By Gerry Conway, Paul Levitz, Ric Estrada, Wally Wood, Keith Giffen, Joe Staton & various (DC Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-7795-0071-7 (HB)
In the torrid and turbulent 1970s many of the comics industry’s oldest publishing ideas were finally laid to rest. The belief that characters could be “over-exposed†was one of the most pernicious and long-lasting (although it never hurt Superman, Batman or the original Captain Marvel), garnered from years of experience in an industry which lived or died on that fractional portion of pennies derived each month from the pocket-money and allowances of children which wasn’t spent on candy, toys or movies.
By the end of the 1960s, comic book costs and retail prices were inexorably rising and a proportion of titles – especially the newly revived horror stories – were consciously being produced for older readerships. Nearly a decade of organised fan publications and letter writing crusades had finally convinced publishing bean-counters what editors already knew: grown-ups avidly read comics too. Moreover, they would happily spend more than kids and, most importantly, wanted more, more, more of what they particularly loved.
Explicitly: If one appearance per month was popular, extras, specials and second series would be more so. By the time Marvel Wunderkind Gerry Conway was preparing to leave The House of Ideas, DC was willing and ready to expand its variegated line-up with some oft-requested fan-favourite characters…
Paramount among these was the Justice Society of America, the first comic book super-team and a perennial gem whose annual guest-appearances in the Justice League of America had become an inescapable and beloved summer tradition.
Thus in 1976 Writer/Editor Conway marked his second DC tenure (he had first broken in to the game writing horror shorts for Joe Orlando) by reviving All Star Comics with number #58. In 1951, as the first Heroic Age ended, the original title had transformed overnight into All Star Western with that numbering running for a further decade as the home of such cowboy crusaders as Strong Bow, Trigger Twins, Johnny Thunder and Super-Chief.
If you’re interested, among the other revivals/introductions in “Conway’s Corner†were Plastic Man, Blackhawk, Secret Society of Super-Villains, Freedom Fighters, Kobra, Blitzkrieg – and many others…
Set on the parallel world of Earth-2, and in keeping with the editorial sense of ensuring that the series be relevant to young readers too, Conway reintroduced the veteran team, leavened with a smattering of teen heroes, combined into a contentious, generation-gap fuelled “Super Squadâ€.
These youngsters included Robin (already a JSA-er since the mid-1960s and Justice League of America #55), Sylvester Pemberton, AKA The Star-Spangled Kid (in actuality a boy-hero from the 1940s lost in time for decades) and a busty young thing who quickly became the feisty favourite of a generation of growing boys: Kara Zor-L; soon to become infamous as the “take-charge†dynamo Power Girl.
This titanic hardback and digital collection volume gathers the 4-year run of the JSA from the late 1970s into a sublime showcase of so-different, ever-changing times via All-Star Comics #58-74, plus the series’ continuation and conclusion from epic anthology title Adventure Comics #461-466, and includes seminal DC Special #29 which, after almost four decades, finally provided the team with an origin…
Without preamble, the action begins with ‘Prologue’ – a 3-page introduction, recap and summation of the Society’s history and the celestial mechanics of Alternate Earths, by Paul Levitz, Joe Staton & Bob Layton (first seen in Adventure #461, January/February 1979). This outlines the history and mechanics of DC’s parallel continuities, after which the first half of the 2-part debut tale from All-Star Comics #58 (January/February 1976 by Conway, Ric Estrada and Wally Wood) finds newly-inducted Pemberton chafing at his time-lost plight and revelling in his new powers after being given a cosmic-power device by retired veteran Starman. When a crisis propels him and elder heroes Flash, Dr. Mid-Nite, Wildcat, Green Lantern, Hawkman and Dr. Fate into a three-pronged calamity devastating Seattle, Cape Town and Peking (which you youngsters now known as Beijing) with man-made natural disasters, the elder statesmen split up but are overwhelmed, giving the new kids a chance to shine in ‘All Star Super-Squad’.
With the abrasive, impatient Power Girl in the vanguard the entire team is soon on the trail of old foe Degaton and his mind-bending ally in the concluding #59’s ‘Brainwave Blows Up!’
