must cater to the male gaze. You know how many comic book drawings of dead female heroes I've jerked off to?! I mean, obviously it's zero! That was meant to be hyperbolic and satirical!

So sexily satirical!

Comic book fans think they have it rough now, what with Tom King portraying Batman as a man who might actually have to deal with the psychological trauma of his entire life in ways other than beating criminals nearly to death. Back in 1994, we had to deal with poor misunderstood and tormented Raven turning into a rape monster just like her father! It was a hard lesson! Thankfully, the only people who had to learn it were the assholes who still kept buying The New Titans after the Wildebeest story arc.

Nightwing arrives to save Starfire from more trauma induced by Alderman's ranting. He appears in full costume because men are allowed to be dignified. Although, technically, with the way artists draw characters in spandex, Nightwing looks more naked than Starfire.

Starfire yells "Kynasf'rr!" and blasts through the wall, leaving Nightwing free to think about how Alderman said he was always second to Batman. I mean, Kory's pain is terrible and Alderman taunting her about a possible Trigon pregnancy is terrifying but second to Batman?! Below the belt, crazy lady!

Phantasm makes an appearance to say, "Trigon's seed has returned to Earth!" So now I'm thinking about Trigon's ejaculate, so thanks for that, Marv Wolfman! You dirty pervert!

Based on these two articles on the front page, I'm guessing nobody at the Globe knows what "landslide" means.

Beast Boy and Dr. Sarah Charles have a grieving session while packing up Victor's things in whatever space Victor kept his things. Garfield decides to remember things so that Marv Wolfman can show that Garfield has learned a lesson about inspiration and hope from Cyborg. Gar says, "Only [Cyborg] never complained. He just kept going on, even after what happened to Sarah Simms. Even after he realized he was going to die. He just took things as they were and changed what he could and accepted what he couldn't." Maybe I'm the one remembering things wrong but I felt like Cyborg was constantly complaining! He was constantly angry at his dad for turning him into a machine. He was constantly upset at his robot life because it didn't allow him to fuck his romantic partners. He was always saying "Booyah!" because what else is there to say when your body is a constant and painful reminder that you'll never again be human and you're bound to live a life of loneliness? I mean, I could be remembering wrong. And anyway, this plays much better. You want the dead guy to have left some kind of meaning filling the void his presence has left. Also, Garfield needed this moment to grow the fuck up.

It reveals too much about my inner character so I won't discuss the scene where I identify too strongly with Pantha's grousing about the Beast Boy/Dr. Charles scene just before Red Star almost beats the shit out of her. Those two are definitely about to fuck, right?

Roy Harper discovers that his bosses at Checkmate have found a non-Dayton Industries corporation to begin design Titan weapons systems and that corporation is run by Alexander Luthor. Not Lex Luthor! Alexander! The one with red hair and the beard. The one that was fucking Supergirl. But not the real Supergirl! The Supergirl made out of slime or computer data or something. I don't have a real clear memory of these post-Death-of-Superman Superman family histories!

And finally, Starfire travels to South America — the Tamaran of Earth, I guess? — to undergo Kynasf'rr. I don't know what that is but I bet it's sexy.

New Titans #108 Rating: B-. I almost gave this issue a C+ which is worse than a B- but feels more positive because our perceptions of things, as humans, can be fucking stupid. I was hoping for Marv to really plumb the deaths of Starfire's tragedy but instead he just scripted a few pages of Starfire nearly naked while Alderman tries to convince her to let Raven rape her again. Marv doesn't even spend much time on the Titan's grief over Cyborg since he had to deal with a bunch of Titans' bureaucracy over their current leadership and membership problems. This seemed like an issue where Marv could have really flexed some emotional writing muscle but he spent only a few pages superficially glossing over the Titans' grief and pain.

The Letters Pages!

Jeff DeMos of New York, NY, gave me a good laugh when he wrote, "Why is there a periodic need to overhaul a character that will 'change (them) forever?' Has Cyborg really become so boring and dated? Has he exhausted all possible storylines?" Why, yes and yes, Jeff! Thanks for asking the truly important rhetorical questions!

The editor's response to those obviously rhetorical questions was another good laugh: "Cyborg never became 'boring or dated.'" Ha ha! I suppose that statement is true if you consider Cyborg has always been boring and dated which means he could never become those things!

New Titans #107

Can you imagine a team superhero series making it to Issue #107 and believing this is the line-up that will get them to another hundred issues?

I know you're all judging me for that caption. Not because you can't agree with it completely (unless you're somehow, shamefully, a Cyborg or a Beast Boy or a Roy Harper fan) but because I didn't mention Cyborg's weird new cybernetic baby legs. The cover is by Nick Napolitano who seems to be mostly a letterer now (for — forgive me — obvious reasons)? Maybe it's not the same person. I'd hate to imply that a respected letterer in the industry today once drew Cyborg with fountain pen feet and fairly decent breasts.

Although the letterer on this issue is Christine Napolitano, so maybe he stole his wife's job when DC fired him as a penciller?

Oh, excuse me! I shouldn't assume Nick was fired as an artist because of the way he drew Cyborg on this cover. I should probably assume he was offered more money to work at Image.

In my commentary on Team Titans #16, I speculated that the series could have received a huge sales boost by having Lobo as a guest star. If my memory served, I thought it might have been at peak Lobo saturation at DC. According to the ad on the inside cover, I may have been spot on.

Every successful pitch at DC in the early to mid nineties began "Picture this: Lobo [rest of pitch interrupted by sounds of editors jizzing and creaming their pants]."

The issue begins with Roy Harper enclosed in a metal box in space while he tries to explain claustrophobia to sentient software. He describes his reaction as his "sweat glands doing a world-class impersonation of Niagara Falls." The next few pages do not include Roy Harper explaining what Niagara Falls is nor does it include the sentient software saying, "Slowly I turn. Step by step. Inch by inch." If you're young and you don't understand any of that meant, just let it go. Let the old people have their moment to nod and smile nostalgically!

The sentient software haven't had an upgrade in eons ("since Noah was a pup," according to Roy Harper) so they need to copy and paste Cyborg's soul into their code. I know it sounds ridiculous but just remember that this was written in 1994 when people still believed in souls.

