Review: Red Hood and the Outlaws Vol. 2- Who is Artemis?

Quick Summary

Pros: The main story is an solid continuation of what was started in the previous volume. All of the character depictions are on point and make for a touching and relatable read. The majority of the book’s artwork is great.

Cons: Narration is repetitive in places.

Overall: This volume takes all of the positives from the first one and mimics them, while also providing a more interesting main storyline. In addition, with introductions in the past, the focus on character development and relationships is even stronger. Readers can really connect with the people in this book. Any fan of relatable and character driven stories should give this series a try.

Story

Red Hood and the Outlaws Vol. 2: Who Is Artemis? sees the continuation of the character driven drama started in Red Hood and the Outlaws Vol. 1: Dark Trinity (Review). With introductions out of the way, Scott Lobdell is able to dive in to what makes these characters tick and show the individual motivations that drive them. This is done through some slower paced moments and through some intense action sequences as well. The end result is a book that is simultaneously filled with touching moments between individuals and bombastic fight sequences, which is a wonderful mix to have.

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The book starts out by completely wrapping up the plotline started in the previous volume. Red Hood and Bizarro take down the remnants of Black Mask’s gang, though Red Hood is a little concerned about how violent Bizarro is with the criminals. This leads into a discussion about the viability of Bizarro as an unstable clone and the question of who will put him down if he gets too out of control. In a scene clearly designed as an homage to Of Mice and Men, Jason contemplates killing Bizarro but ultimately decides against it. This entire concept is very intriguing and emotional and has the potential to become even more so as this series progresses.

The middle of the collection sees the team separated due to a botched attempt to infiltrate a warlord’s base located in Artemis’s homeland. As we’ve said numerous times before, Lobdell is excellent at character driven moments, so by splitting up the team he is given the opportunity to explore each Outlaw’s psyche individually. Bizarro struggles with being a real hero to people who need him, Jason wrestles with the ghosts of his past, and Artemis is tempted toward a path of destruction by the woman she loves. Each character spotlight is interesting and well done. They are all entertaining on their own while also managing to leave the reader in a place where they care more about the Outlaws than ever before.

In particular, I thought that Bizarro and Jason’s stories were very well done. Both stories were extremely relatable, despite being about high stakes adventures. When broken down to their base parts though, one was simply about a man trying to do what is right and the other was about a man trying to work through his past. These themes are highly relevant to the characters going through them but are also concepts which can easily resonate with anyone picking up this book.

Once the team is back together again, deceptions are revealed, decisions are made, and Artemis steals the spotlight. It turns out that Artemis’s old friend has been the person terrorizing this region; she has simply been blaming it all on the local warlord. After learning this, Artemis has to choose if she is going to side with her old friend, whom she loves, or her new friends, who are in the right. Ultimately, she makes the honorable choice and turns on her old friend. This allows Artemis to have her moment in the spotlight and solidifies her character as someone willing to do a little bad to accomplish the greater good, a persistent theme for all of the Outlaws.

The only moments where the book felt disrupted occurred at the beginning of chapters, when information about the current situation is summarized and explained. Lobdell is somewhat infamous for providing these rundowns more than most, but it actually becomes annoying in this volume. The third chapter spends pages summarizing what happened only a few moments previously. I understand summarizing events from a while ago but this is a bit too much. However, this is a very minor problem overall and isn’t something that dramatically affects one’s enjoyment when reading.

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Art

The first chapter of this collection, drawn by Mirko Colak, is a bit of a mixed bag in terms of quality. Individual characters look odd and are drawn differently than they normally are, especially Artemis, who is nearly unrecognizable in one scene. However, the scenery and backgrounds throughout the issue look great. In particular, the end of the issue features a beautiful scenic view that, when paired with Veronica Gandini’s gorgeous colors, is the perfect compliment to what is happening in the comic.

The next chapter is drawn by Kenneth Rocafort, who’s art I typically love. However, in this particular issue, it does not look nearly as nice as it usually does. Rocafort’s pencils and inks conflict with Daniel Brown’s colors, causing eyes to look darker than normal and random body parts to look brighter than normal.

The collection improves dramatically after these two issue though, as Dexter Soy takes over for the rest of the book. In our review of Dark Trinity (found here), we mentioned how well Soy’s pencils and inks go with Gandini’s colors and that does not change here. Characters are bold and colorful, yet dark when they need to be. Plus, the whole book looks cinematic and makes everything that happens within feel like a scene out of an intense movie. These two make a great pair and a solid creative team that I look forward to seeing in the future.

Continuity

Red Hood and the Outlaws Vol. 2: Who Is Artemis? continues the story from Red Hood and the Outlaws Vol. 1: Dark Trinity (Review).

The story here is continued in Red Hood and the Outlaws Vol. 3: Bizarro Reborn (Review)

This volume also makes references to other comic books, detailed below:

• Jason states that he thought Killer Croc was in the Suicide Squad. Croc started with the Suicide Squad at the beginning of Suicide Squad Vol. 1: The Black Vault (Review).
• Jasons mentions returning to Qurac in the past. This happened in Red Hood and the Outlaws Vol. 1: REDemption (Review).
• Significant references are made to Jason’s death at the hands of the Joker. This story is detailed in Batman: A Death in the Family.