Justice League International Year Four, Part I: The Extremist Vector (JLA #37 / JLE #13-21)

The fourth year of Justice League International largely avoids significant crossovers, except for the two-issue Furballs one right at the beginning, and a small thread that goes from JLA to JLE right at the end, so for it I'll first do a post that covers most of the year's JLE issues with a single JLA issue, then a post that covers most of the year's JLA issues with a single JLE issue.

from Justice League America Annual #4

"What's Black and White and Black and White and Bl—⁠" / Furballs, from Justice League America Annual #4 (1990) and Justice League America #37 & Justice League Europe #13 (Apr. 1990), reprinted in Justice League International Omnibus, Volume 2 (2020)
plot & breakdowns by Keith Giffen; scripts by J. M. DeMatteis; pencils by Mike McKone, Adam Hughes, and Chris Sprouse; inks by Bob Smith, Art Nichols (assists by Joe Rubinstein & Jack Torrance), and K. S. Wilson; letters by Bob Lappan and Albert De Guzman; colors by Gene D'Angelo

This sequence begins with JLA Annual #4, which very well may be the comic peak of JLI. In this issue, the Injustice League accidentally foils a robbery and ends up being branded heroes, so they decide to go legit and offer their services to Maxwell Lord. Much to everyone's consternation, Max decides to take them on—but makes them the JLI's Antarctic branch, where they can't cause any problems, and adds Gnort and the Scarlet Skier to the mix, to keep them out of trouble too. What results is hilarity, as the JLAnt soon comes under attack from the remnants of a mad scientist's experiment left in Antarctica, an army of penguins infused with killer piranha genes. I read this in bed while sick, and it cheered me up immensely; I was cackling over something on basically every page.

After this comes the two-part Furballs crossover, where a stray cat makes its way into the JLA embassy, defeating (among others) Guy Gardner; at the end, it escapes into the teleport tubes, making its way to the JLE embassy, where it causes still more issues... but ultimately ends up adopted by Power Girl. This is the kind of character-based irreverent comedy one comes to JLI for.

from DC Retroactive: Justice League America 1990s #1

"Apokolips No!", from DC Retroactive: Justice League America 1990s #1 (Oct. 2011), reprinted in Justice League International Omnibus, Volume 3 (2024)
plot & breakdowns by Keith Giffen, script by J. M. DeMatteis, art by Kevin Maguire, colors by Rosemary Cheetham, letters by Carlos M. Mangual

This is the last-ever JLI story by Giffen, DeMatteis, and Maguire, written as part of 2011's DC Retroactive event. I read it around this point, but it's chronologically unplacable. It must go before Furballs (JLA #37 and JLE #13) because Booster is still on the team, and he quits at the end of JLA #37, but it also must go after Furballs, because Power Girl has her cat. Also, at the time of JLA #37, Mister Miracle had been replaced by an android duplicate, but this is definitely the regular Mister Miracle. Additionally, it seems to precede JLA Annual #4, because its events set up the Injustice League becoming JLAnt... though in a totally different way to what we see in JLA Annual #4. I did toy with the idea that maybe it (along with JLA Annual #4) could happen during Furballs, but, no, that's not really possible.

I'm not mad about any of this; it was twenty years later, and the creative team's main objective was surely to provide an entertaining story with a classic line-up of characters and set-up, even if that set-up never quite existed at one moment in time. At that level, it succeeds perfectly: more comedy with the Injustice League is always worthwhile, everyone's reaction to Power Girl turning up with her cat is great. A great way for this great creative team to go out. (That said, it did bother me that in this story, Fire is skeptical about shopping and Ice loves it, the exact opposite of their characterizations in the original 1990s stories.)

from Justice League Europe #21

"Bialya Blues" / "You Oughtta Be in Pictures" / The Extremist Vector / "Rue Britannia" / "Blood, Sweat and Tabloids", from Justice League Europe Annual #1 (1990) and Justice League Europe #14-21 (May-Dec. 1990), reprinted in Justice League International Omnibus, Volume 2 (2020)
plot & breakdowns by Keith Giffen; scripts by J. M. DeMatteis and Gerard Jones; pencils by Linda Medley, Bart Sears, and Marshall Rogers; inks by Jose Marzan Jr., Pablo Marcos, Randy Elliott, Bob Smith, and Joe Rubinstein; letters by Albert De Guzman; colors by Gene D'Angelo

This run of JLE stories begins with an annual focused on a tussle with the Global Guardians, who are now operating out of Bialya, under (unbeknownst to most of them) the control of the Queen Bee); it also sees Gerard Jones take over as scripter of the title, a position he will continue in even once Keith Giffen departs as plotter. I liked the initial Global Guardians arc in JLE #1-6 (see item #3 below), but beyond that, it never quite works for me; I think fundamentally there are just too many Global Guardians, and I feel like every story with them piles on still more of them.