If I had a body for the first time in decades, due to the sudden rush of sensations, I would not want it to be in a skintight leotard.

Prester Jon's argument for mortality is that "knowing life is finite is what gives us our drive." You know what I would trade for immortality? My drive! It's barely extant anyway! I know I only have a limited time to write my Horatio Algeresque sex adventure novel, Slags to Bitches, and I still can't be bothered!

The sentient software decides to give Prester Jon his mortal body even though "it is not within [their] programming." What good is software that performs tasks it isn't programmed to perform?! It's like having a toaster thatt can suck your dick.

Hmm. Shark Tank, here I come!

Sarah's low bar for love is inspirational!

Prester Jon reveals his new body and, I believe, Baby Wildebeest reveals that he's gay.

Baby smash!

While Technis begins to destroy the Earth, Phantasm freezes up in a moment of existential crisis. He wonders if he saves people for their sake or if he's saving them because he finds pain delicious. Either way leads to the same thing: Phantasm helping people in pain to be close to their pain. So I'm not sure what the crisis is really about. The only way I see this moment making sense is if the drive is sexual so he's going into a shame spiral.

Speaking of a sexy shame spiral, I'll be right back!

Meanwhile in New York, Councilman Quirk decides to hold a press conference as the Earth is being destroyed. He's decided to lay the blame on the Titans (and just because it is the Titans' fault, he shouldn't know that!). Who does he think will see this broadcast?! Everybody in New York is being turned into digital data or running around trying not to be turned into digital data. This is the worst attempt to garner votes that I've ever seen!

The Titans manage to save the world but in so doing, everybody learns that Cyborg wants to kill himself. Booyah! That's the best idea he's ever had!

I probably shouldn't make light of suicide, and normally I wouldn't. But have you read a comic book with Cyborg in it?! They're all so boring! At least if he attempted suicide, there might be some drama or tension!

I don't think Pantha has ever seen The Wizard of Oz.

Cyborg reveals that he can no longer exist off of Technis because they've completely drained his battery. Remember, this was 1994! If some piece of technology broke down, we figured the battery had died and we threw the whole thing away. So the Titans are forced to throw Cyborg away. He's incorporated into Technis and it flies off into the universe. And Cyborg was never seen again!

New Titans #107 Rating: A+ in 1994 because it left me with the hope that Cyborg was gone for good. F- in 2019 because what the fuck, DC?! How is he a major member of the Justice League?! Oh, don't point to Aquaman as if having one boring member justifies a second!

New Titans #106

New Titans is an anagram for Ew! Nan's tit!

For years, the standard method of making a boring character like Cyborg more interesting was to upgrade him and make him more powerful. This means Cyborg is now a member of the Justice League with Apokoliptian technology that's practically magic but his personality remains "a guy who sometimes yells 'Booyah!'" Perhaps the worst writing decision Marv Wolfman ever made (and he's made a lot of them! Remember, he's the guy who created Trigon, the demon who loves raping things) was not outright killing Cyborg during the Wildebeest story arc. I suppose when you create a character, killing it means also killing the lucrative "character created by" royalty money! I'm only guessing that the money is lucrative and that there is any money at all.

Look at that cover. It just screams, "You will be bored by this comic book!" No, it doesn't scream that. It says it in a dull monotone. Why does Arsenal look so smug? Is it because he needs to emote for everybody else? Why include a close up of Phantasm when he's incapable of expressing anything?

I just read this comic book and it's more boring than even the cover suggests. Cyborg didn't get an upgrade at all! All he does is wake up. If he did get an upgrade while he slept, who can tell? He never gets a chance to show off any powers at all! Not that he has many. At this point in his story, if he managed to do anything other than blast somebody with his white noise cannon, I'd consider it an upgrade.

By the end of the issue, Cyborg is awake, Arsenal is suspicious, and Technis has traveled to Earth to take over. So maybe the Titans will save the world finally!

New Titans #106 Rating: Terrible! I bought this comic book when I was twenty-one years old. That's embarrassing! But I suppose I should blame the thirteen year old who began reading this series. The twenty-one year old was just a slave to the need to collect every issue after that. Luckily Zero Year came along and taught me to stop thinking comic book continuity meant anything. Crisis on Infinite Earths tricked me into thinking DC cared about continuity and that every story in a about a character mattered to the overall tapestry of that character's life. But then Zero Year came out and I was all, "Oh. I get it. Continuity is all bullshit." One thing rereading comic books from my youth has definitely taught me: I wasn't smart.

New Titans #105

Arsenal might look better without the chaps but think of all the pockets he lost.

When a lot of your days are filled with thoughts like "Is this all there is?" and "How much longer must I suffer these fools?", it's easy to shrug your shoulders and spend the day reading back issues of Marv Wolfman's New Titans. It's either that or eat more sugar than my body knows what to do with. Either way, I'm looking forward to a lot of naps today.

Also, I suppose when I say "It's either do this or do that," I'm leaving out a lot of other possibilities. I suppose I could spend the weekend learning a new skill or reading a great piece of literature. I suppose I could spend the day speculating about even more things that would be a better use of my time than reading an old issue of New Titans but then I'd just have to list every possibility that might be open to me if I wasn't so completely fucking tired of living.

This is probably the moment in my after-school special where I finally understand Hamlet.

It's a pretty sad after-school special because it follows me well into my forties and I never learn a negative lesson from taking drugs.

This issue begins by remembering that Starfire and Nightwing were once major characters in this book. It's hard to imagine that only five issues ago, they were almost married. I would say they were married but whichever editor answers the letters was fairly adamant that the marriage was never legally completed. His two main arguments were that the priest never said "man and wife" and that the marriage document was never signed. Which is weird because isn't that usually signed before the wedding? Who wants to deal with the bureaucracy of marriage when you're rushing off to fuck for the presumably first time?! I signed my friend Doom Bunny's wedding papers as the witness. But since I signed "Ben Dover," I don't think he's legally married either.

Anyway, Starfire has decided to watch Councilwoman Alderman as she's moved into her new home, Nordling Asylum. She contemplates killing her because doesn't the councilwoman deserve to die? After all the truth she's told about the Titans? How dare she point out that they're reckless and dangerous and have hurt New York way more than they've helped New York? But she refrains and decides to do a sexy dance against the asylum's fence instead.

