This incarnation of the Titans has visited my blog before, in my review of The New Teen Titans #1 (August 1984), which was the first issue of their book published under DC's "hardcover/softcover" initiative. That book's title would eventually be changed to Tales of the Teen Titans with issue number 41 (April 1984). There was a miniseries of the same title that preceded it. Lasting four issues long, it elaborated on the backstories of Cyborg, Raven, Changeling (as Beast Boy was called at the time), and Starfire.
This issue is a rather significant one because...it's a wedding issue! Yup, one of the Titans, one Donna Troy, the heroine of many origins. Seriously, her origins have been rewritten so many times it's ridiculous. At the time in the comics, she was in a relationship with a previously-divorced teacher named Terry Long, who was nearly twice her age. Yeah, I can certainly see why the character was disliked by some fans. Donna may have been an adult, and she was not one of his students, but yeah. It is a bit iffy to me.
Despite that, the wedding of Donna Troy is considered one of the crown jewels in a rather excellent run of comics. But does it deserve the praise? Let's find out as I take a look at Tales of the Teen Titans #50!
The cover is awesome. It's a Perez piece, so you know I'll love it. You have Donna and Terry right in the center in their wedding clothes. Fun fact, George Perez's wife Carol designed the wedding dress Donna Troy wears in the comic. Behind them stand their bridesmaids and groomsmen. In the background stand Donna's friends, family, and Titans teammates.
"We are Gathered Here Today..."
Writers: Marv Wolfman, George Perez
Penciller: George Perez
Inkers: Mike DeCarlo, Dick Giordano
Colorist: Adrienne Roy
Letterer: John Costanza
Editors: Marv Wolfman, George Perez
Executive Editor: Dick Giordano
The story beings on the Temple of Athena on Themyscira. You may know it as the home of the Amazons. A group of Amazons are wondering why Queen Hippolyte has asked for a private audience with Athena herself...which is incredibly unusual. Considering what's going on in this story, you'd think Hippolyte would be running around the island, hooting that one of her daughters is getting married.
The scene shifts to the home of Steve Dayton, the fifth richest man in the DCU. He's also known as Mento of the Doom Patrol. He's also the adoptive father of one Garfield "Changeling" Logan, who is helping plan the party.
There's a lot to do, and it's clear the green kid is struggling with the proverbial weight of it all. Mento's butler Questor is watching this, and is puzzled by the appearance of a clown. Changeling explains it's because there will be a bunch of little kids at the wedding, and the clown will be entertaining them. Poor Garfield is going bugnuts with all the people getting on him about everything from the cake to the dance floor. Questor steps in to help out so the former and future Beast Boy can take a break.
Elsewhere, Adeline Kane, the ex-wife of Slade "Deathstroke" Wilson is greeting the new day. She goes to wake up her son Joe, aka Jericho, but hears nothing from his room. She realizes that he's upstairs in his attic studio. Turns out, the mute superhero was up all night preparing a little gift for Donna and Terry.
Adeline is impressed by the painting, and pleads with him to let her arrange a gallery show for his work. She feels the world needs to see his talent, but he refuses, feeling he's not ready to exhibit his art yet.
We next go to a place. A place of nowhere but darkness and gloom. This is where Raven is right now. She is struggling with the evil influence of her father Trigon. She's likely not going to be attending the wedding.
Another Titan is having an issue with coming to the wedding: One Victor Stone, aka Cyborg. Yes DC, he was a Titan. Vic and his galpal Sarah Simms are on their way, but Cyborg is feeling like a freak. I don't know why, as his best friend is GREEN, a teammate of his is ORANGE, and they don't hide that. Also, he remarks that he could blow the secret identities of all the Titans. Again, teammates who are GREEN and ORANGE and DO NOT HIDE IT. Cyborg is a dope.
Questor comes by and notices Changeling's tux for the wedding.
Yeah, he knows he can only get away with that tux because it's the 80s. Questor then goes to check on Steve Dayton, who is brooding in his office...and has a bottle of some alcoholic drink on his desk. But he didn't touch it. He's been having some issues, likely because of that helmet he uses as Mento. Despite this, he vows to be there for Garfield, as he really needs this, after that whole thing with Terra.
Next, we shift to Kory Anders/Koriand'r, aka "Starfire". She's hanging out with some of the bridesmaids. Among them is fellow Titan Lilith, aka Omen. As for the blushing bride? Well, Donna Troy is talking to her mentor Wonder Woman as she gets ready. She has some jitters about walking the aisle, but Diana assures her she's doing the right thing, and they'll be happy. The girls get visited by Dick Grayson, aka Nightwing. He's going to walk her down the aisle. Dick and Donna talk for a bit. Dick tells her that Terry is a lucky man to have a woman like her. Donna tells her she loves him (in the familial way, family was a big thing with the Titans), and they share a hug.
And with that, let's get this wedding properly started. The ceremony goes off without a hitch. Nice work, Garfield. Donna Troy walks the aisle, and vows are said.
I think Perez himself appears in that ring of people. Donna Troy and Terry Long share their first kiss as a married couple. Later on, Terry and Donna share their first dance. The party afterwards is a way for us to catch up with some past Titans members. Both the Guardian and Bumblebee had retired from superheroics after their marriage, and Guardian sold his first book. Lilith senses something strange. So does Questor the butler. He checks out door that is oddly unlocked, but nothing is there.
On a balcony, Bruce Wayne and Dick Grayson do some talking. In the Batman books at the time, the supervillainess Nocturna had adopted Jason Todd, the then-Robin, and the Dark Knight can't do anything about it. Dick then wonders something. If Bruce wanted to adopt Jason...why didn't Bruce adopt Dick? Bruce admits that he wonders that himself. He then figures his youth back then and obsession with his career as the Batman at the time prevented him from considering it, and then before he knew it, Dick had grown up.
