Teen Titans #89

Bruised Egos

J.T. Krul – Writer
Nicola Scott – Penciller
Doug Hazlewood – Inker
Sal Cipriano – Letterer
Jason Wright – Colorist
Rachel Gluckstern – Editor
Scott & Hazlewood with Wright – Cover
Frank Quitely – Variant Cover

Our cover shows the newest member of our team, the current Robin, Damian Wayne, immediately assuming the role of leader. I like the image of Damian sitting confidently in an overly large chair, and I enjoy the smug smile on his face. But I'm not a fan of how the rest of the Titans' reactions were portrayed. They're just giant, vaguely purple heads floating in the background. And the purple really doesn't work on Beast Boy.

Our variant cover takes that same idea one step further — Robin has now defeated all the Teen Titans. Quitely has a very distinctive style. Sometimes I like it. Sometimes I don't. This is one case where I don't really like. Robin's hair looks weird, and his costume has all sorts of lines on it that don't seem to serve any purpose.

Our story begins with Doctor Caligan taking Barney to a Silicon Valley Tech Expo. Caligan is wearing a normal suit and tie, and Barney has a blue hoodie covering his bald head, but not quite concealing a large red scar on his forehead. Barney complains that his head hurts, but Caligan says he just needs to learn how to use his new skills, and that he's brought him to this expo to serve as a "feast for the mind." Barney walks up to a man giving a robotics presentation and grabs his wrist, saying, "You think you're so smart, don't you? Well, now so am I." The man collapses with a dazed look on his face and begins to drool, while Barney begins to glow with blue energy and take the robot apart piece by piece with telekinesis.

Earlier, in Titans Tower, we pick up with our team's introduction to Damian. Cassie asks if this is all a joke, but Damian says the only joke here is Beast Boy, and he announces his first order as team leader is to kick Beast Boy out. Gar growls that Damian is only a child, and Dick tells him to ignore Damian. But Damian points out that Dick and Tim both led the Teen Titans as Robin, and he believes he's more accomplished than any of them were. Cassie points out there's a difference between leading and fighting, and Beast Boy complains that Damian's only been Robin for about a week.

Rose asks Bart what you call a baby robin, and Bart offers hatchling, fledgling or even simply a chick. Rose likes "chick" the best, which naturally upsets Damian. He leaps over the table toward Rose, saying if Tim was here, he'd demonstrate who is the best Robin. But since he's not, Damian says he'll have to settle with teaching Rose her place. Robin gets in a few hits on Ravager, who responds with a few hits of her own before Superboy finally grabs her wrist and Kid Flash steals Robin's batarang. Dick says this wasn't exactly the "meet and greet" he was hoping for, but he does admit it has gone better than he expected.

Cassie pulls Dick out into the hall and demands to know what he was thinking. Dick says he doesn't want Damian to be team leader, just a welcomed member of the Teen Titans. Cassie complains that he can't just show up unannounced and drop off his dead weight on their doorstep. Dick says Damian's not dead weight, so Cassie calls him a problem child instead. Dick also objects to that term, and talks about how much Damian needs the Titans. His whole life has been nothing but betrayal and manipulation, and he needs to learn to trust people. Cassie then unfairly compares Damian to Tim, but Dick continues to just ask for Cassie to give Damian a chance for his own sake.

This seems to do the trick, and Dick begins to walk away. But Damian chases him out the front door, pointing out the difficult choice he made to turn his back on his family and agree to work at Dick's side. And now he feels like he's being dumped here. Dick explains that this isn't a punishment, but an opportunity to learn how to be a hero. As he leaves, Dick urges Damian to give the Titans a chance. Once he's gone, Ravager pops out of the shadows and mocks Damian for having separation anxiety and tells to try not to wet the bed.

We then cut to Mohenjo-Daro, an archeological dig of the ancient Indus Valley civilization. Vijay and Rani, a husband and wife team, visit the site every year with their teenage daughter, Kiran, and assistant Helen. They've been uncovering some renditions of rakshasas — demons from Hindu lore — that were apparently frightening enough to scare away a few of their fellow scholars. But Kiran boasts of how she's never been afraid of the dark.

The next day at Titans Tower, Gar, Rose and Raven are watching Bart and Conner engage in wild game of ping pong while they discuss their new member. Conner says Tim has told him all about Damian and the chip on his shoulder. Rose says she heard Damian takes after the psychotic Al Ghul side of his family, and Gar points out that's not fair for her to say, considering her father is Deathstroke the Terminator. But Rose insists that she's different because Slade didn't raise her — he only drugged her.

Raven points out that all of them came to the team with their own baggage and says that if Damian is so damaged, then they should try all the harder to help him. Conner doesn't think Damian wants to be helped, and Bart admits he doesn't like seeing him in a Robin's costume, even if Batman vouches for him. Rose asks Conner why Cassie let Damian stay, and Conner says she'll have to ask Cassie herself. Rose is surprised by this, asking, "Don't you guys share like everything?" Conner meekly replies, "Not lately."

