Welcome to Loneliness & Cheeseburgers Presents: Red Hood and the Outlaws (Vol. 1), Issue #2 – “Shot Through the Heart – and Who’s To Blame?”! Looks like Scott Lobdell is referencing his favorite songs in these titles! First the Clash, and now Bon Jovi! Oh boy, who’s next? BOZ SCAGGS? In the previous installment, we learn a little bit about Red Hood (Jason Todd) and his various outlaws (Roy Harper, Starfire). Todd and Harper and not aliens, but Starfire is an alien. And she likes to bone guys like Todd and Harper because they’re cool and neat. That’s the extent of the rich characterization so far.

There’s something about All-Castes and the Untitled and Jason Todd visits the Well of the All-Caste to talk to a dead woman named Ducra and now he’s getting ambushed by, perhaps, All-Castes? I don’t know. I’ll have to keep reading because I’m “excited” to “learn” more.

Red Hood and the Outlaws (Vol. 1), Issue #2 [December, 2011]
Written by: Scott Lobdell
“Shot Through the Heart – and Who’s To Blame?”

All right, Scott Lobdell. Hit me with your best shot (doo doo, doo doo)! I love it when cover art is unnecessarily busy! I love seeing a whole mess of shit and having no idea what the hell is even going on!

Jason “Red Hood” Todd flashes us back to a year ago when he was just Jason Todd, and he didn’t legally change his middle name yet. Jason Todd, a former Robin (is that common knowledge? Whoops!) who was beaten to death by the Joker (!) and resurrected for reasons he still doesn’t understand (!!).

Like a goddamned Jesus.

Todd didn’t ask to be resurrected. It kind of sucks, actually, because death was nice and relaxing.

“Jason Todd, a former Robin trying to make sense of the world around him. Roy Harper, a self-professed ‘recovering super-hero’ taking it one day at a time. Koriand’r, a slave princess from another world who will never be chained again. Don’t call them heroes, don’t call them a team, call them… RED HOOD AND THE OUTLAWS!!” *applause*

OK, well that clears some stuff up for me. I am optimistic that this former Robin is going to be better than a certain other former Robin who would rather cavort around a three-ring circus.

The issue begins with Todd surrounded by a dozen pointy weapons aimed for his face while he gives a dead-eyed stare. He’s at an unknown place, possibly not even mapped, and he was brought there by Talia al Ghul, and hey, I’ve run into her before. Actually, Superman has. But, he is apparently an ex-girlfriend of Batman. These people are all entwined with one another, aren’t they? It’s upsetting.

OK, let me know when you find one.

A withered old hunchback of a woman stands behind the many monks with the many pointy swords. Todd pats the woman on the head like a dog. It is acknowledged that this wasn’t a very good first impression. Talia is embarrassed.

“The monks were the All-Caste. The ancient one was Ducra, the instructor.”

Well, that explains some of that previous issue ending nonsense. The craggy, lumpy yam grabs the kid’s arm and flips him over onto his back. “I’ve been doing this for three thousand years. It only took you six seconds to torque me off. That has got to be some kind of record.”

I always like it when 9,000-year-old hags have a 21st century sarcasm sensibility. And, as an addendum, I must have torqued myself off three times last night. Todd is knocked out cold. “I can still train you to fight when you are unconscious. I can mold you into the most skilled assassin in the world.”

Ah, the Unconscious Assassin! Now there’s a superhero! But, training people while they’re unconscious is not at all preferable. Ducra turns to Talia, who shrugs. Todd’s a complicated kind of guy, lady. “He was recently raised from the dead, for reasons we may never know.” Ahh, yes, that old chestnut. Also, to make matters even more tumultuous, the kid’s soul was missing for a little bit too, but they found it under the couch. Under the couch in the Lazarus Pit. The Lazarus Pit is where you throw corpses in order to resurrect their soulless bodies? Where’s this pit located? Are there many of them, like McDonald’s?

What’s in it for anyone? If he wasn’t even great before he was murdered, then move onto someone else! Is Regis Philbin still alive??

While Talia thinks he deserves a chance, Ducra has the smarts to go “no way, Jose”. He’s going to kill a lot of people, don’t you see that? Can’t anyone see that? Can’t anyone see anything? I can’t see anything! Help! I can’t find my glasses! Where are my pills?!

That being said, Ducra will certainly train the bastard in the ways of the All-Caste. For whatever reason, it’s not clear other than he needs to be kept away from the rest of the world. For whatever reason.

