Monday Memories #29 - Justice League Annual #1

Each Monday this year I'll be taking a look back at a random comic, prestige format issue, graphic novel or collection of reprints from amongst my 3,000 or so comics that date from 1962 to 2003 - I figured anything in the last ten years would be too recent to hark back to.

The comics are chosen completely at random and apart from a four week lead-in period, even I don't know what I'll be looking at in the weeks to come!

Who'd Like A Cocktail? #228

Jonah Hex asks the important questions

WTF Was That All About? Part 1

Last week saw the final gatefold covers of DC's aborted WTF Certified event in April. The name of the now non-event was widely derided after it was revealed, and rightly so, but the covers themselves - the main cover supplemented by a surprise on the gatefold - was a neat idea. I tried to remain as spoiler free as I could, both in the run up to it when covers were being released on the net, and in my weekly Cocktail posts.

Now it's all over, I figure it's time for a quick look at the ones I bought. So, in alphabetical order...

Who'd Like A Cocktail? #224

Power Girl forgets the point where confidence ends and arrogance starts

Monday Memories #11 - Extreme Justice #13

Each Monday this year I'll be taking a look back at a random comic, prestige format issue, graphic novel or collection of reprints from amongst my 3,000 or so comics that date from 1962 to 2003 - I figured anything in the last ten years would be too recent to hark back to.

The comics are chosen completely at random and apart from a four week lead-in period, even I don't know what I'll be looking at in the weeks to come!

DC's May Solicitations

Rather than do a straightforward Don't Ask post, I thought I'd take a look at a few titles this month.

 

The Green Team and The Movement . . . I'm sort of tempted by these, mostly because of Gail Simone's involvement if I'm honest. A pair of possibles, I think.

New DCU Team?

I saw this post over at Erin's blog and it intrigued me enough to comment on it over here. Erin found a photo from artist R.B. Silva which seems to depict an unusual grouping of DC characters:

and he includes a line about not being able to talk about it. The characters involved are Nightwing, Batgirl, Booster Gold, Hawkman, Shazam, Black Canary and Red Tornado.

• Nightwing and Batgirl on a team together? Sounds a little redundant to me
• Booster back in action is no bad thing
• Hawkman is, as far as I'm aware, going to be in the new Justice League of America
• Shazam is slated to join the ranks of the established Justice League
• Black Canary still heads up the Birds of Prey as far as I know
• Red Tornado is the one that piques my curiosity most - she's already appeared in Earth 2, albeit not active, and there's an embargo on the duplication of names between the two universes, over and above a handful of them, and the figure in that picture appears to be male. That also ties in with what T.O. Morrow said in the most recent Justice League issue.

Are we looking at an alternate League? Something that comes out of Trinity War? Or just an artist enjoying himself? I can't think of anything that immediately links these characters.

Monday Memories #3 - Justice League America #37

Each Monday this year I'll be taking a look back at a random comic, prestige format issue, graphic novel or collection of reprints from amongst my 3,000 or so comics that date from 1962 to 2003 - I figured anything in the last ten years would be too recent to hark back to.

The comics are chosen completely at random and apart from a four week lead-in period, even I don't know what I'll be looking at in the weeks to come!

Who'd Like A Cocktail? #193

Ummm, because he's a bloke?

Who'd Like A Cocktail? #188

Jaime, trust me: Booster Gold is not a good measure of recognition.

Who'd Like A Cocktail? #186

Please pardon my French

Who'd Like A Cocktail? #182

Boxing gloves are so 1960's

Who'd Like A Cocktail? #178

Good advice whatever world you're on

When Is An Abbreviation Not An Abbreviation?

When it takes longer to say the abbreviation rather than the word being abbreviated.

Prime example from last week's Justice League International #8:

Seriously - say Booster's dialogue out loud and count the syllables as you do.

"B.W." = four syllables; "Batwing" = two.

It may take less space on the page to write, but it takes longer to say it. And to compound matters, Booster does it twice in the same issue.

It's a little thing, but it's annoying.

Who's Like A Cocktail? #174

Man, you do not want the August General in Iron pissed off at you

Who'd Like A Cocktail? #168

Somehow, I can't see Batman ever saying that.

Global Guardians #2 - Moving On

For the next few weeks, I'm going to be running through the DCU appearances of the Global Guardians post-Crisis, pre-Flashpoint (or at least all the appearances I have) and wonder why they never had a title of their own and where they are now.

Following the events of Legends, the Justice League was revitalised (to say the least) and from its beginnings as simply a new version of the JLA, was transformed into a United Nations sponsored world-wide group of superheroes with embassies in most major countries.

Thing is, there was already a group with the same mandate, one which had a more international membership than the fledgling JLA/I. Sure, the League had a more interplanetary membership (with J'onn J'onzz and Mr Miracle) but the Global Guardians were already in place and as we saw last week, represented more of the globe than the League.

Still, politics being what they are, with the UN sanctioning the League, there was no need for the Guardians.

Justice League International #9 featured the first of several back-up appearances of the Guardians as they dealt with the closure of the Dome and while some, such as Belphegor and Dr Mist were quite philosophical about the affair, the Irish hero Jack O'Lantern was definitely not.

Who'd Like A Cocktail? #161

Come on, Godiva, most of us would kill to be in space. Some of us have . . .

Who'd Like A Cocktail? #153

Adam shows he's not best at forward planning.

Jurgens League #6 - Blood Secrets

And here we go again, casting our eyes back over an older incarnation of the Justice League, this time from the early 90's when Dan Jurgens was in charge. With that in mind, I had to call this the

JUSTICE LEAGUE AMERICA #76 - #77 - written by Dan Jurgens with art by Dan Jurgens and Rick Burchett.