I’m a Justice League fan. My user ID over at the DC forums has been “JLAmember” since the early days of Grant Morrison’s run. I’ve stuck with the League through some pretty awful times. I even read that Claremont/Byrne story from a few years back! (Those of you who read it understand what a sacrifice that was).
For a long while now, I’ve bemoaned the state of the regular Justice League title. Brad Metzler got free reign on the book and turned it into his own personal playground. He squeezed in everything he wanted to see changed in the DCU before dumping the book on Dwayne McDuffie. By now, we all know how things played out from there.
When Cry for Justice was announced, I was jazzed. The art looked great and I was excited to see what Robinson could do to revitalize the team. Granted, the line-up was… quirky. But I can live with any line-up if the stories are good. And Robinson’s Superman run has only raised my expectations.
But then came that 6-page preview of Hal Jordan bitching. I could not believe how bad it was. Surely, this wasn’t the future of the League. But it was no joke. When Cry for Justice #1 hit the stands, the entire issue read like that 6-page preview. I couldn’t even bring myself to write-up a review.
If you read the title of this article, it’s labeled as a “rant” and not a “review”. That’s because once again I can’t find the inner fortitude to write up a proper review of this issue. It’s better than the first issue simply because Hel Jordan doesn’t get on his high horse and lecture the Justice League for 6 pages. But, that’s true of just about every Justice League comic book I’ve ever read (including that Claremont/Byrne vampire story from a few years back!)
What you get with this issue is another 20 or so pages of “the team coming together”. Unfortunately, it’s filled with more of the laughably bad dialogue from last issue. How do you even begin to review stuff like this:
Hal: Ah yes, Gotham. The sweet smell of corruption and cotton candy.
Seriously, WTF?!? Cotton Candy? After decades of seeing Gotham City in comics, movies and TV, never once did I imagine it smelled like cotton candy. Next panel:
Hal: I have a confession to make.
(Me: Oh boy! Here we go again!)
Ollie: If it involves you, the Huntress, Lady Blackhawk and a bottle of grappa, Dinah already told me. And all I have to say is “well played, sir.”
Seriously, WTF. But they don’t stop there.
Ollie: Everybody heard about it — from Man-Bat to Metamorpho. And Rex Mason was quite the lothario before he turned all weird looking. So for him to be impressed took some doing.
Hal: I’d rather be known for the plans I flew.
Robinson manages to make Hal look like a bigger pig than Ollie in one panel. Amazing!
Hal and Ollie go on to talk about Gotham for a few more pages. Somehow, they manage not to bring up the smell of cotton candy. But the weird dialogue continues. Next, we get Starman and Congorilla battling to the death. No explanation is given as to why, but both characters make their bloodlust known.
Then they get tired and stop fighting. They both decide to put their battle to the death on hold for a few seconds while they catch their breath and talk about… cocktails. A few pages later and Congorilla is quoting “Casablanca”. Soon, the two are best buds and flying off to who knpws where.
Back on the rooftops of Gotham, Batman’s private detective Jason Bard shows up and points Hal and Ollie at a collection of bad guys who are working for Prometheus. Hal and Ollie refer to each other as “Green Lantern” and “Green Arrow” in quotation marks. Cute, huh?
Next up is Ray Palmer and Jay Garrick (what is he doing in this book anyway?). They both say “Ray Palmer” a lot because Robinson seems to love it when people say “Ray Palmer.” And Ray Palmer throws himself another pity party because the universe hates Ray Palmer.
Then Freddy Freeman shows up because he’s on the team and he hasn’t shown up yet.
Freddy Freeman and Ray Palmer actually discuss the breif time they were on the Teen Tians together. Ray Palmer comments that it feels like that almost never happened. That’s because DC has been ignoring any comic book from the 90s in which Superman didn’t die.
Back in Gotham, Hal and Ollie are literally standing on the bodies of the second-string villains they defeated and gloating about how easy it was. Then Freddy Freeman and Ray Palmer show up. Surprisingly, no one says “Ray Palmer” for two whole pages. Instead, they say “Justice” a lot and Ollie confesses a man-crush for Freddy.
Then, the Javelin (who?) gets up and throws a spear (or javelin I suppose) just in time to poke Supergirl in the boob. Supergirl knocks him out and poses for the final page because she is also on the team.
The story is over, but you still get several pages of text in which Robinson talks about Ray Palmer. There’s also a two-page origin story just like the ones we got in the back of 52.
Please, don’t let this be the future of the Justice League!
I love that they turned the Birds of Prey into a throwaway sex joke to make Hal Jordan look cooler.
Seriously. I’m not surprised, but I am deeply saddened.
