Red Hood and the Outlaws #2:
What Happened: We get a few snippets from Jason's past and learn that yes, he WAS still beaten to death by Joker, that he was returned to life for reasons that nobody understood(good old DC...) and that Talia DID toss him into a Lazarus Pit to fix him up. He was taken in and trained by the All Caste to become a better fighter(thanks to Talia). Back to the present, Jason, Roy and Starfire head to the former location of the All Caste's base, where they only find dead bodies and zombies. Roy and Starfire deal with the zombies and Jason talks to the ghost of his old teacher, who tells him the one responsible for the carnage was the Untitled. Needless to say, avenging shall commence next issue.
The Good: Roy and Jason still star in this series, so that's still good. I enjoyed the parts of this story that took place in Jason's past. The art is vibrant.
The Bad: Roy's dialogue annoyed me here, and I usually love Roy... This story is doing NOTHING for me. There really wasn't anything new here, which is weird since this was the second issue of a brand new series. I mean this issue basically ended the exact same way issue #1 ended...
The Verdict: To be honest with you, if Roy and Jason weren't the stars of this comic I would have probably scored it 1, maybe 2 full points lower. I disliked this comic that much. It was just Roy acting immature and spouting bad dialogue, Jason having flashbacks and Starfire... well, I have no clue why she's even here since she seems disinterested in everything going on around her and since she didn't actually DO anything of note in this one. Yeah, this was a pretty big disappointment...
Score: 6 out of 10.
So wait, Roy got his arm back but is also one of the more annoying characters in comics now? That's a weird trade off...
I don't know if I said this last issue or not, but I am afraid they might screw up Jason Todd. After seeing Starfire, the random flight attendant, and the beautified Amanda Waller I am afraid the new DCU is aiming for sex and violence in lieu of better characters and plots. I was disappointed in this issue as well, but my fear is that the Red Hood is going to enter every scene guns blazing. This was the guy who was trained by Batman and therefore went into every scenario with a plan to end up ahead in the end. I hope we see more of that Red Hood, because I thought he was a better character. It is still too early to judge, but I can easily see this as a "sex and violence" comic.
ReplyDeleteI liked it more than the first issue, and I liked the first issue quite a bit. I also found myself laughing out loud at some of the stuff Roy said. Between Batman and Red Hood this week, Batman was a better comic, but I enjoyed Red Hood more.
ReplyDelete"I am afraid the new DCU is aiming for sex and violence in lieu of better characters and plots." You know, that's an interesting point... Harras is the EiC, Lobdell is writing this and two other series, the current DCU looks kind of like 1990's Marvel... So maybe that's the feel they're trying to go with, that 90's "sex and violence" feel. That would definitely explain this one, because it was light on story.
ReplyDeleteThat's good, Jeff. I want this comic to do well, it stars two of my favorites, so the more people who like it, the better.