Posted by Darren in Comics
No, not THAT Death Star, another one.
With this story we get a bit of a tonal shift in our JLA/JSA cross-overs. Veteran author Gardner Fox has been replaced by up and coming Denny O’Neil and with Mr. O’Neil comes a bit more realism in his comics and a bit more pathos.
We open in the cosmos where the Council of Living Stars is passing judgment on the star Aquarius, who is apparently guilty of crimes that we are not informed of, but the council decides to rob Aquarius of all his powers except for those that sustain his life force. This now ex-cosmic force is sent fading to Earth where we pick up our story with our heroes.
ROLL CALL: JLA: Batman, Green Lantern, Atom, Hawkman, Superman. JSA: Red Tornado, Starman, Black Canary, Doctor Fate, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern, Doctor Mid-Nite, and Superman
Red Tornado has appeared in the JLA headquarters to inform them of a dire threat to the universe and the Justice League insists that he tells the tale to them.
The scene fades over to Earth-2 where the Starman has detected the matter floating to Earth that was once the powerful star Aquarius. Starman attempts to apprehend the strange creature, but winds up being caught himself More >
Posted by Darren in Comics
Good question T.O. Morrow, but let us not count our chickens before they have hatched, eh?
Lets remember that last issue T.O. Morrow basically pwned the Justice Society of America and left them all for dead and then discovered that in order to succeed in his evil plans he had to eliminate the Justice League as well. All caught up now? Good. Lets go.
So the Justice League is having a meeting in their Mountain Cave headquarters and the entire membership is there: Superman, Batman, Flash, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern, Aquaman, Hawkman, Green Arrow, Snapper Carr, and the Atom. Down below the main meeting room is the Souvenir Room where we see five of the Leaguers significant others waiting to surprise their lovers: Steve Trevor, Jean Loring, Hawkgirl, Midge (Snapper Carr’s Girlfriend), and Mera. During the meeting the five lovers burst into the room and plant the “kiss of death” on their targets: Wonder Woman, the Atom, Hawkman, Snapper Carr, and Aquaman. The Justice Leaguers attacked fall to the ground lifeless and their lovers turn into dust.
It is at this point that the Justice League receives a challenge to go fight some beasts that are coming to the planet now. In typical More >
Posted by Darren in Crisis
And here we are again folks at another moment between worlds in which a Crisis is occurring.
We open our story with Hawkman of Earth-One is going after a truck of criminals that have stolen a priceless load of furs. Yes, this happens Pre-PETA concerns in our modern world. As Hawkman closes in on the villains a fog takes over and not even Hawkman’s telescopic vision can see through the dense cloud. When Hawkman gets closer to the vehicle it has changed from a delivery truck to an armored truck that begins to fire upon him. Confused by the change but undaunted by the bullets, Hawkman takes out the robbing crew.
At the same relative time and the same relative place, The Sandman of Earth-Two is pursuing an armored truck. Using his trademark sand tricks, Sandman takes out the fur thieves, but is wondering what happened to the armored truck that he was chasing.
Doctor Mid-Nite has a similar experience in which he begins to take out some thugs on Earth-Two and while the good doctor employs some really cool medical techniques against them just as he is wrapping things up he begins to spin uncontrollably and finds himself the prisoner of The Flash on Earth-One. The two heroes More >
Posted by Darren in Comics
Notice anything “odd” about the “Justice League” on the cover above?
No?
Well let me help you out.
First off, that’s NOT the Justice League, that’s the Lawless League.
Let’s recap from last time.
On Earth-Two, a Johnny Thunder and his magical Thunderbolt had a disagreement, but Johnny still controls the genie like Thunderbolt and commanded Thunderbolt to take him to Earth-One to meet his counterpart. What Johnny and the Thunderbolt had not counted on was that the Johnny Thunderbolt of Earth-One was an evil counterpart and E-1 JT knocked out E-2 JT and took over control of the magical Thunderbolt.
When the Earth-One Flash, Barry Allen foils a plot of Johnny Thunder, JT of E1 gets the idea to have the Thunderbolt go back in time and prevent the Justice League from coming into being, which he does. No Justice League, then Johnny Thunder is able to plunder with absolutely no obstacles in his path.
The JSA are waiting on Johnny Thunder at their headquarters meeting on Earth-Two and when he does not show on time, the JSA investigate through Dr. Fate’s mystic powers and discover what has occurred prior. They go to Earth-1 disguised as the now missing members of the Justice League of America. The Thunderbolt reveals the JSA’s plan to the More >
Posted by Darren in Comics
As the Justice League remains helpless on Earth-Three the JSA begin to plot how they will repel the Crime Syndicate’s invasion of Earth-Two, when the Earth-Three villains transport into the JSA headquarters via the globe Doctor Fate used to view where the JLA are being held captive.
Remembering the JLA’s warning to the JSA that they should not let the Crime Synidcate touch them and say their magic word of “Volthoom!” the JSAers are forced to find ways to defeat the villains in unique ways.
Johnny Quick uses his speed on Hawkman to get the winged wonder to get back down to Earth. As Hawkman resists, he decides to instead fly full force and knock Johnny Quick out with a massive punch. Unable to say the word, Hawkman believes he has won this battle.
Doctor Fate defeats Power Ring with the animals of the zodiac while Dr. Mid-Nite uses his blackout bombs and a bit of brain power to finish his battle with Owlman.
Black Canary is able to use one of her “freeze pellets” in her cameo (yeah cuz its really got room for a whole bunch of crime fighting equipment up in there), and put that down Superwoman’s throat, causing her vocal cords to “freeze up” so Superwoman cannot say “Volthoom!” Black More >
Posted by Darren in Comics
It is that time again when the Justice League of America title is home to another earth-shattering Crisis tale.
