Deatshstroke #43 // Review
The Teen Titans/Slade Wilson crossover, The Terminus Agenda, concludes in Deathstroke #43, with story by Christopher Priest and Adam Glass, script by Priest, pencils by Carlo Pagulayan, Sergio Davila, and Pop Mhan, inks by Jason Paz, Norm Rapmund, Andy Owens, and Mhan, and colors by Jeromy Cox, but no one saw the shocking final page coming. Previously, Robin aka Damian Wayne (the son of Batman and Talia Al Ghul) used his new team to ambush villains, and lock them up indefinitely in his own private prison. The catch was that no one on the Titans knew about the prison, except Red Arrow. Eventually, Robin brought his particular brand of justice to Deathstroke’s doorstep, and the plucky group of teen heroes managed to take down the world’s deadliest assassin. While imprisoned, Slade began to get inside Damian’s head, while Kid Flash discovered Robin’s hidden jailhouse. Just when tensions were at their highest, an unknown person freed the prisoners, and all hell broke loose. Now, the Teen Titans must stop a gang of super-criminals from escaping a dungeon that most of them didn’t even know existed below their own base.
The magic of this chapter and the entire arc is in the relationship between Wilson and Robin. Priest has treated the readers to this twisted Dynamic Duo before, in his Batman vs. Deathstroke story, so this was just a natural extension of their borderline buddy cop movie chemistry. Robin displays nothing but disdain for Slade in all of their meetings, but Deathstroke is, at best, amused with the little assassin-turned-” hero.” He sees the dark streak in him, and he knows the evil that he came from on his mother’s side of the family, so it’s evident to him that Damian struggles with trying to be something that does not come naturally to him. To discover that Robin has been locking criminals up in a secret prison just confirms what Slade already knew, and gives him the upper hand in their relationship, despite being locked up in said prison, himself.
Priest also shows great versatility in his handling of the Teen Titans characters, as they are polar opposites of Deathstroke, yet still perfectly in-character for how Adam Glass has been writing them in their home book. He does a particularly spot-on job of handling Kid Flash, and the unique position the young hero is in, being the conscientious objector to Robin’s prison, and the former protege of Slade. If only there had been more time for Priest to really dig into the characters, it could have been very memorable.
The art this issue is tackled by a virtual army of pencilers and inkers, but you wouldn’t know it by the strength of the visuals. Pagulayan and Davila on pencils, and Paz, Rapmund, and Owens on inks, with Pop Mhan pulling double duty in both categories, deliver equal art, if not superior to any of DC’s most notable books. And, with Cox always bringing his A game on colors, this is a team that can’t be beaten.
In the end, this concluding chapter of The Terminus Agenda proved a better read than the rest of the story, which felt overall rushed and lacking substance. It’s almost as if Priest and Glass only had the solid idea of Deathstroke and Robin squaring off once again, with the Teen Titans caught in the middle, but had to pad out the entire story before getting to the meat of it in the final issue. Luckily, for the readers, the conclusion makes the rest of the arc’s light story worth the read, especially when you take into account the shocking final scene.
