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| From the back of Green Arrow v4 #1 and Teen Titans v3 #88 |
Now that we’re in the second month of the DCnU, reading the second issue of Green Arrow (or, in reality: flipping through it in the store) brought something to mind that I had thought about before the DCnU even started: “Wait, what about all those stories we were supposed to see?” And upon looking back at some of the books in my collection, the only DC books that had “to be told soon!” teases were Teen Titans and Green Arrow (outside of Flash, which just teased Flashpoint) — both of which were written by JT Krul.
What were we promised? Well, in Teen Titans (the best thing Krul has ever written, in my humble opinion), we were supposed to see the return of Deathstroke and the addition of Jackson Hyde to the team. However one reboot later, Deathstroke in his own title and Jackson Hyde/Aqualad is nowhere to be seen (although Scott Lobdell did address this, teasing his appearance in “another book”).
In Green Arrow, a book starring Krul’s “favorite character“, Olly was supposed to get himself a new band of Merry Men for his Robin Hood adventures (which, supposedly, included Deadman) as well as fight against a new villain named Black Arrow (see: solicit for Green Arrow #8, which when printed was a story about Olly vs. Etrigan). Not only did we not see either of these things come to fruition, but JT Krul has been replaced as writer of Green Arrow by Keith Giffen in a rather shocking turn of events (although not too shocking given the quality of the title).
JT Krul is obviously known to many fans as the writer of the controversial “Arsenal on drugs hanging out with a dead cat” scene from The Rise Of Arsenal, and that unfortunate stigma has never left him in most critics eyes. However, it stands to reason that it would only have been fair to give Krul a chance to prove himself to his various detractors. As mentioned earlier, Teen Titans was the best thing Krul had ever done for DC, and it would’ve been interesting to see Jackson Hyde get to join in with the rest of the kids instead of pushed off to the side for the DC relaunch until “someone” is “ready” to use him. And Black Arrow? That might sound like a fairly trite or even hackneyed idea, but I can’t honestly say I wouldn’t be intrigued to read a story about archer fighting archer (even if we already had the opportunity to do so over at Marvel in a similar title).
The point is: Krul is now only writing Captain Atom, and it is not doing that much better in most critics eyes than his previous work. Is Krul ever going to get a chance to tell his stories at this point, or is he doomed forever to be “that guy” in the DC writer line-up?
