Our coverage continues of JSA in the 90s with Keith G. Baker and The Irredeemable Shag discussing JUSTICE SOCIETY OF AMERICA #4 (Nov 1992) by Len Strazewski, Mike Parobeck, and Mike Machlan! The Ultra-Humanite raises the stakes on his plans of revenge when he captures the Atom, Wildcat, and Doctor Mid-Nite, but can Wally West save the day? Plus the introduction of Jesse Quick! Finally, we wrap up with YOUR listener feedback!
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Well, I don’t know if it was the recap, but that was A LOT of plot for this issue. Not complaining, though, that’s the way I like it.
This brought me memories of the excitement for the introduction of Jesse. You see, I AM and Infinity fan, and these legacies meant (and mean) a lot to me.
Regarding Wally, he had just very recently moved to Keystone. The first four or so years he lived in New York.
Finally, What if-ing JSA without the Crisis, I agree some sort of reunion with the Infinitors would have happened and at some point they would have had to address aging somehow.
I wonder how Starman, the duplicate identities (MidNite) and such would have been integrated, if so.
I haven’t really given a lot of thought as to the JSA in the 90s. Its always fun to play what if, though. In my own head canon, I have imagined what DC might have done with the JSA if they had decided to keep All-Star Comics.
I imagine the next issue would have a revamped lineup. Superman and Batman would now be active members: Flash, Green Lantern and Wonder Woman would probably remain on the team. Captain Comet would probably be a new member, since I imagine DC would want to push the new kid.
Since they were still pushing kid sidekicks in the 50s, I imagine they would bring on Tom Sparks from World’s Finest as the youth idenity character.
That also probably means we would not have Rex, the Wonder Dog, since that book had originally been planned to feature Streak, Green Lantern’s canine companion. The name change was made after the cancelation of the JSA feature. I suppose to avoid any hope or expectation of GL appearing.
As to JSA in the 90s. James Robinson Golden Age, although a little less extreme to fit canon. DC gained full rights to the Fawcett characters in 1992. Imagine what Robinson could have done with the likes of Bulletman and Ibis as JSAers.
Or, still speculating,; if DC wanted to use only current 1951characters the team might include the followin:
The trinity of course but then Johnny Quick, Robotman, Captain Comet, Aquaman and possibly have Green Arrow alternate with Batman. I believe all those characters still had strips in 1951. In that case, there still might have been a Rex.
1. I dont think there would have been a crisis if EARTH-2 sold. For my part All STAR Squadron was a GREAT BOOK Nobody canceled THat out of dislike!
2. Shag’s right secret origins was Great! I mean i’d always LIKED the CREEPER (You all should!) but as soon as I finished that re-write of his origin where he KILLs the mob boss i got my 13 year old self to the commodre 64 and wrote a pitch. DC in 1987 never formally rejected it so there’s still hope. (as an aside Marvel was much better about sending rejections which is how you get brand loyality
3 What WAS YOUNG all stars? All i know is it existed
Young All-Stars was the successor series of All-Star Squadron. It was Thomas attempt to tell stories of his beloved golden age characters in the new post crisis reality. It had echoes of his own Infinity Inc. A sextet of young heroes asking to join the ASSQ but not being taken seriously, so they attempted to prove themselves to their elders.
Only two of the characters had roots in the golden age.
Dan, the Dynamite and a water breathing mutant, Neptune Perkins. The others were; Tsunami, a Japanese-American character created earlier in his All-Star run. And three new characters.
Arn “Iron” Munroe,
Flying Fox
Fury.
The series ran for about three years and most fans do not consider it to be one Thomas’s better runs.
Didn’t everybody say 3X2(9Y7)4A! out loud when running as a kid?
Not only did I try to say Johnny’s secret formula, I also tried to see if “say you” would summon a Badhnesian living Thunderbolt. I don’t know how things would have worked out w/ the JSA if COIE had never happened. The pre-Crisis 1980s were something of a golden age for team books at DC w/ Justice League, NTT, Legion, All-Star Squadron, and Infinity Inc. and many of these, if not all, lost some steam or concluded soon after.
This issue showcased the incarnations of the Ultra-Humanite. He is a little like The Master in Doctor Who in that sense having different bodies depending on what era the story is in.
Fabulous show, Shag and Keith! Nice shout out for my “home” convention in Charlotte. And three cheers for JSApril!
