"Maybe you were too tough for the JUSTICE SOCIETY... but, mister, now you've got to fight the SUPER SQUAD!": JSA All-Stars

During Justice Society of America vol. 3 (see item #44 below), a particularly stupid subplot saw the JSA breaking up into two distinct teams: the original JSA relocated to Happy Harbor to keep doing their thing, while a group of offshoots led by Power Girl but instigated by Magog formed the "All-Stars," which were supposed to be proactive and militaristic. The result was an eighteen-issue spin-off series called JSA All-Stars published from 2010 to 2011,* written by Lilah Sturges (then known as Matthew) and mostly illustrated by Freddie Williams II. (Flashpoint and the New 52 would kill it off.)

Like... why? If the twenty-first century JSA has worked at all, it's worked when it's been about the team's long history, its "legacy." The All-Stars undermine this by siphoning the legacy characters away from the original ones; the team mostly consists of younger heroes like Power Girl, Hourman, Cyclone, King Chimera, Wildcat II, Damage, and Stargirl. These characters are mostly interesting when contrasted against the older heroes. On top of that, the whole instigating incident is quickly rendered pointless when in Justice Society of America Annual vol. 3 #2, set between issues #3 and 4 of JSA All-Stars, Magog leaves the team! Thus the new proactive, militaristic JSA groups loses the person who makes them proactive and militaristic. So why did they split exactly? (Power Girl herself actually lampshades this with a conversation in the Power Trip collection.)

Once you move beyond that supposedly-unique-but-pointless team set-up... there's not much to this. There are three big story arcs, plus a couple smaller stories, and all of them left me cold. A lot of "big" action—gods returning, people jumping timelines, journeys into other dimensions—but nothing that ever seems clever or interesting, nothing that elevates the title above fairly generic superhero punch-ups. There are good characters on this team... but who is Stargirl when she's not part of the real JSA? Who is the Rick Tyler Hourman away from his wife? (More on him later.) This overlaps with Amanda Conner's Power Girl, and the character here has basically nothing to do with the character there other than costume. At one point a sorceress joins the team, and no one ever even bothers to explain who she is or where she is from. (I think Victorian England? Would have been nice to know.)

The one good issue is probably the Blackest Night epilogue, where everyone mourns the death of Damage. Unfortunately, it makes you realize more was done with him in one issue after he died than in six issues where he was alive.

Freddie Williams is a competent artist, and I seem to remember enjoying other work by him, but nothing from this title sticks out positively in my memory. There is a funny bit where a villain is using what is clearly the TARDIS console and control room from Doctor Who... and Williams (coincidentally, one assumes) draws the villain looking like Jodie Whittaker!

from JSA All-Stars vol. 2 #9
(script by Jen Van Meter, art by Travis Moore & Dan Green)

The one thing that does kind of work is the Liberty Belle and Hourman back-up, The Inheritance. Set before the team split up, this covers the adventures of the married couple as they travel around the world to track down a powerful artifact, competing against but sometimes working with Icicle and Tigress. It appears in ten-page installments from issues #2 to #11. It's kind of hard to follow at times—one has the feeling no one involved knows how to tell a story in ten-page chunks—but it's fun. I like Jen Van Meter's work on JSA Classified a lot, and it's good to see her writing these two villains again, and she does great by the superpowered power couple as well. Travis Moore acquits himself well on pencils, and it's always great to see the dependable Dan Green on inks. I don't know if these were collected, but it probably would have made a nice 100-page collection (maybe throw in the Liberty Belle/Hourman stories from the Justice Society of America 80-Page Giants), but I suspect no one other than me would buy it, alas.

This post is forty-eighth in an almost concluded series about the Justice Society and Earth-Two. The next installment covers Justice Society of America: A Celebration of 75 Years. Previous installments are listed below:

Black Panther: A Hero No More! by Peter B. Gillis, Denys Cowan, Sam DeLaRosa, et al.

from The Invincible Iron Man Annual vol. 1 #5

After the cancellation of Black Panther vol. 1, Black Panther popped up here and there across the Marvel universe. One of those places was "War and Remembrance!", an issue of Iron Man where Iron Man/Tony Stark comes to Wakanda to set up some kind of tech deal, but at the same time who should return but... Killmonger! Keen to begin his takeover all over again, he defeats T'Challa and takes over the country, but of course we soon learn he killed only a convenient Life Model Decoy. Then at the end we learn that Iron Man foe the Mandarin was somehow responsible for Killmonger's resurrection.

It's nice to see McGregor's run back in play after it was ignored during Kirby's, but this story is just fine. Like, it is not bad but I am not sure it has much going for it either. It is much more a Black Panther story than an Iron Man one, though, so I can see why it was included in one of the Black Panther collections I was able to access on Hoopla.

Black Panther finally got his own title again in 1988, nine years after the cancellation of Black Panther vol. 1. (In my post title here, I've called it "A Hero No More!" after a blurb on the cover of issue #1, but it has no official title as far as I can tell.) This was a four-issue miniseries, bringing in real social issues: a rebellion against apartheid is brewing in the fictional country of Azania, and many Azanians think their neighbors in Wakanda should aid them—and many Wakandans agree. But T'Challa does not, which leads to a challenge to his right to rule Wakanda, and then he is attacked by a group of white supremacist superheroes from Azania... and the panther-god himself!

from Black Panther vol. 2 #4

It's a bit all over the place, and some of it works and some of it does not. I like the art of Denys Cowan and Sam DeLaRosa, though I don't really get the wisdom of giving Black Panther cat eyes in and out of costume. They do a great job with the fight scenes, particularly the showdown with the panther-god, and it's neat to see T'Challa tested in such a way.

