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A comprehensive history of Garrae in the comics, part 1

I know of at least one person who would actually read this post specifically as they’ve indicated in the past their desire to learn more about Beast Boy and Raven in the comics over the years, so this one’s for you, @salvatoreren. A lot of people know of Garrae because of the 2003 cartoon, but the two have shared history for almost 50 years now. Before we hop into the (frankly essay that no one asked for) history, a few disclaimers.

I am not a substitute for reading these comics on your own but I am also aware of how complicated the DCU can be. For that reason I’ll be covering important parts of Garrae history, noting out-of-universe information like the specific issue being covered, its writer (because anomalies in their relationship are due to having different writers and/or editors), and the year it came out. I still encourage you to go out and buy the comics for yourselves, but I understand that not everyone has the time, energy, or money to find specific issues in their local comic book store. 

There are going to be four parts to this covering four different eras – Wolfman era (1965-1996), pre-Flashpoint (2003-2011), New 52 (2011-2019), and Infinite Frontier (2020-present). I wish I could have images on the posts, but there's a 30 image limit on all posts and an image limit per day, so I created a Google Sites with all the page images and linked them for easy access because there's a lot of images.

Marv Wolfman, the writer of the New Teen Titans and related books, did not intend for Raven and Gar to get together, so as a result I am not looking for evidence that they loved each other, but rather evidence that they were friends and that they cared. Without further ado, let’s get started.

Doom Patrol #99 (1965, Arnold Drake): The comic debut of Beast Boy. Garfield Logan was a young teenager who broke into the Doom Patrol headquarters. The DP attempted to capture him, but his shapeshifting powers allowed him to evade capture until they just dogpiled him all at once. Despite this, his powers capture the interest of the Chief. Gar is also revealed to be currently attending high school, although many of the students ridicule his appearance. He only has one friend, Jillian Jackson, who stands up to the bullies on Gar’s behalf.

Doom Patrol #100 (1965, Drake): The first telling of Gar’s life before meeting the Doom Patrol. Gar was born to Mark and Marie Logan, the former of which was a scientist studying reverse evolution (bringing back extinct species) in Africa. Mark was a bit of an absent father, and often became frustrated with young Gar, who was almost constantly breaking lab equipment. When he contracted the lethal disease Sakutia, his father used an untested serum and beam of energy to transform his body into a West African green monkey for 24 hours, the only species immune to the disease. When he transformed back into a human, Gar had permanent green skin, hair, and eyes. His powers were not known until his mother was threatened by a deadly black mamba snake. On instinct, Gar transformed into a mongoose and killed the snake. His parents tried to encourage him to turn into other animals, but shortly after this they perished when their boat went over a waterfall. Gar turned into a bird and survived, but was unable to save his parents. In this issue he joins the Doom Patrol in battle for the first time, wearing a mask to hide his identity, as no one except the Doom Patrol knew he could shapeshift into animals.

Doom Patrol #101 (1966, Drake): Here we meet Gar’s court-appointed guardian for the first time, Nicholas Galtry. Almost immediately we learn that Galtry has no love for the boy, only the money in Gar’s inheritance that he has access to. When Gar catches Galtry looking through record books of the Logan’s finances, he realizes that when Gar becomes 21 (Gar is about 14/15 at the time), his embezzlement will be discovered, and so he plots to kill him. Gar discovers the plot and tells the Doom Patrol, but after the would-be assassin leaves Galtry’s house without firing the gun, they believe he is lying.

Doom Patrol #105 (1966, Drake): Rita eavesdrops on Galtry and finds the truth about his embezzlement and plot to kill Gar.

Doom Patrol #110 (1967, Drake): During a court hearing on whether Gar should remain in Galtry’s “care” or not based on evidence that Steve Dayton’s investigators were able to scrounge up on his crimes, Galtry’s attorney accuses Gar of being Beast Boy. He claims that the Doom Patrol are willingly putting a minor in danger. To “prove” that Gar and Beast Boy are two different people, Rita walks into the courtroom dressed as Beast Boy while Gar is in the room, convincing the judge that Gar is not Beast Boy. Afterwards, the judge rules that Galtry is no longer Gar’s legal guardian to the relief of Gar and the Doom Patrol. Rita and Steve later formally adopt Gar as their son.

Doom Patrol #112 (1967, Drake): A retelling of Gar’s origin story. Mark Logan got rich when he invented a medical device that was revolutionary. Instead of working with the company that paid him royalties for the device, Mark wanted to go to Africa to continue his studies on the animal world. When the chieftain of a local tribe, King Tawaba, fell ill, Mark saved the king’s life to the chagrin of the tribe’s witch doctor, Mobu. After his parent’s death, Gar was adopted by King Tawaba. Though Tawaba considered Gar to be like a son to him, Gar had no interest in learning to become a prince, and would rather be in the jungle. Mobu, still bitter towards the Logans, despised Gar, and hired two Americans to kill him. When the kidnappers discovered Gar's Abilities, they instead decided to take him back to the states so he could commit crimes and steal valuable items for them.