Thanks for a great show, Shag and Keith. I’m with Keith, Crisis on Infinite Earths was a great read, but I wish none of it had happened. So much was lost, and so much that was great afterwards could still have happened. It was more about the ‘need’ to make DC seem appealing to Marvel fanboys, via the ultimate jumping on point, than actual in-universe necessity.
It’s such fun rereading this Justice Society series, despite the age of the main cast there was a real dynamism to the story and art. I have to say though, the cover isn’t great – the heroes are bunched up in our faces and the villain looks ridiculous… it’s like UH has anti-body dismorphia, not one of those test bodies from the flashback looked remotely nice. So many massive brows!
That first page ‘Who’s the speedster’ business wouldn’t pass a Mr Terrific Fair Play test – Wally has never been drawn like that in motion.
And hello Jesse Quick… it always bugs me that it’s not ‘Jessie’. Anyone else?
That final page, it’s weird ending with ‘The End’ in the last panel, when it patently isn’t.
An aside, I realise barely anyone read Monkey Prince, a great series, but it turns out he’s the grandfather of Marcus Shugel-Shen, Gerald Shugel – the Ultra-Humanite with the name he was given in the Palmiotti/Conner King‘s Power Girl series (SHUster and SeiGEL, geddit?).
Another aside, there’s a pretty good article on UH’s bodies, canon and less so, by Alex Jaffe at DC.com. The link is really long and I don’t want to make this page ugly, so search for: Ask… the Question: How many bodies has the Ultra-Humanite had?
Why did Roy Thomas never reveal that Dolores Winters is related to Baron Winters? I mean, it’s sooooo obvious.
In the land of house ads, whenever that aborted Nightwing series is mentioned, it always sounds like it’s been drawn by someone called Artie Bear.
Okay, a 5 Earths version just can’t work. The Fawsett and Charlton characters need to be folded in but can’t sustain a line outside the mainline. (And Earth-x is…there, like Wildstorm in the similar post Flashpoint merge.) 2 Earths heightens the contradiction of New Earth both being and not being Earth-1 too much.
I think you need to split the time frame, put books in WWII, Year 1, Now, and 2985 post crisis for at least a year. Not having superman be simultaneously taking place in the present and showing his first meetings with his enemies helps keep things nicer, a permanent year 1 Batman home would be $$$, and we get a home for the JSA that would force editorial to make and stick to decisions on how the Trinity replacements work in the new history.
Also having a time-travel based JLI/JSA crossover would have been great.
What? I’m writing feedback only one day after the episode dropped? Madness!
Great discussion as always, and a treat to hear Keith, the most cheerful curmudgeon I know.
You know what’s undersold is how monstrous UH is. They put their brain into living people’s bodies, killing the original person! That one panel showing 8 faces? All people killed for him to stay alive! Even the white ape was its own being, just doing ape stuff, before UH moved in. Yow! Other series dive into this in greater detail, but it’s a little unsettling for the lives lost to be glossed over.
Ok, I promise I’m not cheating to look this up. Jay started appearing in Wally’s book with Mark Waid. During Messner-Loeb’s era, there was no Jay BUT Joan was a supporting character, and even dated one of Wally’s older friends. (I forget his name, but he was the guy who’d been a sidekick/assistant to a Shadow-esque vigilante, so he close in age to Joan.) After Waid retold Wally’s origin, Jay showed up fairly quickly afterwards and became a mainstay of the series. I’m thinking this issue would be around the same time as Prof Zoom’s epic battle with all of the speedsters when Wally regains his original power levels, give or take a month. Now I can verify at my leisure.
So excited that Jesse has officially debuted. All that’s left is getting her hero name and costume. On this reread, I noticed some key points about Jesse: raised by a Golden Age hero, idolizes the JSA, and grows up to become a hero herself. That is the same trajectory of the second Black Canary after Crisis changed her background. I’m hard-pressed to recall exactly when that became canon for Dinah, but definitely by the Johns JSA series. That’s an interesting parallel.
Now, for that thought experiment about Crisis not merging Earths 1 and 2. If I go back to Dinah, she’s an example of a character who had a *terrible* pre-Crisis history, with the whole thinking she’s her own mom, complicated by her moving from Earth 2 to 1. The Crisis shenanigans actually turned those lemons into lemonade, by making her no longer stuck as a baby in limbo. Rather, they let her have a normal life, train with the JSAers, and then help found the JLA on her first outing as shown in the Secret Origins issue. Now, I’m sure the situation could have been fixed some other way, but it was so elegantly done as a side effect of those 2 Earths now having a combined history. So it’s the rare benefit of the merging.
