BHOC: JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #171

Brevoort History of Comics

Now this was a comic book that I truly enjoyed. As always, I was very much excited to get the year’s regular team-up between the Justice League and their antecedent counterparts, the Justice Society. It had become a regular yearly event. But the truth is, most of those stories had become disappointing. In particular, throughout the 1970s, as a way of keeping such meet-ups fresh, editor Julie Schwartz and his writers had insisted on additionally mixing in a third element–sometimes a team like the Seven Soldiers of Victory, the Legion of Super-Heroes or the unnamed group of Fawcett heroes from Captain Marvel’s world, and sometimes a more oddball aggregate, such as the previous year’s story including a bevy of characters from the past including Jonah Hex, Enemy Ace and Miss America. This made these stories overly crowded affairs in which the main draw–the JLA and the JSA getting together–get a bit lost in the mix. But for this year, writer Gerry Conway and new editor Ross Andru decided to do something a bit simpler.

What Gerry conceived of was a locked room murder mystery in which both the victim and the killer would be one of the heroes attending that year’s get-together. This instantly brought the number of participants down to a more manageable level, and allowed a bit more space for Conway to find meaningful moments of interaction between them. It also created a puzzle story, which felt like it came out of the traditions of the JLA strip, where at least early on cleverness was valued and proved to be even more potent than super-powers. I only had to take one glance at the Roll Call roster on this splash page to instantly figure out who the victim was going to be–the one character who hadn’t made any notable appearances in over a decade, and whose appearance at the end of the Justice Society story in ADVENTURE COMICS #465 felt a bit arbitrary unless he was going to be significant.

That character, of course, is Terry Sloane, also known as Mister Terrific. he was one of the more derided golden age super heroes by modern cynical fans, which came down to the fact that he sported his slogan of Fair Play on his midsection. As this story opens up, the League and the Society have held a joint meeting on the League’s satellite headquarters which then turns into a joint party. Solan tells both Flashes and Power Girl that he came back out of retirement after encountering an old enemy of both himself and Jay Garrick: the Spirit King. If you’re wondering when the Spirit King battled these two JSA heroes, put it out of your mind: writer Conway created him just for this story. Mister Terrific intimates that he’s holding some great secret about his old enemy, and that one of the assembled heroes will be branded a traitor before the truth comes out. Which seems a bit prophetic and contrived to me, but it definitely gets everyone’s attention.

On a more personal note, there’s a very nice one-page aside between Batman and the Huntress of Earth-2, who is the daughter of Bruce Wayne’s Justice Society counterpart. Helena had had to tell Batman that her father recently passed away, as chronicled in ADVENTURE COMICS a few months previously. It’s a profoundly weird scene on a certain level, as Batman is a younger incarnation of Huntress’s now-deceased father, but it’s nicely handled and carries some genuine emotion–more emotion that the Earth-2 Batman really got in the story in which he met his demise, it must be said.

Anyway, after that, it’s time to get down to plot–and so the satellite is rocked by an explosion that tears through an outer bulkhead. The assembled heroes race to the site of the explosive decompression to affect repairs, and Superman finds the lifeless body of Mister Terrific among the wreckage. But before any of the assembled heroes can deal with the death of one of their own, they must first work to repair the satellite they’re meeting in. This becomes an extended sequence that’s about as much overt action as the issue has, which is why it’s as drawn-out as it is–to provide some colorful moments of super heroes using their super-powers. Together, Superman, Doctor Fate, the two Hawkmen and the two Green Lanterns fix the breach and make the headquarters airtight once again–something that almost any one of them might have been able to accomplish on their own were an action set piece not called for. And then it’s time to turn attention to the matter of the deceased Terry Sloane.

