Arsenal #3-#4

 

So far, we have seen:

Roy Harper being an awesome hero person.

Lian Harper being cute.
Kidnapping henchwomen being, uh, kidnappy?
Dinah Lance being kinda stupid.
Oliver Queen being dead.
Lian’s babysitter being… there.
Vandal Savage being evil.
Connor Hawke being ambiguously ethnic.

And now, we continue with our celebration of all things red-haired and arrow-related with the second half of Roy Harper Appreciation Month!

 

 So picking up from where we left off, Connor is yelling “Arsenal!  Heads up!”  Because, as it turns out, the nurses are back and spoiling for a fight.  Again.  Gee, haven’t seen that before.  But at least this time we have Connor to shake things up a bit, and it is the last time we see the henchwomen, so whatever.  Savage shows up in the middle of the fight and exposits about his evil plan, including the fact that it was he who “arranged” for Lian’s mysteriously ambiguous illness.  Precisely how he did that is never explained.  It’s implied later that he may have just “manipulated certain data” to make everyone think Lian was sick when she wasn’t, but we’ll also find out that the disease in question is absolutely real and that Savage is more than capable of infecting and killing children with it. 

Presumably to avoid clearing up this little detail, Savage makes his escape.  Roy, worried that Savage might be going after Lian, abandons the ongoing henchwoman fight to check on her, leaving Connor to clean up the mess and call the cops.

 

Connor’s hair reminds me of an anime character, but I can’t remember which one.

Back at the Harper apartment, all is well for the moment.  Dinah has returned with the groceries, so we finally find out what was so URGENT that she just HAD to leave Lian with a random teenager (?) RIGHT NOW to go get it.

 

Okay, I see flowers… a carton of milk… a really green sausage… unless these are all James Bond gadgets that secretly disintegrate guns or turn people invisible, I really don’t see the urgency here.  But anyway.  Dinah sends the babysitter on her way, paying her with that rarest of American denominations, the twenty-one dollar bill.

 

And then Roy arrives home just in time to hear a loud noise from Lian’s room. (Again, what would have happened if Savage arrived when the babysitter was here alone???)  He and Dinah rush off to investigate, but before we get to that, I’d really like to point out a particular line of Roy’s dialogue.  Pay close attention now:

 

Did you catch that?  Did you see it?  Did you see Roy saying that the idea of his being “Red Arrow” was derivative, uncreative, and completely unreflective of the path his life has taken and the extent to which he has matured?  I suppose that was more relevant before the reboot when Roy actually was Red Arrow, but just thought I’d mention it.

Anyway, Savage has teleported into Lian’s room and, instead of just teleporting out with her, decides to monologue some more.  You’d think being immortal would afford him plenty of time to figure out that that is never ever a good idea, but nope!  “Lian, honey, show Mr. Savage the finger trick Auntie Dinah taught you,” says Dinah.  “Now?” asks Lian.

 

Well I guess when you’re the daughter of a superhero, you gotta start the self-defense classes early.  Also, STOP MAKING ME LIKE LIAN.  I am getting the urge to gather up one thousand copies of Cry for Justice and burn them in my backyard, which I’m fairly certain is about fifty kinds of illegal.

Lian’s actions (lolololololol) provide the opening Dinah needs to get her out of danger and the distraction Roy needs to confront Savage.  Unfortunately, Savage is able to very easily teleport out again, this time with Roy in tow.  Savage then makes Roy an offer: stop the police from raiding my headquarters, and I’ll give you a kidney from the fake baby things to save Lian.

And this is where all of the flashbacks from earlier come into play.  In the last pages of this issue, Savage asks Roy if he believes that he’s lucky enough to gamble with Lian’s life and win.  As the flashbacks have shown, Roy is not an especially lucky person—his father died, his adoptive Navajo father (very kindly) kicked him out when he found out he (the adoptive father) was dying, the whole Ollie thing, having to kill a dude with the CBI, the death of a younger teammate when he was pushed into leading the Titans…

 

Must… not… quote… Dirty Harry…

It shouldn’t come as much of a surprise when Issue Four opens with Roy trying to chase away the police without hurting them.  What does come as a surprise is the fact that Savage and Roy teleport in RIGHT IN FRONT OF THE SQUAD CARS.

 

Seriously?  Guys?  You just create a giant explosion in front of the building you were going to try to approach without anyone seeing you?  I know the cops are incompetent more often than not in the DC Universe, but for crying out loud, I think they know how to point guns at you.  (I think it’s actually implied that the cops aren’t in the cars and are already working their way into the building, but Savage teleports via explosions—you’re gonna tell me no one noticed that?)

But the cops don’t notice and, frankly, get what’s coming to them when Roy attempts to scare them away… for about fifteen seconds.

 
“HOLY X’HAL I HAVE GUNS!  WHERE DID THESE COME FROM?!!”

All of a sudden, Roy remembers that Lian needs to love and be proud of her daddy far more than she needs an ill-gotten kidney.  Half of me thinks that Roy would push aside any guilt and do whatever it took to ensure Lian's safety, but then I put myself in Lian's place, and yeah, I'd be pretty PO'd if I found out my dad teamed up with a big-time supervillain just to save me from a disease that a) I might not have had and b) could have been cured with medication and/or a totally legal organ donor.  And then I'd have to spend the rest of my life making up for my father's crimes, so yeah.  I see where Roy is coming from here, and I totally respect it.