The big question though is: would Last Days of the JSA still happened if the merging was dropped from COIE? If not, then there’s no JSA in limbo, and the team carries on as before, and no setup for the return that launches this series. So maybe this series wouldn’t have happened. I daresay, the annual JLA-JSA team-ups would have continued, but you know, they were not always great for making the JSA their own team to modern readers. Rather, they kept the team stuck as JLA supporting characters, which needed to be shaken up. Would JLI have done JSA team ups? Dr Fate would not have been on the list of characters for JLI, because “he’s JSA.” Power Girl might not have joined JL Europe, because her personality is to staunchly support the JSA, it wouldn’t make sense for her to switch Earths. Would continuity have progressed as we’ve seen? In broad strokes, I agree it would. But the thrill is in the details, and having other characters in those stories would have been different, and those specific characters were part of the fun. Plus, I fear some of DC’s stagnancy would have continued without the radical shakeup from the merging, leading to cut titles from poor sales, instead of the explosive creative and commercial growth post-Crisis brought.
There! Do you see what you did, Shagg? You made me think! Argh!!!!!
Well, my fingers are tired. Thanks for another great episode!
You may be thinking of Mason Trollbridge, who claimed he was the sidekick of a vigalante calling himself the Clipper.
Great episode gents! Shag knows full well I’m with Keith here on the Crisis. Heck, Shag and I debated the same thing on an ancient epsiode of Super Mates while we were parked in the lot of a BD’s Mongolian Grill! But specifically with the JSA, had Crisis not happened, or had not happened the way it did with the Earths merging, here’s what I think would have happened. I think All-Star Squadron was still in pretty good shape by the time Crisis #12 was published. The book did need a regular artist, because it kept flipping back and forth between Arvell Jones and Mike Clark. The art was good, but there was no Jerry Ordway on the book anymore. With All-Star continuing, with no need for the Young All-Stars (which I’m sorry, I believe sunk that ship), how about pulling a hot young artist from Infinity, Inc (which probablly would have been canceled around the same time).? Todd McFarlane had drawn an issue of A-SS retelling the origin of Dr. Fate. His iconoclastic style may have been just what the book needed to keep going… until he jumped ship to Marvel. But maybe if Todd was on a bigger, newstand AND comic shop distributed book, he would have been recognized by DC, compensated, and never left? The mind boggles. The success of All-Star continuing may have rolled over into helping THIS book get launched in the present, with maybe Roy as the editor. And with the JSA never off the table, the Mike Carlins of the world wouldn’t have had much to say about geriatric super heroes.
But now to the issue at hand. It was good! Jesse is this title’s lasting contribution the DCU, and I’ve always been a fan, even if Mark Waid (and Wally) put her through a roller coaster in The Flash. I loved Keith’s story about saying the magic formula. I will admit, I tried it too. I was never great at math, so unlike many comic bits, I could never commit it to memory, and still haven’t. Its those damn parenthisis!
Excellent episode, guys! I love seeing Charles McNider kick some butt. I’ve always loved the name, costume, and conceit for Dr. Midnight, though my favorite iteration of the character is Dr. Midnight III, Pieter Cross. I loved him in JSA and think he’s a much healthier paramour for Black Canary than Ollie “there aren’t many places I haven’t shot my arrow” Queen.
I found the idea that they didn’t advertise Wally West or a new speedster on the cover interesting. It has me thinking back to the lack of faith in the book and how quickly it was cancelled. Did editorial not want to advertise these two as not to draw any more attention to the book? Could it have been them saying “Just get the books out and lets be done with it”? It’s certainly food for thought.
I can’t give away exactly how, but the Quick formula DOES work. How else to explain my productivity all these years?
Impressive podcast most impressive.
Ah the Ultra Humanite. I remember that person being the first Super Man villain. I would point out there is no was Hittler would let a trans person command his troops. See the Nazis reaction to Dr. Magnus Hershfield’s studies.
Yeah Alt right says we’re new but guess which books the Nazis burned first? Any way I won’t say that because this form of Ultra was from the Super Man comics in the 30s . I’m not a big fan of the art style, but it fits the story well. Ah the Ape body. Cindy Franklin will be happy. Just have Earth 1 Robin and Chris will be happy.