Doom Patrol #114 (1967, Drake): After a robbery, Gar decided he would play a prank on the two robbers who employed him, and hid the treasure he stole. The two men, assuming the other secretly pocketed the money, killed each other. Gar is later placed under the care of his court-appointed guardian Nicholas Galtry.

Doom Patrol #121 (1968, Drake): The Doom Patrol (Elasti-Girl, Robotman, Negative Man, and the Chief) are killed in action when the Brotherhood of Evil threatens to blow up an island with innocent civilians on it. The Doom Patrol chooses to sacrifice their lives to save the people instead. Neither Gar nor Mento were on this mission, and they are the sole survivors of the team. Robotman is later revealed to be alive, but is presumed dead until discovered.

DC Comics Presents #26 (1980, Marv Wolfman): The comic debut of the New Teen Titans which I will be referring to as NTT. Raven, Cyborg, and Starfire are also first introduced in this issue, which has a preview of the new series written by Marv Wolfman and George Perez. In it, Raven gathers the team to rescue Starfire from the Gordanians that kept her prisoner. In reality, she has gathered them to help her fight against her father Trigon.

The New Teen Titans #4 (1981, Wolfman): Raven finally reveals Trigon’s origins to the team. Born in an alternate to a woman belonging to a demon-worshipping cult, Trigon slew his mother and conquered his dimension before setting his eyes on Earth. The Titans learn of the darkness in Raven’s soul, and they all leave distrusting Raven and her true motives, especially after the reveal that she forced Wally West/Kid Flash to fall in love with her so that he would join the team.

The New Teen Titans #6 (1981, Wolfman): Arella, Raven’s mother, tells the Titans of her backstory and Raven’s birth. Arella’s mother abandoned her as a child, and she never knew who her father was. A ward of the state, she fell in with a demonic cult after she turned 18, when she was offered up as a bride to Satan. When the cult summoned Trigon to Earth, he took the form of a handsome man and seduced Arella. When she learned of his true nature, Arella was horrified, and Trigon, well, had his way with her. Pregnant with the devil’s child and the cult she had once called family destroyed, Arella was rejected counselling services. Deciding that the only solution was death, Arella tried to kill herself rather than give birth to what would essentially become the Antichrist. She was saved when the Azarathians contacted her, who took her to their dimension  where Raven was born and grew up.

The New Teen Titans #10/12 (1981, Wolfman): Gar gets into a fight with Deathstroke and holds his own until Sade shoots him with an unknown weapon. As Gar lays there dying, Raven senses his pain. The New Teen Titans #12/13 (1981, Wolfman): Taken to Themyscira/ Paradise Island to be healed with their purple healing ray, something in Gar snaps after he awakens, and he attacks the Amazons, along with Starfire and Raven, in the form of a brachiosaur, turning into an extinct species for the first time. Raven uses her empathic abilities to calm him down, taking away the madness that clouded his mind.

The New Teen Titans #14 (1981, Wolfman): Gar discovers that Robotman is alive, and after hearing both his and Steve Dayton’s stories of what happened to them after the death of the Doom Patrol, Gar explodes with anger and flies off to find Madame Rouge, the woman he blames for their deaths.

The New Teen Titans #15 (1982, Wolfman): After tracking down Rouge, Gar chases her throughout the base of the Brotherhood of Evil. His anger at her manifests itself in unexpected ways, and he starts turning into creatures that do not exist. Gar accidentally knocks Rouge into electrical equipment that restores her original personality before she was manipulated by the Brain, but she dies of her injuries. With the hate in his heart now gone, Gar is struck with immense guilt over causing Rouge’s death. As Raven puts it, “Garfield has learned well… before this he was a boy struggling with his own fears. Now he is a man come to grips with his own mortality. He has seen how wasteful it is to hate. How impoverished the soul becomes when vengeance consumes the heart.”

The New Teen Titans #17 (1982, Wolfman): Just a cool moment. Gar, in the form of a T. Rex, catches a cruise ship in midair, preventing it from colliding with and destroying Titans Tower. 

The New Teen Titans #18 (1982, Wolfman): Gar may constantly hit on Kori and Donna (truly an element of its time), but when it comes down to it, he really does care about his friends.

