Girl In The Hood: Lucky Issue 13 Edition

By

Elizabeth Airelle

“The Moon’s Up, And the Sun’s Down- And A Thousand Starry Eyes Have Caught Me Dying”

     The issue opens with the Blight High Lord declaring victory over Tamaran when he is distracted by two shooting stars heading towards him. An intense blast of heat and light hit the soldiers, revealed to be Koriand’r and Komand’r. The Blight move in to attack but get ambushed by Red Hood, Orm, and Arsenal. The freed butinfected Tamrans also join the fight. 

  Meanwhile aboard the Starfire, Depalo makes a deal with the Blight to surrender. The ship is set to self-destruct and K’tten, Isabel and the rest of the crew evacuate leaving just Depalo to his thoughts. He thinks back to the day when Kori left Tamaran after trying and failing to put the past behind her. He tells her he knows her heart and it’s boundless in its capacity for love-friends and enemies alike. He wishes she would stay but he wants her chance for happiness. 

     The countdown is complete and the Starfire explodes inside of the belly of the Blight’s mothership. Komand’r gets mad, seeing this as more blood on her hands.  She gets hit by the Blight Lord’s javelin. That gets Koriand’r mad and she unleashes a powerful blast of her power, which wipes out the Blight’s forces. She grabs the blight lord by the throat and kisses him, burning him on the inside she kills him.

  A week later Kori is at the throne room. She is thinking about how for so long she just wanted revenge on her people for abandoning her. She realized that the only way she could be free would be to forgive them, and that the last thing she wanted was to rule anyone. Komand’r is still healing from the battle, and askes her sister to stay and help rule the planet. Kori however wants to stay on Earth for she has found friends and maybe love. This makes Komand’r happy, but secretly worries about the gathering of the thirteen and secretly vows that she would sacrifice herself before she lets that happen.

     Before they knew it they were ready to leave in the newly commissioned H.M.S Depalo, its first flight will be to return everyone home. Meanwhile back on Earth, in Kori’s hidden ship they have an intruder. It’s the Joker and he is looking for something. He finds it, its Jason’s helmet he states “Here we go” and starts laughing…

     This concludes the Starfire arc. I really hope that the people who read issue one then months later kept writing about how bad Starfire was being written will read this arc. It shows what she’s made of and shows just how string she is. Roy narrated and brought a little light onto this serious situation. This storyline definitely put these two more into focus, the story revolving Starfire and with Roy narrating  we got to get inside of his mind a bit. We see how he feels about her, and we know how she feels about him.

  Depalo’s sacrifice was really sad. His loyalty to Kori just shows the kind of love she can bring out in people, even a Domintor. Komand’r has been completely redone in the new 52. Unlike the evil sister who willing sold her sister into slavery, this one had no choice and felt great sadness for years about it. She loves her people but carries a lot of guilt. She felt a lot of pain and guilt for Depalo’s death even though he wasn’t her soldier. I hope we get to see more of her in the future even in other books.

  Jason didn’t have the spotlight on him but that is about to change. The Joker disappeared for a year and clearly was planning and finding out everything he could about the Bat Family, for him to have found Kori’s ship. Makes you wonder what is he planning and how will it affect the book ?

Until next time Hoodies !! 

You can find Elizabeth chatting with other Hoodies at:

https://www.facebook.com/RedHoodOutlaws

And follow our Twitter feed: @RedHoodOutlaws

Girl In The Hood: Outlaws 12 Edition

By

Elizabeth Airelle

"We Are Family--Come On Everybody And Die!"

This issue starts off before Roy was kidnapped by the Blight. He is trying to cheer Kori up. Her crew has been taking out many of the enemy forces but she does not understand the motive for their attack on her planet.  DePalo and Kori take a moment to talk alone.  He tells her he has never questioned her before but he is concerned about her relationship with Roy. He thinks it will lead to heartache for Arsenal. Kori disagrees with him, saying she went to Earth to be alone and that he is different than any human she has met and will not let anything hurt him or her friends.

Jason and Isabel have a moment alone. She states how crazy it all is and what was he thinking asking her out. He states that he is more of a street fighting vigilante and this is all new to him as well.  She tells him that if she has to die anywhere is the universe with anyone she could do worse than him. He promises he won’t let anything happen to her.

