Comic Review #70: The New Teen Titans Annual #2 (1983)

 

Well a while back I said that I wanted to pick one comic series and end up reviewing every issue over the course of well how long it took. I wanted to pick one series from Marvel and one from DC. I'm already doing Darkhawk for Marvel, so I decided, why not let's pick a series from DC. The DC series I plan to do is Vigilante. The DC version of the Punisher, not the cool western cowboy with the red mask. I'm sure I'll end up discussing his stories sooner or later.  I decided to go with The New Teen Titans Annual #2 as it was his first appearance, plus I haven't talked about the New Teen Titans either! It's a win win in my situation! So let's get ready to rumble!

 So to discuss the Teen Titans we must go all the way back to 1964. Yep, the days when our parents would read comics. We're talkin old school son!. Brave and the Bold #54 had Aqualad, Robin and Kid Flash team up. It would be a hit so several more Brave and the Bold stories and in #60, Wonder Girl joins and we finally get the name of Teen Titans. in 1966 they got their own series and quite some time was a pretty popular book. However that popularity died down in the 1970s and despite some attempts to bring it back the series was cancelled for good in 1978. However because they didn't like some of the things Jim Shooter was doing in 1980, Marv Wolfman and George Perez decided to go to DC and that's where they brought back the Teen Titans and revolutionized the series. If you enjoyed the Teen Titans series from the mid 2000s then you have these comics to thank.

Marv Wolfman had worked on several classic 1970s Marvel stories. He had done stuff on Amazing Spider-Man that I really like at least. He worked on Tomb of Dracula and Werewolf by Night which I'm really sad I didn't get to talk about them during the Great and Cool Halloween Super SPOOKtacular (see what I did there!). The man's biggest claim to fame in comics was probably the 16 years he spent writing Teen Titan stories from 1980 to 1996. The man went from 34 to 50 years old in that time. That's pretty wild. I think he only missed writing one two part story during that time. Now that's dedication! I think the best stuff he did was with his collaborator George Perez. He would help Marv with the stories as along with drawing the best comic art ever.  Well best comic art that wasn't done by Jack Kirby. The man could draw 820 heroes on one page and every single one of them would look awesome and dynamic. Pablo Marcos inks this comic and his art is also cool and good.

This comic starts off with a bang, literally! District Attorney Adrian Chase's house has just been BLOWN THE FUCK UP. He's being brought to hospital, it was mentioned that Robin was there before the explosion happened. The news reporter at the hospital tries to talk to Robin and he freaks the fuck out. Someone he knows is dying. Not the damn time to chat about shit you goober! It's a great little scene. Well who was behind the explosion, well it was a gangster by the name of Anthony Scarapellio or something like that. I'll just be calling him Tony from now on. How many gangsters get the name of Tony out there anyway? It's gotta be like 5200. Anyway he is talking to the Godmother (yes this is a feminist mob, son!) and well she wants his files and he knows that means he's gonna be a dead man. 

Tony ends up contacting the Monitor. He was a part of the Crisis on Infinite Earths crossover. If I ever discuss that series I will talk more about him. He gives Tony some fancy guards AND a bunch of supervillains (more on them later). The New Teen Titans are going through everyone who might even be a little connected to Tony and fucking them up. Tony has his fingers in a lot of pies. He's selling shit to Libya! In the 80s! Anyway this is where the group of supervillains come in. Slasher, Tanker, Scorcher, Spear, Bazooka and Cheshire. Except for  Cheshire I don't think these guys ever appeared in another comic. Not the best group of supervillains that Marv and George ever created but I don't think they were meant to be anything more than a group of losers that get their faces kicked in (after somehow getting one up on the Teen Titans). Marv does give them some character because he's a very good writer but they had two other supervillain teams that were just a lot more fun.

Anyway, Tony now tries to kill the Godmother and the rest of the mob with like several hundred killer guards. It's hard to tell really because George Perez draws so many that at the end of the big swarm that I really didn't want to count. However this doesn't go as he planned. The Teen Titans show up and pretty much make quick work of these guys. Tony runs away like a wussy baby and goes back to his house and talks about how he's running off to Haiti. Honestly that would have been something I would have done days ago but that's just me. Anyway this is when the Vigilante finally shows his face in his awesome costume. Robin is also there and  tries to get Adrian Chase (he's the Vigilante are you shocked! He had also been helping the characters throughout the story unseen which is a neat little story beat I think.) to not shoot Tony but take him in. However seeing as so many fuckers get off so easily because they have money NOT TO MENTION Tony pulling a gun on him. Well we can easily say that it doesn't work out for Robin. Especially seeing as he gets knocked unconscious. 

FINAL VERDICT: This was a great comic book. Lots of action, fun character beats, two new characters that get used a lot. There's a reason Marv Wolfman and George Perez's Teen Titans get like 82 thousand omnibuses and trade paperbacks. It's because the stuff is really damn good. Some of the jokes in this comic I didn't think worked but that's all I can really say negatively about it. I'm excited to get into the Vigilante series!