[Editor’s note: This review may contain spoilers.]
Writers: Keith Giffen & Scott Kolins
Artist: Scott Kolins
Reviewed By: Derek McNeil
Summary
Our story begins with Jaime describing a nightmare where the Blue Beetle is fighting Doctor Fate in what appears to be Ancient Egypt. His friend Brenda tells him it’s just a bad dream, but Jaime isn’t so sure.
Jaime arrives at school to find that Ted Kord is one of the Career Day speakers, but his speech doesn’t seem to have made much of an impression on the assembled students.
After school, Jaime tries to leave without having to talk to Ted, but Ted’s assistant finds him and brings him to the tech billionaire. He and Jaime head back to Ted’s headquarters, then out in the Bug to investigate a tip Ted has gotten that three members of a meta-human street gang, called the Posse, have gone missing.
When they arrive at the house of one of the missing gang members, Jaime enters the house as Blue Beetle. He finds that the house has been torn up. A large meta-human called Blot with shadow powers attacks Jaime, demanding that he “bring them back.”
While Jaime fights off this threat, Ted tells Jaime about the visit he received from Doctor Fate (as shown in Blue Beetle: Rebirth #1). Distracted by this, Jaime is swallowed up by Blot.
Blot threatens to kill Jaime if he doesn’t return his mother and sister, who have been taken by some unknown foe. Jaime manages to defeat Blot and escape his shadow form. Blot turns out to be one of the gang members and also Jaime’s classmate. Despite having fought Blot, Jaime is concerned for Blot’s mother and sister.
Just then the rest of the Posse show up and demand Jaime hand Blot over to them.
Positives
I am loving the strange relationship developing between Ted and Jaime. Jaime isn’t quite sure whether Ted is his mentor or tormentor, but for some reason keeps allowing Ted to get him involved in encounters with superhuman threats. It will be interesting to see how this relationship develops.
Also, for those of us wondering how much of Ted’s pre-Flashpoint history is being restored, another important hint is dropped in this issue. Ted mentions Nightshade, “a comely young heroine from back in my Beetle days.” Here we seem to have confirmation that Ted Kord did indeed have a career as the Blue Beetle. Also, interesting is the mention of Nightshade, as both she and Blue Beetle were characters that DC bought from Charlton Comics.
Negatives
Not much to complain about other than impatience at the slow pace we are getting information about how Ted fits into Blue Beetle history. Now that we have confirmed that Ted was Blue Beetle, I can hardly wait to find out why he stopped. And will he be a superhero again?
Verdict
DC seems to be having success after success with the Rebirth titles and Blue Beetle is no exception. Just as with the other books, we get the best of the classic and the New 52, as embodied by the team of Ted and Jaime.