Damian, meanwhile, is hanging out with Cassie in the monitor room, as she talk to Dr. Mid-Nite about developing a potential cure for the feral boys. When Cassie's call ends, she asks Damian why he's not hanging out with the rest of the team. Damian says he'd rather review the monitor than waste time playing games. Cassie tries to teach him about the concept of unwinding, but they're interrupted by a news report of the chaos Barney is causing at the tech expo.

Cassie leads Damian to gather up the rest of the team, unfortunately walking in on them right as Rose suggests they tell Cassie they don't want Damian on the team. Damian tells Rose she should be the one to leave, suggesting she join up with her father. Cassie tells both of them to stop, saying she's the leader and she made the decision and they all need to act like a team now. She tells them about the situation at the expo and asks Raven to teleport them there, adding that she hopes Ravager and Robin can fight real threats as well as they fight each other.

When our heroes arrive at the expo, they find the place mostly demolished, with Barney standing triumphantly over a handful of people on the ground. Barney says he must be something right to have attracted the attention of the Teen Titans, and Damian charges ahead, telling his teammates to "tend to the weak." And nobody notices Doctor Caligan coyly hiding in the back.

Damian leaps at Barney, but Barney counters with his telekinesis, throwing the boy high up toward the vaulted glass ceiling. Superboy chases after Damian to prevent him from crashing, while Raven, Wonder Girl and Beast Boy begin escorting bystanders to safety. Beast Boy turns into a pteranodon to  scoop up Caligan and fly him away, not realizing he's the true villain behind this. And Caligan can't prevent himself from commenting aloud how Beast Boy is a "fascinating specimen." Wonder Girl tells Kid Flash to stop Barney before he brings down the whole convention center, and Bart assures her Barney won't get the chance.

Ravager has already begun her attack on Barney, but is slowed up in a field of debris he's tossing at her. Kid Flash easily zips past the debris, prompting Rose to call Bart a show-off. But right before Bart reaches Barney, he pushes both the heroes back with a blast of pure psychic energy. Barney boasts of his great power and the amount of knowledge he drained from various experts at the expo. To demonstrate this, he builds an army of robot spiders from the scraps of metal littering the building. Our team immediately begins battling the robots, and while Cassie is worried about someone being caught alone with these machines, Damian finds the experience quite fun, saying he should have joined them months ago.

Bart also can't hide his enjoyment with this battle and even suggests they try out a new battle cry: "Titans Disassemble!" However, Ravager points out the main problem with this fight — Barney can put the spiders back together as fast as the Titans can destroy them. Finally, Raven makes some actual progress by taking Barney with her to astral plane. She manages to calm him down and speak directly to the emotions he's feeling. But as soon as she brings him back to the real world, Robin attacks Barney, thanking Raven for the distraction.

Raven tries to explain that Barney had given up, but Robin won't hear it. And all his punches did was anger Barney even more than before. He sweeps up the Titans in a huge whirlwind, accusing them of lying and not really caring about him, just like everyone else. Barney then flies away, vowing that they'll all be sorry for mistreating him. Bart tries to help Rose get up on her feet, but she insists she's fine. Superboy chooses to check on Raven and Beast Boy instead of Wonder Girl. Raven laments that this could have been avoided and that she had Barney under control. And our issue ends with everybody angrily glaring at Damian, who stubbornly refuses to understand what he did wrong.




I actually really enjoy Damian Wayne. I think he's a really fun character — all this incredible skill, anger and arrogance used to cover up the fact that he's really just a vulnerable little boy. Unfortunately, Damian's arrival basically killed off the character of Tim Drake, much like Barry Allen's return destroyed Wally West. DC sometimes just doesn't know what to do with all their characters. Since Damian became Robin, Tim couldn't be Robin anymore. But he couldn't be Nightwing, either, so he had to resort to the obnoxiously named Red Robin — something we'll be dealing with for the next couple of years. But even with all that, I am happy Damian's on this team now. He adds just the right amount of tension and humor.

This Barney character is rather interesting. Essentially, he's the exact opposite of the feral boys, which makes me question whether Dr. Caligan has any traditional motives beyond experimentation and creating chaos. Barney's acquisition of technical knowledge also makes me wonder if we'll have any payoff with Bart's scramble to record all his futuristic knowledge. Hopefully the arrival of Damian didn't push that thread to the side.

I am a little surprised that Cassie didn't hold a vote for Damian's inclusion on the team. Are we to believe that the leader of the Teen Titans has absolute, tyrannical power on all matters? A vote really would have gone a long way toward building team unity. We also know that at least Beast Boy objected to the inclusion of Ravager on the team, so things are already a little tense in the tower. And Cassie is just making things worse with this authoritarian stance, not mention constantly pushing Superboy away. But it does seem like we might have one romantic couple on the team before too long. Bart and Rose are starting to hit it off, regardless of how much Rose wants to resist. And it makes sense, too. In at least one possible future, the two of them did become a couple.

Next time, we'll review our final episode of Smallville.