Review: Justice League #12 By Geoff Johns and Jim Lee

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Justice League #12

Written by Geoff Johns

Pencils by Jim Lee, Ivan Reis, Joe Prado, and David Finch

Inks by Scott Williams, Sandra Hope, Jonathan Glapion, Mark Irwin, Matt Banning, Rob Hunter, Joe Weems, Alex Garner, and Trevor Scott

Colors by Alex Sinclair, Gabe Eltaeb, Tony Avina, Sonia Oback, and Pete Pantazis

 

 

The short of it:

 

While the world discusses whether or not the Justice League are actually friends or not, in the wake of Diana and Hal’s public brawl, as information about Graves and Steve Trevor’s capture are made public, the League has their own problem. Namely Graves and his evil ghosts of dead loved ones. He wants them to experience loss so that they can be better and understand how to make everyone else better, like if Zoom used ghosts instead of sonic boom finger snaps. Also, they aren’t really fighting back, I mean, it takes a not-quite-dead Steve Trevor saying “I’m not dead” to get the League to actually fight back. Apparently each of them was more than capable of stopping him the entire time but were too distracted by angry ghost like things. In the end Graves goes down and they don’t kill him, just take away his weird powers and ghost armor.

 

A day later Diana goes to see Steve, and I’d say she dumps him but they weren’t together, so she fires him from the League. To protect him. He isn’t happy, nor should he be. The man has been dealing with a woman that he has feelings for that is completely void of any real understanding of that, who think she knows what’s best for him, but doesn’t ever actually listen to him. Meanwhile the rest of the League talks, one demands to be put in charge, another quits to be the scapegoat for the blame of their public issues, and we get the scene that DC has been teasing for a week.

 

Superman and Wonder Woman? It happens. And why it happens? Well, I’ve definitely seen worse reasons to hook up.

 

What I liked:

 

  • I like how they tried to push the League having fights as a big deal to the public, it wasn’t always clear across the arc, but there’s just something about seeing TMZ Live talking about the fallout of the Justice League that got it across in my mind.
  • With most villains this would be a dislike, but Graves being too arrogant to confirm that he actually killed someone and them blowing up all his plans made me go “HA!” What a putz. I love when bad villains look like chumps.
  • Aquaman should demand to be in charge over Batman, I mean, it won’t happen, but he raises some damn good points. Batman has led the team for five years and it isn’t working, Aquaman has worked for teams and run a continent. At the same time, Batman pointing out the issues with his statement was pretty spot on too. The two have good exchanges, I’d like to see Geoff play with the dynamic some more.
  • Superman/Wonder Woman as a couple works for me. Not in the ‘fanboy wet dream’ sense so much as the ‘well, these two really do stand alone above everyone else’ sense. This is a world where Superman lacks the strong family ties that kept Clark Kent going, with the Kent’s having passed and him not being with Lois. Then you have Diana who, really, is always in the ‘alone above everyone else’ boat. Now, I don’t know how long the pairing can really work for, but the places that they could take it are intriguing.

 

What I didn’t like:

 

  • ARMY OF INKERS! I can’t even tell you who inked what! I understood multiple pencillers, with Lee doing the main story, Reis and Prado doing the preview of next year and the last scene, and Finch being credited with his JLA cover, but there are NINE inkers! And typically Joe Prado inks over Ivan’s pencils, so that’s nine inkers across Lee and Finch!
  • Graves not getting killed means he’ll probably return. BOO! Worst villain of the New 52, and that’ saying something!
  • I mean, his powers are spiritual parasites that pretend to be dead people to feed off of the living? It just feels…forced. It’s too cookie cutter, and I probably wouldn’t feel this way if the character had more time to build, but at the same time…man, Graves sucked.
  • Man, I have lived that epic dumping that Steve took at the hands of Diana. Where you’re not even together but they still callously chop you out of their life for ‘your own good’. It’s ridiculously condescending, and while I understand why it had to happen that way for story purposes…I hate people who do that so much.

 

Final Thoughts:

 

So is this issue before War of the Green Lanterns? Now that we have the time line right in this book I can try and work it out, but it has to be before then for Hal to have a ring. Right? Does that mean next issue will actually fully catch up?

 

For as much as I’m going to miss Jim Lee on this book I have no complaints at all about Ivan Reis taking over. Ivan is a big deal artist, as far as I’m concerned, and while he may not have Jim’s name value, he is a whole lot more consistent. Both in quality of work and ability to make a deadline, Ivan Reis pencilling Justice League means it’ll look epic without delays, and for that, I can’t wait.

 

Normally when members quit teams you can sorta see it coming. I remember back in 2003 Kyle Rayner quit the JLA because in his own book he had given up on humanity and wanted to go into space. I remember when Morrison wrote JLA we saw Hippolyta show up to replace Diana and then leave when the story dictated she should. This book has been somewhat backwards about it though, in that our character who quit is one that I couldn’t full wrap my brain around the presence of given current status quos.

 

I dug the things to look for in the future, especially the potentially of a war against Aquaman and new members!

 

Graves really did serve his purpose in the end, he had origins stemming from the League’s origins, and his big master stroke created the first rift that the League has had to face. He sucked, but he led to interesting things, so I can’t fully hold it against them for his actions

 

Overall: 7.5/10

A lifelong reader and self proclaimed continuity guru, Grey is the Editor in Chief of Comics Nexus. Known for his love of Booster Gold, Spider-Girl (the real one), Stephanie Brown, and The Boys. Don't miss The Gold Standard.