Fri Nov 4, 2016
JUSTICE LEAGUE EUROPE! Possibly the greatest Europe-based superhero team from one of the big two comics companies.
Justice League Europe / Justice League International were incredible series in the late 80s/early 90s that really embraced the goofiness of shining a spotlight on a band of B- and C-list heroes. Keith Giffen and Bart Sears worked so well together to make the comic so believable and staunchly ridiculous at the same time.
JLE featured two of my favorite DC characters: Animal Man and Metamorpho. Ralph Dibny is also great (and his partnership with his wife really should be emulated more, in terms of having a hero in a healthy committed relationship).
The cover to this issue is suitably dramatic and goofy: members of the JLE and JLI (from left to right, at varying distances from the “camera”: Batman, Rocket Red, Captain Atom, Booster Gold, Mister Miracle, Fire, Metamorpho, Guy Gardner, Animal Man, Flash, Martian Manhunter, Power Girl, and Blue Beetle) stand, with their backs to the viewer, in the middle of a small town square, with moutnains looming in the background. There’s a large and ominous dark shadow spreading in the space between the mountains and the town. Blue Beetle says, “Uh oh…”
Justice League Europe issue 008
The first page is a perfect demonstration of Keith Giffen’s strengths: Linda Strauss, a short-term Doctor Fate, is engaged in self-reflective exposition about her fears & doubts regarding taking on the Doctor Fate mantle. It’s engaging, interesting, and ends with a joke, as Giffen tends to:
“Order created him [the Grey Man, antagonist for this story] … Order’s responsible for the fact that he’s gone berserk … abusing his power–but if they won’t do anything to stop him–then I guess the job’s fallen to me. (quietly) I think I’m gonna be sick.”
Meanwhile, the JLE and JLI stand off in a Stagg-owned compound against a horde of, and I’m serious, “zombie-vampires.” Zombie-vampires. This story would probably be absolutely terrible if everyone involved didn’t wholly embrace the ridiculous nature of it.
When they finally decide to storm the compound, the zombie-vampires somehow grant energy to the Grey Man, a character who looks like a creepy uncle but manages to grow larger than the building when fueled somehow by the zombie-vampires. I remember nothing about the Grey Man while I reread this, but he has a vendetta against the forces of Order and Chaos (I assume he’s taking the “grey” middle ground between the two).
Luckily, the Spectre shows up with the embodied agents of Order and Chaos—who are now united against their common foe. They promptly lobotomize him, and he’s left to wander mindlessly through the world. According to the Spectre: “[H]e will walk this world, collecting dream-essence from the dead … empty-headed, empty-hearted … beyond pain … beyond even loneliness.” (Seriously?) The Grey Man is last seen just wandering off through an electrical fence and into the wilderness. I guess he doesn’t need to eat or anything. It’s too bad there’s not two entire super-hero teams nearby who could try and help him get super-institutionalized for everyone’s safety.
Sometimes I forget what a given artist’s art style is like until I have the comic in front of me. At no point in my life have I forgotten Bart Sears’ penchant to make everyone top-heavy musclemen with a billion points of light/shadow dynamic to demonstrate textures and contours. I have nostalgic love for it in JLE & JLI, but I would not be able to abide it in probably any other comic (Sears’ X-O Manowar art, for example, is so off-putting to me.)
Anyway, everyone who appears on the cover manages to get at least one line of dialogue, probably to keep this comic from being 96 pages long every month. I love that Grant Morrison busts on this balancing act in the pages of Animal Man when Buddy is asked to recognize the fact that he really only ever shows up in JLE to say/do one or two things in any given adventure.
Now I want to read more of my Giffen-era Justice League back issues to enjoy the best friendly relationship DC’s ever had: Blue Beetle & Booster Gold. (Sorry, it’s superior to Batman & Superman’s longtime partnership.)