Answers on New Teen Titans Vol. 2 Omnibus missing issue #38

DC Comics released the New Teen Titans Omnibus Vol. 2 last week, the first-ever hardcover collection of the famous "Judas Contract" story. By all accounts the binding of this volume is better than the first volume, though DC's collections still have a little ways to go before they're up to Marvel standards.

The only problem is, this book that was originally solicited to include issues #21-45, actually contains #21-37 and #39-45. No issue #38.

Fortunately, via our friends at ComicList, DC has announced to retailers that issue #38 will be in the New Teen Titans Omnibus Vol. 3 (so there's your confirmation on that) "along with other issues in the same storyline."

Couple of things this could mean:

Issue #38 is a "Who is Wonder Girl?" story. New Teen Titans (at that point actually Tales of the New Teen Titans) #50, which would more than likely appear in the next omnibus volume, is the wedding of Donna Troy and Terry Long. So, it might be that DC skipped over #38 here and will include it before a string of issues in the next volume.

For me, this would be the best-case scenario. I don't really like that DC took #38 out of the second omnibus -- I like reading these stories in their original publication order, just like they were meant to be read -- but if DC picks up with Tales #46 and keeps going from there and just sticks #38 in the beginning, everything turns out OK in the end.

However, we should note that before these omnibuses, DC released the Terra Incognito trade collecting Titans #28-34, and then the Judas Contract trade collecting Titans #39-44, and then the Who is Donna Troy trade collecting #38, #50, and New Teen Titans #51-54 -- the latter, essentially, is a trade that jumps all over the place. What I really hope DC will not do is make New Teen Titans Omnibus Vol. 3 some kind of crazy Donna Troy-spotlight collection that varies from the "collecting in order" pattern.

What I like about these omnibuses is that they're collecting stories that have never been collected before (Titans #35-37, among others) and collecting the stories in order. Reprinting, essentially, the Who is Donna Troy collection verbatim in volume three omnibus would be a big disappointment.

Relieved? Worried? What do you think?

Previous coverage of the New Teen Titans Omnibuses:

* Judas Contract in hardcover with New Teen Titans Omnibus Vol. 2 solicitation

* New Teen Titans Omnibus - Death of the DC Archive editions?