Looks like the version I found is significantly abridged. It left me hanging exactly when we were going to find out what Donenfeld did when Arnold Drake tried to get Infantino fired for...well...firing him.

Teen Titans #17 (October 1968)




"Holy Thimbles, It's the Mad Mod"
Script: Bob Haney
Pencils: Nick Cardy
Inks: Nick Cardy
Colors: ?
Letters: Joe Letterese

grade: D

An incredibly unusual issue, and yet also a completely forgettable issue, all at the same time. This one is missing all the trappings of the early Titans stories (catering to teen culture, shoving a sense of social responsibility and respect for authority down the reader's throat) and also all the newer stuff being tried in recent issues (weird alien dimensions, dark visual and emotional tones, expressive panel arrangements, representation of the counter-culture movement) and what we get in the absence of all this proves to be a generic superhero adventure with nothing special going for it at all.

And yet, I also promised that this was an unusual issue. That's for two reasons.

The first is the near-complete absence of Robin in this story. The first proto Titans team-up in Brave & The Bold #54 was written almost entirely to prove Robin's worth and usefulness, even without having super powers, and that conclusion has been the underlying core of the Titans team ever since, the guy without powers being the leader, brain, and most complex character of the group. And yet, in this story, he gets locked in the Tower of London, we never even see him try to escape, and he doesnt come back until the final page after the adventure has already been wrapped up.



Worse yet is this little exchange between Aqualad and Kid Flash earlier on that just sort of drops out and never gets addressed again later on:



I mean...wow. And Haney's script proves Kid Flash right. They didn't end up needing Robin. Let's not lose the context either that, even as recently as last issue, Robin was still haunted by the entire team turning on him in issue #14, and here it's happening again, this time with Haney himself appearing to view Robin as unnecessary to the team's dynamic and success.

My guess is this all comes down to licensing. The Teen Titans were now experiencing wider success as a result of their adventures on The Superman Aquaman Hour, and, due to licensing issues, Robin wasn't part of the team in those episodes. In contrast, whereas Batman and Robin were a pop-culture phenomenon when this title was first launched, Robin getting extra emphasis on many of those early covers,



the Batman television series was, by this point, cancelled and out of vogue. In terms of the reality outside of the comic book page, Robin was no longer vital to the success of this series. And, since he was tied up with the Batman license, it might have seemed like a good idea to get him off the team.

So, for this brief moment, it truly feels like Haney was trying to write Robin out of the Titans. I suspect this was a test, Haney waiting to see fan response to this story and whether or not anyone cared/even noticed Robin's absence and impotence. Considering that Robin does, indeed, stick around, I assume that they did.


The other unusual aspect of this story is the return of The Mad Mod. By this point, the Titans have fought a vast array of enemies exactly once each, no one ever coming back for a second appearance, and while those villains ranged from ridiculous (Ding-Dong Daddy Dowd) to intriguing (The Gargoyle), the Mad Mod struck me as being utterly forgettable in his first appearance and carries even less weight in this second outing. At least the first time around he provided an opportunity for Haney to inject some more teen culture into the adventure, but that aspect of the Titans is utterly lost in this story, the Mod feeling no different from any generic villain surrounded by henchmen that you might find in the Batman television series.



Important Details:

- Aqualad first discovers that he possesses Aquaman's ability to communicate with sea animals when he gets the Loch Ness Monster to aid him.

- The first Titans adventure without Robin

- First time a villain (The Mad Mod) returns for a second story.

- Haney and Cardy take a year long sabbatical from the Teen Titans title following this issue.


Minor Details:

- Cardy's less than enthusiastic work on this issue extends to coloring issues, which seem caused more by his oversights than by any decision the colorist might have made, from not giving Robin any shorts




to not making it clear to the colorist that these are both supposed to be images of Aqualad (not Kid Flash):




This story just seems to lack all of Cardy's usual enthusiasm. Maybe it's because he wasn't allowed to drive the story in the way that I suspect he was for #14 and #16, or maybe it was a more specific objection to marginalizing Robin (who'd been the primary focus of those two stories). Or maybe Haney and Cardy had already been told they were off the book after this issue.