The assembled heroes are remarkably cold about the passing of one of their own–the departed Earth-2 Batman engendered a stronger response a few pages previously. (The Earth-2 Hawkman’s comment that Mister Terrific wasn’t ever really one of the JSA reads as especially insensitive–the man is dead, Carter, show a little decorum!) But much of that is down to the fact that there’s still a bunch of plot to get through before the approaching wrap-up of the issue. As a forensic scientist, Flash has examined the scene of the breach and found remnants of a planted explosive charge–that bulkhead didn’t merely fail, it was deliberately detonated. So Mister Terrific’s death was murder. Zatanna attempts to use her magic to pick up impressions of the recent past from the bomb fragment, but when she does so, she’s instantly zapped by a magic countermeasure, and only Doctor Fate’s intervention saves her life. But there isn’t going to be any peeking at the culprit ahead of time.

The two Flashes do a super-speed search of the satellite to determine if anybody else is present, but they come up empty. The transporter logs also show that nobody has beamed down to the surface or gone back to Earth-2 either. And a closer examination of Mister Terrific’s body shows that he wasn’t killed in the explosion as was first thought–the explosion was meant to cover up the true manner of his death, which is that he was strangled. (This is a seriously dumb move by the killer, by the way, but it makes for a more visual story.) All of which leads Superman to proclaim in the To Be Continued wrap-up to this first installment that one of the heroes assembled among them must be a murderer! and that’s the cool note we go out on. I thought it was pretty clear at this point who the killer actually was at this point, the only thing not settled was where, or who, they might be hiding inside. Anyway, I thought this whole issue was pretty cool when I first read it, latter day criticisms aside, and I was definitely interested in seeing where the follow-up next month would take up.

Again here, we got a new Daily Planet page promoting the comics that would be on sale in a week’s time. And once more, it included Bob Rozakis’ Ask the Answer Man page as well as another goofball comic strip from Fred Hembeck. The big push this time out was for TIME WARP, a Dollar Comic-sized science fiction magazine that only wound up running for around a half-dozen issues. As TIME WARP didn’t carry any ongoing features, it felt more akin to the assorted Mystery titles that DC was still putting out, and so I didn’t bother checking it out. There was a full-page ad for it in this issue earlier on, though:

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29 thoughts on “BHOC: JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #171”

  2. When I really got into my comics mania starting when I was 10 or 11, JLA was my number one title but I had to subscribe because Churchill’s Pharmacy wouldn’t always carry it in their spinner rack. I was a faithful reader until they made the dunderhead move of taking Batman out of the team.

    The JLA/JSA team ups were always highly anticipated.

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    1. Batman’s always been my favorite comicbook character. But I’d love to read a JLA that doesn’t need him. Gerry Conway’s never been high on my writer list. The best JLA I read wasn’t until Morrisson’s like 18 years later (yeah, Batman was in it). 😉

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  3. I’ve always thought this one was very unkind to Mr Terrific, and by extension the rest of the Justice Society, by writing him as if he’s an old man, possibly senile and making things up, so nobody could be expected to take him seriously. Does that mean the whole JSA are doddering old fools now?

    Although that might explain Hawkman’s “He was never really one of us” – granted, Mr T was only in one golden age JSA story (though he was part of the Junior Justice Society pack, with his own secret code and everything!) and wasn’t in the later Adventure Comics stories, but he was an active part of the team in the largely-unnarrated sixties era, and Hawkman should know that. Poor Terry…

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  4. Some of the better Dillon art of this era and his last full JLA/JSA crossover, but the offhand killing of Mr. Terrific still irks me, especially as his killer was someone brand new and was not caught in the second part. On the upside, we eventually got the new Mr. Terrific out of it. More generally, IMHO the crossover was a hindrance for the title, especially in those years when the book wasn’t monthly, as they couldn’t do the sort of popular longform stories that Marvel was doing.

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  6. This is one of those key issues in my personal history that made me a lifelong comics fan as opposed to a kid who liked to read comic books sometimes.

    Something about the way the story embraced the parallel Earth situation in all its tangential weirdness (like Batman learning about “his” own death from a kinda sorta daughter) really grabbed me.