               

            They walk in to find Roy and K’tten arguing. He thinks he can find a way to save power for the ship. She finds it so insane that it might work. When it does she is surprised to  find that humans are not as dumb as everyone says they are. They suddenly are breached when the Blight teleports directly onto the bridge. While Jason protects Isabel, Arsenal protects Kori from the transformer beam.

The flashbacks end and we now cut to where we left off in the present.  Roy had been explaining events to Komand’r. She finds her sister being intimate with Arsenal to be a humiliation to her family. The Blight interrogator warns Blackfire that she is not to overstep her bounds as she is a prisoner as well. Roy then states he remembers why he let himself get captured so he could grab onto Komand’r. A second later they are transported on to the Starfire ship.

We learn it was all a part of Kori’s plan. The ship makes a full about into the Blight’s mother ship. They cannot attack them without damaging their own ship. Blackfire thanks him for saving her.  Against the ideas of Jason and Orn, Starfire and Blackfire are left alone for the first time since the arc has started. They hug it out.  Blackfire apologizes for her ruse. She had to pretend to work with the Blight in order to stay alive long enough for Kori to arrive. Kori states she never doubted her and she is thankful she is alive. Kori understands that Kommad’r was only a child in charge of an entire planet when she was traded into slavery. Blackfire says she will never forgive herself.

Meanwhile, below, the Tamaraneans are prisoners to the Blight and are in bad shape. The leader is using them to keep his race alive. When the Blight invaded they discovered humans were on the planet as well. An Earth colonel and his wife it looks like. They came looking for something called “The Thirteen.”. The leader kills him and states it is only a myth and if the Thirteen did ever unite the entire Omniverse would be destroyed.

            Roy and Jason have a moment alone and Jason worries about the sacrifice he made to be used to go undercover to free Blackfire. Roy tries to shrug it off but Jason pushes the issue. Roy states that after he woke up in vomit with his best friend beaten to a “bloody green pulp”, and seeing all the damage in the wake of his bad choices, other things do not get to him so easily.

Blackfire and Starfire decide to go alone to take the biggest risk to save their planet. Kori asks if she dies for Red Hood and Arsenal to avenge the hell out of her! It ends with the two sisters flying off together to save their home.

This has been the best issue in the arc for me.  It puts Arsenal in the spotlight and we got a quick mention on his past with his fall out with Green Arrow.  We got to see that Roy is very smart.  Since the series began he has made his own weapons and has figured out how to use alien ships quickly (Crux’s ship and now this one). So he is not just some wisecracking sidekick. It feels like pre Rise and Fall Roy Harper is back.

Starfire understanding and forgiving her sister was awesome, not as awesome as them flying off together though. I’m glad she can put it behind her and start to move on.  Even though this is Red Hood’s he took the back seat. We saw more of him and Isabel but with Jason and Kori both telling her they won’t let her get hurt; it makes me think she might not live through this.

            The biggest thing was the art. It looks like it was rushed and it was. Roy and Kori were drawn well I thought and next time Timothy Green draws for the book I hope he is not given a mere two weeks to pencil and ink the entire thing as was the case here, Bad DC Bad!. We also got a setup for a future arc about “The Thirteen” but that is going to have to wait because next month it’s Red Hood’s New 52 origin!

Until next time Hoodies !! 

You can find Elizabeth chatting with other Hoodies at:

https://www.facebook.com/RedHoodOutlaws

And follow our Twitter feed: @RedHoodOutlaws

Ask Lobdell---The Superiority Complex Edition for 8/16/12

Welcome to our...seventh...? installment of Ask Lobdell where YOU get to ask Scott Lobdell questions about Red Hood And The Outlaws. We had a brief near summer long hiatus on account of the fact Scott writes Superman now, and he thinks he's sooooo much better than everybody else because of it and doesn't need to answer questions from ye town folk. Okay, no, there was just a lot of workload wrapping up Superboy while starting Superman while writing Titans and Outlaws. But we're back so... 

This week, Wes Asks: 

So it is pretty obvious to Batman readers that Jason is
going to play a role in the upcoming Death of the Family arc. We also
hear that Crimson Fox will be stepping in while Jason is gone. So this
leads to 2 questions 1) how significant will your involvement be in
the upcoming Batman arc?

Scott: Jason will be no more or less involved in the crossover than the rest of the Bat "Family".  I was on a conference call with the other bat-writers, and Scott and I have spoken a few times and exchanged emails over some details -- which will probably happen more and more as the story develops.  It has been a blast for both of us, because it is pretty clear we both come at our stories from different angles.