It's also possible she's shitting in her space diaper.

Nightwing arrives to scowl for four or five panels. He explains his motivation going forward for the next few months of this comic book. He's going to destroy Raven's soulself and help Starfire move past being raped on their wedding day by Raven's soulself. "It's like raaAAaaAAaape on your wedding day! It's free fries when you've already paid!" One thing we never appreciated Alanis for is kick-starting the national conversation on how many of us never really understood the definition of irony.

Meanwhile on Technis, this conversation is going on:

Technician: "We need Cyborg's soul to survive."
Changeling: "You can't have it!"
Technician: "But without his soul, we won't survive. And if we don't survive, we can't save Cyborg."
Changeling: "Never!"
Technician: "Are you even listening to us anymore? We're going to save your friend so he can save us."
Changeling: "Over my dead body!"

The Technicians use Changeling's memories to convince him that they just want to help. Most of his memories are about dead people so Gar just winds up crying a lot.

Gar can only express his emotions while doing a Buddy Hackett impression.

Pantha decides it's time to show some depth of character so instead of making a joke about Gar's mullet (mostly because the Beastie Boys had yet to let everybody know that it wasn't the best look), she gives him a hug and a pep talk. She feels he's lucky to have been given a hallucination of two people who might be his parents by suspicious alien computer people and hopes maybe they'll do the same for her. That way, she can learn if she's a human or a cat (and by "learn," of course I mean "told a probable lie by creatures she can't trust but she's still willing to believe because she's desperate and credulous). But Gar doesn't buy it! He's still suspicious and he's got the face to prove it!

Red Star is either burping or practicing sucking cock.

The Titans agree to let the little computer people help Vic except Roy doesn't completely trust them. He breaks into the central processing unit causing a feedback loop that brings Vic back to life without becoming a pawn of the Technicians. But Pantha doesn't find out if she's half-cat and half-human or the other way around (which is different somehow). Maybe that'll be next issue.

New Titans #105 Rating: The New Titans continue to not help anybody. Worse, Starfire contemplates murdering the only person who has consistently pointed out how terrible the team is at doing their job. I suppose it's okay now that Wolfman revealed Councilwoman Alderman was evil. Do you think Marv realized at some point that Alderman's arguments were truthful and convincing so instead of fixing the narrative, he just decided to make her evil? And somehow that's supposed to taint the truth of her opinions. "She may have been right about the Titans being a menace to New York City, but now that we've discovered she's evil, we should probably disregard her powerful and insightful arguments!" This issue was the worst issue in a long time because Cyborg was finally revived at the end. Boo! Hiss! Go back into a coma, you ennui machine!

Team Titans #15

Team Titans is an anagram for Matte Saint.

What is it about the early art of Phil Jimenez that I can't stand? I would like somebody else to tell me what's aesthetically displeasing about it because I can't figure it out. I'm assuming it has something to do with the uncanny valley. Is it that he's drawing the characters as realistically as possible but just slightly missing the mark? Kilowatt is the best looking character on this cover so maybe I have a problem with his noses? And eyes? And mouths? And leg muscles? And Terry?

Some people probably read comic books because they love the combination of the art and the writing. But I read comic books because I'm an idiot. You know how long it just took me to read Frankenstein? I began reading it in May and it's now the end of January. It's only 220 pages but Shelley packs a lot of words into those pages. In comparison, comic books have much fewer words! It only takes me a few hours to read a comic book. I suppose if I read it straight through, it would only be a few minutes. But I sometimes read terrible comic books like Team Titans so I'm including the time I spend avoiding reading it in the time it takes to read it. So sometimes it takes over a week to finish one comic book!

My point is that I don't generally read comic books for the art. The art is just a bonus if I like it and barely a blip on the radar if I don't. Sometimes the art skews into so bad I love it territory but that's pretty rare. It usually happens with artists who insist on doing their own writing and they're a big enough comic book celebrity to be left alone by an editor. Then you get some legendary Rob Liefeld or David Finch shit where you can't follow the action from one panel to the next. Some comic book fans might bristle that I put David Finch and Rob Liefeld in the same category, and I understand why. A lot of you are dopes who think David Finch is a great artist. I won't deny that he draws well. But to be a great artist, I think you have to be able to draw men who have actual human lips instead of fish lips and women who might sometimes look older than fourteen. Also maybe tone it down with the double page splash pages?

But I'm not here to criticize Phil Jimenez at the beginning of his career, especially when I can't articulate what it is about his art I don't like (at least with Liefeld, I can argue with his supporters by typing in all caps, "DYNAMIC?! HALF OF HIS CHARACTERS STAND LIKE POORLY MOLDED ACTION FIGURES!"). Besides, I don't think you're allowed to call anything terrible anymore. You have to just say, "It doesn't do it for me!" After that, you wink and make a jerk-off or gagging motion (or both!). Besides, judging by the letters pouring in, some idiots love his work! I know they're idiots because they also think this comic book is good.

I mentioned I just finished reading Frankenstein so that people will think, "Ooh! Grunion Guy reads actual literature! La dee da!" I jotted down some of my thoughts while reading it.

"The doctor's name is Frankenstein. The name of the monster is Frankenstein Jr."

"First three chapters of Frankenstein: 'I'm about to seriously challenge your suspension of disbelief so here's a bunch of science and magic Victor studied that probably explains it all.'"

"'She also might turn with disgust from him to the superior beauty of man; she might quit him, and he be again alone, exasperated by the fresh provocation of being deserted by one of his own species.' — The moment Frankenstein's monster would become an incel."

"I hope Mary Shelley gets the credit she deserves for being the first to write about incels. Frankenstein's monster is a text book example of a guy who does horrible shit because he's desperate to get laid while laying the blame for his actions on everybody else."

"In Shelley's Frankenstein, Frankenstein hesitates to create a bride for his monster because he imagines she might have a terrible will and desires of her own and not be the perfect obedient bride. As if a man would ever come to that conclusion! Suspension of disbelief ruined!"

"Somebody needs to tell Frankenstein about the birds and the zombies."

"Apparently every sentence in this book begins with 'alas!'"

I had some other notes but most of those were just me wondering when Abbot and Costello would be introduced.

