Teen Titans: Beast Boy Loves Raven – review

Here’s a review of Teen Titans: Beast Boy Loves Raven (a DC YA graphic novel) by our 9-year-old daughter (aka Luna Lamb).

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Beast Boy loves Raven carries on from the first two comics in an incredible way. With connections from the first two books (Teen Titans: Raven & Teen Titans: Beast Boy) and full colour, this interesting comic is a spectacular way to continue making the Teen Titans an amazing and hilarious team in the DC universe.

One of the ways it is interesting is how it portrays the characters. Beast Boy is displayed as a teen who idolises everyone and is incredibly self conscious. Raven is made to look like a dark and moody teen but is really a fun and grateful girl who recognises a bully when she sees one. Her foster sister, cousin and best friend Max is protective, kind and ”Not a hope for the best type of girl”. 

Another way it is interesting is how powers are discovered. Raven’s emerge through simply going to school. If an untrained empath went into a building full of teenagers, what would happen? In Raven’s case it caused a splitting headache that was called to a halt after a strange, bird shaped shadow appeared over her head. 

Beast Boy discovered his powers after he ends the supplements that stopped him from gaining weight, height and a lower voice, among other things. There is also how the teens dress that is interesting. Beast Boy loves his green trainers and carries his grey backpack around to put his pet monkey in when travelling.   

Kami Garcia and Gabriel Picolo, who created this comic series, used their favourite Teen Titans and redesigned, remade and put a strange new twist to these characters. Neither had done a graphic novel before they created the first book Teen Titans: Raven but they managed to make an excellent first comic. Raven is Kami Garcia’s favourite Teen Titan, and the following year Teen Titans: Beast Boy came out, who is Gabriel Picolo’s favourite.  

In this comic Beast Boy is funny, thoughtful and kind while Raven is cautious, caring and trying to fit in. With Max trying to follow Raven everywhere, Gar (Beast Boy)  trying to find vegetarian food and Raven having nightmares (again), new and strange characters are appearing with tech and skill like no other. We meet Damian Wayne, who grew up in the shadow of his father, a wealthy businessman living in Gotham city (who could that be, hmmm?), was raised by his mother in mountains far away, and Adeline, a character who until now has been only behind the phone of Slade Wilson. This comic reveals the secrets of the mysterious Slade and his even more mysterious boss, and sees Raven and Gar trying to hide their dangerous secrets from each other.

Pick pocketing, medical issues, thugs, demons, tests, insanely smart and lovable pets, ghosts and inhumane research labs are all included in this extraordinary comic.

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Teen Titans: Beast Boy Loves Raven is out now

Flash Facts review

Here’s a review of Flash Facts (a STEM DC comic collection for 8-12-year-olds) by our 9-year-old daughter (aka Luna Lamb).

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Flash Facts is a funny, scientific, and amazing comic for kids. It explains things like how forensics work, what type of star our sun is, what the names of the four kinds of nucleotides are, and more! Flash, Poison Ivy, Green Lantern, Swamp Thing, and many more DC characters battle baddies, and explain DNA, contortionists, the sea, and more exciting facts! 

Go on ten scientific and technological journeys to learn some incredible facts!

Fast Tracks 

Fast Tracks is a short chapter about forensics. I like how the Flash is telling the readers things consciously. There is a little surprise at the end as well.

If You Can’t Take the Heat

If You Can’t Take the Heat is about Batman and Plastic Man defeating Firefly. I liked the art but I don’t see how you can learn things from it. 

The Facts of Life 

The Facts of Life is about DNA and how it makes up both plants and animals. It tells you what parts of DNA are called and the different types of DNA you can have. It is my personal favourite.

More Than Meets the Eye

More Than Meets the Eye is a Teen Titans Go! story about virtual reality and how a VR headset works as well as how your brain works with your eyes.

Lights-Out 

Lights-Out is a DC Super Hero Girls story about energy and the different types of electricity you can get. I really like how Lights-Out explains how renewable energy works. Perfect for those who want to know how to save our planet.  

(Sub)Atomic

(Sub)Atomic is about atoms and how they work. It also tells you what the building blocks of the universe are.

Home Sweet Space

Home Sweet Space is a chapter about the universe. Supergirl leads a girl called Maya through the galaxy to see what to do for her science project. No baddies here I’m afraid!

Sea for Yourself 

Sea for Yourself is a comic about what lurks in the ocean. I really like the art in it.

Weather or Not

Weather or Not  is about the melting ice in Antarctica. It raises good points about the environment just like Lights-out. If you want to help polar bears look in this chapter and pay close attention. 

Human Extremes

First of all, Arcane is a greedy super villain who wants to capture Swamp Thing and Swamp Kid for a serum that may be inside them. He has some agents who have no emotion in their faces and always wear black suits and glasses. Swamp Kid was found by a swamp as a green, carrot-fingered baby. Swamp Thing can connect to Swamp Kid’s  thoughts. For a more detailed version please look at Swamp Kid Spiral. Second, Human Extremes has a few pretty random facts in it.         

