As we come to the final issue of this run of Doom Patrol, it actually seems like the team might be coming to resemble something like the original. Cliff, Larry, and the Chief are back, Arani is gone (quite violently), and the newer characters are settling into the paradigm of the weird and strange. Too bad it all falls apart in the next issue of Invasion.
There are some nice character pieces in here - I truly appreciate the conversation between Josh and a funeral director who is trying to squeeze some publicity out of Arani's death. The Chief's insistence that Arani was somehow unbalanced is also excellent, and can be read in a couple of different ways if we inflect the various versions of the Chief that we get subsequent to this. There's even a wonderful scene between Scott and Rhea, in which young Mr. Fisher reveals that his leukemia has returned and is terminal. I honestly wish we'd had a chance to play that story out. The deaths of the Patrol are often sudden and violent. How would they have handled a team mate whose death was a drawn-out process? It could really have made for some very touching stories.
Another significant death occurs in this issue, though not of any of the team members. With the withdrawal of the alien forces from Earth, Garguax decides that it's time to destroy the Patrol and take over the planet. It doesn't go his way, and he is blasted from the sky, ostensibly ending forever this particular threat to the planet (though was he actually ever really a threat?). And, surprisingly, it seems that in none of the subsequent universal reboots has he been resurrected. I have to admit, I'm not that unhappy about that.
More to follow.
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