Tales of the New Teen Titans #2 (1982, Wolfman): A full telling of Raven’s childhood on Azarath. Wolfman slightly changes the original story on how Raven was conceived — Arella realizes that the man she married is a demon after Raven has already been conceived, thus making it rape by deception. Other writers will continue to go back and forth on whether Raven’s mother was taken by force or simply didn’t realize what Trigon really was before she became pregnant with Raven. Either way, just like all of Trigon’s other brides and would-be mothers of his children, Arella tried to kill herself rather than let the demon’s child be born. She was saved when “a messenger from God” took her to Azarath, a place between dimensions where its people rejected violence and strove to live in eternal peace, where Raven could be raised far from Trigon. Also, Azarath is where Arella was given her new name, but Raven does not seem to know what Arella’s Earth name was. When Raven was born, the “emerald skies turned black as death itself. The sweet smell of gossamer became the pungent odor of brimstone. Our world shook and rumbled with protest. And peace turned to fear. Life became death.” Arella had described Azarath before Raven was born with “glorious marble streets and golden columns, its blue-green skies and crimson clouds.” She had almost mistaken it for Heaven, but the dimension forever changed — and not necessarily for the better — when Raven was born. A councilman by the name of Juris resented that Trigon’s daughter had been brought to what was once a peaceful domain, and he tried to cast the infant Raven past Azarath’s Great Door into Limbo. Before he could jump, the door opened and a crimson beam of energy (later revealed to have come from Trigon himself) reduced Juris to dust but left Raven alive, who was taken to Azar, the spiritual leader of the dimension. She trained Raven to “exorcise the demons that forevermore will try to control her.” She hardly saw her own mother during this time, until Azar died and left the rest of ten-year-old Raven’s education to Arella, who was tasked with teaching her how to use all her powers (as Azar had already taught Raven the techniques necessary to suppress her emotions). At some point Raven began having nightmares about Trigon and for the first time learned who Trigon was. When the founders of Azarath left Earth, they cast their evil natures out beyond the Great Door, and when a mystical ceremony in a separate dimension summoned said evils, they took form and became Trigon. The eternal flame of Azarath burned bright and then extinguished when his name was spoken out loud, and Raven felt herself being summoned to the Great Door, where it swung open and she met her father for the first time. Arella tried to stop Trigon from taking Raven but was struck down by his power. Though Raven had been raised and lived by pacifism, in that moment she wanted to kill Trigon, and her soul-self, the dark part of herself that came from Trigon, manifested itself for the first time.

Tales of the New Teen Titans #3 (1982, Wolfman): A recap of Gar’s origin story. Most details of his early life remain the same, with Gar noting that he was eight when the criminals who used Gar’s powers for stealing valuables took him in. Galtry is seen holding an object that looks like a pan when he catches young Gar doing something bad, suggesting there might have also been physical abuse involved with the already tumultuous relationship. Though Gar lies about how glamorous his life was before he joined the Titans, flashbacks show how lonely he really was. After the Doom Patrol died, Gar briefly joined the west coast branch of the Titans, though it didn’t last for very long. His appearance landed him a brief acting career on the television show Space Trek 2022 until it was cancelled due to lawsuits from Space: 1999 and Star Trek. Though he continued trying to find other acting opportunities, they all fell through. Jillian Jackson re-entered his life at this point and they started dating, much to the chagrin of Jillian’s father,  who hated him due to Gar’s unnatural skin tone. Also, maybe one of the first demonstrations of Gar’s clothes not staying with him when he shifts without special clothing like his Doom Patrol outfit. 

The New Teen Titans #23 (1982, Wolfman): Get a load of this Gar/Raven interaction, because there aren’t a lot of these moments in the classic Wolfman era. Gar attempts to reason with Raven when she believes that she has killed a Gordanian, reminding her that they commit suicide rather than let themselves get captured. Remember, Raven is a staunch pacifist — the idea that she caused the death of another person is absolutely abhorrent to her, whether she was directly or indirectly involved. 

The New Teen Titans #24 (198, Wolfman): Gar uses his powers to transform into an alien species for the first time.

The New Teen Titans #30 (1983, Wolfman): Terra officially joins the team. She’s actually quite nice to Gar this issue, but don’t get too used to it. 

The New Teen Titans #31 (1983, Wolfman): Wally is now on the train to “I hate Raven and she’s evil” town, after she was manipulated into believing that Wally was Trigon, and tried to kill him (he constantly goes back and forth on whether he hates her or not, and this rejection is one of the factors that leads her down the path to becoming possessed by Trigon). When Raven realizes she is starting to lose control, she turns her power on herself rather than attack the other Titans again. 

The New Teen Titans #34 (1983, Wolfman): Gar stands up for Raven against Terra. This would be a good time to mention that Gar has never once indicated that he was afraid of Raven. When the other Titans briefly left her in NTT #4, he just kinda went along with the others. He didn’t have anything bad to say about her.

The New Teen Titans #35 (1985, Wolfman): Funny moment. Gar and Vic are roughhousing with each other when Vic accidentally throws Gar at Raven, who had just walked into the room. They both go ass over tea kettle over the railing. Vic, Gar, and Raven are the Three Musketeers of “don’t interact with each other regularly but when they do it’s always fun” in the NTT. Despite the others forbidding her from using her powers in fear that it may bring her closer to Trigon, Raven insists on taking away Vic’s pain. Gar notes that she does care about the Titans, despite her distance from them.

The New Teen Titans #36 (1983, Wolfman): Wally is on his “I hate Raven” phase this week. Never mind the fact that she’s almost killing herself every time she takes away the others’ pain. Even Terra is a little more sympathetic to her plight than Wally is. He shows a little bit of compassion towards her when her soul-self starts to freak out, but you can’t just pick and choose which parts of her you want to accept, Wally. It’s either the whole package or nothing. Like it or not, that darkness is and always will be a part of her.

The New Teen Titans #39 (1984, Wolfman): Wally officially quits the Titans. His parting words to Raven are “I alternatively love you and hate you. Sometimes I can’t bear to be apart from you...others I don’t want you to know you exist.” OUCH.