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  7. I REALLY hated Mr. Terrific being killed off. While I had read a few of his stories, mostly reprints, I liked the concept of the guy. He was basically the Doc Savage of the DC universe without the 5 companions. He holds a very special place in my heart. If he had a better writer and artists back when he was in Sensation Comics, he could have been challenging Wonder Woman for the front cover of the title. Heck, when page count went down, they could have merged the two, like they did with Superman and Batman in World’s Finest, and set a really nice ongoing love triangle with Wonder Woman, Steve Trevor and Mr. Terrific, with Wonder Woman always finding her heart wavering when Mr. Terrific was around. The Sensational Team-Up.

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  8. I said this before: I wonder why no one thought to have the Earth-1 and 2 Batmen meet ( The 2 Flashes, Supermen, Wonder Women, Atoms, Green Lanterns, Hawkmen ( Did Hawkgirl and Hawkwoman meet? ) ) –even in a pre-Crisis story that takes place after the Earth-2 Batman’s death. The dance around it with stories like The Brave and the Bold#182 ( January 1982 –team-up with Robin against the Earth-2 Hugo Strange who never had all those other Hugo Strange stories ) — meanwhile on Earth-One, Batman has been drawn to the Gotham Cemetery without an apparent reason and when lightning strikes near him, he is transported to Earth-Two. ( Last page ) After Batman has departed with the promise of working together again, Robin and Starman wonder what caused Batman to be on the cemetery in the first place, and as they walk in front of the tomb of Bruce Wayne, they realize there are questions better left unanswered. Then there was The Brave and the Bold#200 ( July 1983 ) Batman and Batman that wasn’t a team-up but an old Earth-2 Batman foe named Brimstone wanting revenge on Batman and some how possessing his non-criminal Earth-1 counterpart to do so ( Placed him in the same death trap but this time minus the utility belt thinking Batman couldn’t escape without it ). You would think Bob Haney would have done a story if Batman and Detective Comics’ writers wouldn’t for some reason. Plus did no Batman fans want to see them team-up?

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  9. I know! I know! The murderer is … Power Girl! Never liked her and it’s clear she also hates Zatana! And…yeah, I know. I could just go read the next issue on DC’s site.

    Seriously, although I wasn’t reading comics at this time and would have hard time diving back in on the DC side of the pond, this looks like a lot of fun. I also enjoyed the JLA-JSA crossovers several years earlier and this certainly has that feel to it. A tip of the hat as well to Dick Dillin and Frank McLaughlin on the art.

    More I think about it, reading that next issue sounds a like a whole lot more fun than raking leaves which is next on my “To Do” list. No need for “Fair Play.”

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  10. Yeah, that moment between the Earth One Batman and The Huntress is pretty great and is almost as weird as the moment in The Brave and the Bold #91, where Black Canary tries to hook up with the Earth One counterpart of her dead Earth Two husband Larry Lance. Earth One Larry is all, “Yeah, whatever, see ya!” but frankly, as drawn by Nick Cardy, his rejection of Dinah seems extremely implausible.

    Back to the JLA/JSA team up, it’s good that both Hawkmen had their proper headgear instead of that weird flour sack thing that the E2 Hawkman sometimes wore.

    Re: that Time Warp ad, my dad picked that up (he often grabbed issues of DC’s anthology books) but I don’t remember a thing about it other than the Kaluta cover, which made quite an impression on the young me, though I can’t imagine why. (“Let’s do the Time Warp again,” indeed!)

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  11. Hard to believe comics fans could see that ass of the TIME WARP cover and not want to get that book — only to find no such derriere within, of course. It worked on me, at least.

    And yeah, that scene with the Huntress and Batman was an emotional winner, and pointed up the weirdness and interesting textures of the Earth 1/Earth 2 situation. I always loved that sort of thing.

    It’s true that the summer crossovers were both a great idea and fun to see, and an intrusion on the ongoing development of the book as tehstories got bigger and the JLA had more sub-plots and character stuff going on. I wonder if, as mini-series became a thing, it wouldn’t have worked better to make that crossover a standalone mini-series every year, allowing it to go three or four issues across the summer months, without taking up that much of the JLA’s year.

