Comic Info
Comic Name: Justice League
Publisher: DC Comics
Writer: Geoff Johns
Artist: Ivan Reis/Joe Prado/Jesus Saiz/Oclair Albert/Johnathan Glapion/Zander Cannon/Gene Ha/Andres Guinaldo/Rob Hunter/Ebert Ferriera
# of Issues: 5
Release Date: 2014
Justice League (2) #19
Reprints Justice League (2) #18-20 and #22-23 (May 2013-October 2013). The Justice League are under attack. Despite increasing membership by adding Firestorm, the Atom, and Element Woman, the Justice League seems to be targeted by people who know their every move. When Pandora appears with her box, the Justice League, Justice League Dark, and the Justice League of America are forced to team-up to battle the evil…but the source of the darkness will be revealed and could be too great for even Earth’s mightiest superheroes.
Written by Geoff Johns, Justice League Volume 4: The Grid follows Justice League Volume 3: Throne of Atlantis. The series collects the Justice League issues without the Shazam back-up storyline or Justice League (2) #21 which wraps-up the Shazam story. It also includes parts one and six of the Trinity War storyline.
The New 52 (in my opinion) really did help jumpstart DC and reset some of the mistakes made in recent years. It eliminated a lot of DC’s storied past (which was unfortunate), but it did streamline a lot of titles so the made sense. As the New 52 continued, DC began crossovers and started to bog down the new, clean DCU…and Justice League 4: The Grid is a big step in the return of the old DCU.
Justice League (2) #23
The collection is kind of a mess. To start with, readers not only need to know what happened in previous Justice League volumes but seek out the missing parts of the collected story by picking up the Shazam collection which provides the back issues leading into the Shazam storyline within this volume. It also behooves the reader to read both Justice League of America and Justice League Dark (less so on Justice League Dark)…but the lead-ins aren’t even the messy part.
The real problem of this volume is the final two issues. The collection has part one and part six of Trinity War…with no explanation of what occurred in parts two through five which were printed in Justice League Dark and Justice League of America. There is a separate Trinity War collection, but here, you are given the barebones and forced to piece together what you can of what is going on…you get the start and the finish (which is pretty good), but there is no context.
In this, Justice League represents everything that is right with the New 52 relaunch and wrong with comics right now. The collection is both fun and frustrating at the same time. The story is hashed together for a trade paperback and frustrating for readers who don’t have the issues to fill in the missing blanks…leaving an incomplete story. If you are going to collect a story, collect and publish it all at once…don’t force readers to buy a collection that doesn’t stand on its own. Justice League 4: The Grid is followed by Justice League 5: Forever Heroes.
Related Links:
Justice League 2: The Villain’s Journey
Justice League 3: Throne of Atlantis