Keith Giffen replaced Estrada in #60 for the introduction of a psychotic super-arsonist who attacks the squad just as the age-divide starts to grate and Power Girl begins to tick off (or “re-educateâ€) the stuffy, paternalistic JSA-ers in ‘Vulcan: Son of Fire!’.
Closing instalment ‘Hellfire and Holocaust’ sees the flaming fury mortally wound Fate before his own defeat, just as a new mystic menace is stirring…
Conway’s last issue as scripter was #62. ‘When Fall the Mighty’ has antediluvian sorcerer Zanadu attack, whilst the criminal Injustice Gang opens their latest vengeful assault using mind-control to turn friend against friend…
The cast expands with the return of Hourman and Power Girl’s Kryptonian mentor, but even they prove insufficient to prevent ‘The Death of Doctor Fate’ (written by Paul Levitz) and, attacked on all sides, the team splinters. Wildcat, Hawkman and the Kryptonian Cousins tackle the assembled super-villains as Flash and Green Lantern search Egypt for a cure to Fate’s condition, and Hourman, Mid-Nite and Star-Spangled Kid desperately attempt to keep their fallen comrade alive.
They fail and Zanadu renews his assault, almost adding the moribund Fate’s death-watch defenders to his tally until the archaic alien’s very presence calls Kent Nelson back from beyond the grave…
With that crisis averted, Superman makes ready to leave but is embroiled in a last-minute, manic time-travel assassination plot (Levitz script, and fully illustrated by the inimitable Wally Wood) which drags the team and guest-star Shining Knight from an embattled Camelot in ‘Yesterday Begins Today!’ to the far-flung future and ‘The Master Plan of Vandal Savage’: a breathtaking spectacle of drama and excitement that signalled Woody’s departure from the series.
Joe Staton & Bob Layton took the unenviable task of filling his artistic shoes, beginning with #66 as ‘Injustice Strikes Twice!’ as the reunited team – sans Superman – fall prey to an ambush from their arch-enemies, whilst emotion-warping Psycho-Pirate starts to twist Green Lantern into an out-of-control menace determined to crush Corporate America beneath his emerald heel. This subsequently leads to the return of Earth-2’s Bruce Wayne, who had retired his masked persona to become Gotham’s Police Commissioner.
In ‘Attack of the Underlord!’ (All-Star Comics #67, July/August 1977), the Injustice Society’s monstrous allies are revealed as a subterranean race of conquerors who nearly end the team forever. Meanwhile, Wayne’s plans near fruition. He wants to shut down the JSA before their increasingly destructive exploits demolish his beloved city…
The contemporary adventures pause here as the aforementioned case from DC Special #29 (September 1977) discloses ‘The Untold Origin of the Justice Society’…
In an extra-length epic set in 1940, Levitz, Staton & Layton, reveal previously “classified†events which saw Adolf Hitleracquire the mystical Spear of Destiny and immediately summon mythical Teutonic Valkyries to aid in the invasion of Britain.
Alerted to the threat, American President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, hampered by his country’s neutrality, asks a select band of masked mystery-men to lend their aid as non-political, private citizens. In a cataclysmic escalation, the struggle ranges from the heart of Europe throughout the British Isles and even to the Oval office of the White House before ten bold costumed heroes finally – if only temporarily – stymy the Nazis’ plans…
Back in All Star #68 (October 1977) the curvy Kryptonian was clearly becoming the star of the show. ‘Divided We Stand!’ (Levitz, Staton & Layton) concludes the Psycho-Pirate’s scheme to discredit and destroy the JSA, and sets the scene for her first solo outing in Showcase #97-99 (not included here).
Meanwhile GL resumes his maniacal rampage through Gotham and Police Commissioner Bruce Wayne takes extreme measures to bring the seemingly out-of-control JSA to book.