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    1. A stand-alone miniseries would mean only 8 months (or less) between the next one. Kind of a cluttered schedule if there was also an annual line-wide crossover mini-series, too. But maybe that didn’t start (at DC) until “Crisis (CoIE)” in 1985.

      Maybe the extra-pages JLA Annual could’ve been the crossover.

      Involving issues of the JLA members’ solo series, r even their annuals, might have been too big of a head ache to co-ordinate every year.

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      1. Yeah, the line-wide crossovers didn’t happen until Crisis and afterward, at which point there were no JLA/JSA teamups anymore.

        And yeah, doing it as a mini could mean only 8 or 9 months in between, but if it makes money, that’s not really a problem. The crossovers started to get longer in the early 80s anyway, so that shortened gap was still an issue.

        You could do it as two double-sized issues and still get four issues’ worth of story, maybe. Or do it weekly or bi-weekly. A profit-boost in the summer months would probably be welcome to DC and to retailers.

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      2. Marvel’s “Secret Wars” likely beat DC’s “CoIE” by months, if not a whole year.

        But you’re right; if it was gonna make good $$, most other rules could be changed.

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  12. Holy bat-bung, Batman! I gotta say, Earth-1’s Batman being pretty insensitive to Helena Wayne’s grief over her father’s death only 6-months before was a big disappointment to see today. Maybe I’d be far too young in 1979 (likely still 7 years old) when it was released to be critical of how Gerry portrayed that scene (I’d only lost a grandmother 3 years before this, and my memories of her were and still more dreamlike).

    Did E1 Batman offer Helena ANY condolences on the subsequent pages, or the next issue? All he focused on in what’s shown here was how it affected HIMSELF. Spoiled rich guy syndrome. And spare me any argument that the death of his parents could impair his empathy for her loss. I really hope he had additional words of sympathy for her later in this or in the following issue.

    I’ve already said on here and in comments to other of Tom’s posts that Gerry Conway was not a favorite writer of mine once I got into my mid-teens, could think more critically, and could compare his work against other writers. And was finally old enough to contemplate the loss characters could feel, as well as other emotions, beyond just superficial understanding. Six months seemed a long time when I was 7. Not so much when I was 17. And never really again since. So Helena’s loss would’ve still been achingly fresh to her. “Hold me, Uncle Bruce” seems insufficient.

    Notable mentions of this issue include that great “Time Warp Cover”. I remember being less impressed with the stories inside the issue itself, and I’ve read it for the 1st time within the last 10 years or so. It wasn’t available near me when it was initially published.

    Also the blurb for “World’s Finest” #259, by one of the “world’s finest” (or at least personal favorites in comicbooks back then) art teams for Superman and Batman; Rich Buckler and Dick Giordano.

    And then Fred Hembeck’s “Hackensack Brand”. 😉

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    1. Interesting. Gerry Conway became my first “favorite” writer when I started collecting comics in 1972, primarily because of his work on Spider-Man and Fantastic Four. After about a year, that ranking tumbled when Conway took over Ka-Zar with essentially retelling Biblical tales and completely falling out of favor with some truly dismal Marvel Team Up’s. I hated his return to both Iron Man and Avengers in the summer of ‘75. Quite a sharp turn from being on top to a writer whose work I’d actively avoid. (At the same time, I have no real complaints about this issue or the next.)

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      1. Batman just seemed too self-absorbed to me, in the face of the Huntresses’ loss. All his dialog there could’ve been internal, shown as thought/narration boxes (or thought balloons, back then).

        Instead, he could’ve just offered comfort and condolences, and let her express herself, if she wanted to. He knows what it feels like to lose parents. And the way her father died, “fighting the good fight”, should’ve resonated with him.

        He chose to tell a still grieving daughter how her father’s death affected himself. Some bat-signals he was oblivious to…

        If his offering her his sympthies/empathy, then it was quite a missed opportunity, and a bit disrespectful to Helena Wayne.

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