Legion World Forums LEGION COMPANION Dr. Gym'll's Cultural Rarities Oh Yeah, That Forum: The Titans The Official Titans Companion Thread!

Sweet... I've read other companions for the Titans and this has very nice flow and layouting... clean, yet not lacking in its elegance. Too bad our retailers over here hardly order companion publications...

In stores one week from today! Start lining up now!

Got it! Looks good. I'll have to take my time and read it, but it's definitely worth buying.

I really enjoyed the roll call pages.

I picked up mine yesterday. Haven't had time to do more than take a cursory look, but the layouts look really good.

Thanks, guys! And a Merry Christmas to all!

I've owned Titans Companion Volume 2 since the summer 2016, when a beloved relation and I lucked onto a copy at a local shop, which she bought me as an Unbirthday gift.

I've had Volume 1 on my online Want List for what's felt like an eternity.

I was wondering if maybe someone could please let me borrow their copy via snail mail?

I don't mind reimbursing the postage. It'd probably be a small fraction of what I imagine are astronomical prices going for used copies.

There's a couple for $35 (good condition. There's a dog eared one for a similar price) on Amazon.com for what it's worth. Not cheap, but a lot cheaper than some of the other prices quoted for these Twomorrows companions. Checks e-bay too. >whistles<

I just checked. I do own a copy, although P&P may be prohibitive from the Faraway Lands. Perhaps someone from your own part of the world (Land O' Shin Kickings on my map ) will chime in as well?

I didn't want your request to be without a response in a seemingly harsh, uncaring galaxy. Because, harsh and uncaring galaxies are reserved for our v4 rereads.

Thoth, I looked up those used copies you mentioned, and the good condition one turned out to be from a store I've had good experiences with. It's now scheduled to arrive at chez Annfie sometime later this month.

Thanks for the heads-up.

FTR, the only current comic I'm going to be buying is the upcoming Legion relaunch, and the Titans Companion is probably going to be my last online comics purchase for a while that has nothing to do with John Buscema's Pre-1960 work. Gotta focus. Gotta prioritize.

And just to keep this post Titans-relevant, the Titans are one of the DC teams I most wish the loyal-to-Marvel JB had drawn at least once.

I'm glad you've got a copy! Also it was getting hard for me to post while clutching "My precious"

I hope you'll post your thoughts on it.

Thank you...uh...Gollum Lad?



Oh, definitely!

Time for an avatar change? I wonder if Bryan Talbot did one of Gollum.



I was trying to remember what was in it, without peeking. A few things have come back and I hope you're in for a treat. Just in time for Hallowe'en

I guess some of Raven's teleportation power rubbed off on my used copy, because it already arrived!

Thoughts to come over the next day or two...

Okay, after my first read last night -- which, like many first reads of this kind of book, was out of sequence and all over the place -- I have to say what made the biggest initial impression on me was the interview with Jonathan Peterson, the controversial editor during the Titans Hunt/First Deathstroke Solo Book/Team Titans/Total Chaos era.

Even though the interview took place several years after he'd left DC and the comics industry, Peterson's dynamic, proactive, enthusiastic, let's-put-on-a-show attitude still shined as bright as it must have during the early 90s!

To me, it represents the perfect attitude for an editor of superhero comics, and while the end results of Peterson and his creative teams' bold "Marvel-ization" of the Titans could charitably be called *mixed,* at least I have the impression that they gave it their very best shot. And they *tried* to do something that broke away from the stale mould which had calcified around the Titans by the beginning of the 90s.

Kinda weird that, over the last couple years, DC has collected Total Chaos and some of Deathstroke solo, but they still haven't collected Titans Hunt.

Oh yes, I remember Peterson's positive drive coming through, as much as in contrast to the opinions of others interviewed about the period. To be fair, had Peterson had a bit more input and upward steering from the writing department, it would have undoubtedly improved things. But that wasn't there at the time.

Having stopped picking up the Titans when the newsstand version ended, I didn't pick up Baxter until Perez was involved in #50. I dropped it a few issues after he left. It was Titans Hunt that brought me onboard again. If only sporadically through #86. I wasn't back until very late in the run. So, it did work as intended to get readers attention.