Let's get back to the Team Titans by examining the inside front cover.

I am now on eBay trying to get a copy of this disaster.

Dark Joker? How many writers at DC Comics have looked at the character of the Joker and thought, "Why didn't somebody make this guy more evil?" With The Batman Who Laughs, Scott Snyder must just be the latest in a long line of writers who have based all of their work on the most famous line from Crocodile Dundee.

In this issue, Councilwoman Alderman's grandchild from the future has returned to the past to launch a negative public relations campaign against the Team Titans. Some of that previous sentence is speculation. But I'll assume it's true because I know comic books. The bottom line is Jeffrey Jensen (the writer!) seemed to believe that this comic book needed to be exactly like the New Titans: a group of superheroes that don't do any actual superheroing are being smeared by the press. At least the Team Titans aren't purporting to help people. They've already done their job by defeating Lord Chaos and now are just trying to live their lives. Although they did make the mistake of completely trashing a mall. I suppose the millions of dollars in damage to the mall was worth stopping the theft of one hourglass. I don't see why the media should suddenly paint them in a negative light.

Except maybe for Kilowatt. I thought maybe he was a black man that was transformed into an energy being, probably because his Aunt and Uncle in this timeline were African American. Which is why I thought he was going to be in for a shock when he discovered why the Longs' neighbor was flying a confederate flag. But it turns out, Kilowatt is simply racist and was trying to make friends with another good ole boy.

I guess he has a crush on Mirage because she can just turn into a white girl?

The evil jerk plotting the Team Titans' downfall via bad press is a bald white guy in a purple suit. But he's from the future so he's not the bald white guy in a purple suit you're thinking of.

Team Titans #15 Rating: Who knew comic books from the early 90s were so full of social justice?! The B-story was all about a Jewish woman and how she survived Nazi Germany with the help of a Team Titans group that Battalion doesn't recognize. I think there was some moralizing in there about how it was bad to be a Nazi. Weird how nobody was pissed off about this kind of stuff in 1993. The Internet teaming up with white guys who can't get laid has ruined everything! Even if I was bored, at least I can give this comic book a high ranking because it was anti-Nazi! The problem is that it was also boring. Maybe if Jeff Jensen had made being anti-Nazi less boring, we wouldn't have Nazis again! Fucking jerk.

New Titans #104

At first glance, this cover seems really exciting! "The Final Fate of Cyborg" probably means that he's going to die, right?! The artist corroborates the theory by showing Cyborg receiving a bullet bukake. And the name of the story is "Terminus" which is basically just a fancy Thomas the Tank Engine way of saying "the end"! But then you begin to notice the cracks in this vision of paradise! First, this is only "part one" of the story. While that doesn't erase the thrill caused by the presumption that Cyborg will be dead at the end of this story, it does mean I'm going to have to read more than one more issue featuring Cyborg. The other problem? "Now Biweekly!" Two New Titans featuring Cyborg every month?! Who thought that was something to be trumpeted?! DC must only hire sadists.

The New Titans have been transported to Terminus by a rogue computer being so that they can save Cyborg who was kidnapped by the other computer beings. Except I'm sure that can't be right because this issue begins with Cyborg (controlled by Prester Jon) arriving with the other New Titans. Except because I was sure I couldn't be right, I pulled out Issue #103 to confirm that I was right and Marv Wolfman had decided, between issues, that maybe things should be different somehow? Look, it's only the first thing I'm going to be confused by in this issue. Would you like to see the second?

Pantha is now the funny one.

To fully understand the previous caption, you have to understand that Changeling used to be the funny one before he became depressed by his friend's transformation into an appliance less useful than a toaster (I suppose toaster's aren't technically "useless." But they're so specific in their purpose that I don't understand them on a fundamental level. How can something (or somebody) be that confident in their place in this world?! Doesn't a toaster want to experience other things?! Doesn't it worry that maybe it made a wrong choice? Sure, I understand that a toaster never actually had a choice to be anything but a toaster! But that's why this digression would be considered a metaphor!). And when I describe somebody as the "funny one," I don't actually mean they're funny. I'm using the phrase to denote that Marv Wolfman thinks they're funny but every reader of this comic book who wasn't developmentally arrested did not think they were funny at all.

Pantha makes a Tarzan reference five years before Tarzan would be released by Disney meaning she's, once again, making a reference an old man would make (and realize that when I'm calling the Marv Wolfman who wrote this in 1993 "an old man," I'm the same age now that he was then). But that's not too bad because Pantha is a mystery and we don't know how old she actually is. She might be a hybrid of a teen girl and a seventeen year old cat which means she's like 93 or something. But she's also including the name "Simba" which means she's keeping up with her current pop culture references too (that's where the teen girl half comes in!). In the age of the Internet, two pop culture references is roughly equal to one funny joke. But this wasn't written in the age of the Internet so Pantha had to add a little bit more for her routine. So by the time she says "loincloth sandwich," you should practically be in hysterics. Also, I probably shouldn't use the word "hysterics" seeing as how this is the age of the Internet.

The premise of Pantha's joke is that Tarzan once met up with a lion (not really named Simba!) who said, "Rooooaaaar! Roooaaaar! Rooooaaaar roooooaaaar!" But knowing that readers remember how Tarzan could talk to the animals (and this being the Internet, I don't have to make a joke here. I can just say "Doctor Dolittle!" and everybody reading this in groups of two or more will excitedly high five each other), we realize Tarzan hears, "We're here to help you!" But that was a lie because the lion was (being a LIE-on! Ha ha!) really just hungry for a loincloth. Fuck. Now I wish there were somebody nearby to high five.

I won't even mention the poorly edited stuff aside from this aside where I mention it.

But Pantha trying to be funny and snarky isn't the worst part of this panel (it can't be! Because I totally identify with Pantha!). The worst part is the way the light-being chooses to appear to the New Titans. What the fuck is that shit?! It's like Lobo and Image Comics fucked, got pregnant, chose to abort the baby, looked at the fetal tissue leftover and said, "Whoa! That would make a great Image character!" You know, exactly how all of the early Image characters were created. I bet his name is Bloodorgasm.

