60 WEEKS WITH THE JUSTICE LEAGUE: Week 57

Justice League America #57
Dec. '91
Breakdowns Part 9
"The Descent of ... Despero!"
Meaningless violence and a few stale jokes ... brought to you by those immortal masters of comic art:
Keith Giffen, plot 'n' breakdowns
J.M. DeMatteis, dialogue & complaints
Chris Wozniak, penciller
Bruce Patterson, inker
Bob Lappan, letterer
Gene D'Angelo, colorist
Kevin Dooley, hungers for more power
Andy Helfer, just wants out

Justice League Europe #33
Dec. '91
Breakdowns Part 10
"Mere Anarchy"
Keen-O Keith Giffen - plots
Germane Gerard Jones - script
Darin' Darick Robertson - pencils
Jostlin' John Beatty - inks
Wired Willie Schubert - letters
Genial Gene D'Angelo - colors
Kvetchin' Kevin Dooley - associate editing
Anxious Andy Helfer - editing
Billious Billy Yeats


At last, JLA presents the long-awaited return of Mitch Wacky. (And the Beefeater, but that's another story.) Unfortunately, JLE may well be his last appearance--it's unclear, but I think he might have been killed by none other than Dreamslayer, who has inhabited the body of--who else?--Maxwell Lord. Yes indeed, after the destruction of his body back in JLE #19, Dreamslayer's consciousness lived on, searching for an appropriate host body and conveniently settling on Max's comatose corpus. Using his powers of persuasion (which make Max's pale in comparison), Dreamslayer made Uncle Mitch abscond with the Extremist robots to KooeyKooeyKooey; there, Uncle Mitch was forced to return Lord Havok to working order, and now Dreamslayer and Havoc are ready to paint the town red, so to speak. Of course, the League remains blissfully unaware, seeing as they're currently tied up battling Despero--and that battle has so far leveled most of Manhattan, thanks to an ill-conceived earthquake caused by Major Disaster.

Not much else to say this week, I'm afraid. I still don't like Wozniak's art, but I think I'm getting desensitized to it. Robertson's work was strong as usual, although it didn't quite hit the high notes of last issue. Interesting to probably no one, JLE contained a 17-page ad, in comics form, for Sonic the Hedgehog on the Sega Genesis, and then "Europinion" included this cover credits blurb: "THIS ISSUE'S COVER was computerized by the following programmers: Darick Robertson, John Beatty, and Bob Le Rose." (Remember, L-Ron was supposedly compiling the letters pages; nevertheless, with the advent of digital tools in the comics arena in the years since this was written, "computerized" feels like a poor, misleading choice of words.) No cover credits in "Justice Log," but JLA's cover itself, which offers yet another homage to JL #1, clearly shows the initials of Chris Sprouse and Bruce Patterson.

I think "Breakdowns" is wearing on me. Only three weeks to go...

The complete 60 Weeks with the Justice League on The Danger Digest:
#1, #2, #3, #4, #5, #6, #7, #8, #9, #10, #11, #12, #13, #14, #15, #16, #17, #18, #19, #20, #21, #22, #23, #24, #25/1, #26/2, #27/3, #28/4, #29/5, #30/6, #31/7, #32/8, #33/9, #34/10, #35/11, #36/12, #37/13, #38/14, #39/15, #40/16, #41/17, #42/18, #43/19, #44/20, #45/21, #46/22, #47/23, #48/24, #49/25, #50/26, #51/27, #52/28, #53/29, #54/30, #55/31, #56/32, #58/34, #59/35, #60/36


All images this post copyright DC Comics. Original text copyright Jon D. Witmer/The Danger Digest.