This time the tale introduces another Earth and another group of analogues to our mainstay characters.
Earth-One
Earth-Two
Earth-Three
Superman
Superman
Ultraman
Wonder Woman
Wonder Woman
Superwoman
Batman
Batman
Owlman
Flash
Flash
Johnny Quick
Green Lantern
Green Lantern
Power Ring
Before we get into the meet of the story, let us make sure we understand a few things.
Analogues are those characters that are duplicates of another character in another Earth or Dimension. They share enough traits that they may seem identical or similar to another character.
Superman of Earth-1 and Earth-2 are both depowered by Kryptonite while Ultraman of Earth-3 is powered up when he is exposed to Kryptonite.
Wonder Woman of Earth-1 and Earth-2 are both wielders of amazing amazonian strength, so is Superwoman, but her name has changed. In addition Superwoman carries a lasso with powers completely different than Wonder Woman’s.
Batman of Earth-1 and Earth-2 are both very similar, as is Owlman. The main difference is the symbol that each chose in order to don their costumed persona, instead of a bat flying through a window, it was an owl.
Flash of Earth-1 and Earth-2 have similar powers but dissimilar costumes. Johnny Quick of Earth-3 has a costume similar More >
Posted by Darren in Comics
There is perhaps no word more evocative of the DC Universe experience than “Crisis”.
Crisis as defined by Dictionary.com is as follows
cri·sis
[krahy-sis] noun, plural -ses [-seez] adjective, noun
1. a stage in a sequence of events at which the trend of all future events, especially for better or for worse, is determined; turning point.
2. a condition of instability or danger, as in social, economic,political, or
international affairs, leading to a decisive change.
3. a dramatic emotional or circumstantial upheaval in a person’slife.
4. Medicine/Medical .
a. the point in the course of a serious disease at which a decisive change occurs, leading either to recovery or todeath.
b. the change itself.
5.the point in a play or story at which hostile elements are most tensely opposed to each other.
In the DC Universe, the word Crisis is reserved for a specific type of story that is going to change the status quo. As with serialized fiction, like soap operas, literary series or movie franchises, it is sometimes rare that anything will happen of significance to the main characters. This is especially true of comic book characters. While actors on soap operas may leave and be replaced by another actor, or tv.movie franchises replacing their leads like with James Bond or Doctor Who, with comics the characters have a look and they never seem to change.
Sure for a lark, you may see a new costume on a character, or the character might move to a new city or a new focus for the series may occur, but these usually come and go with a change in writer, artist, or editor on the book in question.
The Crisis stories start off rather tame and then go off into more intense tales as they move forward.
The great majority of the Crisis stories comes from More >
Posted by Darren in Comics
In the history of the Justice League of America, since issue #21, the JLA has teamed up with the JSA for a team-up which would usually involve a “Crisis” (there’s that word again) and that Crisis would frequently involve one world’s issues bleeding into another.
However, DC also has a practical problem, one that plagues them today as well. Characters from the Golden Age of Heroism are still wandering around in your 1984 comics as if they are still 40 years old. Even if the original Flash or Green Lantern was 18 when they started their careers as heroes earlier in 1941, that would mean that they were born in 1923. It is now 1984. These characters are now 61 years old and still are functioning as heroes, which is fine on Earth-Two.
They had another problem too, only Wonder Woman was a popular female character and due to story reasons she has exited the Justice League. The League had become a “boys only” club, and there were no good female candidates to take Wonder Woman’s place who did not already duplicate other characters like Supergirl or Batgirl.
There was this ONE character though from the 1940s, the Black Canary, a beautiful judo expert who might fit in More >
Heading back to Earth-Two for our next set of heroes, but as is the case in most of these situations we have to take 2 steps back to take a step forward and these steps back include two new members of the All-Star Squadron we haven’t discussed previously.
Say hello to Will Everett, Amazing-Man. Will was an Olympic athlete who competed in Berlin and showed up the Third Reich. His athletic fame faded quickly once he returned to still segregated America. Will wound up taking menial jobs and was working as a janitor when he was caught in an explosion that gave him his ability to touch matter and absorb the properties of that material. He would touch cement and become living cement, touch a wedding ring and he becomes gold, touch a tire and he gains the properties of galvanized rubber and so on.
When the All-Star Squadron confronts Will, he is working as a henchman for a villain called the Ultra-Humanite. Eventually, Will’s better nature took over and he betrayed the Ultra-Humanite and joined the All-Star Squadron.
Will becomes our first African-American hero in terms of history so much that future tales would show that Will would go on and become a strong supporter of the More >
It’s an ordinary day for the JLA and the JSA in 1982 as each group preps to enjoy their annual get together which is typically set for Thanksgiving. When you know nothing has gone wrong yet, that other shoe is about to fall.
The other shoe is time travel. So far we’ve dealt with stories that are fairly lineal with only the Legion of Super-Heroes going to Smallville to pick up Superboy and go to the 30th Century and back. Consider those your training wheel for time travel that I am now forced to take off the bike to see if you can keep your bike out of the ditch.
As our heroes (Aquaman, Firestorm, Hawkman, Superman, and Zatanna) await their guests the Justice Society of America, the Justice Society on Earth-Two (Doctor Fate, Green Lantern, Huntress, Power Girl, and Starman) enter the Transmatter Cube which transports people from one Earth to another. Unfortunately deviltry is afoot! Instead of the JSA, the Crime Syndicate appears and makes quick work of the JLA. The Crime Syndicate then leave the JLA’s satellite for Earth-One to start to take over this planet, and they do not seem to fond of a gentleman named Per Degaton.
The JSA members meanwhile have materialized in 1982, but not More >
