[Comics] The Return of Donna Troy

There was a point in my life when pretty much the entire family was collecting comic books. My mom is a lifelong Batman fan while my dad was into Green Lantern and Thor. My brother would share in my dad's comics at the time (he was really young) and I had my Spider-man moments, although the Clone Saga had scarred me for life. My sister wanted to get into things as well and so she ended up with Wonder Woman.

Like the good geek that I was, I eventually managed to read all the comics in the house. This led to my renewed respect for Batman, my interest in Green Lantern and even a side-venture into the mythos of Wonder Woman. this is also what helped me learn more about Donna Troy, given her involvement in both the Wonder Woman comics and the Kyle Rayner version of Green Lantern.

She certainly is a unique character in her own right and with origins re-written far too many times. Who would have expected her to play such a key role in Infinite Crisis, eh?

The Return of Donna Troy takes place right before the events of Infinite Crisis but is not commonly tagged as one of the "official" mini-series that build up to the events of Crisis. It makes sense given she is not necessarily a major character all throughout Infinite Crisis but the events in this particular 6-issue limited series go a long way towards explaining how she managed to return and why things stand as they do.

Here a memory-altered Donna Troy is living amongst the Titans of Myth on New Chronus where she is made to believe that she is the original Titan of the Moon and wife to Coeus. The Titans have been attacking nearby planets in order to gain more worshipers and with this added strength were going to use the power to open a gateway into another reality. The Teen Titans and the Outsiders eventually get involved after being summoned by Athyns and they help restore Donna's memories and eventually reveal the Titan's true objective.

The story is a tad bit hard to digest at first as is all ventures into the worlds of mythology as defined by the DC Universe. The Greek Gods and the Titans of Myth have always been somewhat separate from the pace of the rest of the universe yet at the same time employ modern technology and other methods as needed occasionally.

The story is also being told by Donna herself, albeit from her "present" version at he end of the story, and thus provides insights and commentary that does not match what the Donna / Troia knows within the story itself. The involvement of the Teen Titans and the Outsiders was more of a background thing at best - let's not get confused with the fact that at the core this was all about Donna.

Image via Wikipedia The story does well in trying to resolve her various histories and origins by clearly establishing that she's one of the few who are aware of her "other selves" from the other versions of the universe, which is a pretty fun way of explaining the many inconsistencies in her history over the years. While DC Comics deserves many demerits or something for all the mistakes they've made with their characters over the years, this was a more elegant solution to this particular character's issues.

Thus Donna comes out to be a central figure to any story involving the greater DC Multiverse given she's now sort of a "key" to all past worlds. She is, after all, a combination of all other Donna Troys from all the different versions of the universe and that makes her valuable as a link.

All this for someone who used to simply be known as Wonder Girl, hehe.