I really enjoyed Flash Facts. I find it funny how some chapter titles are a play on words like “Weather or Not” and “Sea for Yourself”. I find it interesting that there is a bit at the back which tells you how to do and make things. I like how it is funny and tells you things at the same time.

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Curated by award-winning actress and author Mayim Bialik (Big Bang Theory, Blossom), and geared toward readers ages 8-12, DC Comic’s ‘Flash Facts’ explores STEM and how these principles affect our everyday lives.

The Art of the Brick: DC Super Heroes (London) review

Anything involving LEGO and DC superheroes is always going to catch my eye, so we found ourselves at The Art of the Brick: DC Super Heroes exhibition in London. Continue reading The Art of the Brick: DC Super Heroes (London) review

LEGO DC Justice League: Gotham City Breakout Blu-Ray/DVD review

While DC’s live action movies get increasingly sombre and serious, thank goodness for the LEGO DC movies, that bring the fun back into super heroics.

LEGO DC Justice League: Gotham City Breakout is the latest of the LEGO Justice League series, and as the title suggests is a Batman centric tale.

However, Batman is away from Gotham for most of this story – having been taken on a holiday by his associates Nightwing and Batgirl. He asks Superman to looks after Gotham while he’s gone – something Superman thinks will be easy, given that most of the city’s villains lack superpowers. He soon discovers how wrong he is.

Batman’s ‘holiday’ turns out to be a working one, as he is taken to revisit his old mentors – and there’s trouble involving super villain Deathstroke at the very first stop.

Meanwhile in Gotham, Superman is finding the likes of the Joker far trickier to deal with than he imagined. Even calling on the likes of Cyborg and Wonder Woman don’t seem to help. Perhaps only the new Robin can save the day?

A particular draw to this movie was the featured appearance of LEGO Batgirl, a favourite character of my daughter’s. It was also great to see Wonder Woman included again as well.

This movie has the same irreverent knockabout humour that has characterised the likes of LEGO games and other movies. Of the two plot strands, the Gotham one was by far the most engaging. We also loved the appearance onscreen of LEGO Jokerland – which was probably one of our favourite ever LEGO DC Superhero sets.

The Blu-Ray of the movie also comes with an exclusive Nightwing LEGO minifigure, which was a nice added bonus.

Justice League: Gotham City Breakout is out now.

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Disclosure: I received a Blu-Ray copy of this product free of charge.

Review: Batman Unlimited Toys

These Batman Unlimited toys are from Mattel, and feature Batman characters with updated futuristic looks and gadgets. The first thing I noticed were the key differences to the classic depiction of the three characters.

Batman and Robin look broadly similar to what we’re used to, but their outfits are more like hi-tech armour than a costume. Robin also has a hood, which makes him appear more mysterious – just like Batman.

But appropriately, the weirdest one was the Joker. His look has been completely revamped from the purple suit wearing clown to become a muscled up thug with a crew cut and a sash of bullets draped over him. While he is clearly the Joker – with his green hair, white face, red lips, and magical yellow toothed grin – it took my daughter a while to feel confident in identifying it was him.

These are pretty sturdy looking figures, with Batman & Robin’s fabric & vinyl  capes being the only potential weak link. Anatomically, it’s fair to say these are somewhat stylised. For instance, they have lower legs that are 2-3 times longer than their thighs.

While they offer 8 points of articulation (POA), additional movement in the legs would’ve been welcome – there’s no knee joint for instance, which really limits how these figures can be posed by a child. They can’t even sit properly. My daughter sometimes likes her figures to have a rest, enjoys a tea party, or go to the loo!

Actually, The Joker isn’t the weirdest of these Batman Unlimited Toys in this set. It also includes what appears to be a Robot Batdog. It has no limb or head movement. It does have a removable tail, which the characters can also hold as some kind of sword/club/furry duster. Robo-batdog (as we call it) isn’t even named on the packaging. It feels like this part of the set is a toy they had left over from another line.

My daughter even asked “What is that dog doing there?”. Not knowing how to answer, a visit to BatmanUnlimited.com (as the packaging suggests) indicates it may be one of The Penguin’s robotic Cyber Animals. Who knows? Anyway, while it feels out of place in this set, and is little more than an immovable toy dog, it does look kind of cool.

Overall, my daughter loves that these figures are of Batman, Robin, and The Joker, and they are funky and colourfully designed. But I feel the lack of movement in the legs in particular will be a big drawback for her long term, as she is unable to pose them in a way that she does other figures of this size (about 15 cm high). And the inclusion of robo-batdog is a mystery worthy of investigation by the Batman.

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UPDATE: Batman Unlimited Toys Vehicles

Turns out the Batman figure fits a random Bat Jet I bought my daughter second hand for 80p, so there’s life in these figures yet.

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Disclosure: We received these Batman Unlimited toys as part of the Toys R Us Toyologist programme. They send us toys in exchange for honest reviews. You can read the original post here.

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