Review: Justice League International #9

Plot/breakdowns: Keith Giffen

Script: J.M. DeMatteis

Pencils: Kevin Maguire

Review: Will Dubbeld

The Giffen/DeMatteis/Maguire run on Justice League was one of those critically lauded chunks of comic history that I’d never really been exposed to. Most of my early DC purchases were all Batman related or quarter bin/grab bag related and as a result I had to rely on Who’s Who guidebooks and Holmesian Deduction to parse together much of my DC lore.  Within the past year I cultivated a curious desire to know more about this JLI book and bought a decent sized chunk of the run from my LCS.

And promptly boxed them because they were in the way of my monthlies.

As I am wont to do.

This mostly boils down to the fact that I’ve finite time at my disposal and it’s much easier to purchase comics than it is to find the time to read them.  I’m pretty sure there’s at least one trade paperback still unread that I bought at the HCB field trip to Wizard World Chicago in 2012 or thereabouts…

So, come Tales From the Dollar Box Wednesday I was pleased to have randomly grabbed this issue for review.

Let’s share this adventure together…

First off, the art is phenomenal, from pencils to colors.  Maguire’s pencils are tight, tight, tight and everything about the book is more earnest because there wasn’t any computer rendering, digital inking, WACOM tablets or the like.  Dudes got ink on their fingers making this book, and I appreciate that.  The only stylistic gripe I’ve got is that all of the male heroes have pretty much the same lean, muscular physique without too much differentiation between body types.  Booster Gold could swap costumes with Mister Miracle and the reader wouldn’t be the wiser. Perhaps that’s why they turned Blue Beetle into a fat guy down the road, so you could tell the difference between him and Batman…

The cover depicts Rocket Red (one of them, anyway) holding Martian Manhunter aloft and exclaiming, “No man escapes the Manhunters!” while Batman and presumably Guy Gardner lie broken at his feet.  Fantastic cover, but a warning lies above the title:

Millennium: Week 1

Daaaaaaamn it. For the uninitiated, Millennium was some hackneyed multipart mega crossover event that, for me, served no purpose other than to cloud what the hell was going on in my comics. I’d grab an issue of Detective Comics and it’s proclaim, “Millennium: Week 5!!!” on the cover.  I’d respond with, “I don’t know what that means!!!”

To this day I have no clue what the Millennium event was about, other than it involved some group of wanker heroes called the Global Guardians (I think…) and the Floronic Man was involved to some degree. Apparently there was a monthly Millennium title as well, but I’ve never read it. Hell, I’ve never seen it in a back issue bin. I don’t think it actually exists, to be honest…

Hangups about 1987 crossovers aside, the book opens with our heroes en route from last issue’s adventure, and goddammit right there on page 1 it’s telling me, “WAIT! If you haven’t read Millennium #1-on sale now-run out, buy a copy and absorb every minute detail.”

I did not.

In any case, Martian Manhunter, Booster Gold, Guy Gardner, and a ship that obliquely resembles the Starship Enterprise are tooling along and within the first few pages I’m reminded of how wordy older books were.  I’m not sure if writers crammed as much dialogue and internal monologue as possible into a comic because they really had important stuff to say or because they’re paid by the word.  Either way, I’ve always referred to it as “Claremontian Exposition” and we’ve got a healthy dose in JLI. Our heroes are returning from a meeting with The Guardians (unsure if the reference is to The Guardians of Green Lantern lore or the Global Guardians.  Perhaps I should have rushed out and bought Millennium #1…) and Justice League member in good standing Rocket Red reveals himself to be a Manhunter (of Green Lantern fame…) and attempts to recruit the League to the Manhunter cause.  Due to my ignorance of our Millennium metaplot, I’ve no idea what the Manhunters goal really is, but Batman ain’t havin’ none of it, and a rumble ensues.  We go off the rails a little bit here in this fight.  By the time all is said and done, eight Justice Leaguers and one Rocket Red are duking it out whilst maintaining a 1980s level of Claremontian Exposition, making for some very busy pages and panels. 

Superhero characterizations seem to be a bit off as well as Guy Gardner isn’t his usual assholey self and Batman’s answer, as the World’s Greatest Detective, to fighting a robot killing machine is to jump on it and pummel it to the ground.

Again, perhaps Millennium #1 explains this, but in any case Batman’s plan does not work.

The group eventually crash-lands in Bialya and with the help of some other Rocket Reds (yes, there are several. A whole brigade, in fact.  The Rocket Red Brigade…), the Manhunter is defeated and some nice barbed dialogue is exchanged between Martian Manhunter and the “tyranny dictator ruler of the terrorist nation of Bialya”. His words. J’onn ain’t playin’.

I’ve always liked Bialya. It’s a made up, pissant country in the Middle East that DC uses as a cipher for Evil Overseas Bad People Country whenever they don’t want to name-drop Iran or when they need Black Adam to massacre a nation.  It’s gotten decent mileage in the Young Justice cartoon, may it rest in peace, and is a great answer to Marvel’s Latveria.

A cut-scene involves Maxwell Lord possibly getting assassinated by his personal assistant, Ms. Wootenhoffer, which made me chuckle because I remembered when Wonder Woman snapped his neck.  But then it made me sad because I remembered when Max Lord killed Blue Beetle.

But then Ms. Wootenhoffer’s name made me chuckle again.

Ms. Wootenhoffer (or W00tenhoffer, if you prefer) drops the, “no man escapes the Manhunters”, line leading me to believe this interlude is again related to the Millennium crossover, but I still haven’t rushed out to buy issue #1.

JLI #9 closes with the tyrant dictator ruler of the terrorist nation of Bialya attempting to woo the services of a (maybe) hero named Jack-O-Lantern, of whom I’ve not heard.  I know that this particular Jack-O-Lantern does not fight Spider-Man, however, and immediately grew disinterested.  Apparently so did the rest of the world, as Jack has done exactly that to affect the landscape of the DCU thus far.

Dated dialogue aside, especially when we deviate from “bwa ha ha!” into full-blown “wakka wakka!” territory, the comic is great.  It’s an amazing representative of the 1980s slice of comic book history and although jaded readers of new writing and art techniques may dislike Justice League International, I’ll be digging out the rest of the back issues and giving them a whirl.

I’m still not rushing out to buy Millennium #1.