Phil Filippopoulos
Feb 22, 2008, 01:37 am
<a href="http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/previews/dc/0208/JLA2_Cv18.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/previews/dc/0208/JLA2_Cv18t.jpg" hspace=10 align=left alt="Justice League of America #18"></a>Reviewer: Phil Filippopoulos, astral_revolution@yahoo.com
Story Title: Sanctuary – Part Two
“This is our house.”
Writer: Alan Burnett
Pencils: Ed Benes
Inks: Sandra Hope with Ed Benes
Colors: Peter Pantazis
Letterer: Rob Leigh
Cover: Ed Benes with Alex Sinclair
Assistant Editor: Adam Schlagman
Editor: Eddie Berganza
Senior Executive Editor: Dan Didio
President & Publisher: Paul Levitz
Published By: DC Comics
So, I haven't always been much of a DC guy. Ironically, pretty much everything I do know about DC and its universe beyond the big guys comes from Superfriends and the cartoon Justice League/Unlimited. Which means, a lot of the time, I can recognize characters I'm not too familiar with enough to follow a story. JLA is my must-have DC book, the only one I buy with real regularity. So it's partly my fault, but I'm finding parts of this story extremely hard to follow.
The reason, of course, is that it is overflowing with characters. We have three basic groups here: The League, Suicide Squad, and ten villains looking not to be shipped to what, everyone is pretty sure, is a pretty horrible prison planet. The thing that makes this confusing, for me, is that I don't know who most of these people are. After re-reading this and the last issue, I get what's going on but some backstory would have been helpful.
But let's assume you're not a DC novice. What's actually going on? What we have, essentially, is Amanda Waller (who is by far one of my favorite characters in comics since I saw her on Justice League Unlimited) using Suicide Squad to track down villains and give them a choice to either help them out in capturing more villains or getting sucked into a tube, which leads to a prison planet. Ten villains, desperate not to get sucked into said tube, seek refuge with the Justice League, whose Hall is technically an embassy, knowing that they wont approve of Waller's policies. The result is a diplomatic nightmare involving space and loopholes and misdirection.
But is it entertaining? Absolutely. The thing that makes the Justice League so interesting is its place in a political world; here we have some of the most powerful people on the planet acting as an organization. They have political power, as we've seen with their Hall acting as an embassy, and what we end up with is some tense interactions between them and Waller, whose duty it is to uphold the law. They're both trying to stop supervillains, but their methods are markedly different and they have to follow the laws. The catch is that there's only so far that the law can take you when you're dealing with floating satellite bases and superpowers. That's where things get messy, which is where the conflict in this story is coming from.
<a href="http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/covers/dc/JLA18.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/covers/dc/JLA18-T.jpg" hspace=10 align=right alt="Justice League of America #18"></a> What we have, then, is the League getting it from all sides; they have villains pleading for fairness, the government going too far, and villains-turned-heroes trying to whomp them. Not only that, but (and I do hope this thread is carried further) even within the League itself there is conflict. Not everyone thinks that what's going on with the villain abduction is all that bad. In fact, the big three seem to all have different opinions and motivations regarding this issue. The conflict in this story is complex and difficult, and ostensibly can't be solved by simple brawling (although that seems to be the plan for now). There's a lot going on here.
That being said, something about the issue was a little off. It seemed to flow a tad erratically, Near the end of the issue people seem to go from one place to another in a matter of seconds to take place in a fight. Said fight ends with, seemingly, a suggestion of moving the fight for convenience. This kind of struck me as odd. Now, given the last page of the issue perhaps both parties would not have agreed with the move and simply get distracted, but the last half of the issue seemed to be in general disjointed and random in places.
I think that this issue suffers from the classic dilemma of being the second in a trilogy. It needs to continue the story and set up for the finale and in the process seems a bit rushed and less significant than what pre- or proceeds it. However, I definitely think two issues for all that goes on here would have been too much, and would have needed to be filled with unnecessary details, so I'm willing to forgive a slightly unwieldy issue for what should be an interesting finale.
Also, I'm a little confused as to why the Key speaks like a fourteen year-old boy. A quick internet search didn't give me an age for the character but some of his colloquialisms seemed out of place.
The art is excellent. The heroes look like heroes, the villains look like villains and the heavy inks and colors come together to make a gritty and serious issue look that way. I actually find Benes' talking heads more dynamic than his fight scenes at times, not because they're not good but because he does facial expressions so well. His Batman is to die for; the guy looks just as scary as I imagine him.
There's also a backup story about Red Tornado that I adored. The characterization was spot on and although it was only a few pages I actually found myself really invested in the situation, emotionally. McDuffie's monologues are sad and beautiful, and at the end I was actually a little disappointed that things were looking up for Reddy, only because this story was written so well. The art was quite nice but a bit more stylized than I think the tone of the story called for. To its credit, however it was detailed and interesting enough that it didn't bother me.
Overall, this issue is thematically very interesting and exciting, but in execution was a bit awkward. However, all the pieces are in place for a great finale. More importantly, however, what we're getting is the building of a world, in which the JLA isn't just a bunch of superbuddies going around fighting Starro. There's more going on here, and I hope they continue to back the fight scenes with smart, political conflicts that give you something to think about.
Also, more Waller. That lady is hardcore.
