Sunday, September 23, 2012

Red Hood and The Outlaws #0 Review/Rant

Hey guys, I'm, not going to give you any false hope. This is probably 20% review, 80% ranting. So if you're not up for that, I'd recommend ya skip this post. So, let's get to it so I can get out some of this anger.


Red Hood and The Outlaws #0

Summary: We start things off with Jason being born, to a red headed woman named Catherine Elizabeth and his father, Willis Todd. They have sex in an alley, which I guess leads to Jason's birth. Jason's life sucked because his dad was a petty criminal and his mom was a drug addict. Willis Todd eventually gets arrested so Jason has to watch after his apparently pregnant mom (?), until she apparently OD's. Jason then lives on the streets, steals, and gets beaten up one fateful night where he's nursed back to health by Dr. Leslie Thompkins. Jason, taking after his parents, steals some prescription drugs from her clinic when he's caught by Batman. Thompkins talks to Batman and convinces him not to take Jason in, and Jason is soon adopted by one of Thompkins rich friends, Bruce Wayne. After some time, Bruce tells Jason he's Batman for some reason, and trains him to take over the role of Robin, to which Jason excels at but plays a bit too rough for Bruce. One day, Jason uses the Batcomputer and comes across a photo of his mom, alive and well in the Middle East and heads out to see her. Three days later he arrives there, reconciles and finds out it was a trap by The Joker. Joker beats Jason with a crowbar and blows up Jason and his mother before Batman can arrive to save them.From there we see Jason buried and he says he eventually came back with use from the Lazarus pit and he says "That's my story and I'm sticking to it." After that, we see that the entire thing, Jason's dad being locked up, Jason's mother "over-dosing" when she was apparently in a state that looked like death thanks to a flower, Jason being found beaten by Leslie Thompkins, and Jason being taken in and eventually becoming Robin was all planned by The Joker, just so he could "giveth and taketh away" to Batman.


Thoughts: Fuck you, Scott Lobdell. For the last four years, Jason Todd has been my favorite comic book character. I've read every Jason appearance from a Death in The Family to now, I've had the highs of seeing Jason, a character everyone referred to as "The Worst Robin" have his own Animated Film with an AMAZING performance by Jensen Ackles that brought Jason to life so much so that when I read a Jason Todd comic I hear his voice. I've had the lows of seeing Jason become a crazy murderer thanks to Tony Daniel, a anthropomorphic blob with tentacles thanks to Devin Grayson, and a pimply faced, red haired goon thanks to Grant Morrison, and I would gladly take ANY of those over what you've done to Jason Todd in the last year. It's not enough you've had this ridiculous All Caste shit, Jason going on intergalactic dates, and not to mention the ridiculously stupid scene you wrote with Killer Croc and Arsenal (another favorite of mine), but now, you write this horrible issue that retcons the entire reason Jason was taken in by Batman, to tell us a story about how Jason's parents met and he was conceived from them having sex in an alley?! Then... on top of that, you tell me, that the reason Jason became Robin, was because of a plan from THE JOKER? The Joker... knows who knows Bruce Wayne is Batman sets out to make a kid so miserable and pitiful that Batman decides to take him in, tell him his secret, then make him Robin, while meanwhile, Catherine, his mother, who KNOWS SHE HAS A SON, is just fine with living in The Middle East for no apparent reason and not asking where her son and husband are. And then, Joker says, ah, enough time has passed, now I'll reunite them and blow them up... Nevermind the fact we apparently just skipped over the whole Jason robbing a store at gunpoint then beating up his colleague for shooting a woman story that was set up in Batman #0, there's no point in even MENTIONING that here.

I suppose this is my fault for giving Lobdell another chance after I finally gave up on this series months ago. He's succeeded in making me drop this and Teen Titans, and now, with an upcoming run in with the Joker next month, I should be looking forward to the next issue of this, and that issue SHOULD be written by the man that deserves to write it, Judd Winick, instead it's going to be written by a non-talented hack that isn't worthy of reading a Jason Todd comic, let alone writing one. This issue just solidified the fact that I will not read any comic Lobdell writes again, including this one. As for this rating, It doesn't even deserve one, if I have it anything it would only be for the great art, but Lobdell's writing has even made me unable to enjoy that. So in honor of Zero Month, I think that's what I'll give this comic.

Score: 0/10 

Me: I'd burn this comic but it's not worth the use of a match.