The Titans discover that the world of Technis is dying. The Technicians realized the only way they could be saved was to claim a soul. They learned this due to a story in Swamp Thing that I didn't read. I guess Swamp Thing fucked a Technician which caused her to gain a little bit of soul. I didn't realize that my soul could be expelled from my body through my semen. Also, whenever I use the word "soul," understand I only mean it metaphorically. Don't think I believe in anything so optimistic as life after death! I should be so lucky to be dumb enough that I could mistake my desires for actual truth.

Changeling realizes that the little computer people need Cyborg's soul if their civilization is to survive. But Changeling doesn't want to give it to them even though the request is equivalent to asking somebody if they can dismantle your toaster to use the parts for their life support machine.

Some of you might be wondering, "What's been going on with Baby Wildebeest? You don't discuss Baby Wildebeest enough!" And to you, I say, "Fuck off! Baby Wildebeest is the worst character Marv Wolfman ever came up with (and yes, I realize he came up with Pariah and Cat Grant). Baby Wildebeest spends every comic simply repeating famous lines from pop culture and expressing his love of video games. Occasionally he gets mad because somebody threatens "Momma" and then he Hulks out while Marvel lawyers get raging litigation boners.

New Titans #104 Rating: The Titans haven't done any real superheroing for about eighty issues. I might be engaging in hyperbole with that number but even if I had said "Forty issues," it would still be too many for a group that espouses to be heroes but should really just be guests on an episode of Jerry Springer. Was that an old man reference?!

Team Titans #14

Team Titans is an anagram for Meat Taints.

This issue begins with a fart joke and while I'd like to criticize writer Jeffrey Jensen for that, it would probably come off as hypocritical. Have you seen some of the immature shit I write? Just today, somebody on Twitter wrote, "A virus has spread around the planet. You are locked in at home. You must survive for 30 days. The last thing you ate is what you will eat until the virus passes. What are you eating for 30 days?" and I answered, "My own semen." At least, like everybody else on the planet, I didn't answer it seriously. As if the guy asking the question just wants to see an endless scroll of "Pizza!" and "Beer!" and "Chocolate!" Maybe not all people are so quick to lie like I am. I mean, the last thing I ate was not my own semen. If that virus actually did hit, it would 30 days of eating my girlfriend's asshole.

On the plus side, I didn't try to intimidate an elderly Native American Vietnam vet with my stupid friends who, judging by the video I'm referencing, are just a bunch of apes in Catholic school sweatshirts. I don't think I was ever friends with somebody who was a racist asshole. But I was friends with this one guy who was just a normal kind of asshole. And sometimes he would do something that you would expect an asshole to do. And in those times, I never backed him up. He once got his ass beat at a park for being a prick and I just stood by and shrugged. Maybe I even put on a lousy Maine accent and said, "You reap what you sow," as I watched him take his fucking medicine.

For those reading this who know me from high school, yes, I'm talking about Larry.

But now I'm a responsible adult who has decided instead of needing to make ethical and judgment calls based on your friends' actions, I would rather forego having friends. Comic books never look at me with a deep hurt in their soul because they feel betrayed by my friendship. They just sit there stupidly as I call them the worst names I can think of and express my extreme disappointment in them. So in a way, comic books are exactly like my friend Doom Bunny!

After the fart joke, the Team Titans enter a mall. I'm going to scan the first two panels to open them up for discussion. The main topic of the discussion is, "What the fuck? Did I just have a stroke? How dumb am I that I don't understand what just happened here? Please let me die."

Maybe Mirage developed echolalia due to her recent trauma? But that still doesn't explain why Battalion says distracted in the way he does.

Hopefully somebody else understands what just happened in these two panels because I've spent way too much time on it already. You might think I've only spent the amount of time it took to read it, scan the pictures, and type the previous words. But I first read this comic book in 1993. So now you know why I never amounted to anything.

Conveniently, the time criminals have decided to rob the mall. Time Commander's hourglass has wound up with some clock repair person who works in the mall and I guess super-villains can't just do a normal errand without robbing somebody. Not that they successfully rob anyone. At least I don't think they do. I'm confused by a bit more than the previous scans.

Chronos begins the comic book with just one arm even though I'm fairly certain he had two arms last issue. But then when he's battling Kilowatt, there's a "blink" and suddenly he has his arm back and he's saying, "Huh? Where the hell am I?" Maybe it will be explained next issue because the clock repair woman seems to have some kind of link to time travel. But even if she somehow manipulated time to give Chronos back his arm, where was it in the first place? I mean aside from on his body on the cover.

After the Team Titans destroy half the mall without even needing to (because apprehending these jerks was simple enough without Kilowatt destroying the roof and Terra destroying the foundation), Terra suddenly becomes a philosopher and psychologist. She realizes these criminals deal with time because they're obsessed with their own mortality. She then spends a page or two explaining why this is but all I read was "I'm Jeffrey Jensen and I have ideas, man! IDEAS!" You know, what everybody translates my reviews into as they read them. But just like every young person who thinks just because they have a hot take on something that they're great at deconstructing any text that crosses their path, Terra is just fucking wrong with her assumptions. I know this because I just read the Who's Who entry on Chronos and it explains why he's obsessed with time. It's because he saw how terrible he was at plotting crimes but was then inspired by the clockwork efficiency of the prison system! So he decided to learn how to make clocks. Although mostly he just learned how to make bombs that looked like clocks and guns that looked like clocks and deadly projectiles that looked like clock. He's basically Batman if Batman had had a neighbor who wanted to see time fly.

Team Titans #14 Rating: Terrible. Practically incomprehensible. Sure, overall I understood the story. Inept villains fail to rob mall while heroic team of teenagers destroy mall while stopping them. There's also a costume parade taking place in the mall but that never becomes a plot point like you would have expected it to. But following the story from panel to panel was too hard a chore for this Grandmaster Comic Book Reader. At least this issue has a letters page so I can read the terrible takes on why this comic book is great. That always makes me feel smarter than the five people who wrote in.

New Titans #103

Tumblr is definitely going to flag this as adult content.

