Just when I think Teen Titans has done everything in its power to mess with my head, here comes Teen Titans #23. On the one hand, it’s everything I’ve ever wanted from the comic. Here is an issue dedicated to the various members sitting down and talking to one another about themselves and their lives. Some of them even sound kind of like teenagers; you know, when they’re not utterly the most base, awkward expositional dialogue ever written. Oh yes, oh yes. The one thing I’ve been complaining about most since the start of the DCnU Titans, and Teen Titans #23 delivers in spades.

Teen Titans #23

But holy crap is this a weird, stunted and disappointing comic!

Comic Rating: 4/10 – Pretty Bad.

I don’t even think I should rate these Teen Titans issues anymore. I’ve lost all ability to be objective, or even recognize what is or isn’t a good or bad issue. There’s just the same dull ache of concern over whether what I’m reading is fine, or if it’s just as inane and misguided as it’s been since the beginning. Teen Titans is a bad comic book. The characters are paper thin and have zero depth. They have no reason for being a team. It’s just a collection of familiar characters garbled together into a team book, with sales presumably strong enough to keep it going, based probably entirely on the brand recognition. Their dialogue is some of the most stilted, exposition-heavy in all of comics. And their costumes just look stupid. There, I said it.

Teen Titans #23 starts off with one of the silliest moments yet as the team deals with Kid Flash being pulled into that vortex, which you can see on the cover. It’s one of the most openly comedic moments I have seen in comics in a long time, but it’s so broadly comedic that I’m not sure it’s actually happening in 2013. It seems like something you’d see in a 90s sitcom, complete with laugh track.

On top of that, for reasons I can’t quite fathom, writer Scott Lobdell spends the issue reintroducing every single member of the team, in the most awkward and obvious ways possible. One would think this is a ‘jumping on’ type of play, for any new readers (as if!), but then the next issues of Teen Titans in September are part of that Villains Month play. They won’t have anything to do with the Teen Titans. So why would anybody jump on for this issue, then be forced to read comics about Trigon and Deathstroke?

And the ending. God damn the ending of this comic. If it means what I think it means…

Join me after the jump for a full synopsis and more head-against-wall examination of this out-of-control comic book.

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I think Teen Titans #22 is where the series finally loses its mind. It’s jumped the shark. There is only the insane ramblings of a madman who has too much else to worry about, and can no longer be bothered to tell an even partially coherent story. Scott Lobdell is off writing both Superman comics. He’s got a lot on his plate. So clearly when it came time to write Teen Titans #22, he simply went off the deep end. Everything he may have learned in story-telling school has gone right out the window.

Teen Titans #22

Unprecedented recap page. The Deus ex Machina Squad. Trigon quitting. Evil Red Robin defeated off-panel. It’s all just so…so…lame.

Comic Rating: 2/10 – Very Bad.

On the one hand, the comic is comprehensible. I know what’s happening, I can understand what’s intended. But on the other hand, every other aspect of this comic is a wreck. It’s given up all pretense of being about the characters, and is instead just a rambling befuddlement of stuff that’s happening to a random, somewhat familiar group of superheroes. There’s no cohesion anymore. Issues don’t flow together. Characters are nothing more than colorful bodies who spout painful dialogue, and do what is required of them by the writer. Plot threads are dropped or dismissed seemingly at random, with only a little hand-waving to explain them away. While other plot threads just pop up out of nowhere and make no sense in the larger series.

Nothing matters anymore. Nothing. No friendships, no relationships, no idea of teamwork or why they’re even doing this. The Teen Titans are a train wreck. And the worst part is that they will now always be a train wreck.

Remember, there are no previous versions of the Titans. There is no long legacy of Teen Titans to fall back on anymore, not in the New 52 universe. It’s just Red Robin and this band of idiot misfits grouped together for the sake of hanging a series on. And it’s garbage, pure garbage. I’m pretty sure this book is surviving on name recognition alone at this point. But if it keeps going like this, Teen Titans isn’t going to have a name to bank on anymore.

