Comic Review -- Justice League #7: The Villain's Journey, prologue / Geoff Johns, Gene Ha, and Gary Frank

Okay, my first issue is with the banner across the top of the cover.  I've never liked ads like this, and this one's no exception.  I say this being completely supportive of DC's We Can Be Heroes initiative, but they could have put the ad prominently inside the comic.  This move was just needlessly disruptive, and I don't appreciate it.

Otherwise, I rather like the cover.  It's a Jim Lee, and I'll admit, it's a bit crowded, but it's still dynamic, action-packed, and iconic.  It even supports the story inside somewhat, which is always a plus in my book.  It's clearly an illustration designed for a cover or poster--clearly it makes little sense to engage in combat in this kind of close quarters--but overall, I like the look presented for what it is: a dynamic, en media res representation of the team in action together.

With the new origin story finished and done, we come to what is denoted as the present day.  The League's membership has apparently remained the same for five years, and we have a couple of interesting dynamics going on that are a sharp contrast from the all-out action of the first story arc.  First, we see that the writer from last issue, David Graves, has apparently changed his initially sterling opinion of the Justice League, and is embarking on some kind of clandestine quest to destroy them.  Second, the Justice League is still working on their teamwork even as they take down an emerging threat with little effort.  Colonel Steven Trevor is then shown dealing with the media on behalf of A.R.G.U.S. and Congress on behalf of the League, as their liaison.  Finally, we get a treatise from David Graves, who reveals himself as the person who stole an artifact called the Orb of Ra, and who has discovered the key to destroying the Justice League: Steven Trevor.

I've already seen quite a few negative reviews for this issue, and I'm actually forced to wonder why people seem to dislike it so.  I understand that there's not as much high-octane action as before, but frankly, I could use a break from it by this point.  I'm much more interested in the interpersonal dynamics between the members of the League, and as shown, those who interact with the JL on various levels.  Watching Steven Trevor, with whom I'll admit not being very familiar, deal with his role as human liaison to the modern-day gods and frustrated man whose love for Wonder Woman remains unrequited, lends a sense of anchoring to the narrative that could otherwise easily remove its scope from more human concerns.

I'm also fascinated by the premise promised by the title, "The Villain's Journey," a reversal of the mythological narrative pattern Joseph Campbell described as the hero's journey.  There's a lot of potential for some imaginative storytelling here, especially if Geoff Johns takes this seriously and explores and maybe subverts some of the stages of the hero's journey Campbell sets up in The Hero with a Thousand Faces.  Time will of course tell, but I for one am willing to give him the benefit of the doubt to see how this unfolds.

After all, this issue is more or less bookended by David Graves' observations and foreshadowing. I think he's the one who's intended to be the star of this arc, and I would urge readers and reviewers to keep that in mind for this one before sinking Johns on other areas of the story.  Despite how little he appears in this issue, he's made some key moves in it, and I think we've got a potential setup for a good nemesis for the Justice League.

That's not to say that I have no issues with this segment of the story, but they're fairly minor compared to what I think may be on the horizon.  My biggest issue is that the JL's membership seems not to have changed in the five years since it was formed.  Really?  No one died, left, switched sides, went on to a higher plane of existence, or retired?  They've accepted no other new members since then?  I suppose all of this could have happened, and that they just happen to have their original configuration at this point in time for the story, but that seems awfully convenient as well.

I'm not familiar with Shazam except in the vaguest sense, but I thought the opening of that story was pretty interesting.  I'll be interested to see where it goes, and will continue to read it, though I was a little miffed that it just had to be introduced (and apparently continued) in the pages of Justice League.  Still, I'm willing to give it a shot.  Hopefully Billy Batson's not as huge a jerk as he was portrayed in this first story, but maybe his own hero's journey involves him changing his attitude.  We'll see.

Artistically, I was a little jolted by Jim Lee's absence from this issue (with the exception of the cover), but I do think Gene Ha does a good job in his guest role this month.  It seemed slightly gritty for a story about a high-powered superhero team, but it did a fine job of supporting the narrative.  Batman's angry face in response to Green Lantern's patronizing remarks was pretty amusing, as were the renderings of Spore and his minions at the beginning of the story.  I did enjoy Gary Frank's artwork in the Shazam story quite a bit.  It was very clean, and the linework made for some very realistic illustrations.

Overall, I like the setup and direction for this issue.  I think the story has a lot of potential, and that its focus may not be where a lot of readers think it is.  The Shazam story also promises an epic tale, and starts off well enough.  The artwork in both stories is nice.  Definitely a worthy start for anyone interested in superhero stories, and possibly those interested in studies modern mythologies.  Highly recommended.