Cyborg fans (I'm assuming there were at least two) were having a shit time in the 90s because Cyborg was out of commission for about two years. But if you really think about it, Cyborg fans were having a shit time every other decade as well because Cyborg is the most bland and boring character in the DC Universe. Sure, he says "Booyah!" occasionally but that's only worth it if you happen to be reading a Teen Titans comic book next to somebody else reading a Teen Titans comic book and you both read the "Booyah!" line at the same time so that you can reach over and high five. That's only happened to me like three times so I shouldn't use it as an example of the one thing that makes Cyborg interesting.

The shit that really makes Cyborg interesting are the things that are too serious to be discussed with my facetious and ham-handed approach to life. Like how Cyborg's character arc is that of a black American that had to be emasculated to be accepted by his white peers. He's sort of the Rankin/Bass Abominable Snowman of the Teen Titans. The only way Santa and his white capitalist regime will accept the Abominable Snowman (whom they refer to by a pejorative one word name, by the way. You know, the B-word (Also, the stereotype suggests that Abominable Snowmen can't swim)) is if they defang him and put him in chains. Then they use him to do the physical labor, like putting the star on the top of the tree. Fucking Santa was a racist scumbag piece of shit.

Anyway, I don't (and can't!) understand the things that really make Cyborg interesting. I mean, I can understand them when they're explained to me! But I can't come up with any of them because I find him too boring to contemplate in any serious way. One thing I do know: Marv Wolfman didn't fucking know what to do with him other than as a model for all the stereotypes Marv Wolfman knew. Oh, and smash him to bits in a rocket to Russia.

Marv Wolfman predicted Twitter

Just when you thought the Teen Titans had run out of relatives to attack them, Rita Farr shows up with the Brotherhood of Evil to disrupt the Titans' mind probe of Cyborg. During the fight, Terra finds time to remind Gar that she loves him because this comic book is ultimately a teen drama. It definitely isn't a super-hero comic book because the Titans never save anybody. It's simply a metaphor for being a teenager in nowhere near the same way Buffy the Vampire Slayer was. I mean, Buffy was as well but it was done competently which is why this is nothing like Buffy. Wolfman only knew that to be a successful teen drama, you need young people crippled by crushes, engaging in sex, and fighting with their parents. That's this entire series in a nutshell.

I once wrote a teen drama and here it is:

Canada Junior High

The fat kid ran up to the hot girl on his first day of Canadian School but not because he was hoping to become a man but because it was his sister.

"Hey sis! We're going to Canada School together now!" bothered the fat kid. His name was Fatkid.

"Don't talk to me, you mopface!" screamed his sister completely irrationally just like a junior high school girl would act. Even in Canadia which just goes to show that communism isn't any better than whatever America has because teenage girls are mean and nasty everywhere. Especially to their mothers and fat brothers.

"But Sis! We need to stick together because our parents don't live in the same house and neither do we for some reason that isn't because our dad is a fish but some other reason. I think it is because he likes jokes and whoopee cushions. And chicks old enough to get married and do it don't like those things," expostulated Fatkid to Sis (that was her name in case you didn't catch that).

"I don't care! You're making me unpopular! Go bug someone who isn't me, you mopface!" re-emphasized Sis who immediately went into the bathroom to change into her popular clothes. That means she made herself look like a whore. While she did that, Fatkid went and got himself locked in a broom closet by Jacob Jacoby, the shortest kid ever to go to Canada School.

"Ha ha! That mopface sure fell for the old get yourself locked in the closet routine!" high-fived Jacob to Lizard and Spokes who were off to write one song for their band and play it every episode for the next five years.

"I think I'm a lesbian!" dreamed Spacelin during the big slumber party. Unless she had a medickal seizure instead. Either way it doesn't matter since both things probably make for good character development.

After that, Lucky did some shoplifting with that one girl who never returns after Christmas Break (unless it is called Boxing Day Break in Canada School). And then the cool girl got pregnant at a party just like all the cool girls do. You can tell she's the cool girl because she has hair that can put ten people's eyes out all at once.

Then some foreign exchange student named Doctor Somebody saved the world from inside a phone booth and some people asked for money while other people answered phones. That was weird but it's probably important to the story so if you're an editor, don't even think about taking it out. I think there were some really scary puppets who only ate vegetable soup looking for treasure while riding in a hot air balloon too but I don't like to think about that because it gives me the creeps and this isn't a scary story; it's a coming of age story!

Oh yeah! I forgot to mention that Fatkid was rescued from the broom closet by the Asian kid, Bob. Bob and Fatkid become really good friends and enjoy a good flashback in the cafeteria to get everyone caught up on all of their shenanigans like the time they cheated on the male enhancement test and the time they had to do oral reports on cheap pottery.

Then the twins ran around pretending to be each other but you could always tell which was which by the gross plaque that Prude had on her teeth and Skank didn't. It's really disgusting and I think that paints a pretty good portrait of them so I'll move on to the big dance finale!

At the big graduation dance, the school caught fire and burned down. Unless it was destroyed by a giant snake instead. It was very exciting and initiated a new phase in all of their lives.

The End!

Rita and the Brotherhood of Evil wind up being blobby light creatures from a technological world creatively called Technis. They kidnap Cyborg because he's some kind of human/machine interface and they need him to wipe out a virus infecting their sister Zavior. One of the Technites has second thoughts about the kidnapping and remains behind to help the Titans travel to Technis for a four issue story arc that is going to completely suck.

Meanwhile, Pantha continues to suffer the worst existential crisis in the history of sentient beings: is she a cat that became human or a human that became a cat?! My guess is she's a cat that became a human because she's too stupid to realize that, being created by Project Hybrid, her issue should be "Am I the offspring of a cat that fucked a human or a human that fucked a cat?!" Oh wait. That's the same thing. Anyway, Pantha should buy a dictionary.

New Titans #103 Rating: Boring. It was a Cyborg issue! And the only thing more boring than a Cyborg story is a Cyborg story where he isn't brain dead. So this Cyborg story was actually a bit better than the usual ones. Plus Pantha freaking out about not knowing if she's a cat or a human was lamer drama than that found in any episode of CW's Arrow.

P.S. The Letters Page!

Ingrid Nuernberg substantiates my claim that Titans is nothing but a melodrama when she writes, "The current story arc is better than any soap opera." But she isn't criticizing the comic book! She's actually praising it! Weirdo.