You wouldn't, by any chance, be talking about Marv "I'm Not Bitter, I'm Really Not, Dammit" Wolfman?



My first "real time" Titans purchase was NT Baxter Annual 7 -- the Armageddon tie-in introducing the Team Titans.

I actually do think the Team Titans initial set-up had a lot of potential, with various youth teams around the globe in the not-too-distant future. Sometimes I even wonder if Mark Waid and Barry Kitson might have consciously or unconsciously plagiarized that piece for the Legion Threeboot.

There's so much promising stuff from Peterson's original vision that either didn't happen or got messed up -- to name just one, the Nightwing mini-series which would have ended with him and Starfire marrying without any demonic disruptions.

Crumbs! Mind Reader Lass has plucked the very thought form my mind!

I just remember how he hated *everything* about *everything* about that time. Even as he was involved with it every step of the way. It's easy to say he could have done more to steer it, but I know that there other issues going on at the time. His connection to the book, must have made walking away tough too. There's also the financial reward through the royalty programme by remaining on a book he'd been instrumental in building.

It really needed the Peterson enthusiasm and approach to expanding the Titansverse (Team Titans and Nightwing and Terminator are all good natural progressions) *with* the craft of dynamics and plot construction that Wolfman could (and since I saw his name on a recent-ish cover may still be now able to) deliver. My memory cell tells me it stalled in the latter department with things like the Cyborg plot going on forever. I can't say it was a line up that really had a point to it either. I can't recall if the companion broke that down. Pantha, Red Star, Phantasm, Wildebaby etc. I think Phantasms was Wolfman's pitch to show that Danny Chase *could* be cool?



I would have read their first Titans appearances and they were certainly interesting. I recall the Lord Chaos thing being a bit of a mess in the end, but that initial premise was a good one. COmplete with mysterious future leader with a close link to the current day team.

Yeah, but in his more honest moments he admits he should have left the book years before he actually did. I mean, as bad as the never-ending Cyborg plot from the early 90s was, the never-ending Brother Blood plot from Baxter NTT around 1986-1987 was even worse.

And, I must confess, I don't think the stories got any better when Perez made his temporary return. I remember you've said you still like the Post-Crisis Who Is Wonder Girl arc, and I did used to have a sentimental spot for the A Lonely Place of Dying Bats/Titans crossover, but...full confession, very little of anything Titans that Marv ever wrote does anything positive for me anymore. There are still the odd moments of sweetness, like A Day In the Lives, the camping trip mini-series, the Pre-Crisis Who Is Wonder Girl (FTR, that's the last NTT story that was edited by Len Wein -- arguably the unsung hero of NTT's success, but too modest to make such claims for himself.)

Of course I'll never admit that the last time I picked up Who is Wonder Girl I spotted bags of padding. No! Instead I shall hold firm to my opinion and never be seen to waver from it ...ever...that way Annfie shall never kno... oh pants...

LOL

Moving on to the next interview that made a real impression on me: The late, great Eduardo Barreto. His clean, placid style always suggested to me like it was the work of a gentle soul, a sweet and humble guy who was self-effacing almost to a fault. Happily, that's exactly how he came across in this interview. I shed a tear when he admitted that he never expected to last a full three years on NTT, that every time he turned in a new issue, he expected to be fired. Oh, Mr. Barreto, you needn't have fretted at all. You were a superlative talent, your work all the more impressive for *not* calling attention to itself. Gods bless your soul, good sir.

And now: Bob Rozakis, writer of the mid-70s Titans, hero to our late friend MLLash, and from everything I've heard and read, an all-around nice guy. He's not even bitter that Marvel capitalized on his Titans West concept by launching the West Coast Avengers. That says a lot.

I've only read one or two of his Titans stories, and it appeared to me that they suffered from bad art and editorial indifference. Rozakis is too much of a gentleman to say as much, of course.

But it's a shame, because that Titans lineup was way ahead of its time -- multi-racial AND gender-equal!