22 comments:

  1. See, I was OUTRAGED by the "Nightwing" one that, by the time I got to this one, I was just happy everything more or less made sense chronologically. (It's a low, low, low bar at this point.) Totally agree that the Catherine part made so sense. So, she goes from being a drug addict taking photos of her gangster husband when Batman Batarangs him to living in the Middle East? I mean, I'm not saying that people can't change, but, what, did Joker pay for her to get clean AND become a nurse just so that she'd be in the right place at the wrong time? I'm trying to reserve judgment until we see how it plays in Snyder's upcoming arc, but I'm not optimistic I'm going to like the answer.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I don't know I still prefer this over Tony Daniel's "simplified villain Jason", or Winnicks "he is a villain", and has just let the character stay static, and not really grow.

    ReplyDelete
  3. ...and I thought what they did to Starfire was stupid.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Yeah I was cool with the Main story like.. is a tragic story for Jason Todd but the stuff with Joker turn me off of that... I just hate the Idea of Joker knowing Bruce identity I know Morrison played that card too but is not something you can use all the time plus in this way Jason is just a tool to atack Batman and not a compeling charactar by his own right.. Tynion did a much better work with Jason in the Batman back up than this crap.. I only hope that this wasn't an Snyder idea and he ignore this.. meanwhile I asuming that Joker is not the kind of person you can trust so he must be Lying for sure ( at least in my book)

    ReplyDelete
  5. Alien, your comment made me realize that, with this story, Bruce actually had nothing to do with BOTH his Robins becoming Robin. Dick figured out his identity and essentially asserted his right to being Robin on his own...and the Joker manipulated Bruce into taking in Jason. What does it say about Bruce that he doesn't even have agency over his choice of Robin?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Huh... I basically agree with JT 100% on this review, so I really didn't have much to add when I read it. But that's a great point, guys. If you REALLY want to push things, Bruce had nothing to do with Dick, Jason OR Damian becoming Robins... We've gone over Dick and Jason, but what else could Bruce do but make Damian Robin in the Batman and Son story(which I guess is still in continuity)? Damian knew Bruce was Batman, Damian was going to fight crime, and without Bruce to guide him, he was going to do it in a more brutal fashion. And Damian felt he was destined to become Robin and then Batman. Bruce basically has to make Damian Robin or hand him back to Talia, which he could never do in good conscious... So Batman, the World's Greatest Detective, was basically pushed or had no hand at all in making these characters into his sidekick... I'm kind of curious(in a morbid sort of way) to see how Tim becomes Robin. You can almost make the argument that Bruce WANTS to be a loner, but fate keeps forcing him to take these kids and making them his sidekicks against his will...

      Delete
    2. HA! Poor poor Bruce... they not let him a moment to think about his Death parents anymore with all this sidekicks around him.. Just imagine adding Cas Cain and Steph in the picture (and the Outsiders, and Azrael and all the Batman Inc agents.. is not a good time to be a loner Bruce)

      Delete
  6. I go to work for ten hours and I come back to all this?! I love it! And I pretty much agree with you guys, this story, the MAIN story would've been okay on it's own. I would've accepted it. But the ending is what ruined it. And even if Joker IS lying, its still showing he knows waaaay too much. He knows who Bats is, which I'm fine with cause he basically acts like he just wants to play with Bats, he doesn't care about his "other life", but him knowing all of that just seems... a bit much. And him planning all that stuff, like he was Hush or something... that irked me.

    ReplyDelete
  7. "Fuck you, Scott Lobdell" LOL

    I agree this new origin is just so goddamn terrible that it's unreal. And I admit it was doing fine until that joker backup, then this issue just fell flat the fuck down on its face. None of it made sense if what the Joker was saying was true than this just was some very, very, very, very bad writing from Mr. Lobdell. Hell as of right now I wouldn't be suprised if in the upcoming Joker arc he reveals he was the one who made Bruce become Batman.

    Almost all the Batman 0 issues were terrible this month boy has the new52 been a fail.

    ReplyDelete
  8. "Hell as of right now I wouldn't be suprised if in the upcoming Joker arc he reveals he was the one who made Bruce become Batman." Oh god... I can actually see DC doing that! Ugh...

    "boy has the new52 been a fail." Totally agree, Astrovik. I'm glad I'm not the only one who's saying it.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Sad thing... I can see that. Joker was Joe Chill... sigh. If that happens I may just have to swear off of the whole Bat Family and just read GL and Justice League until the reboot.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Right! I could EASILY see DC somehow working in that Joker was Joe Chill, and that he knew by killing this rich couple, their son would grow up to be his beloved arch-foe... Hell, if he had the foresight to do all that shit with Jason, why not this too?!

      "until the reboot." Ah, if only......

      Delete
  10. OMFG, if Joker turns out to have been Joe Chill, I'm out. Like, I'm so out I'm going to do what you say here, JT, and burn all my DCnU issues.

