Teen Titans #34

The traitor is finally revealed.

"Dope. I love a good long-game trap." Teen Titans #23

SPOILERS AHEAD

Honest question here:  are readers meant to sympathize with Damian?

Yes, there's a traitor in the group but we know so little about the Other that they seem better in comparison to the TT. Damian is so proud of the apparent results of his mindwipe that Kid Flash has to point out all the bad things it took to get that far. Djinn interrupts their talk to freak out about her ring being stolen which Damian takes as a hint of the traitor making their move. He puts the building on lock down until they find the guilty party.

He acts like the traitor being a serious factor has only been a problem since Deathstroke told him the prison break was triggered by a team member. In truth he's actually known about it since Lady Vic was murdered and he falsely accused Red Hood. In fact Damian realized he made a mistake believing it was Jason...yet he never looked into it further. He knew someone almost killed them but didn't do a follow up. If he actually bothered to look into it or trusted Jason this traitor issue could have been solved by now. It's one of the many failings he's had during this run.

Crush is hurt that Djinn hasn't said anything since their kiss. Djinn explains that since she joined the team she's been trying to discover who she is and doesn't know who that is yet. She is less than thrilled that Crush confronted her and blamed her for losing her ring. Damian interrogates Crush and they mention the fact he set up cameras. This is how he knows that she kissed Djinn. He asks if Crush took the ring to make Djinn return her feelings. Which is painfully ironic since no one on the team seems overly bothered about taking away the villains free will.

Djinn believes Damian took the ring to win points with her. I don't care about either of the teens having a romance with a four thousand year old "teen." What I am interesting in is this line from Djinn:

"I imagine it must be exhausting, to be hated so thoroughly by everyone under your leadership."

I constantly ask how Damian is ever able to maintain leadership when no one ever seems happy with how he runs things. Out of all his Robin brothers I think he's the only one that has ever had a zero percent approval rating with his team. Djinn calls Damian out on a lot of his negative personality traits. She says he's: cruel, nefarious, that his skills are deceit and manipulation. Is she wrong? Well no, that's pretty spot on for what we've seen in this title. We've seen it with how he treats his enemies and Jason.

Kid Flash is easily able to point out why Damian's logic doesn't add up. Wallaces' dad was a criminal, well so is Damian's mom and grandfather. He seems to think the traitor is Red Arrow despite there being no evidence she was even there to steal the ring.

Emiko gets attacked by Djinn only to reveal Roundhouse is controlling her with her ring. This was actually foreshadowed for some time.

The Roundhouse interrogation really highlights how well he's playing the game. When Damian first tries to be intimating Billy touches a nerve by asking if Batman taught him that. Damian brings up how little they know about him and the loss of his sister potentially affecting him. Yet Billy is able to easily turn the tables. He sees and calls the interrogation (Reid) tactic by name, explains how it's supposed to work and why it's flawed. That should have been a warning sign that Damian is speaking with someone that understands what he's attempting to do. But he completely underestimates Billy because he seems like the least threatening member.

Right away Damian dismisses him not thinking Billy knows what he's talking about. From there Billy plays to Damian's feelings towards Djinn before giving a speech to convince Damian he's not the thief. Billy admits to struggling to be better (also noting that's more than Damian can say.) How he doesn't know if he's a hero but surely even Damian noticed he's putting in more effort than anyone else on the team. He effortlessly gets Damian to believe him by just saying all that.

Awhile back I did a list to see which Titan was most likely the traitor. The only thing I questioned with Roundhouse as how to factor in Kid Flash insisting he joined the team. How would he ensure that? There were a lot of clues that Billy was the traitor like him starting to say that he didn't realize something after the explosion with Lady Vic before stopping himself. Billy even gave away their positon to Lady Vic prior to that. He was present when team members gave out important information (how Djinn's ring worked, Robin not getting along with Batman, etc.) and threw out some suggestions of his own.

Even his involvement in the love triangle between Damian/Djinn/Crush makes sense. He sees something there and questions if Crush likes Robin before learning she has a thing for Djinn. At first this seems pointless since we haven't seen anything come from it--until this issue. The cameras weren't a secret and Damian did see the kiss. The tension on the team was increased with barely any effort. When Kid Flash tried to tell him about the secret prison Billy figured it out but played dumb.

This makes the "I'm with stupid" sign Roundhouse holds that points to Damian on the cover of #27 even more hilarious.

Is this really Billy? Did Clarie merge with him instead of dying? Was the Clarie we saw the Other controlling him? Maybe not if the quote from #23 is to be believed.

Is there going to be an actual fall out for the teams' actions besides their crumbling group dynamics? Besides finding how what happens when Roundhouse is revealed as the traitor I'm hoping we see actual conquences. Especially if Identity Crisis still happened, there needs to be something. The Justice League had assigned the Titans (Nightwing's team) a babysister and had Donna Troy under house arrest because of a possible future version of her being evil. This needs to blow up in their faces and the league needs to step in.



Questions Raised?: Why couldn't Djinn feel her ring?

Who was Kid Flash talking to? Barry? Iris?



Did You Notice?: Kid Flash says he's looking Damian in the eye and telling him it wasn't him. In Roundhouse's last panel during his interrogation he's not looking at Damian. Also he never techically says it wasn't him. Just that his issues with his sisters' death doesn't mean he took the ring and Djinn scares him.