OVERALL:
http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/dcfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/dcfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/dchalf.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/dcnone.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/dcnone.jpg
Buy Justice League of America online now from X-World Comics and save! (http://x-worldcomics.com/yourvirtualstore/shopexd.asp?id=25925)
Story Title: Sanctuary – Part Two
“This is our house.”
Writer: Alan Burnett
Pencils: Ed Benes
Inks: Sandra Hope with Ed Benes
Colors: Peter Pantazis
Letterer: Rob Leigh
Cover: Ed Benes with Alex Sinclair
Assistant Editor: Adam Schlagman
Editor: Eddie Berganza
Senior Executive Editor: Dan Didio
President & Publisher: Paul Levitz
Published By: DC Comics
So, I haven't always been much of a DC guy. Ironically, pretty much everything I do know about DC and its universe beyond the big guys comes from Superfriends and the cartoon Justice League/Unlimited. Which means, a lot of the time, I can recognize characters I'm not too familiar with enough to follow a story. JLA is my must-have DC book, the only one I buy with real regularity. So it's partly my fault, but I'm finding parts of this story extremely hard to follow.
The reason, of course, is that it is overflowing with characters. We have three basic groups here: The League, Suicide Squad, and ten villains looking not to be shipped to what, everyone is pretty sure, is a pretty horrible prison planet. The thing that makes this confusing, for me, is that I don't know who most of these people are. After re-reading this and the last issue, I get what's going on but some backstory would have been helpful.
But let's assume you're not a DC novice. What's actually going on? What we have, essentially, is Amanda Waller (who is by far one of my favorite characters in comics since I saw her on Justice League Unlimited) using Suicide Squad to track down villains and give them a choice to either help them out in capturing more villains or getting sucked into a tube, which leads to a prison planet. Ten villains, desperate not to get sucked into said tube, seek refuge with the Justice League, whose Hall is technically an embassy, knowing that they wont approve of Waller's policies. The result is a diplomatic nightmare involving space and loopholes and misdirection.
But is it entertaining? Absolutely. The thing that makes the Justice League so interesting is its place in a political world; here we have some of the most powerful people on the planet acting as an organization. They have political power, as we've seen with their Hall acting as an embassy, and what we end up with is some tense interactions between them and Waller, whose duty it is to uphold the law. They're both trying to stop supervillains, but their methods are markedly different and they have to follow the laws. The catch is that there's only so far that the law can take you when you're dealing with floating satellite bases and superpowers. That's where things get messy, which is where the conflict in this story is coming from.
<a href="http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/covers/dc/JLA18.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/covers/dc/JLA18-T.jpg" hspace=10 align=right alt="Justice League of America #18"></a> What we have, then, is the League getting it from all sides; they have villains pleading for fairness, the government going too far, and villains-turned-heroes trying to whomp them. Not only that, but (and I do hope this thread is carried further) even within the League itself there is conflict. Not everyone thinks that what's going on with the villain abduction is all that bad. In fact, the big three seem to all have different opinions and motivations regarding this issue. The conflict in this story is complex and difficult, and ostensibly can't be solved by simple brawling (although that seems to be the plan for now). There's a lot going on here.
That being said, something about the issue was a little off. It seemed to flow a tad erratically, Near the end of the issue people seem to go from one place to another in a matter of seconds to take place in a fight. Said fight ends with, seemingly, a suggestion of moving the fight for convenience. This kind of struck me as odd. Now, given the last page of the issue perhaps both parties would not have agreed with the move and simply get distracted, but the last half of the issue seemed to be in general disjointed and random in places.
I think that this issue suffers from the classic dilemma of being the second in a trilogy. It needs to continue the story and set up for the finale and in the process seems a bit rushed and less significant than what pre- or proceeds it. However, I definitely think two issues for all that goes on here would have been too much, and would have needed to be filled with unnecessary details, so I'm willing to forgive a slightly unwieldy issue for what should be an interesting finale.
Also, I'm a little confused as to why the Key speaks like a fourteen year-old boy. A quick internet search didn't give me an age for the character but some of his colloquialisms seemed out of place.
The art is excellent. The heroes look like heroes, the villains look like villains and the heavy inks and colors come together to make a gritty and serious issue look that way. I actually find Benes' talking heads more dynamic than his fight scenes at times, not because they're not good but because he does facial expressions so well. His Batman is to die for; the guy looks just as scary as I imagine him.
There's also a backup story about Red Tornado that I adored. The characterization was spot on and although it was only a few pages I actually found myself really invested in the situation, emotionally. McDuffie's monologues are sad and beautiful, and at the end I was actually a little disappointed that things were looking up for Reddy, only because this story was written so well. The art was quite nice but a bit more stylized than I think the tone of the story called for. To its credit, however it was detailed and interesting enough that it didn't bother me.
Overall, this issue is thematically very interesting and exciting, but in execution was a bit awkward. However, all the pieces are in place for a great finale. More importantly, however, what we're getting is the building of a world, in which the JLA isn't just a bunch of superbuddies going around fighting Starro. There's more going on here, and I hope they continue to back the fight scenes with smart, political conflicts that give you something to think about.
Also, more Waller. That lady is hardcore.
OVERALL:
http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/dcfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/dcfull.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/dchalf.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/dcnone.jpg http://www.comixfan.com/xfan/images/reviews/dcnone.jpg
Buy Justice League of America online now from X-World Comics and save! (http://x-worldcomics.com/yourvirtualstore/shopexd.asp?id=25925)