After this comes a fun story about the JLE (along with Fire and Ice) going to Cannes and encountering a guy whose power is to become real-life versions of movie characters; here, he almost accidentally becomes Godzilla. This leads, though, into probably the most serious JLE story of all, The Extemist Vector, where the Extremists, who destroyed the world the Silver Sorceress and Bluejay came from with nuclear weapons, make their way to the DC universe and attempt to do the same thing there. This is probably the low point of the JLE I've read so far (as the point I write this, I'm up to issue #31). It's not that I think JLI can't be serious, but the seriousness here seems largely independent of the characters; this story is five issues long but really tells us nothing about them as people. Compare the next JLA story after this (the one with Despero), which is also very serious, but manages to also have a lot of heart and character moments. Part of the problem is the Extremists themselves, who are harbingers of the worst sorts of 1990s "extreme" villains.

The next two issues bring some significant changes to the JLE; in #20, their Paris embassy is inadvertently destroyed, and in #21, they settle into the JLI's London location. I did not find #20 very funny, and it was quite obviously intended to be so; I do remember Gerard Jones doing some funny work later on in this title, but he hasn't really hit that here yet. I did enjoy the next issue more, which has some good bits like Captain Atom's sheer joy at learning he's been relieved of command of the JLE, and Power Girl's cat killing local dogs! I am a bit sad to lose the Paris setting, because it led to good cultural clash; thankfully, Giffen and Jones have the grumpy French police inspector who hates the JLE, Camus, dispatched to London along with them.

This is the fifth in a series of posts about Justice League International. The next covers issues #38-50 of JLA and #22 of JLE. Previous installments are listed below:

1. Justice League #1-6 / Justice League International #7-12 (May 1987–Apr. 1988)
2. Justice League International #13-21 (May 1988–Dec. 1988)
3. Justice League International #22-25 / Justice League America #26-30 / Justice League Europe #1-6 (Jan. 1989–Sept. 1989) 
4. Justice League America #31-36 / Justice League Europe #7-12 (Oct. 1989–Mar. 1990)

Faster than a DC Bullet: Project Gotham, Part XXXV: Batman: Dark Detective

Comic trade paperback, 136 pages
Published 2006 (contents: 2005)
Borrowed from the library
Read February 2016

Batman: Dark Detective

Writer: Steve Englehart
Penciller: Marshall Rogers
Inker: Terry Austin
Letterer: John Workman
Colorist: Chris Chuckry

Year Nineteen, November
I'm reading this because it's a sequel to Strange Apparitions, reuniting the all-star team of Steve Englehart, Marshall Rogers, and Terry Austin, and bringing back Silver St. Cloud, one of the great loves of Batman's life, now engaged to Senator Evan Gregory, now running for governor. Strange Apparitions wove a thread about Boss Thorne through its various issues; Dark Detective weaves in Gregory's bid for office, especially the Joker's declaration that he'll also be running. Meanwhile, Bruce's meeting with Silver rekindles old feelings, and Two-Face and the Scarecrow both put in appearances.

Word and image. WORD AND IMAGE!
from Batman: Dark Detective #4

Sometime when you get the band back together, they don't play as well: Dark Detective is not quite as grabbing as Strange Apparitions, but it's still very good. Rogers and Austin are still an unbeatable Batman art team, capturing the twisted gloom of Gotham in all its splendor. They're slightly let down by Chris Chuckry on colors, who makes Silver St. Cloud's hair white instead of, well, silver, which I found very distracting.

Faster than a DC Bullet: Project Gotham, Part XXV: Batman: Strange Apparitions

Quick note: read my review of Doctor Who: You Are the Doctor and other stories at Unreality SF. Today!

Comic trade paperback, 175 pages
Published 1999 (contents: 1977-78)
Borrowed from the library
Read November 2015

Batman: Strange Apparitions

Writers: Steve Englehart, Len Wein
Pencillers: Marshall Rogers, Walt Simonson
Inkers: Terry Austin, Al Milgrom, Dick Giordano
Original Colorists: Marshall Rogers, Jerry Serpe
Letterers: Ben Oda, Milton Snapinn, John Workman

Year Eight, November
All of the Batman stories I've read so far (in this project) have been "flashback" tales: they haven't been set in what was the current continuity at their time of publication, but rather have been set in some earlier period. Strange Apparitions marks a first for me, then, in that this is the first Batman story I've read that took place in the "present" when it was published. This is no flashback to the early days of Batman, but simply the next adventure of Batman.

Much has changed of late. The Caped Crusader is fundamentally solo again, as Dick Grayson is off attending Hudson University. He's grown up so fast! In addition, Bruce Wayne has moved from Stately Wayne Manor to the actual city of Gotham; he now resides in a penthouse on the top floor of the new Wayne Foundation tower, beneath which there is, of course, a cave, where he's relocated all his stuff. An secret elevator directly connects his penthouse to the cave. I like this change: if you imagine Gotham as a New York, it strains credulity to anyone who's ever driven anywhere near New York that Batman could effectively police the city from the location where his manor ought to be. I was surprised, though, to learn that the Wayne Foundation was not in the heart of the city, but rather past "the impressive rows of ancient brownstones" in "Gotham's humbler districts, where the Wayne Foundation towers above the lower, leaner skyline."

