Justice League: Trinity War (comics)

Writers: Geoff Johns, Jeff Lemire, Ray Fawkes, J.M. DeMatteis
Artists: Ivan Reis, Doug Mahnke, Mikel Janin and others
Collects: Justice League #22-23, Justice League of America #6-7, Justice League Dark #22-23, Trinity of Sin: Pandora #1-3, Trinity of Sin: Phantom Stranger #11, Constantine #5, New 52 Free Comic Book Day Special 2012

For as many mistakes as the New 52 initiative may have made, it certainly did a fine job of returning some of the lost luster of the Justice League brand. JLA ended somewhere around 2006 and despite numerous attempts it never really managed to strike a chord with anyone. That changed after Flashpoint, with no fewer than three Justice League books launching under the relaunches umbrella; one faltered, but was swiftly replaced by another. They rarely, if ever, interacted on any major scale.

Finally, a solid two years in, they collide in a big crossover. This time it's war. Well, sort of.

Trinity War certainly feels important. For one thing, it's the first big "DC Universe" story since the relaunch. For another, it's readily apparent that it is meant to be a culmination of everything the Justice League line had done in its first two years. Not everything feels as though it was planned - having read all the League books from Flashpoint to Trinity War, I get the distinct feeling that the plan for Pandora may well have shifted early into the lines life - but for the most part you can draw a clear line through each book to lead here. That's fairly impressive, especially given the fact that DC has often had troubling aligning the stars in the past.

The stakes are fairly high as well. We start with Superman having apparently* killed someone. From there things escalate as numerous heroes of the DC Universe try to absolve him - after, you know, the requisite punchup, lest the title be a complete lie - with battle lines being drawn over the best way to go about it. At the center of the conflict is Pandoras Box, the supposed prison of evil the titular character unwittingly opened long ago, unleashing sin upon the world.

It's an interesting story and it holds up fairly well, despite involving several writers and even more artists. I think what impressed me the most is that by the end, you realize the stakes are even higher than previously indicated. Trinity War manages to re-purpose several characters and concepts in ways that might surprise you, including a silver age villain given a no brainer of an origin that makes you question how this is the first time anyone has tried it.

As always, there are flaws. As the crossover goes on, there's less importance put on the "Trinity of Sin". They're made out to be a big deal very early on, but The Question is practically a non entity and while important, Pandora kind of fades to the background a bit by the climax and the Phantom Stranger, who is definitely a presence throughout most of the story, just disappears from it past a certain point. It's also a big difficult to suss out how the "sins" work, exactly, given the big twist of the storyline. I think I managed to figure it out, but it's something that isn't spelled out all that clearly. It isn't enough to break the story - and I imagine the nature of the sins will be explained more in the issues of Pandora that take place after Trinity War - but it's fairly curious.

There's also the elephant in the room that is the ending. Trinity War doesn't really finish so much as it moves us into the next phase. Turns out the war leads into the first - and with the recent end of the branding, only - event comic of the New 52. I can see how that might piss some people off. Personally, I think it works and the twist is intriguing enough for me to overlook the fact that the story is, in a way, a big lead in to an event. I understand how others might chafe, however.

Despite utilizing a small army of artists, visually the book holds together quite well. You'll still see some visual flair here and again, but most conform to a general "look". Many people bristle at the mention of a companies "house style", but there's little denying that in the case of multi-book crossovers like this it's an advantage as opposed to a detriment. Ivan Reis is the best of the bunch, but everyone holds their own well.

All told, Trinity War is a fun crossover that does its job well. You could do far worse. Do be advised, however, that it doesn't so much end as it pulls a time honored "to be continued". It's entertaining enough that it doesn't matter to me and it did its job well of stoking the flames of my interest in Forever Evil.

My Opinion: Read It

* "Apparently" because a three year old could tell you Superman wouldn't do that. The story, to its credit, doesn't even try to pretend otherwise; once everyone calms the hell down and stops throwing punches - hell, even while punches are being thrown - pretty much everyone agrees something is wrong with the picture. Well, save Waller and maybe two others, but if we're being honest "distrusting ass who is not afraid to pull some seriously shady business" is her character in a nutshell.

Justice League: The Grid (comics)

Writer: Geoff Johns
Artists: Ivan Reis, Joe Prado, small bits by other assorted artists
Collects: Justice League #18-20, 22-23

The upward arc in overall quality continues for Justice League, but unfortunately the collection itself kind of pisses me off.

