Blog

Publisher: DC Comics
Writer: J.T. Krul
Artist: Geraldo Borges
Cover: Greg Horn

Spoilers!

“A Father’s Loss”: Recently in the mini-series Justice League: Cry For Justice, the villain Prometheus disguised himself as Captain Marvel and infiltrated the ranks of the Justice League. In doing so it allowed him to do some serious damage to the team both emotionally and physically. And with that, no one on the team is suffering more than Roy Harper, better known as Red Arrow. When we last saw him in Justice League: Cry For Justice, he was severely beaten and missing his right arm. At that time everyone assumed Captain Marvel (Freddy Freeman) was responsible for the assault, but now in Justice League: The Rise of Arsenal we get to see how the fight went down and the aftermath of Red Arrow’s climatic encounter.

Roy wakes up from a dream that recalls the events of the fight with Prometheus in the guise of Captain Marvel, which fills in the gap and shows in detail the beating Roy receives at the hands of the villain. When Roy realizes where he is, he looks down at what’s left of his arm while Green Lantern brings him up to speed on what’s been going on. He then asks about the damage to Star City, and quickly realizes that he’s not being told everything; he soon figures out for himself that his daughter is among the ninety thousand casualties and has a breakdown. After sedating him, an eerily calm Green Arrow decides to go out on patrol while the others decide to go after Prometheus; but while Roy is asleep, he dreams of his former junkie buddy who is currently dead, and he insists that Roy needs to start using again. After waking up again, he goes to see Dr. Midnight to find where the body of his daughter is and visits her privately. A grieving and angry Roy leaves the lab with stolen pills and ends up at his old home that is currently being looted. He takes on the two thugs, but before it gets out of hand, Black Canary shows up and the two get into a very heated and hurtful argument. Later that night, he’s working the heavy bag and the pain comes back, causing him to pop another handful of pills; just then, he sees his old junkie partner again.

J.T. Krul keeps The Rise of Arsenal just as dark and dismal as the ending of the Justice League: Cry for Justice series was, and when you take into account that these events take place soon after Blackest Night, it’s been a pretty rough time for the Justice League as of late. This issue does fill in gaps in Justice League: Cry for Justice and the Justice League: Rise and Fall Special during the first half of the issue, but once we get to actually focus on Roy, that’s where I think the story starts. From Roy’s trauma induced dreams, to seeing Lian’s body, and then to his argument with Black Canary, I think that Krul effectively set up a decent issue and might even change my opinions on what’s been going on with Roy and Ollie lately. Though I do wonder what will come out of all this despair and tragedy going on with these two, and if it’s a little much at times.

Geraldo Borges gives us some pretty good work and keeps with the tone of Krul’s story. The two-page spread of the team’s faces as Roy realizes his daughter is gone was the best in the book, and was made more effective without any captions. It was different seeing emotion on Batman’s face, but this is Dick not Bruce, and these guys have been through a lot together as former Teen Titans. I was a little confused as to why Lian’s body was already pulled out as if someone was viewing her body but left it open before Roy got there; something about it just didn’t sit right with me.

So far the Rise and Fall series is very heavy on the “fall” right now, and hopefully it won’t be dragged out; but I don’t see an effective “rise” coming in a four issue mini-series, so we’ll see what happens.

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