Future State: Justice League #1 Review

 

Legion of Gloom

Writer: Ram V, Joshua Williamson

Artist: Robson Rocha, Marcio Takara

Cover Price: $5.99

Release Date: January 12, 2021

Justice League is one of the Future State books I've been looking forward to because, while it's nice to see heroes kick ass in their solo books, I love seeing them together, especially in the Justice League.  So, what does this Justice League look like, and do they work well together?  Let's find out...

Before I go any further, I need to point out that this book takes place in 2040.  for the life of me, I don't know why DC doesn't spell this out by putting the visual timeline they released and will now show you below... 

That aside, Joshua Williamson's story is an average start that seems to lack direction on what he wants to show us.  It's not all his fault, though, since some of these heroes are brand new to the reader, but not the Future State DCU.  Take Batman, for instance.  At this point, he has been in less than a handful of panels, yet Williamson has to write him as a 15 year Batman veteran.  Plus, it's not his place to reveal his identity, so what does he do with him?  Not much, but again, I don't blame him one bit!  Like the Flash and Aquawoman, other characters haven't even been introduced in Future State yet, though if you are an Aquaman fan, you at least have seen Andy.  I just don't know why this book didn't come out on the last week of the month.

The story is a murder mystery with enough setup to be interesting, but l worry that just one more issue won't be enough to make this memorable.  The Legion of Doom, mixing oldheads and legacy characters, has holed up in the Hall of Justice ruins and plan on bringing down the Justice League.  Things go wrong, and the Justice League shows up to investigate.  Things meander a bit while we get the new rules of the team... no knowing each other's identities and lives (which most seem to do anyway), no hanging out after JL work hours (which most seem to do anyway), and no more adding members to the team (which Jon wants to do anyway).   None of this matters one bit, and it just takes up precious time and space.

Watch our Future State: Justice League #1 Video Review

The issue then continues with the Big Bads (I won't spoil who) duping the Justice League one by one.  The problem is, Williamson seems to want to base this off of us knowing the team when we don't yet.  It is just confusing (in the wrong way) until the reveal, which will leave most people lukewarm with the affair.

We then get a Justice League Dark story by Ram V with familiar characters to readers of the recent JLD book.  There are a few changes, especially with Bobo, but there isn't much fun besides that.  I know it's a dark book, but we are in a possible future where you can do what you want, and all this story wants to be is a tedious setup.  Characters stand around talking for most of the issue, and while I thought the cliffhanger was awesome, it was a slog to get to it.

I hope that the next issue turns this one around because this was just an average effort all around.  The art and writing lacked the spark that a two-issue event book should have, and instead of getting me excited for more, it just felt like filler.  This is the Justice League!  It should not feel like a boring bunch of filler!  If you can take one thing out of it, though, it's that there is still a system in place in the year 2040 to mail it in!

Bits and Pieces:

The Justice League is about team interaction as much as the Bang! Slam! action, but without proper introductions to all of the roster, the JL story by Joshua Williamson falls flat.  While that's not the case for Ram V's Justice League Dark story, that one is just boring until the last few pages.  Overall, this was a boring read that did nothing to expand on the overall Future State universe or tell it's own interesting story.

5.5/10