    So far, the only DCnU series I've consistently liked have been Batgirl and Earth 2. But, given the premises of those books, they both could've existed without the reboot.

    ReplyDelete
  11. I highly doubt he'd be Joe Chill. Chill would've been REALLY old, and I don't think he'd work for a bunch of guys.

    Remember the Killing Joke? That's one of the more likely Backstories that Joker has.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Exactly... It's doubtful that Joker is Joe Chill, I mean it makes no sense, but Joker having a hand in Jason becoming Robin also makes no sense! If DC would allow something like the Jason thing to happen, I can see them allowing pretty much anything...

    I wish I had gotten into Earth 2, JW... It actually sounds like a really good book. I guess I'll wait a year and a half for DC to put out the first trade. :D

    ReplyDelete
  13. "Fuck you, Scott Lobdell". Lol. Haha...now that's the way to start a rant! I've done told you guys that DC is stupid with this reboot retconned bs....if I were you guys I'd stop reading and spending money. You are better off reading reviews over the internet..ha! Better yet, I actually need you all to continue buying this crap of story telling because sometimes a brotha needs something to laugh hard at. I know you hate it, all this retcon, but please keep up the good work. Lol. P.S. if Joker is in fact revealed to as Joe Chill....you know I'm gonna die laughing, take away all my respect for both the characters Batman and Robin as a whole and follow up with plenty of juicy comment cause I know that would be big negative response. Hearing all of this crap leaves me to believe that it was probably for the best that Stephanie was indeed retconned, otherwise she too would have had a jacked up story origin. Ha...comment on that!

    ReplyDelete
  14. HA HA HA. Radtrainer, I can't even IMAGINE what they would've done to poor Stephanie. I mean, think of what they did to her in the DCU. In the DCnU, she'd be some sort of amputee child prostitute who Batman finds on the street, but it would be revealed that she was actually Catwoman's daughter and Catwoman manipulated Batman into taking her home with him.

    X, "Earth 2" has been pretty consistently great. I thought its #0 issue was the best of the bunch.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. HA!!! Is it wrong that I would have enjoyed a storyline that terrible in a perverse sort of way? And I love that, naturally, Bruce was manipulated into taking Steph in too! Poor Bruce... Manipulated by EVERYBODY!

      Hmm... Do you think I'd be able to get into the series easily enough if I was able to find the #0 issue at my shop?

      Delete
    2. Definitely. If you get a chance to pick up #4, I think you'd be all good. Issues #1-#3 pretty much just set up the back-up story. On Earth 2, the Justice League wasn't able to defeat Darkseid as quickly as it was on New Earth, so we start the series with Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman fighting Darkseid. (If you can get issue #1, it's AWESOME.) Issue #2 and #3 go into the post-war period and give you the origins of Flash and Green Lantern. They were good, but Robinson had to move through a lot of stuff, so they weren't quite as action-packed as issue #1. But, issue #4 should give you a good sense of where the world is and issue #0 should give you the background you need.

      Delete
    3. Sweet, thanks, JW. My comic shop is on the smallish side, but hopefully they still have #4 and #0. And if those are good, I could always snag the first three at an online shop with little trouble.

      Delete
  15. "Poor Stephanie...some sort of amputee child prostitute...actually Catwoman's daughter and Catwoman manipulated Batman". Lol. That's is quite hilarious JW! The funny thing is...I could actually see it with DC's lame story telling and jacked origin tales. That would definitely be ridiculous!

    ReplyDelete
  16. THe DC New 52 is such a giant mess. Every time I hear Didio or Johns or others affiliated (writers, editors, artists) talk about it they contradict each other terribly and go back on everything they originally said. It is sad that the Batman books are feeling the most wrath because they are trying to change so dang much with it. Dc has just passed Jeph Loeb on my list of "crap talkers in the industry" with quotes like this from Didio" Well, tim drake was never Robin." Then he explains...

    "Following Jason Todd's supposed death, Tim became Batman's apprentice, but took the name Red Robin instead of Robin because he did not want to use the name of a fallen hero. Damian, didn't have the same problem." Okay...

    Let us not forget "the dcu timeline is current, but some books have characters only acting for 5 years (detective comics and others)"

    Now they are throwing out a crossover "trinity" that deals with pandora, phantom stranger, and some others. This will clearly have something to do with the old DC and proves that even THEY know the new 52 is a giant frickin mess. Books like green lantern are succeeding because they didnt try to change every single thing. The 0 issue was introducing a new character not an entirely new origin.

    -A major problem that I've had from beginning though is that continuity matters and the rich history of the characters was the best part about getting back into comics some 4-5 years ago now. If it weren't for marvel and independent titles I would just be reading old stuff from the library (which i still do) from here on out.

    ReplyDelete