Adventure Comics #526

Mosaic

Paul Levitz Writer
Jeffrey May Penciller
Philip May Inker
John J. Hill Letterer
Hi-Fi Colorist
Darren Shan Assistant Editor
Brian Cunningham Editor

Our cover by Phil Jimenez features a handful of characters I'm not familiar with. I do recognize Duplicate Girl on the bottom, but the three on top are new for me. But that doesn't matter, though, because they're all involved in the main story we're going to be skipping. All in all, I think this is a rather odd cover. It's very ... red. And not very exciting.

Our backup story features Jenni Ognats, Bart's cousin, slowly and painstakingly putting together a beautiful mosaic of thousands of tiny, colorful rocks. She's only about halfway done, so it's tough to tell what exactly the mosaic is depicting. What we can see now is a center of a couple of trees surrounded by geometric shapes and lots of lightning bolts. Although Jenni has super-speed, she is choosing to create this work of art in real time, sitting in a hut by the edge of Lake Tana, Ethiopia.

Night Girl pays Jenni a visit, commenting on how odd it is to see her moving so slowly. Jenni merely says she's pacing herself these days. Night Girl asks XS if she'd like to come to the Legion Academy, which initially insults Jenni, who is literally hopping mad, reminding Night Girl that she already was a Legionnaire. Night Girl clarifies, saying she wants Jenni to help train the new recruits. Jenni says that's a better offer, but it's still not appealing, as she abruptly rushes out the door.

As Jenni races across the lake, she kicks herself for being so hasty, and admits it might actually have been fun at the academy. But she tells herself the "family business" she's conducting is more important. Jenni runs to the Olduvai Gorge in Tanzania, considering it the birthplace of both sides of her family. She plans to make this gorge the center of her mosaic, and then build outward to the spots the Allen and Ognats ancestors came from. She finds a small turquoise rock, but when she picks it up, she's suddenly assaulted with confusing images of her past and future.

After the images subside, Jenni notes that energy felt like the Speed Force, the Time Barrier, and the ugliest soul she could ever imagine. But, instead of investigating further, Jenni tells herself she got what she came for, and heads back to finish her mosaic slowly, leaving the Legion to deal with whatever threats are out there.




Well, that was ... something? I'm really not sure what to make of this, and based on the handful of reviews I read that came out on the time, nobody else could figure this one out, either. The best guesses some people had back in 2011, was that Jenni's visions had something to do with Flashpoint. But beyond that, I don't understand Jenni's motivations behind building this mosaic. When we last saw Jenni, Bart was trying to convince her to come back to the 21st century with him. But she refused, saying she wanted to stay in the future and look for any relatives she might have here. Apparently that search has turned into a half-hearted archeology dig? I don't get it. We never got a clear answer as to what happened to Jenni's dad or Bart's mom, and this issue only muddies things more. Yeah, we got a bunch of caption boxes revealing Jenni's thoughts, but all her words were oblique clichés that failed to explain her actions or goals. I think this story may have been a victim of Levitz trying too hard to set up some grand mystery, but not giving the reader enough information to make it interesting, let alone actually having enough time to get around to solving said mystery. Like I keep saying, Flashpoint is breathing down our necks, which means that long-form stories like this are going to be harshly cut off halfway through.

Next time, we'll head back to Teen Titans #95.