Teen Titans Annual #1

Love & War

Marv Wolfman – Plot
Geoff Johns – Dialogue
Ed Benes, Dale Eaglesham, Tom Grindberg, Elton Ramalho – Pencils
Eclair Albert, Mariah Benes, Alex Lei, Drew Geraci, Wayne Faucher – Inkers
Rod Reis – Colorist
Rob Leigh – Letterer
Jeanine Schaefer – Asst. Editor
Eddie Berganza – Editor
Special thanks to Chris Castallo & Wellington Alves

This month's cover by ... Ed Benes and Mariah Benes, color by Rod Reis. I'm not the biggest fan of this cover. I don't like the style. I don't like Wonder Girl's star belly-ring. I don't understand why Wonder Woman and Superman are giving Cassie and Conner the stink eye, or why Lex Luthor is giving them an evil grin. The bottom half makes a little more sense. Robin and Raven are battling OMACs in a burning city, while two of their teammates are too busy kissing each other to help.

Full disclosure: Bart Allen doesn't technically appear in this issue. But he does show up on a photograph, and since I'm having so much fun with Infinite Crisis, I decided to review it anyway. We open with Superboy recovering in the Empire Strikes Back bacta tank (which is apparently in Titans Tower), while Lex Luthor pays him a visit. We get some flashback scenes as Lex ruminates over Superboy's creation, lamenting that the clone didn't fully age to adulthood, and how he himself waited too long to activate Superboy's programming.

Before Lex can leave, though, he's spotted by Wonder Girl and Robin. Cassie warns Lex to not hurt Conner, but Lex responds by asking where Superman was when Superboy needed him most. Cassie moves in to attack, but Robin stops her, saying that Luthor provided him with critical information to save Conner's life (because Robin was put in charge of healing Superboy for some reason). Beast Boy and Speedy hear the commotion and enter the room, prompting Luthor to teleport away.

Robin says Luthor isn't behind the disasters and their priority should be helping clean up Blüdhaven. Raven, meanwhile, is meditating and seems to hear the Superman of Earth-Two crying over the loss of his Lois Lane. Raven says, "A great love is dying. And it could destroy us all." Everyone takes off except for Cassie, who says she's essentially lost her powers since Paradise Island vanished, and she wants to be here when Conner wakes up. Cassie pulls out her scrapbook and laments the simpler times of the past. Eventually Conner does wake up and Cassie advises him to take it easy until his strength returns.

In Blüdhaven, the rest of the Titans join with dozens of other heroes in rescuing survivors, putting out fires and dealing with lingering radiation. Nightwing is seen watching all this from a distance, but he doesn't engage in the cleanup efforts. Raven, who had been struggling with her powers at the Superboy fight, is having an even harder time, as the old Titans villain Psimon is overwhelming her mind with thoughts of Trigon.

Psimon is leading a small group of villains sent by the Society to gather up Chemo and drop him on Gotham, but Psimon notes there's not much left of Chemo now. Robin confronts them, asking if they're doing this for money or power, but Psimon darkly says they're only doing this for fun. Superman suddenly arrives and knocks Psimon out by blowing him into a wall. He asks the Titans how they're doing, and Robin stuns his teammates by angrily giving Superman a list of complaints about the lack of organization with the cleanup efforts. Robin vows the Teen Titans will take charge, and Superman agrees. He still needs to finish gathering up the rest of Chemo, but for all other matters, he tells everyone to listen to the Boy Wonder.

Back in Titans Tower, Cassie cooks Conner some eggs, and as they reminisce on the past, she shows him her scrapbook, flipping to a photo of one of their first adventures together.

You might recall this image as the cover of Young Justice #12, which sent our heroes down to a hellish underground cavern controlled by a villain named Dante. So I have no idea who took this photo or how Cassie acquired it. But that's beside the point.

Conner teases Cassie for her old wig and goggles, and she gets him back for his old haircut and earring. But she does admit that even back then, Superboy was hot, which he attributes mostly to his leather jacket. Cassie says she never thought they'd grow up so fast, and Conner says he thought they'd never grow up. (And for quite a while, the story of Superboy was that he'd be stuck at 16 forever.) Cassie says everyone said Bart would never grow up, then suddenly grows said at the thought of Bart and hopes he's OK. Conner believes Bart is OK, citing his ability to bounce back and run with a smile even after Deathstroke destroyed his knee.

The young couple flips through a few more photos, including one of the two of them kissing. They talk more about their relationship, and Cassie confesses she doesn't know what to do if her powers never come back. Conner tenderly holds her and says he's with her not because she's Wonder Girl, but because she's Cassandra Sandsmark. He then takes her hand and flies her off to someplace where they can be two regular kids.

In Blüdhaven, Robin surprised that all the other heroes — including many he's never met before — are actually listening to him. But since Superman vouched for him, everyone has given Robin their trust. Robin says this is the first time he's felt comfortable leading and the first time he thinks he might want to actually lead — completely negating the bulk of his time spent leading Young Justice. And among the heroes helping out, we see the female Dr. Light, indicating that she stopped by here to help before heading off to Tokyo to deal with the volcanoes.

