A Brutal Week #1: Blackest Night Titans

It’s been a damn brutal week in comics – and I mean really brutal.

Take Blackest Night: Titans #3.

Say what you will about Ed Benes art (such as ‘cheesecake’ and ‘posed’) but the man can draw some pretty powerful stuff when he puts his mind to it. I’m not talking about ‘punching the heart out of your dead ex-husband’ powerful…

No, I’m talking about crushing your zombiefied son to death.

Benes wisely concentrated not on gore, but instead on Donna’s reactions to the act. It’s pretty horrifying, and certainly the most emotionally compelling moment we’ve had in Blackest Night so far.

Of all the books to step above being a simple ‘zombie-attack’ style tie-in, I admit that Titans was the least expected, but it’s by far been the best of the BN mini-series.

And Donna seems to be coming out – finally – as a character worth watching. After Dove saves the day by having her peace sever the connection between the dead and the black rings (and after a visit from Don Hall, it seems that scene earlier has a lot of resonance), Donna is determined to take her to the front lines of the battle with her not only to save the day, but to take care of her if her infection spreads.

The issue closes with the revelation that Donna can already see people’s emotional spectrum – a sign that the Black Lantern Zombie Vision is already spreading; but it’s the moment where she kills her dead child that stays with you.

Brutal.

Tags: Blackest Night, DC, Hawk and Dove, Titans

This entry was posted on October 29, 2009 at 9:25 am and is filed under Archive, Comics-Archived. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.