AIR WORLDWIDE FLIGHT 102, THREE HOURS AGO. “Three hours ago” meaning three hours before the events at the end of the last issue. I suppose Jason Todd is on his way to China to commit human rights violations, make low-quality steel, and eat delicious food with chopsticks. He stairs absent-mindedly out the window while Roy Harper looks gross in the adjacent seat. “C’mon dude, snap out of it,” Harper nudges him, “Whenever you start getting all spacey like that… it freaks me out.”

It’s mostly because Harper thinks Todd is mad because Starfire (aka Kori) asked for a fuck and he gave it to her. Well, Todd’s not upset about that. Have at her. He’s not the first and he won’t be the last. Even today!

OK, with that all patched up, Harper is satisfied and walks away to either take a shit or slam open the emergency hatch with a fire extinguisher. Todd is still visibly distracted and/or constipated. But, hey, don’t worry, an extremely attractive, blonde flight attendant with a very tight, non-sanctioned flight attendant uniform puts her hand on Todd’s shoulder and asks him what is bringing him to China. Business or pleasure. She kneels on the empty adjacent seat and bends over toward him unprofessionally. He tells her there’s a death in the family. She’s (barely) sorry about that! But follow her and she’ll suck you off in the tiny airplane bathroom.

Come on, man. This is the kind of shameless self-insertion fantasy bullshit that the likes of ugly, fat guys like Kevin Smith stoop to.

Her name is Isabel. She slips Todd her number and continues on with her sultry flight attending. He can’t fucking believe it. Doesn’t she know who he is? JASON TODD, FORMER ROBIN, CURRENT RED HOOD. He’s going to murder her.

The plane lands in Hong Kong, and Harper tells Todd that everything has been taken care of. Whatever that means. But Todd is worried because Harper doesn’t know how to do anything right and this will surely end up a complete, destructive failure for both of them. We’re talking body parts accidentally launched into space during a routine business meeting.

The first fuck-up was that Harper called for a limousine, which is the opposite of keeping a low profile and now they may as well fly back home and try again. Before Harper can defend himself, the open door reveals the Hot Orange Lady who called for the limo. Now it’s a good idea.

Harper likes this three-person team they seem to have stumbled upon! A real team! None of that Justice League shit! Superman farts and smells bad all the time with his farts.

Jason Todd is kind of annoyed. He doesn’t want to be part of any team. He folds his arms sulkily and tells Roy Harper that he’s all but leaving him for dead if he needs to at a moment’s notice. Even if he DID bust him out of prison. Don’t get too cozy.

Sorry, geez. You don’t have to give me the ol’ shitty polygon mesh face.

Now it’s Harper’s turn to fold his arms and get sulky. Todd pretends the two of them don’t amuse him.

The limo takes them to a ritzy skyscraper where Jason Todd owns a suite, or as Harper calls it, a “safe pad”. That sounds like a feminine hygiene product, but it’s absolutely not in this case. At least I don’t think it is! Todd owns these kinds of suites in Paris, London, Tokyo, and about *checks map* seventeen hundred other cities around the world. Cheyenne, Wyoming. Keetmanshoop, Namibia. The apartment over the Pope’s apartment.

“Robbing criminal masterminds is good business,” he thinks to himself as he stares out the window. His pad is riddled with plants, “In the years I spent learning how to ‘fight crime’ under the Batman… there was one lesson he stressed again and again. Be prepared. Don’t ever assume you’re safe. Even in your own home.

Sounds like three lessons to me. Another lesson could be ‘learn to count your lessons properly’.

Jason Todd has only been in his safe pad for three minutes before it becomes unmistakably unsafe. Two henchmen aim guns at the kid’s head while a morbidly obese woman ambushes! Her name is Suzie Su and she looks like she smells like really strong $3 perfume, but Jason Todd has a joke about that too: “The unique scent of undercarriage just wafts through the night air.”

There’s not much preamble to this one. Jason Todd whips out a couple of guns and shoots bullet holes right into both henchmen. Blood splatters all over Suzie Su. She goes “KAK!”

Sounds like a really thrilling backstory! Some real good stuff to go “Bu…cra…” about

Todd doesn’t find pleasure in this senseless killing and the taking down of the lumpy 900-lb lady. Usually he would, so these are strange times. She’s so fat she looks like she’s gurgling through some fat in her mouth. “When m’daddy… finds out…” she gurgles. Lots of gurgling.