Conner and Cassie arrive at Smallville, flying over the wrath of destruction the Superboy fight caused, which Conner blames himself for. They eventually reach the Kent farm, and even though the sun hasn't set yet, Conner claims Ma and Pa are probably asleep, so he just takes Cassie into the barn. They talk late into the night about life, the terrifying encounter with Superboy-Prime, and their desire to return to Young Justice. Believing this could be their last night on Earth, the teenagers decide to go all the way and ... well, have sex.

In the morning, Conner rejoices in the strength he receives from the rising sun, and Cassie awkwardly walks out the barn and right into the Kents while wearing Conner's shirt, making it pretty obvious what the two of them were doing last night. The teens awkwardly try to come up with a story, but the Kents decide not to make a big deal of it and offer them breakfast.

In Blüdhaven, the Titans have finally rounded up all the Society villains and shipped them away with a government task force. Our heroes are exhausted, having worked through the night, but Robin urges them to keep going until the job is down. He's happy that Raven, Beast Boy and Speedy don't hesitate to follow him, but he feels like something is missing without Cassie, Conner and Bart.

During breakfast, Conner receives Nightwing's call and decides to head out, saying he's almost fully recharged now. The Kents agree to let Cassie stay with them for a while, and she says it'll just be until she gets her powers back ... somehow. Conner thanks the Kents for giving him a family, then thanks Cassie for giving him someone to care about. They both say "I love you," and Superboy flies off to Titans Tower.




I have problems with this issue. First, the art. Infinite Crisis is the rare exception that is able to get away with an art-by-committee approach because they're using the best of the best. No offense to the four pencillers and five inkers who worked on this issue, but they're not the best of the best. This issue had disjointed, and even grotesque art at times. I don't know who drew the bulk of the Conner-Cassie talking scenes, but they drew the creepiest, ugliest eyes I've ever seen in a comic. Luckily, the one shot we had of Impulse was a Todd Nauck image.

Now let's talk about continuity. It does seem possible that during that Adventures of Superman issue, Superman wasn't able to get all of Chemo out at once, requiring him to go back for the last few glops. This does mean, however, that our heroes spent a lot of time traveling back and forth from Blüdhaven, especially Beast Boy, who went there for the initial cleanup, then ran down to Florida to find the Doom Patrol, went to Keystone City to help Superboy, went back to San Francisco, participated in the memorial in a cathedral somewhere, then finally returned to Blüdhaven to finish the cleanup. Sure, it's possible, but ...

Then there's Nightwing, who, if you remember, had such a hard time trying to contact other superheroes that he felt compelled to journey all the way to Titans Tower to use their communication systems. Yet here he was, one day before sending out that message, watching about 30 superheroes cleaning up his city. Why didn't he try to talk to them then and there? Why didn't he tell them all that if they don't help him take on Alexander Luthor, then there's no point in cleaning up Blüdhaven?

On an unrelated note, I'm surprised Marv Wolfman would write a plot that made Psimon so ineffectual. I named him Impulse's top villain in 1994 because he was a massive, major threat. He destroyed an entire planet and single-handedly crippled the Titans. But now he's just a nobody, easily dismissed without a second thought.

Now I guess I need to talk about the elephant in the room, er ... barn. I can't complain that the sex scene was obscene in any way. You didn't see anything graphic or inappropriate. But the act itself was inappropriate. These are two underage teenagers taking things too far. Yeah, you could say it's realistic and even a little understandable — they do both have good reason to believe the world could end any day now. But it still makes me uncomfortable. And that's all I have to say about that.

Now let's lighten things up with some ads:

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Bartimaeus is back! The Bartimaeus Trilogy books.

Discover the secrets that couldn't be revealed ... until now! Rann-Thanagar War: Infinite Crisis Special.

JSA #82 — a crucial Infinite Crisis tie-in, and JSA #83–87 — a five-issue storyline where the future is now!

Teen Titans Pizza & Play sweepstakes. Grand prize is a special pizza party for you and 50 friends, $500 cash and the Teen Titans video game.

The secret origin of the Red Hood. Batman Annual #25.

Discover the secrets that couldn't be revealed ... until now! The OMAC Project: Infinite Crisis Special.

DC in Demand previews this very issue (I think someone messed up). It also talks about Impulse creator Mark Waid working on the Legion of Super-Heroes.

First and nine. Milk's number one in my playbook. It has the nine essential nutrients I need to go all the way. So ask somebody to pass the milk. It's your best call. Got milk? with Philadelphia Eagles quarterback Donovan McNabb.

All that pressure — the pressure to fit in, look perfect, get high, to be accepted — if you let it push on you too much, how will you change? AboveTheInfluence.com.

Next time, we'll follow Superboy and see another quick memory of Impulse in Teen Titans #33.