Written by Scott Lobdell
Illustrated by Kenneth RocafortNo sooner has Batman’s former sidekick, Jason Todd, put his past as the Red Hood behind him than he finds himself cornered by a pair of modern day outlaws: Green Arrow’s rejected sidekick Arsenal, the damaged soldier of fortune, and the alien Starfire, a former prisoner of intergalactic war who won’t be chained again.
As a loner, Jason has absolutely no interest in this motley crew of outlaws. So what’s he going to do when they choose the Red Hood as their leader? Find out in this hot new series from writer Scott Lobdell (WILDC.A.T.S, Uncanny X-Men), featuring art by rising star Kenneth Rocafort (ACTION COMICS)!
If there’s one character that was the breakout star of the DC Universe in recent years, it was the formerly deceased second Robin, Jason Todd. While he never had his own book per se, he was hugely popular among fans. He eventually got his own mini-series, The Lost Days, which must have done well because now we have him leading his own book with two former Teen Titans in Arsenal and Starfire. Will the book fly high like Starfire or sink down to the grave of mediocrity?
Check beyond the cut. But be forewarned, there are mild spoilers.
To put it bluntly, I really enjoyed this book. Jason Todd is a character I’ve enjoyed ever since he was resurrected by Judd Winick in Under the Hood some years back, and I enjoyed how he became a foil for his predecessor Dick Grayson. His popularity persevered and now he’s the anti-hero lead; a wry, sarcastic bastard who is just as quick with a pistol as he is with a wise crack. In a sense (and this is as much a complaint as a praise, actually), he’s become the middle ground between Slade Wilson and the Marvel knockoff/parody Wade Wilson. His Red Hood Helmet even resembled Deadpool’s mask just a bit, minus the scars the mask is hiding of course.
The character who probably benefitted the most from this book, however, is our first outlaw, Roy Harper. Roy has had a tough go of it the past few years, and the highs Jason reached were matched by the lows to which our former Speedy dropped. He lost his arm, his daughter, his city and his sobriety, all in a few months. But now, with some clear inspirations from the Young Justice cartoon, he’s a tough superhero/secret agent who will sacrifice his life to help others. He’s still a little naïve, but his chemistry with Jason and Kory is so well written that you forget about the traumas he’s gone through. He’s also a bit of a sarcastic bastard, but that’s not a complaint at all. It helps with the banter during the fight sequences (of which there are abundantly).
And that now brings me to the third member of this little squad: Starfire. Now, I admit I haven’t read a lot of books starring everyone’s favorite extraterrestrial, but I’ve gleaned the following from my limited experience: She’s a Hedonist who knows what she likes and likes doing that a lot; she’s optimistic if not a little disconnected, since she’s an alien, but just because she doesn’t necessarily understand humanity doesn’t mean she doesn’t understand what she’s doing. There have been a few complaints I’ve seen since the book came out, complaining about the male-gaze aspects of her character, and how she’s being exploited. And then on the other side, she’s being dismissed as a “slut” and “promiscuous,” as if to say the actions she’s taken are some terrible thing and that Lobdell pushed upon her.
But here’s the thing — both of these opinions are misinformed. Sure, she can be a problematic character in the wrong hands. She can be dismissed easily as simple eye candy who has massive boobs. But there’s something presented subtly in Lobdell’s script that has been glossed over: these are her choices. She was having regular sex with Jason (who thought they were in a relationship) and she just flat out asked Roy if he wanted to have sex with her. He didn’t seduce her; in fact, he was taken aback, and she said she could just find someone else. These are not the actions of a “slut,” but rather the actions of a man. She’s being called a slut because she’s the dominant one. Roy and Jason are merely objects of pleasure to her, and that’s upsetting to people. There’s nothing wrong with anything she did, though. In fact, the male-gaze, while initially problematic, is beneficial to her because it helps her achieve her ultimate goal: to have pleasure. These are her choices, not someone else’s ideas thrust upon her.
Continued belowLet’s get down to the brass tax. Lobdell, who is also writing Superboy (which got a buy from me last week), balanced out these characters to tell a story that got right to business with an action packed escape from Black Adam’s home nation of Qurac. The personalities were fully realized and bounced off each other well; the lone supporting character we’ve met, Essence, will be an interesting addition to the team, and might help further parallel Jason with Deadpool, as it seems only he can see her. I don’t quite know if she’ll stick around, though, as she’s heavily tied into the set-up for Jason’s initial adventure/arc. There is also a thread starting here with Starfire involved that will assumedly be very important. To what end we don’t know yet, but it will either help her grow or hinder her development. I certainly hope it’s the former.
And then there’s Kenneth Rocafort. Rocafort’s art has always been something I liked (as far back as Madame Mirage), even if it was sexified, but Lobdell used this to his advantage in the Starfire portions of the book. (I think I even spotted a small homage to Madame Mirage early in the book with the priest who Roy introduces us to on the second page.) Let’s be real — everyone in this book is supposed to be sexy as Hell. Jason and Roy look great, as does our new friend Essence. And while everyone looks REALLY good, Rocafort also has equal parts brutal rendered with the early actions scenes, and without giving anything away, some grotesque scenes later on in the book. The layouts are just as kinetic as the action scenes, with a two page splash that shows Roy and Jason getting ready to duke it out in a remarkable fluid and flat out gorgeous scene. And then there’s the Kory at the beach moments, which I don’t think I have to describe for you to get what I’m getting at. This whole book is just gorgeous.
Overall, the book is lot of fun, with breakneck action and some wonderful art from front to back. I highly recommend you at least give it a shot.
Final Verdict: 8.0 – Buy