“I’ll kill him too. Promise,” he says as he pulls open a dresser drawer full of weapons and a red hood. “I got what I came for.”

As if there wasn’t enough perplexing crap happening in this comic that I have no frame of reference for or interest in, we cut to the Himalayas where a woman is piloting a helicopter through a storm. She turns her head and yells behind her. “I don’t care what you did to save my village, Red Hood. This freak storm is going to fry my bucket! I’m turning this thing around, now!”

Do you know what fries my bucket? Calling a helicopter a bucket. Maybe she meant a bucket of water. I remember using one of those in SimCopter, but I don’t see a bucket at all. I think she’s calling her helicopter a dang bucket.

Jason Todd and Roy Harper had opened the hatch door and are now ready to jump out. The pilot calls them a couple of lunatics, but they’re already gone! Then she shrugs and moves on. lmao

Starfire is already floating around the sky. “What did I miss?” she asks these knuckleheads. Red Hood whips out some metal wings and starts soaring toward the side of a mountain. The other two follow him. I get Starfire’s alien whatever powers, but why is Roy Harper able to do this? Then they all fly through an invisible portal in the mountain? This comic is absolutely fucking stupid.

And just like that, I stopped reading.

Red Hood is now back to where it all began. He’s been to eighteen different locations so far, so I have no idea “where” is actually “all began”. It sounds like it’s a nineteenth location. He’s back to where everything began. After he became Batman’s young protégé. After he got his ass creamed by the Joker (and I don’t mean Preparation H style OR MAYBE I DO). That’s not important at all. We’re talking resurrection bad boy stuff. Talia al Ghul threw him in that Lazarus Pit. He became a fresh new man!

“I’ve seen a lot of horrible things in my life. Some of them at my own hand. But this…”

Red Hood talks to that dying Ducra woman again. We really are back where it all began, so to speak. Is this supposed to be profound? They’re losing me here. There aren’t enough half-naked alien ladies with big ol’ floppy titties to hold my interest, let’s consider adding a few more. Am I right, gentlemen?

“No time for tears, Man-Child – nor regrets. An Untitled was here. More powerful than ever.” This is the spirit of Ducra talking, floating above her body all blue and ethereal. Even in death she calls Todd “Man-Child”, which is apt.

The Untitled broke into the Chamber of All (my least favorite Harry Potter book), so that’s bad news. Untitled shouldn’t be around here at all! They should be home eating chicken nuggets and cleaning their toilets. Well, Jason Red Hood Todd Rundgren is going to avenge her! He will not stop until–

“Pish. Always the avenging with you. It’s as if you learning nothing, Jason Todd.”

Well, that puts a damper on plans. Ducra just Jon Snowed this kid. No avenge for you, lady.

This is the point from the end of Issue #1 where these hooded zombies show up to eat Todd’s lack of brains!

Oh yeah baby, gimme some of that sloppy rage.

Todd decides not to shoot them. They’re dead already, but he doesn’t want to re-kill them, you know? Seems tacky.

Oops, one gets shot in the back with an arrow containing a timed bomb! Uncouth! And it seems very expensive to waste one of those on someone who is already dead!

Red Hood is peeved that his good outlaw buddy Roy Harper is such a volatile dumbass. Starfire asks Harper if that was really necessary. “He’s dead – he didn’t feel a thing,” Harper argues.

The trio fights. Provocative poses abound. Why bother fighting unless you look good doing it?

These zombies keep goading Todd with phrases like “Focus, Jason. See past your past,” and “You’re getting faster, Jason.” It’s like this is a deliberate test that the zombies want him to win.

“I feel like I’m saying goodbye to a past I forgot I ever had,” Todd thinks. Why do all the past Robins have these really abstruse personal hangups? Get over yourselves.

Harper calls these zombies “trash”. Todd calls these zombies “the greatest people he has ever known”.

Then Todd fornicates with a few zombie corpses.

OR, rather, he sits and quietly prays for a moment. Then he stands back up.

“Let’s go kick some ass…team.”

Final Thoughts

Oh wow, how touching. Snort. New 52 seems to be doing this thing where the internal dialogue is wooden and lacking personality. Not everything can be X-MEN WACKY, but would it kill Jason Todd to lighten up just a little bit? Even Bruce Wayne can crack a joke every once in a while. Damn.