Brad Meltzer, Ed Benes, et al, Justice League of America (DC Comics, 2006-7). $2.99, monthly.

By Alex Boney

I should say first that I generally like Brad Meltzer’s writing. I’m not familiar with his fiction outside of comics, but he has done good work for DC. I enjoyed his follow-up story to Kevin Smith’s run on Green Arrow (more than I enjoyed Smith’s work, in fact). I was late to the party with Identity Crisis, but I liked it quite a bit when I sat down to read through the trade paperback collection. In any case, I wasn’t as outraged by the retrofitting of ghosts in the JLA’s closet as many fans seemed to be. When Meltzer and artist Ed Benes re-launched Justice League of America after the conclusion Infinite Crisis last year, I was expecting a high-energy but thoughtful treatment of the highest-profile team superhero comics have to offer. What I ended up reading was…well, not that. Decompressed comic book storytelling is all the rage these days. Brian Bendis has all but trademarked it in his work for Marvel Comics (New Avengers, Ultimate Spider-Man, and Daredevil), and Ed Brubaker is currently using it better than any contemporary comics writer (in Daredevil, Iron Fist, and Captain America). But now that Meltzer’s run on the Justice League has drawn to a close, it’s clear that this was not the right book for this technique. Justice League of America was a book that rose to a slow boil for its first twelve issues. The problem is that nothing ever really got cooked.

The problems with Justice League of America first became clear to me when, in the fourth issue (counting the #0 prequel issue), Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman were still sitting around a table trying to decide who they were going to let into the League. Most of that issue (#3) was dedicated to Red Tornado’s quest to find and cope with a new humanity after years of being trapped inside an android body. This primary story is what Meltzer does best in comics: he explores the identities behind the masks in an attempt to understand what makes these apparent gods tick. “The Tornado’s Path,” the story that occupied the book through issue #6, was actually a compelling treatment of a minor character. But the pacing and narrative disjointedness often got in the way of that story. I like clever asides and narrative complexity as much as the next GutterGeek, but they always felt forced and never really worked in this story. The “trinity” discussion of membership was a bit like a treetop clubhouse; it was a little corny, but I was willing to go along with it for a couple issues. After #1, it was time to get things under way.

After the resolution of the Red Tornado story in issue #6, Meltzer paused for an issue to solidify the new team roster and invite the newcomers (Vixen, Black Lightning, and Arsenal [now Red Arrow, because you can never have enough color nomenclature in your League]) into the League’s inner sanctum. This issue (#7) was chock-full of fanboy goodness. The Hall of Justice (of Super-Friends fame, complete with the crystal sculpture in a pool out front) was established as the Earth-based JLA headquarters in Washington, DC. Inside was a museum/arsenal stocked with recognizable toys and relics from past JLA adventures. When League members stepped through a certain door, they entered the new satellite headquarters in orbit around the Earth. All well and good. Meltzer combined all eras of JLA history. This should have been a fanboy’s dream. But somehow, it wasn’t. There comes a time when nostalgia (even the nostalgia of an escapist, safe youth) is layered so thick that it actually becomes suffocating. This was one of those times.

Issues #8-10 were three parts of a five-part crossover with the new ongoing Justice Society of America book (which, on the whole, has been much more successful and engaging). It’s difficult to review this story, though, because (again) not much happens. Seeing the interplay between the modern big guns of the JLA and the legacy characters of the JSA is interesting, but the whole point of the story seemed to be to bring Wally West back from…wherever he had been and to re-establish him as the Flash after Bart Allen died. When an epic, multipart crossover event starring a comic company’s highest-profile team books adds up to resetting the norm, it’s a good sign that the story was a success.

The best single issue of the entire run was issue #11, in which Red Arrow and Vixen are seemingly trapped in a building at the bottom of the Potomac River. The story was told and illustrated in a claustrophobic way that created tension and allowed Meltzer’s disjointed, cerebral technique to take hold. I was tensed-up the entire time I was reading, I exhaled loudly at the end, and I actually cared about two relatively minor characters who were given complex treatment for the first time in the book’s run. Perhaps the biggest reason why this issue worked was that, for the first time in the series, the art matched the narrative. Gene Ha provided a dark, gritty layout and palette that evoked exactly the tone and mood of the story Meltzer was telling. Ed Benes, the regular penciler for the rest of Meltzer’s stint, is a very accomplished artist who is good at rendering a variety of costumed heroes in exciting poses. In fact, his art consistently provided a refreshing contrast to the contorted, unnatural figures depicted on the Michael Turner covers. But his style never quite suited the muted progression of Meltzer’s narrative. A more experienced technical draftsman such as J. H. Williams III might have worked with Meltzer to make panel progression and pacing smoother and less jarring, but I get the sense that Benes just drew what was on the page and turned it in without question. In any case, this was a book that needed a stronger collaborative connection (or at least a stronger editorial hand) to hold it all together and make it work.

And then came the coda issue, #12, in which two shadowy characters (eventually revealed to be Aquaman and Martian Manhunter) watch as various JLA members switch shifts on monitor duty. I can’t say I was hoping for something huge to happen by this point. I certainly wasn’t expecting things to blow up or Darkseid to invade the Earth (though it may have been appropriate, given Meltzer’s frequent nods to the Super-Friends era). But I was hoping the book wasn’t going to whimper and limp its way toward a non-eventful conclusion. I’m not sure what new writer Dwayne McDuffie has in store when he takes over for Meltzer as of issue #13. But at this point, I’ll gladly take a Legion of Doom bash-up or Darkseid trying to wed and bed Wonder Woman to cleanse my palate.