TITLE: The New Teen Titans vol. 1, issue #16
YEAR: February 1982
COMPANY: DC Comics
Writer/Co-Creators/Artist: Marv Wolfman and George Perez
Embellisher: Romeo Tanshal
Letterer: John Costanza
Colorist: Adrienne Roy
Editor: Len Wein
When I was still a child, I felt that “The New Teen Titans” vol. 1, issue #16 was the ultimate issue to own.
For one, I loved “The New Teen Titans” but it would introduce me to a series that would literally captivate me and make me a huge fan, “Captain Carrot and His Amazing Zoo Crew”.
Not only did I love the story but I easily ruined the copy I owned because I saw on the top of the comic book, “Prevue Pull-Out!” and when I pulled it out of the comic, needless to say I ruined it.
But I would repurchase the comic book nearly two decades later to keep it bag and boarded and to now, reading it again as an adult and falling in love with this very issue again.
First, let’s talk about “The New Teen Titans”. The series embodied young adult angst and team cohesion to the utmost level.
Raven has been raised to have no emotion and now that she is entering college, she’s scared of going to a public institution and not knowing how to behave. She sees her fellow teammates, joking and having fun, but she doesn’t know how because she was taught to shun all emotions and it’s tearing her up inside. Meanwhile, Wally West who has fallen for Raven, can’t do nothing to help her and it hurts him because she can’t love anyone, because she’s not sure how to have emotions especially to love.
Meanwhile, Donna Troy is worried about Koriand’r (Starfire). Having been jilted by Dick Grayson (Robin) who didn’t want to mix work with pleasure and had to tell her that he thought of her only as a very good friend, she has found a new boyfriend.
As Koriand’r takes part in modeling photos for Donna, she had a secret admire named Frank Crandall Saunters. The two would hit it off instantly.
But Frank was working with a mysterious person who just was brought into the H.I.V.E. and is trying to prove himself worthy, so he had paid Frank to use his charm to get information from Koriand’r. But Frank has fallen in love with her and doesn’t want to hurt the woman he’s in love with. But is threatened that if he doesn’t do the job for the mysterious man, he will be dead.
Needless to say, the storyline is tragic and for Koriand’r, her relationships with other men have all been unfortunate and I hoped that with the long hiatus from comic books, things would look better for her. That she may have found happiness. I hope.
And while the storyline for “The New Teen Titans” was solid, the popularity of this issue is the first appearance of “Captain Carrot and His Amazing Zoo Crew” and how Superman ended up in an alternative Earth where animals speak and for some reason, a few of them became superheroes.
Created by Roy Thomas and Scott Shaw, “Captain Carrot and His Amazing Zoo Crew” became a major part of my childhood as I absolute loved this comic book series, would always try to draw the characters and is probably the only comic book series in which I purchased the complete run several times. To share them with my son, who like my younger years, read them to the point of the comics being in tatters.
But that fanboy instinct towards “Captain Carrot and His Amazing Zoo Crew” would not be possible without me reading “The New Teen Titans” issue 16.
So, reading it in 2017, not only did I have those nostalgic memories of a young me, but now I appreciate this issue even more as an adult, and seeing how awesome Marv Wolfman and George Perez’ work with this issue and the series.