The Beasts Lurking Within: Reviewing ‘Tales Of The Titans’ #4

Garfield Logan, the Beast Boy, is about to be a pretty big center of attention for the entire DC Universe. Things haven’t been too great for the usually jovial Titan. Before things move forward, it’s time to turn back the clock just a bit.

Tales Of The Titans #4 does just that, in order to show how the hero bounced back following events in Dark Crisis On Infinite Earths. Those events included Deathstroke shooting him in the head, costing him an eye. A story of personal struggle and healing comes from Andrew Constant, Brandt & Stein, Lee Loughridge, and Wes Abbott.

This series has been an interesting one. Each moment with the four spotlight characters has been focused on very different emotional aspects and genres. Deep-cut character Anthony Lupus, a former Olympic Decathlon champion turned werewolf, comes for Garfield. In an attempt to cure himself, Lupus lets the beast out fully and the werewolf takes over and goes for Raven which causes a fight of course with Beast Boy.

Constant does a good job really digging into what is happening with Garfield. We see him in the Titans series being more like himself and this bridges the gap that gets him there. Out of the four stories in the series this and the Starfire one is the closest in connection to the series and building the characters up.

A story dealing with trauma, grief, and trying to build back what is lost needs a particular artistic vibe. Brant and Stein create some really rough, sharp, and powerful artwork. It captures all the emotions and moves pretty solidly.

Much of the story is dark both in tone and actual light, and Loughridge leans into that. Most of the colors are pretty bright, but plenty of shadows really take over. A lot of the palette is sort of washed out in quality as it’s not the very vivid superhero stuff that usually accompanies these characters.

I’m so glad that Abbott has a place in the stories of these characters. Bringing such solid lettering choices that capture voices in fun and unique ways. Little shifts to bubbles and fonts change how the voices are being heard. I especially love how Abbott and others do Raven’s bubbles, those really rough and bumpy bubbles that make me think of the cartoon voice. Something deeper and stoic, bridging the light and the dark.

Tales Of The Titans #4 is now available from DC Comics.