Regarding the story, in itself there's nothing wrong with the Grid. There's a fair amount to keep you interested, including the League opening its doors to new members for the first time since the unseen conflict with the Martian Manhunter. Despero shows up. There's some mystery over who broke into the Batcave and some obvious subterfuge going down behind the scenes. Plus, we revisit the old "Batman has a plan for everyone" chestnut, though this time Batman not only comes clean before anything happens, but everyone is far more reasonable about the whole thing.

This book also has a few... Heartwarming Batman Moments, I think we'll call them. I've noted before that while I'm fine with dark Batman stories, the old Batdickery bit had gone way too far, especially prior to the New 52. It's a problem similar to what we see with Iron Man over at Marvel, only not quite as severe; the writers take their behavior so far it's amazing anyone will put up with or work with them ever again.

As such, I enjoy bits that focus on their humanity and ability to get along with others, even in a small way. Here, Batman stops Jason Todd from beating himself up with a hand on the shoulder and a "I'm just glad you're okay". In another scene, he rationally discusses the at-the-time secret relationship between Superman and Wonder Woman, as well as the impact they have on how the League is percieved, without the theatrics or yelling you might usually see in a scene like this. Later, in private, Batman affirms that Superman is his friend and offers a briefcase with plans to deal with him, should the need ever arise. It shows the characters usual forward thinking while also showing a humility he simply did not have in the pre-Flashpoint version of this plot point, Tower of Babel. There, while technically correct in his thinking, there was an undeniable bit of arrogance to Batmans plan, seemingly suggesting that he was the only one there who was infallible.

Showing that the heroes are actually friends within the comic itself? That's something I wanted since volume one. I cannot dislike that. I'm not a rock. Throw in more Ivan Reis art and yeah, I'd say I'm pretty well on board with Justice League again.

Sadly, as I noted at the start, the praise had to end eventually. I didn't go into the story too much because, frankly, there isn't much to get into. You probably noticed the little "collects" bit there, right? Five issues. Issue twenty one is skipped because it's the full issue conclusion of the Shazam story that had been running in the singles as a backup and is, I assume, collected in the trade of that material. Of what we have, only three of the five issues are a coherent story exclusive to this volume.

The other two? Chapters of Trinity War, also collected in the Trinity War trade. You'll recall Justice League of America pulled this as well, but the difference here is that book had five issues of exclusive material. That's fairly reasonable for a volume. The Grid, however, has three. The Trinity War chapters are the bookends of the event and fairly incomprehensible without everything in between.

Whether it's intended or not, it feels like being fleeced. This volume, after all, has a suggested retail price of seventeen dollars for the paperback. I realize they were kind of put in a hard place here, but is there any reason they couldn't have collected the three issues as a small, nine dollar collection? It wouldn't be the first time that's happened. What other reason is there except that extra seven dollars a copy?

I'm enjoying Justice League now, but I don't enjoy feeling like I'm being bilked for extra cash and the score reflects that.

My Opinion: Try It

Justice League: Throne of Atlantis (comics)

Writer: Geoff Johns
Artists: Ivan Reis, Tony Daniel, Paul Pelletier
Collects: Justice League #13-17, Aquaman #15-16

It's certainly been a while.

About ten months ago I reviewed the second volume of this incarnation of the Justice League and it was scathing. The Villains Journey was bad enough that I wasn't sure I'd be back at all. But time can temper your annoyance. Eventually I decided to give the book another chance.

Throne of Atlantis is a crossover with the Aquaman title, concerned as much with advancing that comics story as it is the League. The short version is that a missile test goes wrong - foul play is evident, but that's left to simmer a while - and Atlantis is left with the impression that it was an attack. Thoroughly pissed off, Atlantis attacks the surface. The Justice League retaliates. Aquaman, who wants a peaceful solution, is caught in the middle. The creatures of the Trench are also involved; they were introduced in the first volume of Aquaman.

I'm not sure what it is about Aquaman that brings out the best in Geoff Johns, but if nothing else he's done a pretty great job of making the character interesting. Between Brightest Day, the characters solo and this crossover, it feels almost like a rehabilitation project for him. Throne of Atlantis does a fair job of redeeming the League, as well; they feel more heroic here than they did in the last volume. Even Wonder Woman has signs of likability as she attempts to solve a conflict with a classic rogue without bloodshed.

