Doom Patrol #3: But What If a Man Fears Himself Above All Else?

The Doom Patrol #3 picks up with the Doom Patrol on the outskirts of the Ever-Void compound on thier mission to rescue a kidnapped girl, who is also the one Caulder is somehow linked to.

Having the team in the midst of a very bad situation or so it would seem given the events of last issue, continues to allow Van Poelgeest to dig deeper into the mental traumas of  Robotman, Negative Man and Elasti-Girl and explore where the characters are in this Next Level series. As it turns out, the three are in the grip of the villainess Phobia, best known from her involvement with The Brotherhood Of Evil and second member of the villain team joining Warp who appeared last issue.

Van Poelgeest uses Negative Man and his still developing abilities to save the team after delving into Phobia’s psyche and freeing her from the power that she unlocked as a kid to protect herself. This sequence is handled in such a way that the reader is given enough information with out a long and drawn out sequence that might have been a larger portion of the issue in other books.

Along with the character building there is plenty of action as the Doom Patrol successfully rescue the girl from the cult that is lead by none other than General Immortus ( a cool and well-played reveal, if not unexpected). While the issue resolves the opening plot, it at the same time, sets up the next issue as Elasti-Girl is sucked into one of Warp’s vortex.

Along with the writing Niko Henrichon’s and Lucas “Lettering Bear” Gattoni’s lettering continue to harmonize with one another to give the issue the weirdness that one expects from The Doom Patrol. It is clear that Gattoni is having fun playing with not only the lettering, but the use of the word ballons, an example being the twistiness or melting of  Elasti-Girl’s dialog boxes and the way he represents the different versions of Negative Man.