AND 2) How in depth will we see Roy's
perspective with Jason gone for a few issues, will we see a bit of his
past or continued interaction with Starfire and Fox ?

Scott: Alas, Crimson Fox will not be appearing in the book anytime in the immediate future.  I made the mistake of talking about it on a panel in San Diego -- in front of Upper Editorial -- and I got a "That is not going to happen."  LOL!   Sometimes I can convince people to let me try something if I present it in just the right way... but not this time!

It's okay, though, because it turns out Roy is going to be very busy leading his "own team" during Death Of The Family... 

Remember Hoodies, you get to ask Scott a question in our weekly polling over at the Red Hood & The Outlaws Facebook page, so like us and keep an eye out for the invitation to submit next week's questions.

Mike DePalo
Hoodie Admin
https://www.facebook.com/RedHoodOutlaws
@RedHoodOutlaws on Twitter

Girl In The Hood: Outlaws #11 Edition

By

Elizabeth Airelle

"Stars Fading, But I Linger On, Dear--Still Craving Your Death!"

     The story opens with Roy Harper; he has been taken prisoner by the Blight. They are torturing him trying to find out where Koriand’r aka Starfire. He claims she left him behind, abandoned, so he feels no need to protect her any longer and the stoy unfolds.  We flashback to the end of last issue, the Starfire crew wipes out a majority of the Blight’s fleet and the rest flee.  While the ship celebrates, Roy notices that Kori is sad so he and Jason talk privately with her  in the sickbay.

     Starfire’s origin is explained.  She and her sister Komand’r grew up together. They were very close and Komand’r cared a lot for her younger sister, until she traded Kori for her people’s freedom. She suffered for years and grew to resent and hate her older sister. After her, Depalo, Orn and K’tten escaped to Tamaran she planned on killing her, until Komand’r held her and they cried for days together. But the damafe was still done.  Kori and Komand’r couldn’t reconnect so she left to command the Starfire.

     For years Starfire was a slave, and not one person on her planet had tried to save her. Now she really doesn’t want to help them. She claims a part of her wouldn’t care if the planet got destroyed.  Jason starts to say she’s not wrong but Roy interrupts and tells Kori she is a good person and if she is going to help, it comes from her own strength not because of what her people did or didn’t do. It’s interesting how one member of the group seems to play the role of a conscience for other at various times.

     Starfire leaves to be alone and Roy debates on going with her but stays. Is.Abel aka Isabel aka Jason’s date from last issue catches up with them.  Jason starts to explain himself but Isabel says there is no need, and until aliens crashed their date it was the most boring date for her. Interestingly from one issue to the next Jason’s phoney life story for his date went from Dry Cleaning service owner to Real Estate Agent. I sort of wish we’d had an issue of Jason just lying to his date to see how far he’d take it.

     We cut to now and the Blight is enraged over what’s deemed a delaying tactic by Roy, telling a whole story instead of answering a simple question of : Where is Koriand’r?  A voice off panel says that he is stalling because he thinks Kori will save him, but she won’t because Kori only ever has been worried about herself and her own safety.  The voice is Komand’r aka Blackfire and she is demanding to see her sister. Roy states that will happen sooner than later and he can’t wait.

     Roy narrates this story which I like because so far we haven’t focused much on him. Isabel handling this situation makes sense when she compares it to a scared kid alone on a plane. I like the space outfits, very nifty. I really like the space adventures but can’t wait for them to get back to Earth. Also was I the only one to catch Roy saying he was wounded?

     So we finally get to see some of Starfire’s past. I want more already. From the sound of Komand’r there’s another version of the story and I’m curious to see it unfold. The old origin was Komand’r was born with an illness that made her unable to fly and lost the title of princess to Kori, and that’s where the hatred and jealousy came from. It seems she became queen at a young age so I really want to know what happened. I always liked the Starfire/Blackfire rivalry. Also love Blackfire’s new look. She used to be drawn to be less attractive than Kori but the uniform, claws even hair looks a lot better. Kudos to Rocafort, because this is one of my favorite redesigns for the new 52. 

Until next time Hoodies !! 

You can find Elizabeth chatting with other Hoodies at:

https://www.facebook.com/RedHoodOutlaws

And follow our Twitter feed: @RedHoodOutlaws