Pondering Hero Death In Movies, and Realism vs. Genre Conventions

Man, speculate about a hero's death, and you will get an earful from the fans...

This article on Cracked.com offers up a pretty interesting (and, I think, persuasive) argument for Bruce Wayne not surviving the third of Nolan's film trilogy, The Dark Knight Rises, and that the mantle of the Bat will be passed on to a successor. Who knows if it's true. Regardless of whether or not it turns out to be correct, it got me thinking that it would a pretty brilliant way for Christopher Nolan to end the Batman movies he's worked on.

I told this to a friend, who did not agree, and our 10-minute phone call turned into an hour and a half debate about the conventions and rules that should be observed when working on modern mythologies. It was a pretty spirited discussion, and it got me thinking about some of the ways in which we comics enthusiasts transfer our expectations from the original medium of comics to the very different arena of film. A few points that came to mind tend to work in one medium, but not the other. Here are a few of them:

1. The Hero Must Not Die. By and large, this is overwhelmingly true in the comics. Even when the main character or a major one is killed off, he or she inevitably comes back. Superman, Green Lantern, Captain America, Jean Grey, and even the hated Jason Todd have proved this time and again. I usually blame this on lazy writing, and the fact that fictitious characters (ie, intellectual property) aren't really "alive" to kill in the first place, but even I will admit that in a serialized medium that should in theory never end, it's very tempting to want to bring back characters from the dead. In movies, however, this is less of a problem. Film is, essentially, a re-imagining of the source material, and given how expensive they are to make, one can't reasonably expect them to go on forever. It's reasonable to go in, tell a set of stories, and then effectively end that segment as an interpretation. It's not like films are canon to the comics. I also think that with comics, we're a little spoiled by an elastic timeline that allows us to essentially think of our heroes as ageless. Film does a lot to remove those assumptions, as actors age noticeably over time. Why not take that into account when interpreting the myth for this other medium? What, in essence, is wrong with Bruce Wayne dying at the end of a film trilogy? Wouldn't that be a more realistic end to what has been praised as a realistic interpretation of the Batman mythos?
2. I Don't Watch Movies For Realism. After all, how realistic is a guy dressing up as a bat and going out to fight crime, night after night? Good point. But saying that entertainment should be devoid of realism makes no sense. Why, then, watch anything that has humans in it at all? Humans are real, last I checked. Why aren't we, as grown up children, watching movies about animated bunnies all the time? Because we need a certain amount of verisimilitude in our fiction, so that we have points at which we can identify with it. There's nothing wrong, in my opinion, with a consistent internal set of rules in which a fictitious world can operate. And, to take it a little further, I think there's nothing wrong with altering those rules within the same mythology when someone else is making their own interpretation. The Nolan films are a perfect example of this. They've been heavily praised for their realism. And realistically, what can we expect in terms of a shelf-life of an individual who fights crime, day-in, day-out, pushing their body every day, for years? My guess is that a decade would be a generous estimate. If you want the legacy to continue, then why wouldn't you do succession planning for it? This is an idea we don't really think about because of the essentially ageless nature of comics, but that we would have to consider when placing our heroes outside the panels and into the "real" world.
3. Death Is Defeat. And therefore, why end the films on such a downer note? It's hard for me to hear this, because it's such an all-or-nothing approach. I've seen superheroes get trounced seven ways from Sunday, and still live to tell the tale. Is that a victory, just because they lived? And what about dying to protect something larger? Say, a city like Gotham, or loved ones, the way Ultimate Spider-Man did? Are those really losses? I think viewing death as an automatic defeat takes the potential for nobility and heroism down considerably for anyone who is supposed to consider themselves a hero. I'm more willing to accept the phrase that Senseless Death Is Defeat, or that Death For Death's Sake Is Defeat. But any death? Heroic sacrifices are a part and parcel of the superhero life, and those that result in the death of the hero are supposed to be the most heroic of all. I acknowledge that a lot is lost, and the victory would be costly, but I don't think it would diminish in any way the idea that a noble or heroic death is a victory.

These, of course, are my opinions, and I acknowledge there are plenty who will disagree with me. But I doubt I'll be the only person cheering the boldness of Nolan's decision, should Bruce's demise indeed come to pass in The Dark Knight Rises. He's done a good job of taking this mythos and exploring the considerations required for a more realistic superhero in a modern world. I'm sure he'll do the same thing again with this film, and this approach would be an indisputably original and unforgettable way to do it.