Justice League of America #1 Review and *SPOILERS*

Written By: Bryan Hitch
Art By: Bryan Hitch, Daniel Henriques, Wade Von Grawbadger, Andrew Currie, Alex Sinclair
Cover Price: $5.99
Release Date: June 17, 2015

Things!........and Stuff!

*Non Spoilers and Score At The Bottom*

Here I was, thinking that this book was going to be a bridge to tie together the time that the Justice League first got together to that jump they did to the present in their early issues........ Yeah, I was wrong.  So I guess what we'll call this is further adventures of...... just not in the current continuity....Justice League.  We've got the core seven members that we started with, but this is obviously a story that takes place after Forever Evil because Cyborg is rocking his slimmer look, so where it fits in, I don't know, but we'll go with it just because who doesn't love seeing the Justice League?  Let's jump into this story and see what Bryan Hitch has in store for us with this all new Justice League of America book.  Let's check it out.

Explain It!:

Our story begins by ominously setting some stuff up for later, like Superman watching the world being destroyed before getting shot into space and then being teleported away....... Oh yeah, we've got a lot of craziness going on in this book!  We've got a guard at the Super Max prison "The Maw" carting a casket out of the facility and we have Aquaman talking to the U.N. about sharing Atlantean technology, before someone whispers something into his ear about someone looking for Olympus.  You better watch carefully though because I simply thought that Aquaman lost his mind a little bit with the dialog because this dude whispering to him didn't really come through really well.  So yeah, a lot of stuff already going on in this book, but let's get to Clark Kent being invited to a company in New York called: The Infinity Corporation.  I got really freaked out at first because Clark showed up as Superman, but apparently the invitees, knew his secret identity and were really calling for Supes and when he gets there we see some really messed up things...........You know, besides for people knowing Superman's secret identity.  What you don't think it could be that bad?  How about a room full of dead Supermans?  Is that messed up enough for you?........lousy jaded simps.  Anyway, we get the full exposition about how this kid genius talks to these "stones of forever"........I guess Infinity Stones was already taken.  Anyway, these stones have a link to all of time and they're trying to warn this kid genius Victor about the end of time which has something to do with Superman's death......hence the room full of Supermen, from all the times that the timelines were checked by Vincent.  The latest one is the one from the beginning of the story.  Apparently, all we have to do to prevent the end of time is make sure that Superman stays alive....... Easy right?

While Superman and Victor are trying their damnedest to not say Infinity Stones, Green Lantern, Wonder Woman, Flash and Batman show up at Metropolis' new Clean Energy Power Plant, where they all were apparently invited too........kind of like Superman, but instead of a room full of dead versions of themselves, we find out that whoever sent the invite to them were the same people that carted that casket out of "The Maw" and our heroes find themselves up against a power hungry Parasite.  Now, I'm a huge Parasite fan, but this is one of the worst sections of the book because even though we have a bad ass battle that takes place, our Justice League look like a bunch of rookies that just decided to put on costumes and go out and fight super villains for the first time.  They get their asses handed to them bad............ and somehow Superman finds out about them fighting Parasite and shows up to back them up............ and so does Cyborg.  I don't know why, but we'll go with it.  This is where the book, even with all it's end of time, multiple dead Superman's plot, goes and gets a little screwy.  Wonder Woman gets briefly swallowed by Parasite and begins hearing people scream in her head and when she gets out she mysteriously vanishes.  It's very odd, but it doesn't stop our team from fighting the good fight............even though, since Hal is out of power and unconscious, his ring opens a wormhole back to Oa, which Flash gets sucked into as well, causing some kind of disturbance. 

In the end, Batman and Cyborg come up with a plan to siphon Parasite's collected power out of him using the Clean Energy Power Plant and we discover that Batman is a big bag of dicks.  Superman is keeping Parasite busy while Batman and Cyborg rework some technical things in the plant and before Cyborg could get clear, Batman turns it out, frying Cyborg and stopping Parasite.  After the fight, Superman figures that the Infinity Corporation must be behind this attack and Cyborg boom tubes them back to New York, where we see that the location is just an empty lot............curiouser and curiouser.  Don't worry, the shit doesn't stop hitting the fan there.  On top of all the other crazy shit we've seen, Aquaman returns home to find someone saying that the time for false gods is over and in the sky above New York, we see that the Kryptonian god Rao has come to Earth and Superman flies up to meet his savior with open arms.

That's it for this issue of JLA and I have to tell you that I'm just a little bit overwhelmed with everything that was given to us this issue.  Green Lantern, Flash and Wonder Woman are M.I.A., Aquaman's dealing with Atlantean things and a prophet, time teleportation with dead Supermen, mystery corporations and the freaking god of Krypton showing up.  It just seems like too much too soon.  Yeah, I said the same thing about Justice League #41 with everything that Geoff Johns threw at us for the beginning of the Darkseid War and I don't know if it's just because I've had time to process all of that, but this feels like it's throwing even more at us.......... and that seems crazy to me.  So with all of that going on, we have what feels like a very rookie Justice League and I didn't like seeing them that way because whatever is thrown at them from here on out feels like it will just utterly destroy them because they had trouble with Parasite.  Our heroes just felt off from the get go and I wasn't a fan of Hitch's art style either.  The only characters that looked okay to me were Flash and Cyborg and it leaves me thinking that Bryan Hitch might have bit off a little more than he could chew taking on writing and art for this series.  Hopefully the next issue will make me eat my words because this definitely sets up a cool mystery and makes me want to continue the story, I just wish the execution was a little better.

Bits and Pieces:

This issue is a lot to process.  Bryan Hitch is throwing everything at you all at once and isn't apologizing for it.  He wants you immersed in this story immediately and even though it got my attention, it feels like too much too soon, while not really allowing the heroes to feel like they've done super heroics before.  The big battle in this issue feels off because of that and I can't say that I'm really a fan of this art style either.  I'm still looking forward to this series, but it feels like Bryan Hitch bit off a little more than he could chew by taking on both writer and artist roles. 

6.5/10