Not the greatest insults, but they tried. Ah Ultras new body kind of looks like Elon Must . As Dolores Winters.Ultra even had the “My heart goes out to you “ hand gesture. Ah so Shagg made a NXT Gen Johnny Quick? Cool. I made a few kids of hero’s here and there myself. But it was for the Marvel game. Probly Hawk Eye and Mocking Birds daughter. Yep Dr. Midnight is BA in this. He and the comedy duo of wildcat and the atom worked well together.
Well, that’s all my thoughts on this one. What is interesting that they had Wally West in this issue. Back when DC knew what to do with him and I’m glad to have seen Jesse quick in this though I remember her mostly from when she was in the flash comics Also why is Ultra dressers tgat badly? I thought Dr. Midnight was the blind one?
rate can’t wait till the next podcast.
Wonderful episode that’s all I got
Al Pratt, in the Koehaha storyline in Infinity, Inc., went to a thorium reactor to boost his power, as he’d felt it fading in recent years.
As for the Crisis. I think a huge number of continuity problems could have been avoided if they’d stuck with Earths 1 and 2, with the Charlton characters on E1, and the Fawcett and Quality ones on E2. This would have allowed for new versions of the GA characters to be created on E1 without the extra baggage, and for different legacy versions on E2.
As promised, I’m going to really sharpen my knives and carve up this one– really give the issue the business. Man, this thing was totally the worst issue for me to poop on… because it was the most satisfying so far? It’s not a masterpiece or anything, but it functions better as a comic book. The titular heroes have a villain of magnitude to face, and are made to look good standing firm against the threat after it is established by having a notable outside hero falter before it. There’s nice exposition, the pacing picks up, and the characters can banter without trying to sound like Bartman. Given the simple pleasures of Mike Parobeck’s linework, the art is still overrendered, but I can now see that Mike Machlan is going for a Arthur Adams-type dichotomy of cartooning and detailing in a bid to appeal to the kids. Machlan is still trying to ink Ordway without the Ordway, and Parobeck’s obvious lifting from Byrne (especially on the Jesse Quick pages) indicates there’s still cause to not have full confidence in him yet. But the book looks great overall– even I’m keen on that Wally-Flash, and it’s too bad when the editor can’t get out of the way (cheesecake=bad, but you’re rubber-stamping full Ilsa, She Wolf of the SS imagery?)
I like Ultra-Humanite as a shaved-ape Fabio, but he needed to embrace the ’90s and leave the exposed leg/short cape combo in the back of the closet. Speaking of which, this issue is rife with queer subtext, and I’m 100% on board with the intentionality of Al & Ted as a couple. Strazewski still feels the need to say three times what would have sufficed once, dooming Ultra-Humanite to making-up for the JSA’s lost years by smashing enough mirrors to generate enough bad luck to bridge the gap. I like Parobeck giving 1940s Vandal Savage 1880s hair, because why wouldn’t an immortal be outdated in their style? If you like muttonchops, just keep rocking them until they come back into vogue?
If this was intended as an ongoing series just offering Dr. Mid-Nite a single arc visitor spotlight, I’d have an easier time with their working overtime to put him over as an honored guest, but he goes so Batman with the gadget escapes that I was waiting for the Nite-Shark-Repellent to come out of the utility belt next.
I’m good with losing the y-chromosome on new members, but Johnny Quick has got to be among the least compelling legacy options ever. You forget how lame the basics of the costume were because it was being sold by artists punching way above Quick’s weight class. I’ll be the stand-out who never said the formula aloud because ew, math. Runs-Fast-Girl was never going to get much mileage for me, so I was glad when she switched to favoring her mother’s identity. Speaking of, Alan Brennert pretty blatantly recycled the Silk Spectre dynamic for Black Canary in the final issue of Secret Origins from 1990, and Mark Waid really ran with the second generation JSA fangirl angle eight years later in JLA: Year One.
I passively listened to the holiday episode while navigating the holidays myself, so I wasn’t as invested in the particulars, while still enjoying the show & guests. I’m pretty sure I read one or both back in the day, but was fine revisiting them wholly secondhand.
Listening to Shag mispronounce “kaddish” caused me physical pain, and he just kept doing it. Reminded me of a little seen sex comedy starring The Unknown Comic called Night Patrol where his super-weakness was the phrase “crap tonight” (say it fast,) and his boss (played by Billy Barty) kept saying it until he doubled over. It’s like Shag solved the mystery of the abjad and was casting the evil eye upon me with his unwitting kabbalistic incantation. Luckily I was essentially parked on a back road waiting for workers to let me pass during this assault.
