Rats
Geoff Johns Writer
David Finch Penciller
Richard Friend Inker
Sonia Oback Colorist
Carlos M. Mangual Letterer
David Finch, Richard Friend and Sonia Oback Cover
Ethan Van Sciver and Hi-Fi Variant Covers
Kate Stewart Assistant Editor
Brian Cunningham Senior Editor
Once again I refuse to track down the variant covers, especially since Ethan Van Sciver is involved. Anyway, our main cover isn't too bad — if you can stomach David Finch's art. It shows three members of the Crime Syndicate — Ultraman, Superwoman and Johnny Quick (not to be confused with the good Johnny Quick of way back when) — standing over the defeated Teen Titans. This is basically what happens, although our heroes don't actually confront Ultraman and Superwoman in this issue.
We pick up with our Teen Titans in San Francisco, which is really cute, because it means Geoff Johns is still operating under the old continuity and hasn't heard yet that the Titans have spent the past two years in New York. On the plus side, Raven has replaced Bunker in this scene. So either our creators got caught up on continuity, or Bunker decided to go visit his boyfriend after the shocking arrival of the Crime Syndicate.
Anyway, Wonder Girl doubts that the Syndicate really killed the Justice League, so Kid Flash asks where they are. Red Robin tells everyone to suit up (even though they already are) and announces they're going to the crashed Watchtower to rescue Nightwing. Superboy asks why the villains who supposedly killed the Justice League haven't already killed Nightwing, so Red Robin reasons that they wouldn't have gone to the trouble of exposing Nightwing's identity just to kill him. He also believes that if there are any other heroes still left, they'll also be heading to the Watchtower to confront the Crime Syndicate. Tim says he's prepared to fight to their dying breath, then follows that dramatic line up with a rather lame concern about their secret identities also being exposed. (Seriously, Tim? That's what you're most worried about?)
I don't know how our heroes journeyed from San Francisco to the Watchtower, which naturally crashed in Happy Harbor, Rhode Island. Of course, I shouldn't be worrying about such things, since the Titans were never supposed to be in San Francisco in the first place. Anyway, they show up to find just Johnny Quick and Atomica holding off a bunch of police officers and soldiers in tanks. Unfortunately, the Teen Titans did not bring their A-game to this battle. Johnny Quick immediately knocks them all down with a whirlwind and Atomica jumps into Wonder Girl's mouth ... but doesn't do anything inside her.
The real interesting part is when Johnny grabs Kid Flash and feels that he's from the future. Somehow, Johnny is able to vibrate Kid Flash and send him back to the future via another whirlwind that conveniently sucks up all the Teen Titans and only the Teen Titans (after Atomica jumps out of Wonder Girl's mouth). Oh, and Raven turned back to Bunker on one the three pages of this fight.
This issue was entirely unnecessary. Johns wanted to create an environment where all the heroes are gone, forcing the villains to unite and save the world. So he had to come up with this goofy way to get rid of the Teen Titans by sending them to the future. Here's the thing, though: Scott Lobdell also wanted to send the Teen Titans to the future, and was in the process of doing just that, when he had to suddenly pull everybody back out of the portal to send the Titans over to this stupid crossover. It would have been so much easier and cleaner to just have somebody say the Teen Titans have also mysteriously disappeared.
Channel 52 talks about various aspects of Forever Evil. We also get a checklist of the event, which surprisingly includes our next issue.
Teen Titans #24: Lost in time, the Titans set out on a mission to not only return to the present, but save Kid Flash from his future!