I take solace in the fact that 10 years from now Robinson’s run will be a trivia question. Can you believe that Congorilla was ever part of the JLA?
It’s a shame DC can’t clone Gail Simone and have her or her clone write BoP. Dini’s Sirens is a poor substitute.
I bought this yesterday and was stuck on that specific exchange as well. And I would put money that the script actually called for the artist to “have the bullets bounce off Supergirl’s boobs”.
I was hoping that Prometheus, the reason I’m picking up this series, would have shown up and kicked the living shit out of Hal and Ollie after their frat dialogue. But to no avail and judging by the preview of the next issue, he won’t be doing it there either.
See, I told you. Robinson is a hack.
Hey, after you read the third issue, why don’t you watch the LOEG movie.
That was Robinson’s doing as well. Have fun!
So, why isn’t the Internet lighting their torches over this?
Actually, I think they are. Even Gail Simone weighed in on this over at the DC message boards.
Sadly, I’ve seen LOEG.
Just to let ya know, I posted more sketches. Don’t know if you saw ‘em.
Good for Gail. Negative, I trust?
I saw the sketches. Like you said, everyone loves sketches!
You know how Gail is. Always the class act:
This is what Gail had to say :
“I could see Lady Blackhawk, actually. Two pilots having some sexy fun, okay, I get that.
But I hate to see Huntress get branded as a **** again. The whole point of the Josh story was for her to realize she deserved better.
And I can’t see them doing a threesome, that affects their friendship, and the Birds were ALREADY one of the very few books about female friendship which is so ******* rare in comics it might as well be moonbeans captured in mason jars. Not that friends can’t have sex, but once again, this is all about the man, and “Well played, sir” is just, ugh.
I love James Robinson. But I really feel like most writers of mainstream comics get the sex thing all wrong over and over. It’s all wink wink nudge nudge and women as trophies and thumbs up and it seems so weird and off-character to me.
But I haven’t read it in context and I’m just the dumb girl anyway.
But James Robinson is a great writer, he’s never written anything I didn’t enjoy in comics and I still think Silver Age is an underrated classic. Maybe I’m reading it wrong. But it does feel weird that people can read bop and still come away with the impression that THAT Huntress and THAT Lady Blackhawk would get drunk and be someone’s sad Penthouse fantasy.
It just shows again that Bop was an important book for a lot of reasons and its absence is keenly felt in the portrayal of female characters in the DCU. Not my bop specifically, just the book overall.”
Great rant. Glad to see that not everybody will fall all over themselves just because it has Hal in it. Here’s my rant from the GLCMB>
Fool me twice……shame on me.
That pretty much sums up my feelings on this issue and this series. I had not planned on getting the second issue after the letdown and complete bust imo of the first issue.
But, sucker that I am, I opened to the first page in the shop and saw Hal and Ollie and thought, “Any chance to see Green Lantern and Green Arrow together is good, right”? Wrong. That was my first mistake.
I don’t know who’s dressing himself and playing Green Lantern in this issue, but it’s not Hal Jordan. Horrible dialogue, completely out of character. And to top it all off, he’s perverted revenge into some twisted idea of “justice”.
Then the scene with Congorilla and Mikaal fighting and becoming friends was completely stupid. Some of the worst pages I’ve ever read in comics.
This was it for me, I’m done with “Cry For Revenge”, and if this is a preview of Robinson’s JLA, I’ll be saving my money on that too.
So, like Bush said, “Fool me twice, won’t get fooled again”.
Glad you liked it!
I think people are catching on. Most of what I have seen on this issue has been negative.
Just because someone painted pretty pictured doesn’t mean we’ll buy what you’re selling, DC!
I have enjoyed this more than you guys, and it might be because JLA has been SO awful that anything is a step up relief. The sexual talk between the guys did throw me, but hey, I just got done watching Saving Private Ryan and in the scene before the final battle the soldiers, the REAL HEROES are talking sex. That’s what guys do and for that I like the realism that these guys are not celibate priests in capes. But to bring in two other DC characters has ramifications on how they are portrayed, and it was not a well thought through moment.
What I think is bizarre are all the pages that Robinson has wasted telling us his personal blog on his history of being a comic fan, that’s more ridiculous than anything else. The mini bios are fine. The rest of the crap should be for a trade or something.
I see the need to redefine certain relationships, and a comic can be very excellent if not even one punch is thrown through interesting dialogue. There has been a lot of set up. I’ll judge it when it’s over.
And for you guys that think Robinson is going to save JLA…not gonna happen. If you think his Superman run was good, then youre reading something different than me
Great reply. Thanks for reading!
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