Tales of the Teen Titans #42 (1984, Wolfman): Part 1 of The Judas Contract story arc. Gar and Terra share their first and only kiss. Later during a training exercise, Gar taunts Terra to the point that she explodes with rage and tries to beat him to a pulp. 

Tales of the Teen Titans Annual #3 (1984, Wolfman): The Judas Contract finale. After helping to capture all the Titans save for Nightwing, Terra reveals herself to be a traitor to the others. Gar tries to reason with Terra, but she violently rejects him, claiming, “you stupid moron. I’ve never been with you. I’ve hated you...Logan, there doesn’t always hafta (sic) be answers for everything. All my life I’ve felt hate…wanna know why I hate you? You try to make everyone love you...we’ve been nothing. It’s all been an act. Every part of it — ‘specially that kiss, Logan. That was the biggest act of all. It made me wanna gag kissing you, Logan. Y’like knowing that, Logan...I got all your secrets just so I could watch as the H.I.V.E killed you one by one.” In the ensuing fight between the Titans, a Jericho-possessed Slade, and the H.I.V.E., Terra lashes out with her powers and attempts to kill the Titans. In the end, she brings the roof down on everyone, but only ends up killing herself. As Gar and Donna dig through the rubble to try and find Terra, Gar tries to convince Donna (or perhaps himself) that Terra was innocent, and that Slade made her do the things she did.

Tales of the Teen Titans #47 (1984, Wolfman): As Gar finds himself consumed more and more with hate towards Slade, Jillian Jackson enters his life again. This is actually where the quote “you think you’re alone, but you’re not” comes from. Jillian said it to Gar when he was heartbroken over Terra’s death. The show adopted that line for Spellbound, and almost everyone has forgotten that Gar’s ex-girlfriend was the one who said it first. Jillian is a nice girl I guess; she wasn’t around much, but later we’ll see why we haven’t seen her since the 90s. For what it’s worth, she and Vic were there for Gar after Terra’s betrayal.

Tales of the Teen Titans #50 (1985, Wolfman): Donna Troy and Terry Long get married. The wedding seems to have been planned solely by Gar, who seems to now be in a relationship with Jillian.

Tales of the Teen Titans #54 (1985, Wolfman): During Slade’s trial, Gar is overtaken by rage towards the mercenary and attacks him in the courtroom. While not held in contempt of court due to being a minor, he is forbidden from entering the courtroom again. 

Tales of the Teen Titans #55 (1985, Wolfman): Slade is sentenced to one year in prison due to an inability on the witness’s part to prove he is Deathstroke. Gar attacks him in his jail cell, and Slade is only able to escape Gar’s rage when the guards spot Slade in the courtyard. When Gar challenges Slade in a fight to the death, Slade shows up in civilian clothing and refuses to fight back. Gar, ultimately unable to bring himself to kill Slade, agrees to sit down and have a talk with Slade over the Terra issue. Though Slade tries reiterating that Terra had been and always was mad with power and hated the world, Gar refuses to believe Slade until he learns that Terra is responsible for the death of King Tawaba, the chieftain of the local tribe who adopted Gar after his parents died. The two part on good terms, but to once again remind you of how some aspects of NTT have aged poorly, when asked if Slade had ever “made love” to Terra (read: had sex with a minor, and yes he did), Slade replies, “does it make a difference?” Uh yeah, it kinda does. You don’t just shrug off a crime like statutory rape, Slade.

Tales of the Teen Titans #57 (1985, Wolfman) Gar: flirts with every woman he finds attractive Also Gar: freaks out (and not in a good way) when Starfire accidentally moons him

The New Teen Titans #1-5 (1984, Wolfman): The original Terror of Trigon storyline which season 4 of the cartoon is based off of. Raven gives in to her demonic heritage and summons Trigon to Earth, who promptly turns everyone to stone. The Titans are spared as they were in Azarath at the time, trying to find something that would help them defeat Trigon. All the monks die save for Arella, who agrees to help the Titans save her daughter. In an attempt to enslave them, Trigon traps them in their own nightmares where they kill their evil alter egos. Instead of becoming Trigon’s slaves, Lilith Clay manipulates the possessed Titans, who kill Raven (it was Starfire who landed the killer blow, but they all participated in killing the demonic Raven). In Lilith’s own words, “she is dead. Slain by your evil selves. But do not mourn. Only in your evil forms would you have killed her.” As the Titans try in vain to stop Trigon, Lilith places the Rings of Azar on Raven’s body, which is possessed by the souls of Azarath, who then use her as a conduit to kill Trigon. Yes, he dies. In the process, Raven is cleansed of Trigon’s evil and returns to Earth. She is then captured by the Church of Blood, who brainwash her into worshipping Brother Blood. Dick saves both her and her mother.

The New Teen Titans #31 (1987, Wolfman): Raven finally sheds Brother Blood’s brainwashing, and almost kills him in retaliation. When all the Titans reunite at the Tower, a moment passes between Raven and Wally (now the Flash), but any attraction that was once there is now gone.

The New Teen Titans #32 (1987, Wolfman): Raven explains how Gar’s emotions feel to her: “I can imagine Garfield being comfortable in this chaos of growing things (forest). I remember how his emotions feel to me—constantly growing, shifting furiously—a sea of green fire.” 