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Teen Titans should be a comic about teamwork and camaraderie. It should be built on a foundation of strong characters who actively want to spend time with one another because they are legitimately friends. They’re not the Justice League or the Avengers. The Teen Titans are not Earth’s greatest heroes, joined together to fight the threats that one hero alone cannot handle. They’re teenagers, and they just want to hang out and be friends. That they also use their powers to save the world should just be icing on the cake.

Teen Titans #21

This is why I hate the current Teen Titans comic so much.

Comic Rating: 3/5 – Alright.

I say this all the time: I like comics where the characters are people first, superheroes second. In Scott Lobdell’s Teen Titans, they are only superheroes, randomly grouped together because that was the decided cast list of this series. There is nothing deeper or meaningful about the team. They’re friends because we’re told they’re friends. They’re a team because we’re told they’re a team. Their friendships and relationships are barely skin deep. Lobdell and his fellow writers are far more interested in writing generic superhero stories than they are in character interaction. We’re 21 issues into this series, and I don’t think any of the characters have dealt with anything all that emotional or personally important. There’s been no drama. There’s been very little done with any romantic relationships or personal friendships. Nothing memorable has happened at all.

The current Teen Titans is a concept-driven comic. DC knew they wanted a ‘Teen Titans’ book in their reboot, so Lobdell slapped one together. He picked a bunch of characters, created a few new ones, and then has just been kind of coasting from one issue to the next. The threat that pulled them all together in the first place – N.O.W.H.E.R.E. – was a dud, and is now long gone. Since then, he hasn’t touched upon any reason why the team should stay together, or why they even want to do so. They stay together because that’s the comic. If they didn’t stay together, there wouldn’t be a series. And it’s frustrating, because so much more could be done. I want to read stories about these essentially orphaned teenagers actually expressing what they get out of the Teen Titans and why they stick around. I want to see some real friendships blossom, or better yet, some real relationships and the drama that comes with those. I want to see these kids understand their place in the DC Universe. How do they see themselves compared to the Justice League? Why are they superheroes? Sure they have powers, but what is it that drives them to dress up in costume and throw themselves at dangerous situations?

These are all plot points that I think could make for a great Teen Titans comic, but we don’t get any of that. Instead, in this issue, the Teen Titans fight Trigon’s three sons in a generic, mildly entertaining superhero slugfest. It’s just mindless, mostly boring superhero fights. Not only that, but still the Titans treat Raven like she’s been their friend since the beginning. I must have missed a scene where Raven even went so far as to introduce herself to them. But this is how weak the camaraderie is: Raven and Beast Boy pretty much just glom onto the Titans and are treated like total members just because that’s what the plot has dictated. It’s maddening.

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Teen Titans attempts to break up the crumminess of the recent storyline by giving us an issue devoted to Raven’s origin. That’s all well and good, I suppose, and now is probably as good a time as any to let us know what the heck Raven is doing in this series, but it doesn’t raise the quality of the comic, and it kind of makes Raven worse than she was before. I’m fairly certain this origin sticks closely to Raven’s pre-reboot origin, but honestly? She has one messed up origin.

Teen Titans #20

The cover is a total lie. Evil Red Robin doesn’t even show up in this issue (thank God). Instead, it’s just Trigon narrating the long, complicated origin of Raven.

Comic Rating: 2.5/5 – Pretty Bad.

To an extent, I realize that my dislike of Teen Titans stems almost completely from  the comic diverging from what I want to see, or what I think could be done better. Trigon is definitely one of those things, and now we can add Raven to that list as well. I’ve pretty much disliked everything we’ve seen from Trigon so far, and this issue adds even more garbage to his story. However, I’ve rather liked what we’ve seen of Raven. I like her new costume, and I kind of liked the life being built for her. But after this issue, she’s a complicated, pointless mess of a character. Oh well. She was fun while she lasted.

Pretty much nothing else happens in the rest of the issue. The origin is book-ended by short scenes with the Titans, and they don’t do much of anything. Definitely nothing about Red Robin being ‘reborn’ as the cover would indicate. This story can’t end fast enough.

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