Changeling and Jillian are dancing, and having some fun doing it. The green-skinned Titan is thrilled. Nothing has gone wrong at the wedding, and he's naturally feeling pretty proud of himself. Cyborg wants to talk to him. The former athlete has noticed that no one has made any remarks about how he looks, and he wants to know what Garfield did. Well, Beast Boy had his stepfather Mento use his helmet to send out mental impressions to everyone who looks at him. As a result, they see only Vic Stone. Cyborg...takes it well.
Again, Garfield doesn't hide his green skin, Starfire doesn't hide her orange skin. Why is he so worried about people seeing him?! Starfire ends up quite popular with the guys at the party. A couple of women talk about it, finding it disgusting. One of them remarks that she did talk to the Tamaranean, and she was really nice. It's crazy.
We get a cameo of the original Hawk and Dove, and Dick Grayson runs into Duela Dent, aka Joker's Daughter and Harlequin. Perez drew her as middle-aged. Her Harlequin days are, in her own words, "fifty pounds ago". Dick tells her he realized something a while back: She was far too old to be the daughter of the Batman villain Two-Face, like she claimed. But then again, she claimed she was the daughter of various other Batman villains, too. Dick wants to know the truth, but she teases him by walking away and saying that maybe she'll tell him one day. I get the feeling Marv Wolfman had intended to do something with this in the future, but never got around to it.
In the pool, Charley Parker and Bette Kane are discussing reforming Titans West with Aqualad and Tula. However, the two Atlanteans have responsibilities to Atlantis that must take priority at the moment. Speedy is considering it, but Bumblebee, Guardian, and Kid Flash are all retired. Maybe the idea of a West Coast-based Titans team isn't meant to be...
Elsewhere in the mansion, Changeling is brooding. He feels like a royal screwup. He's lost a lot in his young life, and it makes him feel like he's ruins everything he touches. Cyborg comes by...to apologize. Yeah, he was hurt by what Garfield did, but he gets that the green-skinned animorph meant well. He just wanted Donna's wedding to run smooth, and Vic does think Garfield did a great job with it. The two are able to reconcile. But enough drama! Let's ROCK!
Jericho, Mal Duncan, and Dick Grayson cut some tunes for the audience. FREEBIRD! PLAY FREEBIRD! Wonder Woman approaches Donna Troy, and tells her there's something she and Terry have to see. They follow the Amazing Amazon to a room in the mansion, the same room Questor noticed earlier. Donna is nervous about it being a supervillain attacking. Makes sense. Quite a few supervillains would attack a wedding. However, it's not a supervillain. Well, not at the time, anyway.
Yup. Queen Hippolyta came to give her regards to Donna. You see, the Queen of the Amazons can't step foot off the island or else she'll lose her immortality. So, she asked Athena if she could witness her daughter's wedding, and Athena was like, "Okay, that's cool. Tell her the other gods wish her well, too." I think they've mellowed out a bit with age.
The ceremony continues on. We get the cutting of the cake and the tossing of the bouquet and garter. But even the most fun of parties have to end. As the sun goes down, the guests are leaving. Drinks have been drunk, cake has been eaten, and a good time was had. The Titans give Garfield a little gift for all the hard work he did to make the wedding a spectacular event.
Terry's brother Barry is talking to their sister, and he admits something: He's a bit envious of his brother. Both of the Long brothers had marriages that ended in divorce, but it seemed that Terry managed to find the most wonderful new lady to marry. He wonders if he'll himself ever be that lucky.
As for the newlyweds? Well, they're going to spend their honeymoon in Greece. And they're going to head there in style: On Steve Dayton's private jet. Being friends with a kid who was the adopted son of one of the richest men in the DCU has its perks. Both Terry and Donna had decided to get out of their wedding togs and into something more comfortable.
Wonder Girl indeed. The two make a toast to their love, to peace, to wisdom, and to unity. Donna Troy was so happy to see everyone there at her wedding...except for Raven. She wished the empath was there. Terry tells her a tale of a student he had about three years earlier. Like Raven, she had troubles. She needed help, but was too shy to ask for it. She would get the help she needed, but she had to gather up the courage to ask. The Titans can't help Raven unless she asks for it.
With that, the story ends with Donna and Terry enjoying their honeymoon as the plane flies into the sunset.
I will admit, I was a bit bothered by the age gap between Donna and Terry...mainly because Donna herself says she's nineteen in the comic. Yeah, technically, Donna Troy is legally an adult, but it's still a bit...creepy to me. I'm sorry, I can't come up with a better word for it.
Otherwise that, it's actually really good. I like that the wedding went off without a hitch, and the drama of the story was character stuff. Speaking of character stuff, I thought it was rather odd that Cyborg was worried about people seeing him even though one of his teammates is green, another orange, and they make no attempt to hide that. I get that Cyborg still feels like a freak because of his cybernetics, but it did feel kind of silly. I'm surprised that most of the Titans don't operate publicly already, considering who they are.
You could tell Wolfman and Perez saw an opportunity to weave some potential new story threads with the attempt to reform Titans West and the whole mystery regarding the identity of the Joker's Daughter. Shame those never panned out as far as I know. I would have loved to have seen those plot seeds come to fruition.
This story has moments that are funny, dramatic, and rather heartwarming. Some consider this story one of the crown jewels of Marv and George's work on the Teen Titans, and I can see why. Despite my reservations with Donna and Terry's relationship, I can see they truly loved each other.
Next time, we're going to rejoin the heroes of the Marvel Universe as they continue their adventures on Battleworld. Thanks for reading this blog entry! If you enjoyed it, spread it around! And if you want to give my blog some additional support, please drop a tip in my Digital Tip Jar! See you next time!
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