The dark energies that I’m not diffusing via the main story commentary will have to be released into the thought experiment instead. I think the pro-Earth-2 crowd are overly optimistic about a COIEless DC Comics’ prospects. All this talk about reshuffling heroes across Earths might as well have been deck chairs, and one of the things I always liked about Captain Comet was his not being tangled up in the JSA/JLA business. If Jim Shooter can be believed (uhhhhh…) the Chairman of Warner Books reached out to him in 1984 about shutting down DC Comics, and licensing the properties to Marvel Comics to maintain the trademarks. For context, the average sales of Action Comics had slipped to 86K in 1984, and continued to sink to 67K, then 61K over the next two years. DC’s namesake Detective Comics was at 77K in ’84 & 67K in ’85. Batman wasn’t cracking 90K, and Superman fell below 100K in 1985. These were not sustainable newsstand numbers, and I question DC’s solvency at this point. The month Crisis #1 was released also offered the long-delayed finale of Camelot 3000, late life All-Star Squadron, post-JLGL Atari Force, post-Cullins Blue Devil, Kayanan Firestorm, post-Ordway Infinity Inc, and an early inventory fill-in without the Detroit-era JLA. The Flash, Wonder Woman, and World’s Finest Comics were already on the chopping black. The year gap between direct market Baxter books and year late newsstand reprints was already in the process of killing mass audience interest in New Teen Titans, Legion, and the Outsiders.
Crisis on Infinite Earths had to happen. Marvel readers had to be wooed because there was not enough of a DC audience to sustain publishing. Just anecdotally, how many red skies Crisis tie-ins have you read specifically for same? Without COIE and the recognition of its mandate that “worlds will live, worlds will die, and nothing will ever be the same again,” do you think other 50th anniversary initiatives like Who’s Who would have had any market impact? We know Flash only survived to #350 because it was in a holding pattern ahead of killing Barry Allen in Crisis, and Green Lantern was on COIE-powered life support. Secret Wars happened because even Jim Shooter recognized that its magnitude threatened Marvel’s dominance.
What was DC going to use to pull out of its nosedive? Hex? Super Powers? Deadman? Booster Gold? Where are the helpers? Alan Moore was in his final year on Swamp Thing, and despite being an awards darling, it wasn’t some sales juggernaut. Guys like Alan Davis and Todd McFarlane were still making a name for themselves, but didn’t have a significant audience yet. Lightle was on his way out on Legion, and the dual-publishing scheme had killed that book’s moment. Wolfman and Perez had already caused production delays on Titans, and there’s no guarantee they could have maintained the flagship’s vitality into years 5+ even without the demands of COIE. Crisis was DC’s killer app– the one book everyone had to read– the book that promised significant death and destruction in every single issue. Soylent Green is Earth-2– butchered and cannibalized to feed the savages being lured away by drips and drabs from Marvel. John Byrne only comes over because he was already plotting out what a Marvel-licensed Superman would look like before the 1984 deal fell through, and the clean slate of COIE allows him to execute his revision at DC. Perez Wonder Woman only happens because he thought he could handle a solo character, and was energized by a mythology-heavy reboot, after his COIE burn-out. Who’s buying a Kid Flash spin-off if Barry doesn’t buy it before a COIE-sized audience. Without the COIE lead-in, you don’t have Byrne on Legends, so probably no Suicide Squad or JLI. Without COIE, you still only have Earth-2 as a nostalgic memory, because you probably don’t have any DC Earths as an ongoing publishing concern. It’s just Warner Books offering a few special projects like The Dark Knight Returns to the bookstore market each year.
Another great episode! I’m relatively new to dc comics. I read the staples as a kid,(Dark Knight Returns, Death in the Family, Death of Superman) but never got into the whole universe. I’ve been catching up with the help of DC Infinite and the fine folks at Fire and Water network (even rob kelly) to learn more about these wonderful characters like the JSA, and their exploits. Keep up the great work! You’ve got a huge fan in Texas. Boo Gators, Go Noles!
Great show, Shag and Keith. Man, that is a chesty cover. I’m really enjoying reading this series on Infinite along with the podcast. Love the Statler and Waldorf routine from Wildcat and Atom. Parobeck and Machlan’s art is so lively and fun. More and more I see a John Byrne influence in the figure work. Jesse Quick on page 15 looks like it was taken straight out of a Byrne Fantastic Four issue.
Great Johnny Quick II card, Shag. Very imaginative. And thank you for having your hand in the photos and not your feet.