Rick Burchett

Access a version of the below that includes illustrations on my blog.

Justice Society of America vol. 1 was an eight-issue miniseries consisting of Vengeance from the Stars!, a story set during the Golden Age. Just this year, in a bit of fortuitous timing for me, it was collected in a nice hardcover edition under the title The Demise of Justice, along with two extra stories, both "final" adventures for the JSA: their last Golden Age appearance from 1951's All Star Comics #57 and the retconned story of their disbanding from 1979's Adventure Comics #466. Justice Society #8 actually sets up Adventure #466, and Adventure #466 mentions All Star #57, so the whole thing reads pretty well. (The book also contains a foreword by Mark Waid, where he gives exposition on ten JSA members... six of whom do not actually appear in the main story... but doesn't give any background on one who does... the woman one... hmmmm...)

Vengeance from the Stars! is a great little story, using its somewhat broader canvas to good effect. The first four issues focus on, in turn, the Flash, Black Canary, Green Lantern, and Hawkman, each reacting to a crisis as America's power grid is dismantled by a shadowy figure, and as they come under attack by living constellations. Then #5 is a Flash and Hawkman team-up, #6 is a Black Canary and Green Lantern team-up, and #7-8 bring together all four characters along with Starman. It's a really pleasing structure, ensuring that each JSA member gets some great moments in the spotlight, and also giving you the fun of them teaming up together; it feels triumphant when all five of them come together at the end because the anticipation has been building for six issues.

I didn't think I'd ever read anything by Len Strazewski before (I just checked, and it looks like only his Phantom Lady feature in Action Comics Weekly), but this shows him to be a solid, un-pretentious writer. The story takes the sensibilities of the Golden Age JSA and updates them without losing what made them charming to begin with. There are a lot of fight scenes, which in the hands of a lesser writer would annoy me, but each issue's fight is distinct, and there's a lot of focus on how each member of the JSA thinks their way out of the problem using their unique abilities. The eight issues give each encounter space to breathe. There are a lot of nice touches here, like Hawkman's Native American archaeologist friend or the way Solomon Grundy is woven into the story. Strazewski has a great handle on Black Canary, who's my favorite of the five characters spotlighted here.

I was a bit worried by the fact that the eight issues feature four different pencillers and three different inkers, but there are no hasty fill-ins here. Each artist does a great job of capturing character and action, and the style is the late 1980s/early 1990s, pre-computer coloring one that is my favorite. If all comics looked like this I wouldn't complain!

After this, Strazewksi, along with Parobeck (who pencilled #3 and 5), put out a short-lived Justice Society ongoing, and on the basis of this, I am looking forward to reading it. It did strike me that I don't think there are any references to any post-Crisis retcons; this could be set on pre-Crisis Earth-Two without any issues.

The bonus issues are nice. All Star #57 is dumb, of course, like most Golden Age JSA stories, but I appreciate its inclusion. The JSA put on a detective exhibition (!?) featuring the world's four greatest detectives; a villain kidnaps them right from under the JSA's noses, and so the JSA has to substitute for them back in their home countries. Adventure #466 has a frame set in the then-present featuring Huntress and Power Girl; I skipped the frame (I had read it before, in Only Legends Live Forever) so that I was immersed in the 1950s for my reading experience.

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