This ties into something I said about Geoff Johns in the last review, mainly that his best work seems to be when he focuses on the characters as opposed to simply worrying about the plot at hand. Unsurprisingly, that's part of why Throne of Atlantis works where Origin and The Villains Journey absolutely did not. He's clearly trying to do better with Wonder Woman, who has been portrayed as little more than a bloodthirsty warrior in past volumes. Cyborg has to make a hard choice in order to go save the League. Aquaman struggling with his dual heritage obviously has a lot of focus. It plays more to Johns strengths as a writer than the usual shock schlock.

We even get some long overdue moments between team members, chiefly Aquaman and Batman, who finally come to an understanding. Batman is the first to get what kind of position Aquaman is in, adamantly states that Aquaman will get a chance to resolve the conflict peacefully when the rest of the League is ready to go in and even goes for the old "we were both at fault" chestnut when Aquaman starts to blame himself. It's exactly the sort of thing this comic needed a lot more of; had a few storylines with similar development been done between Origin and Villains Journey, the conflicts of the prior volume would have been easier to take at face value. Batman and Aquaman feel like teammates here.

On top of that, there's a decent fake-out regarding the character behind the events that transpire. I won't spoil what happens, but it's a plot beat that has some more weight of you were a fan of DC or even just Aquaman before the New 52. The story leaves you expecting it to go in a familiar direction, then it flips the script. It's simple, but effective.

It's not all sunshine and roses, however. We get the fallout to the big kiss that closed the prior volume. You may recall I wasn't fond of that whole thing. It doesn't get much better. Geoff's clearly trying to make this work, going so far as to show the two on a "date" in civilian garb, but it feels like too much, too soon. We have the implied five year history, but nothing about the actions of the characters or their dynamic suggests people who have known each other for that length of time. We're told five years passed after Origin, but it feels like these events could only happen a year later at maximum, if that makes sense. So with things like Superman and Wonder Womans budding relationship, it feels like they've only just met - even if we know better - only to throw themselves into a relationship with the other. Mainly because they're lonely, which is the other problem. They don't even have much chemistry, at least in my opinion.

I'm want to just accept it at face value and move forward - after all, this is clearly going to be a thing whether we want it or not, so it's easier to just let it go - but I can't escape the feeling this whole thing is as shallow as I feared.

There's also the reality that the League this comic was sold on is changing. We've already lost Green Lantern because of plot contrivance. It's unclear, but we may be losing Aquaman as a result of this volume; the epilogue deals with his decision to go back to Atlantis and lead, interspersed with the League discussing recruitment. The New 52 Justice League was clearly marketed as a team of the greatest, most recognizable heroes and by the end of the second volume we've already started losing members. I was on board with the lineup, so the fact that it's already in flux isn't a good sign. I could always be reading the epilogue wrong and Aquaman will be present at the start of the next collection.

Oh, and Batman is still sort of useless, which is an obvious negative, but the book is clearly trying to work him in better.

Unlike Origin and Villains Journey, I don't have any major problems with the art of this collection. The highlight is, of course, Ivan Reis, but the others do a good job of keeping a visual consistancy. Aside from a few iffy panels where the storytelling isn't particularly strong, Tony Daniel manages to hang tough for his two issues as well. Jim Lees departure may have hurt the book in star power, but the result is stronger as a whole.

We'll see if the quality holds, but for now Justice League has won me back.

My Opinion: Read It

Blackest Night (comics)

Writer: Geoff Johns
Artist: Ivan Reis
Collects: Blackest Night #0-8, Directors Commentary, sketches, scripts for deleted scenes and other bonus material

Ahh, Blackest Night. The culmination of the first five years of Geoff Johns run on Green Lantern and his third big event for DC. Thing is, I'm not a big Green Lantern reader. By all rights, Geoffs run on Green Lantern has a lot of things I generally like in comics - as much as it's been derided by the smarmy corner of internet reviewing, the mutli-colored corps are a hell of a way to throw color around and history will show I like that - but I've long had difficulty really caring*.

To tell the truth, that's been a bit of a problem for me in general regarding Geoff - I'm generally fond of his work, but Teen Titans aside he has quite the affinity for characters I couldn't care less about - but in this case, he threw zombies into the equation. I'm not a rock; I had to get around to this one eventually. It certainly helps that I loved the idea. After all is said and done, this one didn't sell me on the Green Lantern, but I have to admit that this is probably the most accessible - even if it isn't the smartest - event he's done to this point.