The New Teen Titans #36 (1987, Wolfman): Oh god, I have to talk about Raven being obsessed with Dick now...Okay so after being cleansed of Trigon’s evil and rescued from Brother Blood, Raven no longer needs to suppress her emotions as she once did, as Trigon is dead (for now). The only thing is, she isn’t familiar with the different kinds of emotions that you can feel towards other people. She mistakes her platonic love for Nightwing as genuine, romantic love. Say all that you want about Gar and him constantly sexually harassing women, but at least he didn’t actively peep in on the Titans girls when they were in the shower. Yes, Raven peeps in on Nightwing when he’s taking a shower despite knowing that he’s in a relationship with Starfire. 

The New Teen Titans #37 (1987, Wolfman): Raven’s new ability to manipulate other people’s emotions unknowingly affects Dick, who starts to believe that he loves Raven. It’s kind of creepy, actually, especially when Raven kisses Dick. She doesn’t approve when he gets violent with people when they’re trying to find Starfire, but she continues to believe that they love each other, even thinking to herself, “Dick no longer loves you. He loves me now. And I’m not giving him up.”

The New Teen Titans #39 (1988, Wolfman): While Dick is confused about the whole situation with Raven, even having dreams about her, Starfire is way more understanding than you might expect: “remember, Raven was always denied emotions...she was never allowed to feel, to care....to love. And now that she can, suddenly she’s feeling things she’s never felt before. And I’m so sure she doesn’t even understand what she’s feeling. Dick, she spent so much time with you as Brother Blood’s captive...she senses how much you care for her. And she’s reading more into it than you mean.” Kori goes to talk to Raven about the new emotions she’s feeling, and says, “Raven, you haven’t had emotions long enough to recognize the different ways one loves another. Dick loves you, Raven, but he’s not in love with you. And in truth, I don’t think you’re in love with him.” Starfire helps Raven understand her emotions better, and though a small part of her seems to hurt when she sees Dick and Starfire kissing, she seeks comfort in the company of Cyborg. When she gets to his apartment, she realizes that he has thrown a party and all the other Titans are there, along with their partners. Raven, believing she has inserted herself into a situation she does not belong in, goes back to her own apartment where she discovers that she was in fact invited to the impromptu barbeque at Cyborg’s apartment. She returns to the party, and stays with the others.

The New Teen Titans #48 (198, Wolfman): First appearance of Eric Forrester, a technopathic shithead womanizer that everyone in the Titans has immeasurable disdain for. Unfortunately, we’ll be seeing more of him soon.

The New Titans #53 (1989, Wolfman): Probably the only time NTT Gar hits on Raven, as he usually was hitting on Donna and Kori. Maybe Raven wasn’t conventionally attractive enough for him at the time. 

The New Titans #62/63 (1990, Wolfman): As Raven heals a dying Donna Troy, the S.T.A.R. Labs scientists debate taking Raven away as the both of them could die. Gar stops them before they’re able to interfere with the healing process, but Raven is heavily injured. One of the few times in the Wolfman era that Gar shows concern for Raven’s wellbeing, asking the scientists not to let her die.

The New Titans #66/67 (1990, Wolfman): Raven starts a relationship with Eric Forrester, a technopath who secretly slept with other women to consume their souls so he could regain his own humanity. Believing that Raven’s soul self would allow him to permanently regain his humanity, Eric attempted to gaslight Raven into sleeping with him (yes he knew of her struggles with intimacy), but was stopped by Jericho, after which he was destroyed by Raven. I don’t want to have to talk about this guy any more than I have to, so here’s the panels, and I leave you with a disturbing thought: Malchior was a kid-friendly stand-in for what Forrester did/attempted to do to Raven. Fucking asshole.

The New Titans #84 (1992, Wolfman): Conclusion of the Titans Hunt/ Jericho Gambit storyline. Jericho has gone mad after the evil souls of Azarath corrupted his mind and uses the Wildebeest Society to capture the Titans. After Deathstroke is forced to kill Jericho, the souls seek refuge in Raven’s body, once again corrupting her. Arella and Danny Chase sacrifice themselves to destroy Raven’s body using the soul of Azar housed within Arella’s body, and the two merge to form the being known as Phantasm.

The New Titans #86/88 (1992, Wolfman): Gar is shocked when Terra appears before him, seemingly alive and well. In reality, this is a future clone of Terra, with all her powers and seemingly none of the crazy. 

The New Titans #94/95 (1993, Louise Simonson): Terra visits Gar in the Dayton Mansion as he is tasked with watching over Baby Wildebeest, a specimen from the Wildebeest Society that becomes attached to its “mother,” Titans member Pantha. Gar wants nothing to do with her, which Terra blames on the original. When Gar tells her he already has a girlfriend (Jillian), Terra challenges him, asking him why he hasn’t been returning Jill’s phone calls. 

The New Titans #96 (1993, Simonson): Gar and Terra are able to drop off the Baby Wildebeest at a private nursery school after Jillian’s father pulls some strings to let the creature into the building. While Gar goes inside with the baby, Terra confronts Jillian. Though she stands her ground, when Terra threatens her life, she disappears. Like, literally. Jillian is never seen again after this issue, and Gar doesn’t mention her again. This Terra is obsessed with trying to get Gar to love her, but he’s still bitter over the entire fiasco with the original Terra, and can barely stand to be around her.

