COMIC BOOK REVIEW: Injustice 2 #58 (Space Bounty)

To bolster their ranks, the Titans have officially recruited Blue Beetle. But now he’s a prisoner of the Intergalactic Bounty Hunter Lobo. Will his first day as a Titan also be his last?

Injustice 2 #58
Writer: Tom Taylor
Artist: Bruno Redondo
Cover Artist: Bruno Redondo
Cover Colors: Jose Villarrubia
Colorist: J. Nanjan
Letters: Wes Abbott
Publisher: DC Comics

What You Need to Know:

After being freed from the Phantom Zone, the Teen Titans set out to bring hope back to a world desperately in need of it. Redubbing themselves as the Titans; Superboy, Starfire, & Wonder Girl recruit Blue Beetle as their first new member. Unfortunately, right after the Titans leave Blue Beetle he and Booster Gold are attacked by Lobo, the intergalactic Bounty Hunter. With ease he dispatches the pair, taking Blue Beetle and fleeing. Though not before Booster Golds robot sidekick, Skeets, can put a tracking device of Lobos flying motorcycle…

What You’ll Find Out:

Minutes after Lobo’s attack in the previous issue, the Titans (Superboy, Starfire, & Wonder Girl) return to the ruins of Kord Industry to investigate. With the aid of Skeets, they locate Booster Gold partly hidden beneath the rubble. After getting him to his feet, Booster Gold tells them that Blue Beetle was captured by Lobo. The scene briefly shifts to Lobo as he travels through space. Blue Beetle awakens briefly, long enough for Lobo to say he has to keep the hero alive. But when Blue Beetle tries to break free, Lobo knocks him out once more with a single punch. Back on Earth, the Titans learn about Skeets tracker. Unfortunately, they need to become space-bound as soon as possible so they don’t lose the signal. Luckily, Superboy knows where they can get a spaceship. The Javelin stored within the Hall of Justice.

Now that they located a space worthy vessel, the next issue was finding a pilot. Booster is confident he can do the job…moments before he has Skeets help him turn the Javelin on. However, the moment they do an alarm begins blaring. Skeets is unable to turn it off when we find Brother Eye alerting Bruce in the Batcave. Somewhat surprisingly, he’s not in costume for once and holding a tray Alfred style. Brother Eye activates the onboard camera and Batman is less than pleased to find Booster Gold is responsible. He begins a classic Batman scolding when Superboy, overhearing that it’s Batman, asks how to turn off the alarm. He orders them to return to the Hall of Justice only for Booster to end the transmission. We’re then treated to this glorious image.

Selina finds all of this hilarious and even asks if Batman is upset they stole the Javelin or that he wasn’t brought along. She briefly flirts, implying that Batman has been taking care of her while she recovered before we shift back to Lobo. Lobo has arrived at the Bounty giver and awakens Blue Beetle. Revealing that the person who hired Lobo was, in fact, Metron, one of the New Gods. He’s disappointed at how young Blue Beetle is but is forced to deal with the hand he was dealt. He hired Lobo so that he could get Blue Beetle to aid in the stopping the new Red Lantern Starro. Now that he had been tainted by the Red Ring, his spores now spread rage rather than just mind control. Blue Beetle isn’t convinced he can handle this but Metron tells him Starro was bested previously by another Scarab user. That now it was up to him to save the universe…prompting the chapter to end on Lobo laughing at the idea.

What Just Happened?

It was another relatively upbeat chapter (special shoutout to Batman having only the cowl on to appear intimidating while on camera and Lobo in the final panel) while still setting up the next major conflict. One that, as expected, ties the Titans plotline and the Green/Red Lantern plotlines together. It’s fitting that the first time we see Lobo he was working with Darkseid and now this time he’s working with New Genesis. The Main Man just can’t seem to stay away from the New Gods. This is also the first time we’ve seen New Genesis since the whole debacle with Mount Olympus and the New Gods. So seeing them return was unexpected.

Rating: 8.5/10

Final Thought: I like the direction Injustice 2 is going currently. I know in the grand scheme we know this HAS to end up at Injustice 2 the game. But the things and characters their using still feel interesting like this could be standalone. It’s not so held down by canon as previous events were since the “canon” characters for the game are kept to a minimum.