Is this the issue where Troublemakers jumps the shark? I’ve really enjoyed Troublemakers up to this point. Though not perfect, and with an art style that can occasionally veer way too far into exaggerated caricature, it’s been a heartfelt and engaging look at the lives of super powered teens. Created by a corporation and sheltered from the outside world to various degrees of severity, the teens have been growing up and getting to know each other, and earning the trust (or not) of their parents.

In this issue, Christine (aka XL) is found, late at night, way outside the complex. She’s distraught, having attended a party with normal kids, and it’s clear that something has happened. But what? And did her biofield (or, in normal comic book parlance, her super powers) enhance the situation and confuse matters? Is she even being truthful about what transpired?

The mystery and an unreliable narrator do a great job of setting events in motion here, and for the first two thirds or so of the issue, it’s an intriguing mystery which soon becomes genuinely compelling. However, it goes completely off the rails towards the end, with a direct preachiness, complete with stats, facts and figures that just make it feel like an out of touch parent or teacher talking down to their kids. It’s such a shame that this is handled so badly, because Fabian Nicieza had, right up to that point, shown that you don’t have to talk down to kids to give them important life lessons. Nor should you come so close to breaking the fourth wall, and almost directly address the reader with such moralistic nonsense.

The final twist, however, is very well handled. It’s such a shame that the story just stops dead to deliver a ham fisted lesson, and then goes back to normal straight after.

Anyway, this issue is, apparently, infamous for all the wrong reasons, and I can imagine that it’s quite possibly a point where readers lost interest; however, the series did last until #19, so it’s not as if it ran out of steam immediately.

It is becoming clearer why Troublemakers seems to have been mostly forgotten, but hopefully this was just a blip in what’s been an excellent series so far.

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