The New Titans #99 (1993, Wolfman): After the Brotherhood of Evil force the flawed Mento helmet that Steve Dayton invented onto Gar, he is unable to comfortably transform into normal animals, and instead turns into monstrous, horrific creatures. Though Gar is terrified of what he has become due to his fractured mind, he says that the new transformations feel exhilarating.

The New Titans #100 (198, Wolfman): The wedding of Starfire and Nightwing is interrupted when the dark part of Raven’s soul incinerates the priest. “Dark Raven” claims to be the unrestrained, evil part of Raven’s soul-self, and possesses the souls of one hundred children of Trigon slain before they were born. Dark Raven intends to give one seed to Starfire, hence the dramatic entrance. She has already given an alternate version of Dick Grayson one such seed, turning him into the sadistic and murderous Deathwing. The relationship between Dark Raven and Deathwing is very odd, to say the least. It sometimes comes across as a very Bonnie and Clyde type relationship, at least until Deathwing sets his sights on the heroine Mirage and Dark Raven captures Gar. Oh yeah, that. Don’t worry, we’ll get to that part soon.

The New Titans #102 (1993, Wolfman): Gar demonstrates what the power of the Mento helmet has done to him. Though it seems he can still turn into normal animals, it causes him great pain to do so. 

The New Titans #114 (1994, Wolfman): Gar is captured by Dark Raven, who gives him a Trigon seed. For some reason she has to kiss people to actually transfer the seeds. Gar doesn’t seem to remember receiving it, and laments what Raven has become, stating that they used to be friends.

The New Titans #115 (1994, Wolfman): The Trigon seed has completely taken over Gar. It’s unknown how much of the original personality remains in those who have received a Trigon seed, but Gar’s sense of humor has not changed much. He’s now entirely devoted to Dark Raven, and seeks out more people for her to corrupt.

The New Titans #118 (1995, Wolfman): Now that Gar has a Trigon seed in him, Dark Raven seems to take a personal interest in him, communicating telepathically with him as he scopes out his first victim. He devours a poor girl’s soul and is then tasked with showing the others how to “hunt.”

The New Titans #120 (1995, Wolfman): Gar’s new suit under Dark Raven is revealed. It’s his Doom Patrol outfit that he’s been wearing since first joining the Titans, but the white is replaced with black. He’s tasked with finding Deathwing, who used to be Dark Raven’s right hand man, but that title seems to have gone to Gar instead. He even calls her mistress.

The New Titans #130 (1996, Wolfman): A flashback reveals the possible reason why Gar has been entirely devoted to Dark Raven. Back when she first gave him the Trigon seeds, she says that she will give him ten seeds out of a total of one hundred. All the other people who were given a seed only received one. Dark Raven knew that he would be able to survive the process, and he ended up with more seeds than anyone else. This issue is the final one in the Wolfman era of Titans comics. The battle occurs offscreen, but in the end Dark Raven is destroyed, leaving behind the golden spirit form of Raven, who reveals that when Dark Raven interrupted Starfire and Nightwing’s wedding to give Starfire a Trigon seed, she actually planted the good part of Raven’s soul in Starfire’s body for safekeeping. With her body destroyed and the evil part of her soul seemingly gone, this is the purest form of Raven’s soul-self, hence why it is gold. She stays behind onEarth to help the Titans in their endeavors, including repowering Darkseid to fight an alien threat and restoring Cyborg’s humanity after he was made a slave to the Technis alien race. One day, her spirit form disappeared, and the Titans assumed that she had moved on to the next plane of existence.

Part 2

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I think you can just not mention that he's there at all.

Drawing fanart of Kragar must be really funny cause do you. Do you make him slightly transparent.

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“I turned around and found I was looking up at Sethra Lavode, atop a horse that, with my equine expertise, I can assure you was dark coloured and very big.”

Someone get this man a horse-identifying gimmick blog

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I've been working on this illustration for several months, on and off, but I think that drawing when I felt the most motivated and inspired only benefited the outcome! 🐯 What do you think? The song of inspiration for this artwork is Provinz - Pazifik. Check out my Ko-fi page for downloadable content!

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NOT CLICKBAIT !!!

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It is said that before the arrival of Men or Dragaerans, so long ago even the hills have forgotten, in secret caverns deep in the mountains, an ancient race called the Serioli constructed artifacts of breathtaking beauty, profound subtlety, and unimaginable power.

All of which is true, but has nothing to do with this. The object called the Wand of Ucerics was made by a Hawklord in Adrilankha about two hundred years ago.

Hawk, Chapter 13: Making Connections or Making Music

incredibly funny move for vlad 'i would rather tell you how to prepare the perfect cup of klava for the sixth time than give you any lore about the setting' taltos to pull

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Alas the last of my backlog of older drawings is empty

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BAWKtober Day 24 - Hide and Seek

One of these hens is not like the other

(the absolute mindcluckery i went through trying to figure out how the reflections and reflections of reflections would work whY did i do this to myself??)