All of the letters were in regard to Issue #100 and not one of them mentioned the rape of Starfire by Raven. Although Johnathan Mark Campa of Glendale, California, had this to say, "...the lip-lock between Raven and Kory (HOT STUFF)...". I feel you, Johnathan! I hate when comic book artists draw the women so hot that you don't realize something terrible is happening in the story! How am I supposed to know I should feel shocked and horrified when I have a boner stirring in my pants?! You know how many dead heroes I've jerked off to?! Stupid artists! Make terrible things look terrible so I stop acting terribly!

Team Titans #13

I'm not saying there should be a version of Let's Make a Deal where awful things happen to people who choose the wrong curtain but I am saying I'd lie to people's faces when I told them I absolutely do not watch it.

This issue begins with a bunch of rainbow silhouettes trying to time travel. I bet their superhero team name is God's Covenant.

I was visiting with my youth pastor the other day and he was all, "Grunion Guy, don't you think you should include more Biblical references in your writing? Maybe less references to blow jobs and gay sex?" And I was all, "Hey! Lay off! I don't tell you how to do your hand job!" Then just to let him know I was upset, I didn't make eye contact while he finished.

But the Biblical references thing was a good idea! I need to cast a net to catch a wider audience. That was probably a Biblical allusion right there! It was definitely an allusion to Spanish dancing.

After the rainbow kids fail to time travel (but when they get it right, I bet it'll be super exciting! They're probably the children of the Team Titans who need to go back in time to poke holes in their parents' condoms), Clock King escapes prison. He's teaming up with Calendar Man. I assume they're starting a wedding catering business.

I just lost the ability to orgasm.

It's too bad I can't orgasm now that I saw Deathwing's nipples and tongue because the next few panels are of Mirage bending over in her underwear! Sure, she's traumatized and puking from the time Deathwing raped her. But she's in her underwear! If artists didn't want me to masturbate to hot characters in their underwear, they shouldn't draw them so sexy! They should make them obviously horrified and in pain and anguish which probably means concentrating on their face instead of their asses and pudenda. Like the way they drew Deathwing in the above panel. Nobody is going to masturbate over that! Unless they're a gay male into really flamboyant men just barely exposing their rock hard nipples and hiding in showers. They also need to love sharp spikes just over the mouth giving them a thoroughly satisfying blowjob.

Just because I was turned off by Deathwing's appearance doesn't mean I can't recognize his blowjob expertise.

Donna is concerned that Mirage needs to see a doctor and maybe a therapist because of her traumatic experience. But Battalion, being a rational male who knows the inherent manipulation within all social justice story arcs in super hero comic books is...well wait a second. Isn't social justice the point of all the story arcs?! What the fuck is the point that comicsgaters are trying to get across? "We just want to see people punching each other in tight costumes! I don't want any of that shit where the heroes are trying to make the world a better place! Just stop the robberies and leave the racism and sexism for your feminist romance novels!" scream the comicsgater strawman character I just invented (whom I'm certain isn't actually a strawman at all and pretty close to the mark). Um, anyway, Battalion's reaction comes off a bit cold and patriarchal.

Here's a small hint about the word patriarchal for the anti-feminists: it's not the same as saying men. The majority of mothers in the 70s would probably have had the same reaction as Battalion to their child being sexually assaulted. "Oh dear. It's just boys being boys. Run some water over it and have some ice cream. You'll feel better in a few hours."

Donna, being a social justice Titan, can't let Battalion have the last word. She's all, "She needs to see a doctor! And probably a therapist! And get an AIDS test!" And just like that, it's an after-school special on HIV!

This was in 1993. Is this what Comicsgaters mean when they want to go back to old school comic books? Because if that's their argument, I don't think they have an argument! Although if their argument is that this kind of thing ruins the comic book, they obviously haven't read the rest of the comic book. This might be the best bit!

So the conversation about whether or not Mirage should see a doctor and a therapist after being sexually assaulted ends with Battalion declaring he doesn't want to talk about it anymore. Why isn't this guy the poster child for the Comicsgate movement?

Ugh! Enough about those creeps. I'll save really discussing them when I reread Cerebus! If you want to see what happens when a guy believes feminism means completely overthrowing the patriarchy and establishing a matriarchy and what he thinks that would look like, you'll love Cerebus! I love a lot about Cerebus but Dave Sim doesn't come across as logical as he believes he is. It seems a large part of his anti-feminist philosophy stems from the fact that he doesn't believe relationships benefit anybody and since he's a cis-hetero man, that means the problem is women. He claims he's not a misogynist but then acts offended (or whatever the "rational" expression of "offended" is (because he's not emotional!)) when somebody calls him one after his conclusion from research on Mothers and Daughters is that women are dull and uninteresting if he doesn't want to fuck them. I mean, a lot of men are dull and uninteresting too but he doesn't see that as a problem because he never wants to fuck men. If a man is interesting and he enjoys being around that man, the man becomes a friend. If it were a woman, that woman would become somebody he wants to fuck. I'm not sure what his thoughts on a woman who he isn't attracted to that's interesting. Maybe he never finds out because he's all, "Ugh! I don't want to fuck that! She sucks!" Also Dave has been celibate for like twenty years or something so, at the very least, he's putting his dick where his mouth is.

Oh man that sounded hot.

Calendar Man and Clock King break out Chronos to join their catering business. If they wind up just being criminals, I'm going to be severely disappointed. They could really start a fantastic business by combining their powers. Stiff competition? Just go back in time and start your business earlier! Need to provide products by a certain time? Who better than these jerks?! Need additional resources? Travel to the future and borrow against your future earnings! They could be such a success! But I have a feeling they're just going to rob a bank.

And then the SJW hits just keep coming! Fucking Team Titans! I'm trying to avoid noticing social justice concerns in comic books the Comicsgaters hold up as the pinnacle of the genre!

"Look! A confederate flag! That just means we'll have lots of southern things to discuss!" says Charlie who is in for a racist shock about what the flag really means, at least in our timeline.

Dressed as women, the Time Buddies pick up Time Commander from an insane asylum.

Aha! This is more like it! Back to the days before male nurses existed!

Later that night, Donna Troy and Terry Long fuck and I finally think, "Writer Jeff Jensen, you've gone too far!" And Jeff Jensen replies (I imagine), "Too far? Wait until you hear Terry's thoughts on the sex!"