In #69’s ‘United We Fall!’, he brings in his own team of retired JSA stars to arrest the “rogue†squad, resulting in a classic fanboy dream duel as Dr. Fate, Wildcat, Hawkman, Flash, GL and Star Spangled Kid battled the original Batman, Robin, Hourman, Starman, Dr. Mid-Nite and Wonder Woman. It’s a colourful catastrophe in waiting until PG and Superman intervene to reveal the true cause of all the unleashed madness…
…And in the background, a new character was about to make a landmark debut…
With order (temporarily) restored ‘A Parting of the Ways!’ spotlights Wildcat and Star-Spangled Kid as the off-duty heroes stumble upon high-tech super-thieves Strike Force. The robbers initially prove too much for the pair – and even new star The Huntress – but with a pair of startling revelations in ‘The Deadliest Game in Town!’ the trio finally triumph.
In the aftermath, the Kid resigns and the daughter of Batman and Catwoman replace him.
All-Star Comics #72 reintroduces a brace of classic Golden Age villainesses in ‘A Thorn by Any Other Name’ – wherein the psychopathic floral fury returns to poison Wildcat, leaving Helena Wayne to battle the original 1950’s Huntress for an antidote and the rights to the name…
Concluding chapter ‘Be it Ever So Deadly’ (with Joe Giella taking over the inker’s role) sees the entire team in action as Huntress battled Huntress whilst Thorn and The Sportsmaster do their deadly best to destroy the heroes and their loved ones. Simultaneously in Egypt, Hawkman and Dr. Fate stumble upon a deadly ancient menace to all of reality…
The late 1970s was a perilous period for comics, with exponentially rising costs inevitably resulting in drastically dwindling sales. Many titles were abruptly cancelled in a “DC Implosion†and All-Star Comics was one of the casualties. Issue #74 was the last, pitting the reunited team against a mystic Armageddon perpetrated by nigh-omnipotent Master Summoner who orchestrates a ‘World on the Edge of Ending’ before the Justice Society triumphantly drag victory from the jaws of defeat…
Although the book was gone, the series continued in the massive 68-page anthology title Adventure Comics, beginning in #461 (January/February 1979) with the first half of a blockbuster tale originally intended for the anniversary 75th issue. Drawn and inked by Staton, ‘Only Legends Live Forever’ details the last case of the Batman as the Dark Knight comes out of retirement to battle a seeming nonentity who has mysteriously acquired god-like power.
Adventure #462 delivered the shocking, heartbreaking conclusion in ‘The Legend Lives Again!’ whilst #462’s ‘The Night of the Soul Thief!’ sees Huntress, Robin and the assembled JSA deliver righteous justice to the mysterious mastermind who actually orchestrated the death of the World’s Greatest Detective….
In #464, an intriguing insight into aging warrior Wildcat reveals ‘To Everything There is a Season…’ as he embraces his own mortality and begins a new career as a teacher of heroes, whilst ‘Countdown to Disaster!’ (inked by Dave Hunt) finds Flash, Green Lantern, Hawkman, Power Girl, Huntress and Dr. Fate hunting a doomsday device lost in the teeming masses of Gotham. It would be the last modern outing of the team for years…
But not the last in this volume: that honour falls to another Levitz & Staton landmark: a little history lesson wherein they expose the reason why the team vanished at the beginning of the 1950s.
From Adventure #466, ‘The Defeat of the Justice Society!’ shows how the American Government had cravenly betrayed their greatest champions during the McCarthy witch-hunts: provoking the mystery-men into voluntarily withdrawing from public, heroic life for over a decade – that is until the costumed stalwarts of Earth-1 started the whole Fights ‘n’ Tights scene all over again…
Upping the gaudy glory quotient, a team pin-up by Staton & Dick Giordano and two earlier collection covers from Brian Bolland cap off the costumed dramas. Although perhaps a tad dated now, these exuberant, rapid-paced and imaginative yarns perfectly blend the naive charm of Golden Age derring-do with cynically hopeful modern sensibilities. Here you will be reassured that no matter what, in the end our heroes will always find a way to save the day.
These classic tales from simpler times are a glorious example of traditional superhero storytelling at its finest: fun, furious and ferociously engaging, exciting written and beguilingly illustrated. No Fights ‘n’ Tights fan should miss these marvellous sagas.
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