DC’s Titans Have a New Leader…and It May Surprise You

The Titans have had a whirlwind few years. After the close of Dark Crisis on Infinite Earths, Nightwing was told by Batman and Superman to have the Titans — Nightwing, the Flash, Starfire, Cyborg, Beast Boy, and Raven — take over for the Justice League. Titans launched, from Tom Taylor and Nicola Scott, showing the team take their new place in the DC Multiverse. The team did a good job, leading the superhero community during Titans: Beast World, but they also had their share of failures, including missing that Raven had been replaced by the evil version of herself. The Titans did their best, but they were caught flatfooted by Amanda Waller’s machinations, which led to Absolute Power.

After the upheaval of 2024’s biggest DC event, the Justice League is back and the Titans are taking a backseat. However, the team is staying around and getting a new creative team in the DC All-In publishing initiative. Titans was taken over by writer John Layman and artist Pete Woods with Issue #16, and the team is already making big changes to the group. Roy Harper has returned to the team, but that’s small potatoes compared to the leadership change of the team. Nightwing, despite showing how capable he is as a leader of the entire superhero community, is out and Donna Troy is taking over the team with Issue #17. This has been a long time coming, as Troy has been one of the more important second-generation heroes who has never truly gotten a chance to shine.

Donna Troy Has Always Been the Forgotten Titan

Donna Troy is one of the most complicated characters in superhero comics, if not the most complicated. That begins with her time as Wonder Girl. The first Wonder Girl appeared way back in 1947’s Wonder Woman #23. This Wonder Girl was Diana as a young girl, playing off the success of Superboy. Wonder Girl had many adventures over the years, and when the team was picked out to be the Teen Titans in 1965’s The Brave and the Bold #60, Wonder Girl was made a part of it. However, a change had to be made, so Diana was no longer ever Wonder Girl and Donna Troy was. This was the first of many retcons that would damage the character in the years to come.

Donna later became a part of The New Teen Titans, the landmark book from Marv Wolfman and the late, great George Perez that made DC competitive with Marvel again. Wolfman and Perez wanted to answer the question of who was Donna Troy, with New Teen Titans #38 doing its best to answer that question, as Grayson and Troy unravel the mystery of her origin, starting with the burnt-down orphanage Wonder Woman rescued her from. They were able to piece together her life, eventually finding the grave of her biological mother, Dorothy Hinckley. This issue was published in 1984, and the question was thought answered, but all of that changed in 1985 and 1986 because of the continuity reboot of Crisis on Infinite Earths.

Crisis on Infinite Earths saw Wonder Woman’s history rebooted, placing her on Themyscira until the present day. She was no longer a founding member of the Justice League and that meant that she also didn’t rescue Donna Troy. This mean that all the work that was done to make Donna’s origin make sense had to be redone. Wolfman and Perez reteamed for New Titans #50-55, which established that Donna was a daughter of the Titans of Myth, the precursors to the Greek Gods. She became Troia, with a new sense of self and would go through some trials, including losing her husband Teddy Long and finding out that her son would become a terrible conqueror in the future. Eventually, the New Titans would fizzle out, and Donna was adrift for years, eventually joining the Darkstars, the replacements for the Green Lantern Corps destroyed by Hal Jordan during his time as Parallax.

Donna got another chance when the Titans reformed in the late ’90s, rejoining her old friends as adults. Titans did well for a while, but soon Titans/Young Justice: Graduation Day, by Judd Winick and Ale Garza, killed her off. Troy spent a few years dead before returning in DC Special: The Return of Donna Troy, from Phil Jimenez and Jose Luis-Garcia Lopez, in the run-up to Infinite Crisis, which re-established her Titans of Myth origin. While it seemed she would be important to the upcoming events, she only played a bit role in Infinite Crisis before disappearing until Countdown to Final Crisis, a book that few enjoyed. She’d eventually get her chance at joining the Justice League during James Robinson and Mark Bagley’s run on the book, but would be wiped from existence at the beginning of the New 52. She’d return as a villain, and when continuity shifted again post-DC: Rebirth #1, she rejoined the Titans as a hero, her origin again in doubt.

The New Teen Titans have always been important, but Donna rarely got a fair shake in the DC Universe. Donna is one of the most experienced heroes of DC second generation, especially if one considers all of the retconned Golden Age Wonder Girl adventures. Donna’s old origin has been restored, meaning she grew up with the Amazons and trained in their ways. Donna is an extremely formidable and experienced hero, having trained with the best since the beginning. She’s worked with many of the best leader out there. Donna definitely deserves her spot as leader of the Titans. Dick Grayson and Wally West, Donna’s fellow Teen Titans founders, have both taken important places in the DC superhero community. Donna deserves her chance to prove that she’s just as good as her compatriots and she can prove that as leaders of the Titans.

Donna Troy Is Ready to Soar as the Leader of the Titans

Donna Troy has been a rather inscrutable character for decades. Her history is filled with retcons, and it’s easy to see that has hurt her standing in the DC Multiverse. The question of who Donna Troy is has always held the character back, especially as DC got into its continuity rebooting years. Donna Troy basically became too complicated, and that saw her pushed into the background while her fellow Teen Titans alums got to grow in stature and as characters. Recent years have seen an easier to understand origin for Donna restored — the Amazon trained warrior who grew up as Wonder Woman’s younger sister. This has made her ready for her latest role.

Donna Troy as the leader of the Titans is a step in the right direction. While the Titans are no longer the main team on Earth with the return of the Justice League, they are still a part of DC’s Big Three teams — the League, the Justice Society, and the Titans. Giving Troy command of the team should be exactly what the character’s long-suffering fans have been waiting for. Few characters deserve a chance in the spotlight like Donna Troy does, and hopefully this chance will allow her to finally join her Titans compatriots in the upper echelons of the DC superhero community.