Hello everyone and welcome back. Did you miss me? Well I missed all of you too. Lol. Anyways, this issue is the beginning of the final arc involving Adam Glass's run on teen titans. A new co-writer (Robbie Thompson) co-wrote this with them and this is the start of the transition period for the book. So since this is the start of this last arc let's go ahead and talk about what happened in this issue.
Summary:
So in this issue the Teen Titans are out gathering the pieces to the cup of sorrows in order to summon Djinn's brother Elias who they're going to try to utilize to free Djinn and also stop Elias once and for all. But, the mission doesn't go according to plan and Elias gains possession of Djinn's ring as well as the Stone of Souls. (After forcing Djinn to reveal its location when she summoned someone named Jakeem Thunder who was in possession of the stone). By the end of the issue Djinn managed to saver her friends but now Elias is set on going to invade heaven with the help of Djinn and the other rings he possesses. Oh and at the end of the issue Damian says that they are going to all have to die in order to reach purgatory.
The Good:
Ok so now that I got the summary out of the way let's talk about the good and bad from this issue. Starting with the good. This issue felt more like a teen titans issue. The banter was more comedic and more energetic. I was shocked at how tonally different this issue was in comparison to the previous issues in this run. Next positive is that the team actually tries to work together. They don't have a leader anymore but they make decisions as a team. So that's good. I mean they still argue a lot but it's better... well somewhat better. Next positive is the artwork. They finally fixed Damian's weird messed up looking face and the rest of the art looks so much better.
So yeah, there's some l plus sides to this. I'll give the issue that. Oh and Elias was pretty cool. He definitely feels like they took trigon and mixed him with a villain you would see in a 1980s buddy cop movie. (If that makes sense).
The Bad:
The characters still haven't grown as much as they should have. Damian was made to be a terrible leader and lost his job as that leader. I don't know why this book wasn't about him showcasing how he has grown into a true leadership role. But, it hasn't. In fact it's only done his character a disservice. I was hoping that things would truly get better. But, they really made him almost just pure evil. His trademark narcissistic personality is gone from this book. Part of the charm of Damian is his personality. He's like a grown man trapped in a child's body. But, he still is good at heart. They went way too far in this run showing his darker side. Other issues I have with this is that Roundhouse is still annoying. I don't get how the team was so quick to forgive him after what he did. I also don't by the part where he says they're a family.... Ugh... no you're not. Like at all.
The teen titans is supposed to be a group founded on friendship and this book has almost none of that. How are we supposed to buy you as family when we can't buy your friendship? There's been no issues of the team really spending anytime together outside of their missions. Maybe a few panels. But, we don't get nearly enough time with these characters in their everyday lives as friends. They've done almost nothing but argue with one another for months on end. If you had showcased the building of a friendship amongst the group in this run then I could buy them calling each other a family. But, I don't at all. Also, I found crush to be really annoying in this issue. Djinn was fine, so was Emi and Wallace. But, the others not so much.
Shipping Moments:
There were no real shipping moments in this issue. But, it's understandable. This issue was mostly action and also a rescue mission. So I'm just going to leave it at that.
Final Thoughts:
There was some good and bad with this issue. But, it did feel closer to a teen titans book so I appreciated that about it. Hopefully when the new creative takes over they can do a good job showing more of this side of the teen titans as opposed to what we have seen from this current run so far. I'm hoping for the best but have been let down before plenty of times. I personally think that we should just get a new team together in this book. I saw that Wally's kids (Jai and Irey) are back. Can we get them to join the teen titans? Please. That would be nice. They could bring some much needed levity to this team. Anyways, what do you all think of this? Post your comments down below and let discuss. Thanks for reading this and I hope you all have an incredible day.