Department of Aquatic Desperation:

In an unusual change of direction, Haney gives Aqualad two big water scenes this issue, and both actually manage to feel earned, Aqualad's scene in the tower being the most memorable of these:



Ever since Giordano expressed an awareness of the Aqualad problem, Haney seems to be giving him more and better deserved water moments each issue. Of course, Aqualad will be gone from the title soon regardless.



Department of Worrying about Wonderchick:

So Cardy is still giving us a few cheesecake good-girl shots of Wondergirl in this issue, which always manages to creep me out seeing as how she's clearly underage:



but, weirder still, is the amount of violence he and Haney depict towards her this issue. It's not just that she's a woman being repeatedly injured by a male in 1968 -- its the severity of the depictions while none of the rest of the Titans are getting attacked by the Mod at all. These are two entirely different scenes in this issue:





Sexualizing and roughing up a minor...I just feel icky reading this.




So a pretty unusual story in several respects, and yet a thoroughly forgettable adventure when you're not studying the minutia. The Titans are due for a course correction (eight issues away), but hopefully we'll get back to more compelling stories like we saw in #14 and #16 until that time.




Plot synopsis: The Titans are guests at some sort of ceremony at Windsor Castle, the Mad Mod shows up to steal the royal scepter, and the Titans pursue, initially thwarted by the fact that the Mod did something to their costumes that caused their powers to diminish. The rest of the story becomes a series of confrontations with The Mod in pursuit of the scepter while Robin is nowhere to be seen because the Mod's henchmen trapped him in The Tower of London on page four.

Teen Titans #18 (December 1968)



"Eye of the Beholder!"

Script: Len Wein; Marv Wolfman
Pencils: Bill Draut
Inks: Bill Draut
Colors: ?
Letters: Jon D'Agostino

grade: C

We've got a new managing editor, a new editor on this title, and a company trying to find itself now that Batman isn't so hip anymore. I guess it was just a matter of time before these forces ended up creating a shake-up for this title. For whatever reason, Haney and Cardy are now off of the mag and won't be back for a year. In the meantime, before the series can get handed off to Neal Adams, it lands in the hands of an extremely young Len Wein and Marv Wolfman. While Wolfman has stated on numerous occasions that he was a true fan of the series, the team's script in this issue shows absolutely no understanding of the characters nor the title, serving up a generic story in which the team fights the most cliche French jewel thief ever committed to paper



and (more importantly) in which the Titans have absolutely no recognizable personalities beyond Kid Flash being a hothead. Weirder still is how a jewel thief manages to take down a team of super-powered beings, from pulling on Wonder Girl's lasso harder than she does and then threatening her with electrocution (would that even work on her?) to Aqualad suddenly not being able to go without water for more than an hour



I mean, how could he have ever survived half the missions we've read thus far with that kind of restriction? Some of the Titans Copter flights alone would have lasted more than an hour. Does Robin pack moist towelettes in his utility belt in order to get Aqualad through each trip?


The other focus of this issue is a little less disappointing, and that's the Coldwar-era sentiment of mutual cooperation put forth via the introduction of Starfire, a Russian super teen who gets his own origin and who initially distrusts and dislikes the Titans as much as they distrust and dislike him until a mutual respect is attained by the close:



I have to wonder why Wolfman didn't bring Starfire back when he got control of the Teen Titans revival in 1982, instead giving the exact same name to an entirely new character. Interesting choice.


I do have to say that the one part I really did enjoy in this issue was Robin's utter verbal annihilation of the villain while beating the heck out of him at the same time:




Does it fit Robin's character? No. Does it come out of absolutely nowhere? Yes. But it was awesome all the same.


So this ends up being a forgettable story that feels more like fan-fiction than an actual Titans installment, even if it serves up an important Coldwar-era message and has a fun climax. Still, I think we have to let the rookies off the hook for this one. They'll certainly do a better job of proving themselves down the road.