I hope the "Mmmmm!" is because of something he found in the fridge and not a memory of what Donna did to his dick.

Team Titans #13 Rating: A few other things happened but does it really matter? I can't actually retain anything else after Terry Long thinking about how wild his sex life is. I know I'm not speaking for anybody else and that this might be a little insensitive but the above panel is more traumatic to me than Mirage being sexually assaulted by Deathwing. I'm not saying it should be more traumatic for everybody! I'm just saying it was for me and nobody can deny me my pain and suffering! On the other hand, it's canon that Calendar Man enjoys wearing bras. So this was a pretty historic issue of DC Comics.

New Titans #102

Why couldn't this have been Starfire on the cover?

One of the big changes to the New Titans post Issue #100 involves Gar Logan's powers. It was okay to be a character that could turn into all sorts of cute and lovable animals in the eighties. But this was now the fucking 90s, motherfucker! Nobody is going to be impressed by Changeling turning into a raccoon to steal Gizmo's batteries out of his World Destruction Gadget. This is the era of people named Deathblow and Deadkill and Murderfuck! So Marv Wolfman pulled on his "I'm Keeping Up With the Times!" pants and decided Gar could now only turn into the most vicious and scary looking demonic creations. So instead of becoming a bear and getting Deathstroke in a bear hug to save the day, Gar now has to turn into a creature with three mouths full of teeth and seventy thousand dicks. The dicks aren't in the mouth specifically. I mean, with seventy thousand of them, I'm sure some of them are in the mouth. But I didn't mean for the description to sound like all of them were in there.

Since Councilwoman Alderman went insane and died, she's been replaced by Councilman Quirk. At first you might think he's basically the same character because has he got a huge bee in his bonnet about stopping the Titans before they get any more citizens of New York hurt or cause millions of dollars more in damages. But then you realize, "Oh! He's got a dick!" So that's probably why the change.

Or maybe because it would be hard to sympathize with Arsenal if he were screaming like this at a woman? Not that it's at all easy to sympathize with his terrible position. Screaming at a guy making salient points to just shut up and "lissen" to you? Maybe chill out a bit, Roy. Have you tried opiates?

I can understand how Roy would like to clear up this mistake that Sinn is a Titan. But I'd argue that he should allow the misconception. Sinn has now saved more New Yorkers from criminal harm than the Titans have in 101 issues! I think this situation can be spun in a positive direction! Roy should have been all, "Sure, Titans don't kill! And Sinn didn't kill these scumbags. They were merely killed in the commission of a crime against the people of New York. Sinn couldn't know they didn't have invulnerability! If you dress as a super villain to commit crimes, you have to expect that you're going to, at some point, be punched by Superman. You think people would blame Superman for killing somebody who acted invulnerable and was putting people in harm's way?! He'd punch that fucker into outer space without a second thought and be proud of the lives he saved. Why would anybody spend a second thinking about the dumb criminal who died doing dumb criminal stuff?! It's the criminal's own fault, really!"

If you have any problems with that line of reasoning, don't argue them back at me! That was Roy Harper saying that stuff!

I shouldn't even bother discussing the Titans and their adventures. Liz Alderman (I decided to finally use her first name because I think I'm the only one amused by the phrase "Councilwoman Alderman") and her male replacement, Leonard Quirk, quickly become the most intriguing aspect of Marv Wolfman's Teen Titans. Marv wants so desperately to create a public persona who condemns the Titans while obviously being on the wrong side of history. And yet, she's absolutely proven right every step of along the way. If one were to go through this entire series and count the number of times the Titans saved people from danger which the Titans were not ultimately responsible for, the number would be far less than the amount of story arcs within the last hundred issues. The Titans bring danger and destruction to New York City. Liz Alderman has valid complaints about their proximity to the city. She should be praised as a hero trying to save her community. Instead she's vilified and treated as a mere nuisance and public relations nightmare.

Ultimately, I think Marv Wolfman realized Liz might be more sympathetic than he expected. So what does he do? He reveals that she's being manipulated by Raven gone evil. Which, when you think about it even a little bit (which is all I can generally muster), doesn't invalidate her previous complaints! It just shows she was under the influence of evil when she was trying to get the Titans shut down. But that doesn't mean the Titans shouldn't be shut down! It just means terrible reasons to shut down the Titans line up with plenty of good reasons to shut them down! They're a fucking nuisance to the city and they, rightfully, should be banned from New York.

By the end of this issue, we learn that Councilman Quirk has been manipulated by Sinn! Oh no! Once again, good arguments against the Titans operating in the city will be overshadowed by the evil manipulating this poor man! The Titans sure do get lucky!

New Titans #102: Once again, the threat to the city isn't actually a threat to the city. Sinn is actively targeting the Titans. If they weren't there, she'd be off doing something else. I mean, sure, maybe she would be murdering people and looting the city because it wasn't protected by the Titans. But that's just rampant speculation on the part of Titans' lovers! Ignore them and just acknowledge the facts! On the plus side which is actually another negative side but I'm trying to be more positive, Cyborg might soon get his personality back! Unless he already has it back? It's hard to tell because he's so fucking boring.

The letters page is back and it's full of "did this person's brain get pierced by a screwdriver" compliments like this one by Jesper Christiansen: "The New Titans is definitely the best super-hero comic book on the market today. Marv Wolfman is an exceptional writer. While reading New Titans #97, I felt the same as when I was reading Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings; I couldn't get enough, and I didn't want it to end." Jeremy Norris sends in a list of questions and two requests, one reasonable and one because he loves boobs:

"1) Is Solar Flare Red Star's new name?
2) Will Aqualad ever get a new name?
3) Can you please bring Speedy back with a new name? How about Longbow?
4) Please get rid of Cyborg.
5) Will we ever see Aqualad, Troia, Nightwing, Flash and Speedy fight side by side again?
6) I would like to see a Titans action-figure set that includes Starfire and Redwing."

It sounds like Jeremy has an issue with some names! But Longbow? Ugh!

One reader whom I think I'd probably get along with great sent this:

Not lose Changeling. Not change Changeling's name. Not even a "please" kill Changeling. This guy understands communicating thoughts.