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7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
DC continues its foray into darkness..., June 26, 2010
This review is from: Justice League of America: Cry for Justice (Hardcover)
DC has, by and large, always been the publisher that goes for the throat as far as the material they publish. Their greatest tales are tales that are much more oriented for an mature audience. Tales such as THE DARK KNIGHT RETURNS, WATCHMEN, V FOR VENDETTA, Alan Moore's run on SWAMP THING (essentially anything Alan Moore), BATMAN: YEAR ONE, ARKHAM ASYLUM: A SERIOUS HOUSE ON SERIOUS EARTH... these are beholden to be some of the greatest works in the four-color industry. They have an entire sub-publishing house, Vertigo, that is dedicated to more independent and darker tales, and the titles that spawned such as SANDMAN, PREACHER, and Y: THE LAST MAN are some more examples of great storytelling. But they are dark, violent, and adult-oriented.
When Grant Morrison came to DC in the late 90's with his new vision of The Justice League of America, it started out dark from the get-go, and it was relatively consistent with his bizarre, almost stream-of-consciousness storytelling style and I believe it was here that the DC really kicked their darker stories into gear, even though it had started a few years previously with major events like The Death of Superman, the fall of Hal Jordan, and the BATMAN: KNIGHTFALL arcs.
You look in the recent happenings of DC, and you have almost all of their major heroes going through cataclysmic and frightening changes and events. There was an IDENTITY CRISIS, where some characters lost their lives, their minds and their way. Then there was an INFINITE CRISIS, where many heroes and villains died. Then recently came the Grant Morrison spear-headed BATMAN: R.I.P and FINAL CRISIS tales in which Bruce Wayne and J'onn J'onnz were killed (presumably to await their eventual resurrection). Now, while I personally feel that both R.I.P and FINAL CRISIS were collossal failures from a storytelling point of view, they did open some interesting doors for DC to walk through, such as BLACKEST NIGHT, the Green Lantern Meets Zombies mega-event and Dick Grayson becoming Batman, which DID work.
But CRY FOR JUSTICE has nothing to do with the latter two events, but much to do with specifically FINAL CRISIS.
In the very beginning of CFJ, Hal Jordan essentially announces to the JLA that, with the deaths of Bruce and J'onn, the hunt for Super-Villains should be more proactive and less reactive because that's what the League seems to do: stop catastrophic events after they've already begun. Hal, after all, is a member of an intergalactic police force. First and foremost, he's a cop, and a cop's job is not always to stop crimes after they've been committed, but to prevent them from happening altogether, and if the League had used this kind of foresight, it could have possibly prevented the Crisis. Naturally, Hal and Oliver Queen go back a long way and Ollie will follow Hal and in many cases, act as a counter to Hal just in case things go south. But around the DCU, other heroes are recovering from very personal losses: Congorilla, one of the beings to call himself Starman, Ray Palmer (The Atom, whose wife catalyzed the murderous events of IDENTITY CRISIS): They're all feeling a similar need for justice to be done. Soon after, Supergirl, Donna Troy and Shazam become involved in the hunt for a specific super-villain who has caused some of these heroes a lot of suffering. The villain is Prometheus, a great character created by Grant Morrison for his run on JLA, who wears a helmet allowing him to download physical and mental attributes directly to his body to counter and defeat his adversaries. When Prometheus first combatted the JLA, he was done in by Batman, who uploaded the physical attributes of Professor Stephen Hawking into Prometheus' helmet. And then J'onn used his mental abilities to keep Prometheus' mind locked away. But J'onn's death has brought Prometheus out of his stupor and he is seeking his own brand of justice, which could conceivably bring about the deaths of hundreds of millions.
Believe me when I say this book is incredibly dark. James Robinson, who has done some very dark things with Superman, and worked on the STARMAN title for years, is no stranger to the darkness. But it took a lot of faith in his comic writing for me to pick this up because he is responsible for writing one of the worst films ever made, which was the film adaptation of LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN. But his comic style is confident and has a good flow to it. And artist Mauro Cascioli... wow. His art just pops from the page with its beauty and its atmosphere.
There are a few events that take place that I won't spoil here that really throw the reader for a loop as characters take their revenge on others. And some of these events can, by some, be seen as 'lazy' writing, which goes something like this: "Do (this) to (Character B) and (Character A) will react in an extreme fashion that may even appear out of character." That DOES happen here in one instance. And that DID make me mad. It worked at shocking me, but it was more of a "WTF?!?" moment rather than a moment that actually as something that worked within the character's own persona. If one of the other characters had done it, maybe that moment would have been believable, but it didn't. But DC has been, for many years now, about shaking up the status quo, but in some cases, they seem to be doing it just to give the character something new to do as opposed to any really good reason to do it.