Strange Apparitions collects the full run of the creative team of Steve Englehart, Marshall Rogers, and Terry Austin on Detective Comics, which despite its significance, was a mere six issues long. It also collects, however, two issues Steve Englehart wrote but someone else drew, and two issues that Marshall Rogers drew, but someone else wrote. I was surprised to read in Englehart's introduction to the collection that while he and Walt Simonson worked from the "Marvel style" (the writer plots, then the artists draw, then the writer does dialogue) and he and Marshall Rogers worked "DC style" (the writer does a full script, the artists draw), and that Englehart actually wrote all six issues without even knowing who would draw them, because Steve Englehart and Marshall Rogers mesh perfectly. Englehart's writing and Rogers's illustrations support each other perfectly to create a moody, atmospheric, but ultimately fun story, whereas the first two issues drawn by the great Walt Simonson are just kinda there (though necessary for Englehart's eight-issue plot).

Strange Apparitions begins with a so-so story about a new Batman villain, one Doctor Phosphorous, a medical doctor who invests his money in a nuclear plant where disaster strikes: "Five million slivers of red-hot sand were driven through my body! But not--hee hee-- ordinary sand! No! Radioactive sand--blasted upward one level on the chemical scale!" I'm sure this is all very scientific. Doctor Phosphorous doesn't appear again, but the two issues do introduce a couple of important characters: Rupert Thorne, chairman of the City Council, and Silver St. Cloud, a socialite with whom Bruce Wayne quickly becomes sexually involved.

Scott McCloud would be proud of this use of the gutter.
Also, get your mind out of it.
from Detective Comics vol. 1 #472 (script by Steve Englehart, art by Marshall Rogers & Terry Austin)

Englehart's story is a tour through a sequence of Batman rogues in a way that I really enjoyed, bringing in one for an issue or two at a time, and then moving on to another one, without feeling contrived or pandering. With the wounds he sustained at the hand of Phosphorous not healing, Bruce Wayne checks himself into a clinic for Gotham elites renowned for its discretion-- only to discover that the clinic manager is actually Hugo Strange in disguise: Batman's very first supervillain opponent, from Batman and the Monster Men. Batman shouts, "Professor Hugo Strange! I thought you were dead!" and indeed, when we last saw Strange in Batman: Prey, he was quite clearly dead, his body having been impaled on a metal pole for several days before it was found. But Strange apparently wasn't really dead, just in Europe. Even though The Monster Men and Prey were written much later, these stories are all of a piece, Strange's obsession with Batman here leading him to actually take over Bruce Wayne's life. (Amazingly, at one point he wears a Batman mask over a Bruce Wayne mask.) The work of Englehart and Rogers is perfectly simpatico here: it's a moody, splashy, nightmarish tale with some great twists and turns. Dick Grayson guest stars to help Bruce reclaim his life, but then leaves for an issue of Teen Titans when Wonder Girl calls.

Everything continues from there. Having deduced Batman's identity, Strange wants to sell it to the highest bidder, but he decides Boss Thorne isn't worthy of it, prompting Thorne to have him killed. (No doubt he'll get better again.) While Strange's ghost heckles Thorne, the Penguin (having lost his bid) decides to carry out a scheme anyway. Batman puts him in jail, where his escape gadget is stolen by Deadshot, who escapes himself to get revenge on Batman for putting him away. Meanwhile, Bruce's romance with Silver has been turning into one of real emotion, and Silver works out that Bruce is Batman-- and when his fight with Deadshot ends up in her place of work (Silver runs a convention center), Batman realizes she knows! Then the Joker turns up with a wacky but deadly plan, and so on. Meanwhile meanwhile, Boss Thorne is trying to eliminate the Batman while being haunted.

Sound effects never looked so good.
from Detective Comics vol. 1 #473 (script by Steve Englehart, art by Marshall Rogers & Terry Austin)

Englehart and Rogers have a handle on each and every one of these villains, not to mention Batman himself, who is clearly a man as much as he is an unstoppable force of the night. The story is moody without being grim in a way that hits the exact tone I want out of a Batman tale: darkly fun.

The book wraps up with a two-issue Clayface story written by Len Wein (in a surprising display of fan pedantry, it is actually titled "The Coming of... Clayface III!", making a fan's numerical bookkeeping part of the actual narrative), that follows on from the events of Englehart's run. I've read and liked other stuff by Wein, but it pales in comparisons to Englehart's work; suddenly Batman is melodramatically shouting his feelings at everyone: "Blast it--it's all going sour!! [...] Alfred, things couldn't be more wrong! I let two punks I tangled with tonight get to me--and that's a luxury I cannot afford!" Still, it comes to a suitably tragic conclusion, and I also noted that the trick Prey pulled with Strange's manikin lover was actually first used here with Clayface III.

On the whole, this is one of the best stories I've read so far on this project, and probably one of the best Batman books I've read full stop. Englehart and Rogers perfectly balance ongoing plots with standalone stories, and character insight with fun adventures in darkness.

Next Week: Out with the old Robin, in with the new Robin, in Second Chances!