Important Details:

- 1st appearance and origin of Starfire (Leonid Kovar, later known as "Red Star")

- Marv Wolfman's first work on the Teen Titans



Minor Details:

The letter column provides several interesting tidbits this time around. Namely:

- Dick Giordano asserts that Speedy will not replace Aqualad. And yet that's exactly what's going to happen next issue.

- Dick Giordano asserts that the Dimensional Caper was fully the brain child of Bob Haney. And yet I don't believe him.

- Fans are already demanding to know why Robin got left out of the Superman Aquaman Hour animated episodes, putting to rest the idea that fans would permit Robin being written out of the title.



Plot synopsis: The Titans are teamed up with a Russian hero to stop an international jewel thief. They distrust each other at first but ultimately learn to respect one another.

shaxper, loving these reviews!

I think your thought about the exclusion of Robin b/c of the animated show is a good one. Certainly makes sense.

The Mad Mod cover is indeed an excellent one, though I wish that a worthier villain could have been given that kind of artistic treatment. That's the only issue between #s 13 and 43 that I did not have, so I particualrly enjoyed the review.

I remember being affected by the "message" of the Starfire issue; one of the first inklings of anything but conventional politics in comics, especially at DC! And like you, I think, I always expected him to resurface. A quick check with the amazing Mike's Amazing shows that -- ironically -- after his appearance in TT 18 in 1968, he wouldn't show up again until New teen Titans #18, nearly 14 years later.

And did Wally West become a brunette in Teen Titans? He was, I think, always a real redhead in the Flash. Maybe so he wouldn't conflict with Speedy? But it's not like Speedy was around enough to confuse readers. Maybe redheads are a problem for colorists?

Btw, did you notice that this is the third of what would be four straight issues with an entirely different logo? The fourth would remain until #43, the final issue of this version of the Titans.

Thanks, Shax. Well done, as always! This is a great thread!

I wonder if they were experimenting with actually doing a different one each issue and then reverted to form by going with one.

When I read these as a 13-or 14-year-old kid, I have to tell you that I wasn't as keyed into noticing WG's poses as I would become when I was a little older, fwiw. I think it was the "new" Wonder Girl issue (#23) that did that.

If Haney was experimenting with removing Robin, it would have been against the tide of the character's popularity and DC's interests. Although Robin was not a part of The Superman / Aquaman Hour of Adventure (which ran at the same time as the live action Batman's 2nd and 3rd seasons hence the licensing matter), Filmation's next TV series--The Batman / Superman Hour--made its premiere in the fall of 1968, and essentially picked up where the live action Batman ended in March of that year.

With Robin making his animated debut as one of the series' stars, its clear that Filmation was not only carrying out DC's wishes, but responding to the general culture, which loved the Robin character. There were more watching Batman than reading any comic, so if one counted numbers, it accurately represented the interest of a much wider audience landscape. When the Batman part of the hour was repackaged / expanded into its own series (fall 1969), the title was Batman with Robin, the Boy Wonder.

In short, if Haney was trying to axe Robin fro the team built around him, it was an unwise pursuit, since Robin's presence was welcome to the audience; it would have been damaging for the most important of all comic-book teen sidekicks to be kicked out of the Teen Titans.

I doubt Haney planned to ax Robin all at once. Rather, I think he saw the issue as a test-run from which he could gauge fan reaction. There had definitely been letters in the past complaining about someone without powers being on the team (let alone the leader), and now that Bat-Mania was over, I wouldn't be surprised if those letters had increased in number. Still, in the very next issue, we get a fan writing in, demanding to know why Robin was left out of the Superman Aquaman Hour episodes, and that seems to end the debate. Haney claimed those published letters were representative of the larger body of mail they were receiving.

Fwiw, Cardy continues as the Titans' cover artist. Even though Cardy was busy with other projects (as MDG said), by having him do the TT covers this meant DC could still reap the benefit of Cardy's TT mastery, even if only for the covers.  It's similar to Curt Swan doing the majority of all the Superman-related covers earlier in the 1960s; there's a consistent look even though the interior art was by Boring, Plastino, Costanza, and others. 

Plus Cardy was back inking the TT book by issue #20 (Mar-Apr 1969). His inks are pretty strong and help maintain a consistent "Cardian" look to the characters.