DC’s Young Animal is a pop-up imprint launched in 2016 in collaboration with Gerard Way, musician and writer of the Umbrella Academy with the purpose of relaunching characters with a more experimental approach. It gives us four ongoing series: Doom Patrol, Shade the Changing Girl, Cave Carson Has a Cybernetic Eye, and Mother Panic.
In the middle of 2018, those four titles entered in collision with the mainstream DC Universe thanks to the Milk Wars event, a crossover with the Justice League, when the inter-dimensional corporation Retconn hijacked the DC Continuity with the goal to make the whole DC Universe more wholesome.
What to read before Milk Wars?
There is no pre-requisite reading for the Justice League, as the story has no connection with what was happening at the time for our heroes. For them, it doesn’t occupy a particular place in the timeline. That’s not the case for the Young Animals’ characters. The Milk Wars event takes place after volume 2 of each title — Doom Patrol’s story leads directly into the event.
With that said, it is a self-contained event supposedly new reader-friendly. Will it be confusing? Probably, but chances are it’ll still be even with prior reading due to the nature of the story itself.
- Doom Patrol Vol. 2: NadaDoom Patrol Vol. 2: Nada
Collects Doom Patrol Vol. 6 #7-12 - Mother Panic Vol. 2: Under Her Skin
Collects Mother Panic #7-12 - Shade, the Changing Girl Volume 2: Little Runaway
Collects Shade, the Changing Girl #7-13 - Cave Carson Has a Cybernetic Eye Vol. 2: Every Me, Every You
Collects Cave Carson Has a Cybernetic Eye #7-12
Milk Wars Reading Order: Collected Edition
This is a small crossover and all the issues concerned have been collected in one trade paperback.
- DC/Young Animal: Milk Wars
Collects JLA/Doom Patrol Special #1, Mother Panic/Batman Special #1, Shade, The Changing Girl/Wonder Woman Special #1, Cave Carson Has A Cybernetic Eye/Swamp Thing Special #1 And Doom Patrol/JLA Special #1.
Milk Wars Reading Order: Issue by Issue
- JLA/Doom Patrol Special #1
- Mother Panic/Batman Special #1
- Shade, the Changing Girl/Wonder Woman Special #1
- Cave Carson Has a Cybernetic Eye/Swamp Thing Special #1
- Doom Patrol/JLA Special #1
What to read after Milk Wars?
Without surprise, the Justice League is unaffected by this crossover. But, as small as Milk Wars was, the event was used to relaunch three of the Young Animals titles — Shade the Changing Woman, Cave Carson Has an Interstellar Eye, and Mother Panic: Gotham A.D. — and simply launched the new title Eternity Girl. All those titles ran for six issues.
Last Updated on July 22, 2022.