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BAWKtober Day 22 - Cottage

Fowl's Moving Castle Cottage

Flappy HallowPREEN everybirdy! The month of october may be coming to a close, but fear not! I will still be completing the rest of the BAWKtober prompts into NovHENber. So if you are lagging a little behind like me, i will still be checking the tags~ But for tonight, stay safe, have fun Chick or Treating, and watch out for any suspicious houses that seem to have giant chicken legs

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Discord and the Online Ecosystem

Discord is an awesome service to use. Overall, it's user friendly to do "basic" stuff, like instantly updating, global text, image, and video posts with a near-infinite level of storage for those things. For 95% of people that use Discord, it's an incredibly convenient, functional service almost all the time. But Discord in fundamentally making the Internet - not the people interacting with each other, but the actual infrastructure and ethos of the Internet - worse.

I'm saying this not only as an "Internet person" - after all, I'm here with the rest of you, but as someone who is only now realizing that I am an expert on the function, technical details, and history of the Internet compared to most users of this place. I get paid to do it. I get paid to learn about how everything on it works, not as a researcher, but as someone that makes important parts of it work, at least to a certain scale.

Discord is a parasite on the internet, just like Reddit being a self-hosting image and text repository. The centralization of the Internet, I believe, is essentially toxic to how the Internet was built and used for it's most formative times, and losing that essence makes the Internet a worse place.

Here's the technical reasons it's starving out the Internet. Essentially, the Internet was built as a network of first a few, then dozens, then hundreds, etc. of small servers, each hosting data and sharing almost exclusively text communications and records. Usually, these were hosted on Universities and other technical institutions. As those developed, thanks to the nerds that were core to actually making the systems talk and work, those nerds started hosting little servers of their own, sometimes on the same machines as those big systems, sometimes just using the same infrastructure like power and networking. Then personal computers and home servers started to develop.

This entire time, if those big organizational servers were the Bones of the Internet, the flesh were those little sites that held the little services. Niche forums, mostly, where people could communicate their own small passions and hobbies. It was the beginning of the Internet being a global cultural hub, and caused the development of those niches into communities with their own histories and knowledge troves.

Then the Internet started making money. And technical changes made economies of scale more feasible. There was a transitional period where a lot of people didn't see what was coming. I was too young and wouldn't have predicted it even if I was the me of today. After that transition, consolidation of the Internet started intensifying. The Internet was no longer a facilitator to commerce, it could be commerce all on its own.

So sites like Reddit, Facebook Groups, Discord, even to an extent Github, and Tumblr and fanfiction.net, though lesser because Tumblr is more of a social media site related to random fandoms and FF.net is so public and archived, show up and gather the niche communities, which is great because they are providing a really good service to use. Until they decide to delete a niche because it hasn't had activity in a few years, or because they decided that it's a banned topic, and that trove of information about those people and their passion is gone forever.

This is part of "digital archaeology". Of keeping that knowledge around so we can look back at the world of today and know the cultural context of who we were. This is anthropology of the digital age.

Now on to the technical reasons Discord, in specific, is such a parasite on the internet. That's not a term of disgust, I literally mean that it's kinda latched onto the Internet as a whole and stealing it's nutrients from within. Discord especially is a problem because it's so good to use. It offers up instantaneous creation and use of a moderated chat space that can be shared easily, doesn't require any technical knowledge, and immediately does it's job unlike any previous niche gathering tool.

Those technical people developed how the internet worked using those niche communities. They shared technical ideas and designs and talked about how to do more with the technical resources they had. They built the internet protocol by protocol, bugfix by bugfix, and their knowledge, even after they stopped talking on those forums, was picked over by new people who had new ideas but also has problems that that niche could now solve.

And now those niches are put into walled gardens on Discord, privately managed, unsearchable from the wider internet, and where a year or two after nobody touching the chat, the history is deleted for the sake of ruthless business resource efficiency.

It takes the knowledge, extracts the value from the people who may or may not produce something with that community with that niche area, and then leaves no record of it for people outside that community to learn from.

Think video game developer communities. There's technical knowledge of how to get a game to run that is answered on those discords. FAQs and mods are hosted there. Lore is dropped. Depending on the scale of the game, patches might even be released. No one can try to start up a copy of that game in the future and have access to that knowledge once Discord, the business, decides to close it down.

This isn't a new problem. Servers, neglect, or even upset owners of the gathering places took their toll and got rid of a lot of knowledge over time. Historical Anthropology, History, Cultural Anthropology - all of those expect a certain level of information decay and loss. But this is a lot more.

And the worst part is I don't know what can be done about it. Discord is in a fundamental technical way, better at doing what it does than any other system we have. No other system could semi-publicly, instantly, in a structured manner and across the entire Internet landscape, share voice chat, text, photos, and even some videos natively to the service. Traditional web pages fail at the instantly part. Most services fail at the picture and video part. Practically none succeed at the voice part. It's just better.

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By Popsteeth!

Absolutely beautiful! Love the colors!!!

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Bbrae Week starts with a "Camping" prompt!