With television and film, it's always the person going against the rules that we end up rooting for: the archetype of the acting-on-his/her-own-against-all-odds hero is a great standard, and CRY FOR JUSTICE shows that this can also work within a group dynamic. But do superheroes kill? Do they cross that line and still remain heroic? I think that is a somewhat archaic idea, and sometimes, you feel that a villain is so bad that they deserve to die. But when the reason seems to be invented just so that some character will step up to the plate to take one of the bad guys out to, again, change the status quo. And sometimes that works, and sometimes it doesn't... and in CRY FOR JUSTICE, it just barely works. But just barely.
On a personal, somewhat spoiler-ish note, I am a weekly comic collector, but I decided to wait for this tale to come to the Trade format. Unfortunately, sometimes when you wait for trades, things happen in the rest of the universe that are direct results of the events within the trade, and there are several spinoff series that grew out of the events of CRY FOR JUSTICE such as THE FALL OF GREEN ARROW, which is not a major event, but this book does represent a major turning point for the Emerald Archer.
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9 of 12 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
I expected good things, but not this good..., June 14, 2010
This review is from: Justice League of America: Cry for Justice (Hardcover)
When you look at Cry for Justice, the first thing you'll notice is the beautiful artwork, but the book goes way beyond its pretty face. What begins as Green Lantern and Green Arrow parting ways with the JLA for a bit leads to one of the most exciting Justice League stories I've read. From the cover of the book, those familiar enough with the JLA can easily see that this story involves the villain Prometheus, and while he's given the JLA a run for their money before, this maniacal, brilliant villain created by Grant Morrison has somewhat fallen off the radar. But this is his big return, and he's never seemed so threatening to the League than in this book. What I like is how well the villain is established as something of an evil Batman, especially since the caped crusader, having "perished" during the events of Final Crisis, is nowhere to be found. I can't help wondering how this story would've played out had the Martian Manhunter and Batman been around. It actually prompted me to go back and read through Morrison's original Prometheus story arc, which I think only lasted for one issue in his run of JLA. Even so, it was one of my favorite characters introduced during his run, so it was nice to see him back in action, mainly because I just hate the character so much. I really like seeing it when he finally gets taken down. And after reading through this collection, I think most people will have the same reaction. There's a lot lost by the end of Cry for Justice. Some heroes suffer dearly, especially Green Arrow, yet that only helps to strengthen the short but unexpected conclusion of the story, which left me feeling satisfied.
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11 of 15 people found the following review helpful:
1.0 out of 5 stars
Gore for the sake of gore, June 22, 2010
This review is from: Justice League of America: Cry for Justice (Hardcover)
I can appreciate where the other reviewers are coming from. All I want to do is give an alternative opinion without declaring anyone wrong. Please take what I am saying as an attempt to give a different view on this comic.
When I read through this comic, it seemed incredibly violent for the sake of violence. The artist did everything he could to make each act of violence so horrific, it was pornographic. No, I don't mean that in a sexual way. I mean, the violence was brutal for the sake of brutal, and the artist did everything in his power to drive the point of brutality home just to shock the reader rather than to help contribute to the story.
The story itself upset me greatly. There has been a theme in DC Comics where everything has to be dark for the sake of being dark. There was no reason to make this comic so dark. I will not give any spoilers, but there were multiple instances of darkness that makes no sense in the DC universe (where magic and technology are so common place, mind control and missing limbs should not be a problem anymore). But, the reader was expected to be shocked and think about the "reality" of what was going on and how nothing will ever be the same again, when in reality, things will be exactly the same again in a few years. All that's left for the reader is a story that would have been better served as an elseworlds book rather than in DC canon. All that's left to wonder about is how the editors will sweep it under the rug (you know, like they did with Wonder Woman).
The other part of the story that upset me was how post Silver Age characters were treated. Prometheus was called a joke on many occasions. As was pointed out, he's an incredibly dangerous man. But nope, he's a joke apparently. And his hideout, which is only accessible through magical means, or very high technology that the Justice League doesn't have access to, can be reached by an archer that isn't very technically minded. Yep. Makes no sense to me. But, that's how the story played out because it was convenient for it to happen. The treatment of the rest was equally insulting. Glorify the Silver Age and darken it up a bit to make it relevant.
Bah! Enough of that for me!
But, you know...read it for yourself and make up your mind. The other reviewers did and that's great! I did and that's cool too.
What's your take on this comic?
Violence for the sake of violence does not make a good story. Realism for the sake of realism does not make a good story. The DC universe can be shown as a realistic universe with the right story.
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