Teen Titans: Beast World #6 review

After a couple of months of comics in which a plague of Starro spores have been proving a massive threat to everyone on Earth, the Titans save the day with surprising ease.

Nightwing has an idea to undermine Amanda Waller’s plan to kill a million humans who have been transformed into beasts – cure them so they don’t ‘need’ to be murdered. The second a spore – a mini-Starro shaved off a temporarily giant Beast Boy – is expelled from a victim they return to normal. So separate them.

Cyborg has a plan.

And if the spores die in the process, fair enough – Beast Boy is already dead. Or is he?

Raven is fighting Dr Hate, now revealed as a Dark Raven who’s been hiding in her head jewel. Raven urges the Titans not to kill any more spores.

Cyborg has a plan.

He knows that all the titchy green starfish tend to jump out of ordinary people when unpossessed superheroes near – they want power. As for possessed Super-folk with a capital S, that’s where Donna and her new suit – properly customised, of course – come in.

Clever Vic sends Boom Tubes all over the world to bring the l’il Gars to Titans Tower, where they give Batgirl a surprise.

As it turns out, there aren’t enough bits of Gar to build anything more than a greasy green shell.

Cyborg has a plan.

And soon Gar is back together again, body and mind. As superhero resurrections go, this is one of the madder, but at least writer Tom Taylor set it up earlier, Gar did lose an arm when he was Garro, Garro, giant Starro.

But how did Raven overcome Dark Raven?

Oh dear, she didn’t. There’s a Traitor Within The Titans. Again.

Does anyone know when the darkness within Raven, inherited from demon dad Trigon, came to be a separate being living in her soul gem? And hasn’t Raven conquered and expelled her demonic side several times? If Raven does have a dark half, why not immediately try the old ‘reabsorb the evil me’ trick?

And for goodness’ sake, does Dark Raven really think she can fool people who have lived with Raven, on and off, for years? Terra spoofed the Titans for a while because she was a newcomer, an unknown quantity. Raven? No chance.

Taylor gives us some nice moments this issue, such as an encounter between Nightwing and the President of the United States. There’s an amusing Peacemaker gag. And a nicely logical super-speed advantage Wally’s Flash powers give him.

But this really isn’t a great ending to DC’s quarterly event. The Beast World business was sold as a massive deal. The heroes have been at their wits’ end just trying to contain the chaos. But here the Titans sort things out easily with the help of Cyborg’s all-purpose invention kit. Nothing throws Victor who, last I looked, was the son of a scientist, not a boffin himself.

Why are the Titans having to do everything themselves? This is meant to be an event, loads of other heroes are on hand for brainstorming purposes. For goodness’ sake, Superman is there!

No, actual Superman! Did anyone read Nightwing’s dialogue and think, yeah, Jon Kent! Taylor tried to make Super-Fetch happen in two series and both were cancelled. Just give Jon his own superhero name.

So yes, Superman is there with several of his Justice League colleagues. I know DC is currently insisting the Titans are all any universe needs, but that doesn’t mean the experience of the JLA members can’t be useful. For goodness’ sake, Nightwing is bouncing ideas off Detective Chimp. I get that Beppo is a top sleuth, but J’onn J’onzz, Hawkgirl and friends might have an idea or two. Heck, Wonder Woman has extensive experience with bestiomorphs, maybe she could do a deal with Circe for some magical help?

But no, it’s the Titans and only the Titans who are, all of a sudden, incredibly effective. Donna can cure the First Lady of beast mode, off panel. Starfire can crush the helmet of a Lord of Chaos with her head.

The most annoying scene of this issue comes towards the end.

This is after the entire world has seen Waller order the deaths of the people turned into human/animal hybrids. Why is anyone listening to her – she’s hardly a ‘globally elected leader’ herself. Why are the heroes and their allies in the media not putting the counter-arguments, the ones so obvious, so true in a superhero universe that I’d be insulting you by laying them out here?

As for the resurrection of Beast Boy, were he dead that might at least give this event some weight. Heroes should be dead for at least a few weeks…

As it is, we’re left with Dark Raven bound to follow a predictable path, and Sodding Amanda Waller’s neverending cunning plan. I’m so sick of the latter, and finding myself looking at all the lovely collections of Legion, Shazam! and more on my bookshelf, begging for a reread. The Sandman Mystery Theatres I’ve never read. And so much Golden, Silver and Bronze Age fun to be had on the DC app.

Positives: the many artists do a good job of bringing the action and emotion to life, with standout scenes including that first look at Donna’s suit, the aforementioned moment of Starfire nutting Dark Raven and the hollow Beast Boy looking truly haunted. Also, Traitor Raven, with the hood up, looks better than any Raven in years – I really dislike the cutesie ‘Rae’ of Taylor’s Titans.

So let’s hear it for (deep breath) pencillers and inkers Ivan Reis, Lucas Meyer, Edward Pansica, Danny Miki and Júlio Ferreira and colourists Brad Anderson and Romulo Fajardo Jr. And letterer Wes Abbott, a man who is never lost for words.

Reis, Miki and Anderson provide a decent cover illo, pretty generic for the event, but sharp and attractive. Catchline ‘The final evolution’ is nonsense.

I can’t recommend Beast World as a whole; it’s had its moments, but plenty of sore points too. Tie-in tales have been pretty evenly split between decent and mediocre to bad. Not a thought for poor, murdered Chunk from supposed pal Wally. And oh, so many moments of Amanda Waller twirling her invisible moustache.

This time next year no one will be able to tell us what the difference was between Beast World and the event that preceded it, Lazarus Planet – both involved things falling from the sky and turning ordinary folk into big problems. Will there be a third version of the story next month? I wouldn’t bet against it.