Raven is under the control of Trigon and manipulating her way toward world dominance in Titans #9. 

Writer Tom Taylor offers readers a solid second part of the "Dark-Winged Queen" arc in which the team navigates Beast Boy’s public relations nightmare while Trigon works to take control of earth. What I appreciated most about this issue is that it feels like this arc is actually going somewhere. 

Titans has mostly been tied up in messy tie-in events like "Beast World" up to this point. While that event continues to impact Beast Boy, I like that this feels like an actual story rather than a series of mandated editorial choices. 

Trigon’s scheming with Waller establishes a fascinating dynamic between the two characters. Waller says flat-out that not only is she not afraid of Trigon, but that she has the ability to kill him. In the DC Universe, it appears that a bureaucrat and a demon are about the same levels of evil and powerful. I'm not sure what that implies about the political dynamics going on at DC's offices. 

Wes Abbott's lettering is doing a lot of the leg-work on conveying dialogue tone, and it works nicely. There are several characters who receive their own unique lettering style, including two variants for Raven. Abbott exploits these styles to the fullest, immersing the reader in Taylor’s dialogue. 

Artist Lucas Meyer’s line work is clean, his compositions naturalistic and his characters expressive. This is an all-around good looking comic in which the team seems to be working well together. 

I do have a few gripes. The first is a bit petty but I can’t help but point it out--the cover of the comic says "Titans together…behind bars!" There is no point in this comic in which that is the case. It is annoying when a comic pitches a concept to readers and then fails to deliver. 

A more substantive problem with this series is the way that it keeps repackaging the same narrative arcs. Titans began with a story in which a member of the team, Tempest, is possessed by a manipulative villain and attempts to take control of the team. The team then has to grapple with their dynamic being interrupted by outside forces. 

So far, "Dark-Winged Queen" has covered the same beats. If you swap out Tempest for Raven, it is essentially a repeat of "Out of the Shadows." 

It is understandable that a writer might want to revisit a concept, but I wish that Taylor would have given this series time to explore new ideas before revisiting old ones. 

A side-effect of the way that Titans uses mind-control as a plot device is that it makes it hard to flesh-out their relationships. Nightwing is supposedly the leader of this team, but it doesn’t feel like he has much of a grasp upon what is going on at headquarters. Within the span of just nine issues two members have completely swapped personalities without him noticing. It clashes with the characterization that this comic is attempting, in which Dick is an empathetic and competent leader. 

Heading into the next issue, I’m hoping that this series moves past Raven falling under Trigon’s mind control quickly. Titans stories are at their best when writers choose to explore how the team functions and wrestles with their responsibilities. At this point, the Titans feel like individual characters that happen to fight crime near each other rather than a group of friends who work together. 

Recommended if…

• You are a Trigon fan. 
• You are willing to give this series a few more issues to find a good rhythm. 

Overall: 

Great art, combined with some sharp dialogue choices, makes this a fun read. However, Titans suffers from larger structural and characterization issues which make me worried about the viability of this arc moving forward. 

Score: 5.5/10

DISCLAIMER: DC Comics provided Batman News with a copy of this comic for the purpose of this review.