JSA #55
Originally presented at Comixtreme.com.
Quick Rating: Excellent
Title: Be Good For Goodness’ Sake
The old guard of the Justice Society pays a Christmas Eve visit to an old friend.
Writer: Geoff Johns
Pencils: Leonard Kirk
Inks: Keith Champagne & Wade Von Grawbadger
Colors: Hi-Fi
Letters: Jared K. Fletcher
Editor: Peter Tomasi
Cover Art: Carlos Pacheco, Jesus Merino & Hi-Fi
Publisher: DC Comics
Review: I love this comic book. I love this more than my next 30 minutes of oxygen. I would buy a bushel of this book and give it out as Christmas presents if I thought everybody I knew would get what makes it so great. This is one of the sweetest, most joyful comic books I have read all year, but the only people who will get it will be people like me, who love the old-school, Golden Age superheroes more than anything else, who thinks of Allen Scott and Jay Garrick as the definitive Green Lantern/Flash team, and who misses those characters who have faded into the background.
Green Lantern, Flash, Wildcat and Hawkman spend every Christmas Eve visiting an old friend, once a comrade-in-arms, who has been sadly absent from the DCU for far too long. I can’t tell you the identity of this friend without spoiling the issue, but suffice it to say when I realized who it was, I literally cheered. And I don’t care if I am the only one.
This is a beautiful, self-contained, one-issue story that every JSA or Golden Age fan needs to read.
Leonard Kirk makes a fill-in return to the title he sadly had to depart four issues ago, and for my money, he’s always welcome back. He draws the classic heroes better than anyone in the business these days, and if a new creative team for Hawkman hasn’t been decided on yet, the editor should take a long, hard look in Kirk’s direction.
I can’t say enough good things about this comic book. JSA, month in and month out, is one of the most solid superhero titles on the market. This issue is a Christmas present for fans who remember a time when heroes were pure and innocent, when “grim and gritty” had not yet become part of our vocabulary, and when the silliest of concepts made for the purest of spirits.
Rating: 10/10
An archive of all my reviews is online at Evertime Realms.