But now the tables are turned as Roy runs into the clinic for cover from the angry cops, bumping into that French doctor from earlier.  Remember her?  Her name is Babette Doubel, and it turns out Savage infected her son with the same disease he’s supposedly given Lian.  Doubel’s son died of the disease, at which point she agreed to work for Vandal Savage, presumably to save others in her family or other people’s kids.  But even as she was creating the undead baby army for Savage’s personal use, she was also working on an antidote to the illness that took her son’s life.  Hooray!  Once Roy ensures that she’ll be able to save Lian without the help of any of the clinic’s equipment, he rigs the whole place to explode.  All they have to do now?  Evacuate before the earth-shattering kaboom.

 

Are you implying that if Roy hadn’t felt some residual loyalty towards his dead mentor he’d be willing to let all those innocent cops die?  …Have we been reading the same miniseries?  This is the guy who still feels guilty over killing a psychotic gunman, remember?

Whatever.  Savage shows up for the final boss battle, which features Roy going all MacGyver on us (paperclips as weapons!) and Doubel actually being kinda useful by stabbing Savage in the foot with one of Roy’s arrows.  Savage ends up getting caught in the explosion while Roy and Babette make their escape.  Now all we have left is the epilogue, which begins with the most badass panel you will ever see.

 

Roy, Lian and Dinah have traveled to the Navajo Nation in Arizona for Roy’s third naming ceremony.  I have a feeling that this is all vaguely accurate, but precisely how accurate?  I’m not sure, and I’m not even going to try to sort it out.  Though for some reason, letting the (other) white people in on such a ceremony feels off, but what do I know?  Let’s just skip to the cutesy ending so I can stop wondering if I should be offended by any of this.

 

And there you have the original Arsenal miniseries.  As you probably noticed, I’m kind of a fan.  Sure there are a few hiccups here and there in terms of plot (how did Savage infect Lian again?) and characterization (really, Dinah?  Shopping?), but on the whole?  It’s a fun, relatively light-hearted adventure as well as a great example of all the things I love about Roy Harper: he’s resilient, loving, unconventional, and prone to self-doubt, but always, always able to bounce back and be the hero he is.  And that’s another reason why things like Rise of Arsenal annoy me so much, because we’ve seen how Roy deals with tragedy time and time again, and becoming a crazy pill-popping villain-ish guy ain’t it.  Even if losing a child is the worst thing that could ever happen to a parent (not that I’d know), I refuse to accept that Roy would go completely off his nut because of it.  Would he go through a long period of being depressed and angry?  Sure.  I’d be just as annoyed if he didn’t.  But as we saw in Issue Four, one of Roy’s main goals in life is to be the kind of father that Lian can (or could have been) proud of.  And no one would be proud to be associated with this dude:

 

Anyway, the art is also adorable, and you will never convince me otherwise.  Sure, there are a few weird perspectives and faces and stuff, and parts of it look kind of amateurish and photoshoppy, but on the whole it’s really nice to look at.  There’s a wonderful sense of movement and action, which is more than I can say for arguably better artists like Alex Ross. 

If you don’t like manga-style, then you won’t like this, but personally, I can’t get enough of it.

I really love the writing here too.  Well, all of the writing aside from the portrayal of Dinah, which varies from awesome when she’s kicking butt to insensitive when she’s talking to Roy to downright idiotic when she’s dealing with Lian.  I’m also not sure what the babysitter subplot was doing there, since hiring one only made Dinah look stupid and prevented us from seeming more interaction between Lian and her grandmother.  I think the babysitter does make appearances in future comics, if memory serves, so maybe that was an editorial mandate to introduce a new character…?  I have no idea.

Still, the writing is fun, funny, and and and character development!  It has some!  Yes, Roy’s drug issues are brought up, because at this point I don’t think people would recognize him if they weren’t, but those issues aren’t what defines him.  He’s not just a drawing on a page.  He’s a person with personality, depth, conflict, and the capacity to learn from mistakes and move forward.  I wonder who wrote this wonderful little character piece…

 

 

Holy... what the.... I just... how… how do you go from writing something as entertaining as this miniseries to writing gratuitous rape scenes that you yourself admit were pointless and then expecting us to sympathize with the rapist?!  I mean, I guess I should have figured it out given that big flowery speech Roy gave in the first issue, which looks like it was practice for the “luminosity of spirit” soliloquy in Nightwing #99…

(Seriously, was I supposed to be moved by this?)

But it still amazes me that Devin Grayson—who is apparently a very competent writer—could have gone on to mastermind the deplorable pile of buffalo chips I’ve ever owned.  Just… what happened, lady?

Moving on (or trying to).  Conclusion?  If you’re not familiar with Arsenal beyond “the sidekick who did drugs,” then this is a fantastic place to start.  If you’re already a fan, then this is just a reaffirmation of why you like him and what makes him such an intriguing character.  And no, there are no other options beyond “completely unfamiliar” and “fan.”  It’s my blog and I’ll dream if I want to.

Next Time: Remember when Gonzo promised to review a good episode of X-Men: Evolution to make up for the awful that is “Walk on the Wild Side”?  Well, this is it.

Images from Arsenal #3, Arsenal #4, Freakazoid!, Rise of Arsenal #3 and Nightwing #99