Justice Society of America #24 Review

JUSTICE SOCIETY OF AMERICA #24
Written by Geoff Johns and Jerry Ordway
Art by Jerry Ordway

No, no, no! Why Johns? Why do you have to do this? Pink haired, sex crazed, Desaad possessed Mary Marvel worked within the confines of Morrison's insanity and the framework of Final Crisis. She should never, ever, appear anywhere else again. Especially drawn by Jerry Ordway. You didn't even try to explain why she was like that or why she used her magic word again other than a cheap one line, "the voices told me to", explanation.

In fact, this issue was bad on so many levels, even ignoring the Mary Marvel nonsense, and, to be honest, I'm not even sure I want to pick up the next issue now.

Let's take it from the top. The JSA are storming the Rock of Eternity with the depowered Billy Batson. There's no personality to anyone and little emotion or reason for the reader to invest themselves in their plight.

Upon arriving at the Rock, they simply yell for Black Adam to come speak with them. With Jerry Ordway's terrible art, he shows up looking like a cross between an elf and poorly down characiture of the more regal and snobbish Black Adam we've come to know. It's really quite ridiculous how bad he looks. The rest of the JSA don't far much better and most of the women suffer from a serious case of man face.

After Adam basically tells them all to leave before Isis comes, predictably, Isis shows up and grabs Billy. Instead of just killing him, she's decided to toss him into some mist-like magic soup thing which is never really explained.

Somewhere along the line we get a Black Adam origin story about how Theo Adam betrayed Billy's parents and became Black Adam. It's also shown how Billy became Captain Marvel when his father's spirit showed up to take him to the wizard, Shazam, at the Rock of Eternity.

Why does that matter? Well, before Isis can throw Billy into the magic mist, Jay Garrick zooms in and tosses Billy away from harm. This causes him to be absorbed by the mist and, by issue's end, he's seen talking to Billy's dad's spirit, who offers to take him to the Rock of Finality. No, I don't know what that is nor do I care.

Finally, after Billy was saved by Flash, he's magically in a cave passage with Stargirl and Mary Marvel shows up and, after Mary tosses Stargirl aside, tells Billy he'll be joining their family, which I believe means the Black Adam one. The only explanation for the shifting of the caves is that, well, it's magic and they don't have to explain it.

Verdict - Avoid It. Johns never really clicked on this volume of JSA and, sad as it is to say, I'm glad he's finally leaving. I only wish this final storyline could have come out better.

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