So, basically, lots of dudes in neon spandex like killing each other in space with rings that produce colored light. Of course, differences need to be put to the side when, holy crap, black rings show up and start reviving dead bodies. While on Earth, heroes and civilians are celebrating their own day of the dead, honoring the fallen in the line of superheroics. What a lucky coincidence that some black rings are around to raise dead loved ones and have them eat some hearts, right? This looks like a job for... some second stringers!

I'm being snarky, sure, but the idea is pretty sound. Basically, the black rings revive dead heroes and loved ones who could get a rise out of our heroes, causing them to feel emotions. They need these emotions to power up the Black Lantern battery, at which point they could really smack around our heroes. You can see why this was retooled from being just a Green Lantern story to a full on event; there's a lot of potential here for mining the storied DC history - which, at the time, was played as one of DC's defining elements - for emotional drama.

As you can tell by the contents, this was an eight issue event, not including the short zero issue that served as a prologue. That's a hell of a lot of room to work with, arguably too much for an event. These things are sold largely on hype, so somehow you need to keep wowing people each issue, in this case having to do so for eight issues.

To Geoffs credit, he pulls it off. The stakes are high early on and manage to keep going up. Even when you think "this is it, the good guys have it in the bag", Geoff will have one more trick to pull. As such, the book is filled with big moments that will stick in your mind, even if the general story does not. These alone hold your attention very well even in the collection; it must have been really exciting month to month.

It's a good thing Geoff knows how to wow you though, because his writing in this book is not always the sharpest. Some exchanges vary from either hammy to corny, while some of Green Lanterns cracks about "lite bright" and "rainbow brigade" are a little too wink wink, nudge nudge to fan grumblings to really work. For every moment that works - there's some speechifying Flash gives Mera and Atom about halfway through that I thought was effective - there's another that isn't.

Worse still, the book feels like a jigsaw puzzle with a few of the pieces missing. There are some quick cuts that are obvious setups for the tie-ins, but in the process the main story suffers somewhat. Green Lantern is spirited off a third of the way through the book to round up the rest of the corps and doesn't appear again until a while later, the whole recruitment bypassed. Similarly, you could be forgiven for forgetting the Lanterns in space are in trouble too, because after some quick setup early on showing them besieged by black rings, we almost never see them again until the end.

Sloppy, confusing and stupid. Probably easily fixed too with a bit of trimming.

All that said, if you ignore these moments, the book IS readable. Like I said, it's pretty accessible even if you don't care a whit about Green Lantern. This was clearly what they were shooting for. Of course, the fact that "readable" and "genuinely great" aren't the same thing happens to be lost in the process. Still, I'm not sorry I read it, which is a hell of a lot better than some other events I've read.

The event is bolstered by the presence of Ivan Reis, who is on art duties from start to finish. His work is great as always. The coloring isn't quite as lush as Brightest Day - considering this is a story dealing heavily in death, it probably shouldn't be - but the actual linework is still top notch. No artist changes midway through either, which really bolsters the book. Better written events were practically sunk by art shifts partway through; had the same fate befallen Blackest Night I think it would have joined them. Never underestimate the value of a consistent look.

The Score: 7 out of 10

Not as great as I hoped it would be when it was in the midst of monthly serialization, but it's definitely a solid seven. It might have fared better if the Green Lantern issues were included in their proper place; at times it felt like I was only getting half the story. I imagine I will get to that collection eventually. In the meantime, the core event is worth a read at the least. But unless you're a fan of Geoffs ongoing Green Lantern saga I hesitate the recommend an outright purchase.

* Actually, that's not entirely fair. There was a point during Blackest Nights publication where I had honestly considered trying to get into Geoffs Green Lantern starting from Rebirth on. The trade collection plans are what changed my mind. I wasn't happy when I heard the Green Lantern tie-in issues were to be collected separately, as what I'd heard made it sound like they easily slotted in the issues of the event and added a lot of depth. A lot of folks would have just sucked it up and switched off between the two books, but I'd hoped DC would eventually collect Blackest Night and the GL tie-in issues in a big ol' "Ultimate Collection". So far, it hasn't happened.