On the other hand, seeing his right to rule challenged is not so interesting; so far, we've had Killmonger's attempted takeover in Jungle Action, T'Challa's half-brother's military coup in Black Panther vol. 1, Killmonger's seeming assassination in "War and Remembrance!", and now this. That's four time across five runs on the character! It's a natural enough well to go to when your protagonist is the ruler of a country, but if everyone goes to that well, it makes that ruler seem a pretty ineffective one.

from Black Panther vol. 2 #2

The Supremacists are a bit dopey. Which, I guess is the point, they are white supremacists, but I think the story wants me to take them seriously as opponents for the Black Panther. On the other hand, embroiling T'Challa in real-seeming politics worked well in Jungle Action, and it's decent-enough ground here, and the ending worked pretty well, as real change comes to Azania.

Again, the politics of Wakanda here don't benefit from the fact that nothing seems to carry over from previous runs on the character: no one from McGregor or Kirby appears here as far as I can tell.

"War and Remembrance!" originally appeared in issue #5 of The Invincible Iron Man Annual vol. 1 (Nov. 1982). The story was scripted and co-plotted by Peter Gillis, co-plotted by Ralph Macchio, pencilled by Jerry Bingham, inked by Dan Green, lettered by Diana Albers, colored by Beth Firmin, and edited by Mark Gruenwald. It was reprinted in Marvel-Verse: Black Panther (2020), which was edited by Jennifer Grünwald.

Black Panther vol. 2 originally appeared in four issues (July-Oct. 1988). The story was written by Peter B. Gillis, pencilled by Denys Cowan, inked by Sam DeLaRosa, lettered by Rick Parker, colored by Bob Sharen (#1-3) and "Max" Scheele (#4), and edited by Mark Gruenwald. 

ACCESS AN INDEX OF ALL POSTS IN THIS SERIES HERE

Review: Legion of Super-Heroes: Hostile World by Paul Levitz, Francis Portela, Walter Simonson, et al.

Comic trade paperback, n.pag.
Published 2012 (contents: 2011-12) 
Acquired August 2015
Read May 2016

Legion of Super-Heroes, Volume 1: Hostile World

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Writer: Paul Levitz
Co-Plotter: Walter Simonson

Artist: Francis Portela
Penciller: Walter Simonson
Inkers: Dan Green, Sean Parsons
Colorist: Javier Mena
Letterers: Pat Brosseau, Travis Lanham

This is the first proper volume of the "deboot" Legion I've read-- by "proper," I mean stories that don't cross the Legion over with present-day DC characters, like in Superman and the Legion or Legion of 3 Worlds. It's confusing. It's dull. It's terrible. Levitz throws tons of characters at you, but gives you no reason to care about any of them. I've been reading the Legion for years now, and I don't give a shit about these people. How on Earth is a new reader supposed to? The extent to which the deboot Legion deviates from the core premise of the Legion is staggeringly misguided. Like, it's supposed to br about teenagers in the future, yet in this version they're all adults. What's going on? Who thought this was a good idea? I don't care for Francis Portela's stiff and posed artwork, but not even an issue drawn by Walt Simonson can get me involved. Is the deboot Legion a lost cause from its very inception?

Next Week: We warp back around to the beginning... or pretty close to it, anyway, with Legion of Super-Heroes Archives, Volume 3!

Faster than a DC Bullet: All-New All-Different DC, Part XIV: The All New Atom: The Hunt For Ray Palmer!

Comic trade paperback, 126 pages
Published 2008 (contents: 2007)
Borrowed from the library
Read April 2017

The All New Atom: The Hunt For Ray Palmer!

Writer: Gail Simone

Penciller: Mike Norton
Inkers: Dan Green, Trevor Scott
Letterers: Pat Brosseau, Travis Lanham, John J. Hill
Colorist: Alex Bleyaert
Bonus story writer: Roger Stern

This volume isn't great, but it's finally beginning to feel like Gail Simone and her artistic collaborators are getting a hold on the premise and character of The All New Atom. In this volume, Ryan Choi is recruited to find his predecessor, first by one of Ray Palmer's enemies, and then by the Challengers from Beyond from Countdown to Final Crisis. The inventive, fanciful ideas are in full force, as Ryan encounters a race of tiny aliens, half of whom consider the Atom a god and half a demon, then travels into a simulation of the afterlife where he meets the Ted Kord Blue Beetle, then helps prevent a giant monster attack on Ivy Town, then stops an evil alien using 1960s music to control the town.

But I can't help feeling that though this book has good jokes (the Ray Palmer impersonator in the tiny village is great), it's completely unfocused and not in a good way. Like, the whole fake afterlife thing is largely tossed off and irrelevant, even if it does give us Ryan kicking a jetpack-wearing Hitler in the face:

Related to this: Ryan declares that reality itself has jumped the shark.
from The All New Atom #14 (script by Gail Simone, art by Mike Norton & Trevor Scott)

I mean, one issue ends with the Challengers finding a message written in blood from Ray Palmer: