Last week DC released the twenty-eighth issues of Art Baltazar and Franco’s Tiny Titans, and it was the usual mixture of super-cute art and gentle all-ages gags, sprinkled with in-jokes for the old-timers. The main difference between this issue and the previous twenty-seven was that it was completely devoted to the Super-Pets, most of whom have appeared in some form or another in previous issues, with the Tiny Titans in supporting roles.

The image above is the cover of the issue. But it’s not the image DC originally solicited, the image that is still up on dccomics.com because, for some reason, they never, ever update those online solicitations.

Here’s that image:

Notice anything different, aside from the lack of the added-in later logo and Super Pet identification? Anything different about the line-up?

That’s right! There’s a gray squirrel in overalls with a Green Lantern ring on the original cover, whom Tiny Titans readers will recognize as the artist’s version of Ch’p from his appearance in Tiny Titans #25, while the published cover features a different rodent-like Lantern, B’dg.

Having never heard of this B’dg fellow, I had to look him up on the Internet, and it turns out that he is a pre-existing GL (as many of you better-versed in Lantern lore probably already knew), created in 2005 as the inheritor of Ch’p's ring. Ch’p, it turns out, died in the comics a long while back.

Apparently at some point between Baltazar drawing the cover and DC publishing the comic, they swapped out Ch’p for the new squirrel.

Not a big deal, obviously, but sorta weird, since Ch’p previously appeared in the title

(and was a member of the Super Pets team that appeared in last year’s Super Friends #19). I guess DC decided they’d rather used the living squirrel GL instead of the dead one?

Seems odd though, given the continuity-free world of Tiny Titans, where no character who died in the DCU comics is dead, where there are multiple Wonder Girls and Dick Grayson and Barbara Gordon are still Robin and Batgirl.

Plus, I think Baltazar’s Ch’p is much cuter than his B’dg, and isn’t that what’s really important?

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