Science's Less Accurate Grandmother: The Stories between the Stories: JSA Classified

30 January 2023

The Stories between the Stories: JSA Classified

In 2005, the Justice Society reached a new milestone: two ongoing series at once. JSA Classified lasted thirty-nine issues, from Sept. 2005 to Aug. 2008, which means it overlapped with both JSA (which ended Sept. 2006) and Justice Society of America vol. 3 (which began Feb. 2007).

Those other ongoings were clearly the "main" ones. JSA Classified featured rotating creative teams on shorter stories that focused on one or two or occasionally a couple more JSA members at a time. There are two four-part stories; the rest are usually two- or three-parters, with the occasional one-off. No writer or artist works on more than one storyline, with the exception of Alex Sanchez (who illustrates two stories for a total of five issues) and Jimmy Palmiotti (who inks two stories for a total of eight issues, making him the series's most prolific contributor).

Very little of the series has been collected. Issues #1-4, a Power Girl story by Geoff Johns and Amanda Conner, have been collected a few times; I previously read them in The Sequential Art of Amanda Conner. #5-9 were collected as Honor Among Thieves, the only JSA Classified–branded trade. A couple more issues have been chucked into collections here and there: #21-22, by Walter Simonson, were included in Hawkgirl: Hawkman Returns and #25 and 32-33 were part of JSA Presents Green Lantern. Rather than track down the floppies, I decided to read the whole series on DC Universe Infinite, except I skipped the issues in JSA Presents Green Lantern, since I had just read that trade.

As you might expect for an anthology series, some stories are better than others. I'm not going to go blow by blow, but I will give you some highlights.

When I first read Power Trip (#1-4, by Geoff Johns, Amanda Conner, and Jimmy Palmiotti), I didn't like it; rereading it made it even worse. It's a story focused on continuity with nothing to say about character... except it doesn't even really say anything about continuity, either, as the story is just a series of fakeouts about things that are not Power Girl's origin. Amanda Conner's art is brilliant, though, and it made me decide to incorporate her Power Girl ongoing into this project.

On the other hand, I was pleasantly surprised by Honor Among Thieves (#5-7, by Jen Van Meter, Patrick Olliffe, et al.). This is about the Injustice Society planning a heist in JSA headquarters, and I have found most modern takes on the Injustice Society, from Roy Thomas on, gratuitously violent. But Jen Van Meter produces a charming story about underdogs who have to work together to do something that's, well, if not the right thing, not the worst thing either. I liked it a lot, and I'm excited to see that Van Meter returns to some of these characters in a backup she writes for Justice Society vol. 3.

Another villain-focused story did have the problems of gratuitous violence: "The Fall & Rise of Vandal Savage" (#10-13, by Stuart Moore, Paul Gulacy, and Jimmy Palmiotti) just went on and on and on, and had little of interest. Similarly, I didn't like the two Doctor Mid-Nite stories, "Skin Trade" (#19-20, by Scott Beatty, Rags Morales, and Michael Bair) and "Nightfall" (#23-24, by J. T. Krul, Alex Sanchez, and Jack Purcell). Both had lots of squicky stuff. Worse, "Skin Trade" mutilates some minor characters from other series just to prove the situation is serious, one of my least favorite superhero tropes. (On the other hand, it did pick up an interesting loose end from Ultra-Humanite's backstory.)

But when the series is great, it's really great. One thing I didn't like about Geoff Johns's JSA run is that the actual people of the JSA often seemed lost in the way the series lurched from massive event to massive event. Here, we get a lot of nice character-focused stories about the people who make the world's first superhero team also its best. I am not a Scott McDaniel fan, nor a Bane one, so I was pleasantly surprised by "The Venom Connection" (#17-18, by Tony Bedard, Scott McDaniel, and Andy Owens), where Bane comes to Hourman and his son Hourman, seeking help with Venom... which it turns out might be related to the drug that gives them their powers, Miraclo. It's a great focus on the younger Hourman, Rick Tyler, and also Bane himself, with some good (if comic-book-level) discussion of addiction.

I often feel like Wildcat gets a bit flanderized: ooh, he talks funny and he gives Power Girl crap and he drinks beer. So again, I was pleasantly surprised when I ended up enjoying all three of JSA Classified's Wildcat stories: "Fight Game" (#26-27, by Frank Tieri, Jerome Moore, et al.), "Forward through the Past" (#35-37, by B. Clay Moore and Ramon Perez), and "Body and Soul" (#38-39, by Mike W. Barr and Shawn Martinbrough). Each story does a good job focusing on his history, and tying into his interest in wrestling without making it contrived. He uproots a gambling ring, takes on criminals using his old gyms in Gotham, and stops people from stealing the mental patterns of retired wrestlers. Each story is solid, but I particularly enjoyed "Forward through the Past," which has some great character-focused writing and, especially, great art. I don't know that I've ever really registered either B. Clay Moore or Ramon Perez before, but I will look out for more by them. Their depiction of the relationship between Wildcat and Catwoman intrigued me, so now I plan to circle back and read a couple stories about that as well.

The only other stories I found particularly bad were the Justice League Detroit one, "Double or Nothing" (#14-16, by Steve Englehart, Tom Derenick, et al.), and the Mr. Terrific one, "Mr. Horrific" (#29-31, by Arvid Nelson and Alex Sanchez). The former was confusing and poorly explained—and also I'm totally over stories where villains force heroes to fight each other for gambling purposes. Maybe I'll like it more when I reread it in the Justice League Detroit omnibus? But I kind of doubt it. "Mr. Horrific" was just awful: nonsensical leaps in the writing, ugly impenetrable artwork.

Beyond that, you have a number of solid, enjoyable stories. If I have an overall complaint, it's that I wish we'd seen more JSA members. Some more focus on the younger members would have been good; Stargirl's only story was the terrible "Double or Nothing," and Jakeem Thunder just gets a one-parter (#28, by Fabian Nicieza and Steve Uy). Or, it would be nice to open the series up some more so it's not so focused on the present-day JSA: give me a good Atom story, or a good World War II–era one, or whatever.

But on the whole I liked it a lot, more than I expected. I kind of though it was a series to burn off bad fill-ins by mediocre creative teams, but it was nothing like that at all. To be honest, I wish the regular JSA series had been more like this: nothing overdramatic, just good character-focused stories drawing on these people's long histories.

This post is thirty-ninth in a series about the Justice Society and Earth-Two. The next installment covers JSA: Ragnarok. Previous installments are listed below:

All Star Comics: Only Legends Live Forever (1976-79)

The Huntress: Origins (1977-82)

All-Star Squadron (1981-87)

Infinity, Inc.: The Generations Saga, Volume One (1983-84)

Infinity, Inc.: The Generations Saga, Volume Two (1984-85)

Showcase Presents... Power Girl (1978)

America vs. the Justice Society (1985)

Jonni Thunder, a.k.a. Thunderbolt (1985)

Crisis on Multiple Earths, Volume 7 (1983-85)

Infinity, Inc. #11-53 (1985-88) [reading order]

Last Days of the Justice Society of America (1986-88)

All-Star Comics 80-Page Giant (1999)