Justice League of America #25 Review

Nobody's Listening

Written by: Steve Orlando
Art by: Miguel Mendonca, Mikyu Jung, Dexter Vines, Chris Sotomayor and Clayton Cowles
Cover Price: $3.99
Release Date: February 28, 2018

Here we are with the last story of Steve Orlando's run of Justice League of America and while I'm not sad to see it go, I will miss bits of it.  You know, Lobo's ridiculous dialogue, Ryan's roller coaster ride of emotions and the Ray throwing more shade at Batman than a Redwood.  On second thought, I probably won't miss anything at all!  So, does the book's last arc start off kicking ass?  Let's find out...

We open the issue with Batman playing the role of the worst neglectful parent ever!  He tells Mari that Happy Harbor is not the same as it was.  No shit, Batman!!!  It kinda got demolished while you were away!  Seriously, Batman...dick move, bro!

We continue with Lobo being an ass and The Ray introducing Aztek to the team.  Steve Orlando continues with his crazy science (metaphysical tech), but it's the idea of both Ray and Aztek leaving Vanity behind that made me shake my head the most.  Plus, Batman again acts like a complete ass and this and everything we've gotten previously makes me come to the conclusion that Orlando hates the Dark Knight.  That's okay, I hate him in this book too!

After Batman comes up with the 100th reason he formed this team (the powder keg was now formed to give people hope by fighting together), he has one last mission...Angor!  Just for good measure, "rebirth" is thrown around a couple of times.

We then get the thing that makes me go crazy in this book...Black Canary erupts like she was supposed to be in another scene or book.  It makes little sense when Canary accuses Batman of wanting to save Angor alone since he has Dreamslayer and Ray Palmer with him already and just said he had one last mission for the JLA!  However, he does leave with only Canary and Dreamslayer in tow so I really have no idea what the hell is going on!!!!

As an aside, I laughed so hard at Ryan and Ray's "Hey, how's it going" greeting.  I guess the extreme emotions that Ryan had about Ray have died down a bit now that Ryan has assumed the mantle of the Atom full-time.  That's what being in the shit does to you!

We then get a brief history of Angor, Lord Havoc, and the resulting destruction before reaching Angor itself and learning the real problem that needs to be solved...somebody or something is not allowing Dreamslayer to rebuild his homeworld.

The mystery doesn't last long as we are literally shown the Adjudicator a panel later and then get a convoluted explanation why he has stepped in to stop Dreamslayer.  It's then off to a flashback where we see how the team of Blue Jay, Ray Palmer, Preon, and Dreamslayer were formed to save Angor. Without half of them in the issue, however, it all just falls flat like everything else here.

Back on Angor, Dreamslayer puts all his hopes for saving Angor in the Batman/Canary basket, but it all turns into a "let's keep repeating ourselves" contest between him and the Adjudicator.  Batman then joins in the yelling, but it's Canary who steps up to settle it.  She argues that they can't rebuild Angor without giving Havok a new chance as well. Dreamslayer doesn't agree, but the cliffhanger shows that it really doesn't matter in the end.

This is another sub-par issue of Justice League of America.  I like the art, but the story is a complete mess with horrible pacing, awful dialogue, confusing situations and an overall narrative that is boring and seemingly directionless.  This is a book that I will be glad to forget the minute it ends and no matter what characters Steve Orlando tries to force into it, it just doesn't matter.

Bits and Pieces:

Batman shows up to save Angor and by the end, I wish he could save this book!  It's ending soon and in case you need to be reminded why that's a good thing, give this issue a quick glance.  It's a take your pick extravaganza of problems...pacing, dialogue, story, characterization and more that keeps this from ever being the important book it wants to be.  If this is the Justice League the people deserve, I hate to see the one it doesn't!

4.0/10