DCU Spotlight Review: Teen Titans: Beast Boy Loves Raven

Overview: After the traumatic experiences in the Raven and Beast Boy graphic novels, our heroine and hero head to Nashville to meet the mysterious Slade…but little do they know that a Robin awaits them, too, in Teen Titans: Beast Boy Loves Raven.

Editor’s Note: Next week marks the release of Teen Titans: Robin, and as a lead into that new graphic novel, we wanted to catch fans up with the events that led to Robin appearing in the graphic novel series. Spoilers are sure to be revealed.

Synopsis: As Teen Titans: Beast Boy Loves Raven begins, Raven, the half-demon child of the evil Trigon, followed by her foster sister Max, who has connections to ghosts, and Gar, whose treatment for a rare disease gave him the power to change into beasts, all head to Nashville from New Orleans to meet with the mysterious Slade, who promises he can help them with their terrifying powers. Raven and Gar bump into each other multiple times over the next few days, slowly developing a friendship and a hidden mutual attraction. However, they are both kidnapped by Slade’s ex-wife Adeline and HIVE, working with Slade, hoping to turn their powers into defense technology. However, Max meets the highly trained Damian Wayne, who helps her break into Adeline’s facility and rescue the escaping Gar and Raven, who use their powers in battle. While Damian and Max flirt outrageously, the book ends sweetly with a kiss between Raven and Beast Boy, who have stopped hiding their secrets and fears from each other.

Analysis: In the third volume of their street-clothes-punk-esque reboot of the Teen Titans franchise, Kami Garcia and Gabriel Picolo really elevate their storytelling, characterization, and aesthetic to the next level. While Raven and Beast Boy were decent YA/middle-grade level graphic novels when you mix the two worlds and develop the relationships between all four lead characters, the result is a retelling with enough danger, darkness, sweetness, and mundanity to really suck you into this retelling of classic characters. Whereas the 80s Teen Titans series, which this run seems to be largely based on, was all gorgeous primary colors and bold, visionary art by George Perez, Piccolo and colorist David Calderon follow the traditional DC graphic novel pattern of using only a few colors, leading to a world made more focused through simplicity. The muted greens, purples, reds, and browns of this series manage to give a sense of transparency and emotional vibrancy that transcends the angsty, overwrought nature of most of DC’s YA graphic novel line. It leads to some really gorgeous effects, particularly Raven’s skin against Gar’s – the contrast makes their romance really pop, but not in the traditional comics coloring way.

Picolo’s art is extremely popular on Twitter for showing the Teen Titans in normal-style high school parties and hangouts, and that aesthetic really works for this reimagining. The clean lines, appealing faces and figures, and aforementioned color contrasts really make the series stick in the memory and stand out from many other offerings. It’s matched by Kami Garcia’s simple, spare writing of both dialogue and thought bubbles for all four main characters. The thought bubbles give each character a strong sense of teen angst without overdoing it. Though sometimes the dialogue can get a bit preachy, as can be kind of expected from YA today (and honestly, books aimed at the young since time immemorial), the characters feel sympathetic, flawed, likable, and the connections between them really draw the reader in because of the desires and hopes they have. By keeping the story much more mundane – no Titans Tower, no mech-suited villains, more the office core villains with balaclava masks, lab-coated Adeline – it really leans into the street-clothes-punk dynamic. Though Damian clearly references Bruce Wayne’s activities as Batman, his training feels a lot more like extreme sports enthusiast rather than hyper-advanced technology crimefighting.

Since this is The Batman Universe, it’s the Robin that we expect our readers to really gravitate towards, and Damian’s appearance doesn’t disappoint. His backstory of being raised by his mother and having a lot of anger at his father is a very good translation of his Grant Morrison creation, and the promise of Dick Grayson and hopefully more information on Bruce Wayne himself in the fourth volume, titled “Robin,” is very exciting!

Gabriel Picolo provided cover art for three variants of this graphic novel. The hard and softcover editions of this book have the main image advertised – Beast Boy holding Raven in his arms as they take a selfie. Barnes and Noble produced an exclusive edition (and also has one coming out for Teen Titans: Robin) featuring Beast boy and Raven kissing gently, composition framing their heads and Beast Boy’s hand. Walmart also produced an exclusive edition featuring a more waist-length shot of the two leaning into each other, not quite kissing yet. This August, DC is releasing a connecting cover edition of the four books in the series so far – the Beast Boy Loves Raven cover features Beast Boy holding Raven, her arms around his neck, the young sweethearts surrounded by musical notes, and Gar’s monkey and cowboy hat.

Editor’s Note: You can find this comic and help support TBU in the process by purchasing this issue digitally on Comixology through Amazon or a physical copy of the title through Things From Another World.