You Can Be My Wingman Any Time
Hey there, metal viruses. Well, my stack's burned out and we're back to the backlog. And since Suicide Squad's all over now, we're down to Red Hood backlog. Can you believe we haven't talked about Red Hood since October? I know, right? We're back in it now, though, so let's plow on ahead~
Here's the cover:
Hey look, all the readers made it onto the cover! I mean, "Red Hood? Not impressed!" is what we've been saying on this blog for years now. Like, even before the New 52, possibly. The crowbar is pretty effective symbolism if you know about Jason's backstory, though. All in all, a pretty good cover. Once again, I feel like DC has really gotten out of the cover slump they were in since, like, the entirety of the New 52. More covers with goofy catchphrases and snarky comments on them, please~
Okay, so I think we legitimately need a recap. It has been So... Jason Todd's been exiled from Gotham and has gone across America to hunt down crime in small-town middle America. He's particularly tracking a group called Underlife (which I hear has an alternate universe semi-sequel called Deflirune) to finish a promise to the late Roy Harper, which led him to Appletown, where he teamed up with Batwoman to fight some mechanical clones of Solomon Grundy. And that's where we are now!
Okay, I did not miss this book starting its setting captions with "'Merica". It's like starting the review with a negative score. Jason quickly crosses from 'Merica into Mexico. Or maybe it's Amexico, given this pattern. He hops a border fence, stops at a small shack, fixes up a pickup, and drives off. He stops at a small gas station, staffed by an elderly woman who asks him where he plans to go next. Jason says he has business in a place called Hierve El Agua, which translates to "boil the water". The old lady begs him not to go, and Jason apologises, saying that he'll be fine. Guess what: he probably won't be~
Jason spends the next two pages recapping his mission, which lines up nicely with what we already recapped. He arrives at Hierve El Agua, which turns out to be an old abandoned prison. Someone has graffiti'd some flames on it, along with the cheery message "Bienvenidos al Infierno" above the entrance. I assume you don't need translation for that one. Jason enters, and immediately he can sense some bad shit has gone down. He identifies a blood splatter as having been done with a sword, and wonders two things: who attacks a prison with a sword, and why will he hate the answer. But as he examines more damage, he realises it wasn't a sword that did this, but an axe.
So the other thing to recap is that Jason's other former partners, Artemis and Bizarro, got shunted into some alternate reality (perhaps the one where they fight Deflirune) in their last adventure, and Jason hasn't seen them since. And now here's evidence that Artemis was here. It's very mysterious. As someone else also mysterious sneaks up on Jason, we cut over to the other universe showing Artemis and Bizarro are very much alive. And they're fighting to get their way home. But enough of that interlude, let's continue with the plot.
So while Jason's examining the axe hole, someone kicks his axehole from behind. This guy is Wingman, that Cyclops-visored Batman wannabe who's been tracking him for several issues. You can vaguely see him on the cover. He beats up Jason, and Jason wakes sometime later to find him tied to a chair. Wingman reveals he wants Jason to return to Gotham--and he'd prefer to do it without resorting to force. Which kind of rings hollow when he already beat Jason up just to get him to listen to him. See, Wingman thinks that Jason is the kind of guy who should be running Gotham's vigilante racket, not Batman. I think the previous 30 issues of Red Hood show why that's a terrible idea~
The comic finally identifies who the hell Wingman even is, a question I've had since his first appearance several issues ago. He's a former enemy of Red Hood's from the series Batman Incorporated, which I haven't read. Before Wingman can explain his actual motivation, though, suddenly a brick flies out of nowhere and clocks the guy across the face, knocking him out. A whole bunch more bricks appear and smash the chair Jason's bound to, freeing him. Noting that the bricks destroyed only the chair and just passed through him--and that they're now floating in the shape of an arrow, pointing down the hallway--Jason naturally reasons something more's going on~
Jason heads deeper into the prison, finding a huge room where a bunch of those robot Grundy clones (they were called "Mondays") are stored in tanks. He also finds an abandoned guard dog, who Jason treats kindly, and the dog responds in turn. The dog leads him to another room, where he finds some drug manufacturing, all stamped with the Underlife's logo. Because when you're a huge evil criminal organisation, you want to brand all your stuff so it can be traced back to you.
But that's not the end of it! The next room has another tank with another body in it. This body is also the source of the magic floating bricks, because this is Bunker. He was a member of the New 52 incarnation of the Teen Titans, wherein he was the only likeable character. And he's not the only one who's surprising to find here, as the main Underlife goon we've been tracking this whole time, Solitary, also steps out from behind Bunker's tank. Dun dun dun!
Well, honestly, this is a great start to pick Red Hood back up on. We鈥檝e started a new, different mystery, we鈥檝e followed up on several plot hooks, we鈥檝e added a doggo and Bunker to the comic... It鈥檚 a good issue, all in all. I honestly am glad to see Bunker again. Not only was he the most likeable character in that version of the Titans, he was also a gay Latino teen, and that kind of representation shouldn鈥檛 be left behind or forgotten. This would also be a great excuse to start reviewing the New 52鈥瞫 Teen Titans on this blog now that Suicide Squad is over, and unlike this comic, that book was awful~
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