Poor Gar is doing his most with grilling the marshmallows, yet Someone isn't as appreciative as she should be ;D

I'm so happy the Week is here, it actually inspired and motivated me to draw Gar and Rachel! I think lately I don't draw them as much. But I do have one artwork in progress (since months) that I want to make as cool as I can, sooo it takes me forever! 😭

❤️ You can support me on Ko-fi and download HQ illustrations! ❤️

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That's actually a really interesting insight into the series. I think it's also worth mentioning that 1. The Monarchs that got to their level of power did so by being "personally exceptional" in a way that they believe makes them inherently superior, while the Reaper squad got there by relying heavily on collaboration and collective effort. Not to say that they weren't individually talented, but our protagonists would have died many times over if they didn't have their companions to protect and enhance their skill. And 2. Eithan, having done everything right. Having followed the "superiority" train to the very end by truly being superior, saw the inevitable consequences and was willing to burn down (multiple) stagnant systems to achieve a more just and equitable system.

Oh damn has it really been that long since I’ve posted? Whelp *cracks knuckles* time to go have some strong opinions on the internet!

Cradle is anti-capitalist and anti-conservative and I’m tired of pretending it’s not. I’m sure I’m not the first person to say this, but it’s my blog so fuck you.

(Leftist ramblings below the read more. You have been warned)

Set in a world where strength is the measure of wealth in a very literal sense, the thesis of the Cradle Series is that there is a certain level of wealth that cannot be obtained and maintained without actively and continuously harming the world around you. More than that, each of the monarchs represent different flavors of conservatism.

Regan Shen is your typical billionaire, throwing scales at problems until they go away. He is obsessed with legacy as wealthy men often are, and strives to be remembered as the greatest monarch to ever live (*cough* Elon *cough cough*). Like his muskrat counterpart he will willingly align himself with whatever movement serves his goals at the present moment and then discard them as soon as their usefulness has ended. He has no real values or principles beyond building his own legend.

Seshethkunaaz very overtly represents the “social Darwinist” a la Senator Armstrong. His whole thing is the strong eat the weak. The other monarchs don’t actually disagree with him on a philosophical level they just don’t like that their group is that one getting eaten. He’s a libertarian through and through, but at least he’s honest about it I guess?

Akura Malice is the “family values” conservative. Malice is a being of spite and bitterness, someone who demands not just love and respect but control. Much like a conservative patriarch much closer to home, she doesn’t love her family so much as she owns and controls her family. This control is supposedly “for their own good” but Malice has demonstrated a willingness to kill her own children and grandchildren to maintain her control, completely undermining her whole argument.

Northstrider is the “anti-authoritarian” conservative, with all the hypocrisy inherent to that idea. He fundamentally rejects the idea that others might know better than him and refuses to be beholden to anyone. He claims to have no ties to the world and yet leads just as many people as the other monarchs. He refuses to participate in the society that he has so much control over except to get something for himself and denies responsibility for the problems he his actively perpetuating. He may have started out wanting what’s best for the world but he let his fear and inferiority complex drag him into stagnation anyways.

Sha Miara is the “old money” conservative. She’s not really “evil” per-say, she’s rich and lacks perspective. Also, she’s like 16 (kung-fu memory transfer technique aside) so it wouldn’t be very fair to judge her for her opinions just yet, but she’s definitely that one girl everyone knew in high school who doesn’t understand that poor people can’t just go get food from the fridge if they’re hungry.

Tiberian is a demonstration that the system is self perpetuating. Even one at the top, ostensibly one of the ones running the whole thing, can’t overturn the system on his own. His attempts to change the world for the betterment of the common people are met with instant and violent rejection by the first person he approaches. There’s an argument to be made that if he’d approached one of the other monarchs it would have gone differently, but I suspect the result would have been the same. Each of the monarchs are so entrenched in their own ideologies that there would be no reasoning with them, with one exception.

Emriss Silentborn is a socialist/communist (she’s not actually in the books that much so I’m not certain) and got assassinated for it. I don’t think it’s a stretch to say that given her desire to “freely distribute the secrets of the sacred arts” in a world where sacred arts = literal money. We don’t get much of her character, but she seems to care deeply about sustainability which, given that she’s a tree, makes sense. A world in which the strong eat the weak and nothing else simply isn’t sustainable in the long term.

Then along comes the Reaper Division, a group of people with enough strength (read wealth) to overturn the whole damn thing and the strength of character to actually do it. They force the other monarchs to either give up their power or have it taken from them. Lindon then sets up a system to ensure that no individual can horde power (wealth) to that degree again for the foreseeable future. Inequality still exists on Cradle, but at least the billionaires aren’t melting the icecaps anymore!

TL;DR Cradle says “Viva La Revolution!”

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💜💚 this is to all the BBRAE stans out there

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I don't think it's dumb at all. Maybe not a conscious thought process MWT was going for, but if you've got to base a romance off of another set of archetypes, Beren and Luthien are not the worst to choose.

I always have a soft spot for MWT's romance because I love the sort of practical, does what needs doing couple backed by deep, adoring love.

Really I just enjoy seeing couples that have a relationship around being each other's number one teammate no matter the challenge.

This is dumb, but...

...has anyone made this joke?