What are you thankful for?
Thanksgiving, a time to stuff your face with turkey, watch a parade or two, and spend time with friends and family. For the Justice Society, the annual get together is cut short by memories from the past.
Only three JSA members show up for the annual feast – Jay Garrick, Alan Scott, and Ted Grant. Everyone else is either too busy with their own families and lives, or too depressed at the events that have happened over the last several months. And who can blame them for not showing with the new heroes jumping out of phone booths left and right.
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Once again the writers roll out the “only those with proper training and heart can be superheroes” line as the trio watch the festivities in front of JSA headquarters. Lex Luthor’s Infinity Inc. has taken the center stage in the Thanksgiving Day parade ready to unveil their newest member.
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Not Alan Scott’s dead daughter for sure, and doing it right outside JSA headquarters is probably not the best thing, especially when it summons up Scott’s son Obsidian. Outraged Infinity, Inc. would take his sister’s name for their own, Obsidian takes his anger into the streets.
Green Lantern (Scott) breaks up the fight, but as he leaves, Nukleon steps forward and tells him even though they are the new kids on the block, he and every member of his team will step up to the plate when the time comes and fight to the end.
Oh really?
The end may come sooner than they think as John Irons has been experiencing some rather odd side effects from his injection of the Everyman formula.
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Even though it appears Lex Luthor can turn the power off, it also looks like his formula doesn’t have the staying power, which will probably spell trouble for the new supers of the world.
And what of the evil powers of the world, shouldn’t they take a day of rest to give thanks for all the evil things they’ve accomplished? At Oolong Island the gathering of the Mads is just a little too much for Will Magnus to handle. When he excuses himself from the table, Dr. Veronica Cale follows.
As the two interact, she only gives the slightest hint on the project she is working on.
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Crackpot Theory of the Week! The End is Nigh!
The phrase she quotes if from Revelation and it talks of a fiery pit with smoke blocking out the sun. Could it be she is working to set off another firepit? The section from the Bible also speaks of locust and scorpions sent to plague mankind for five months. We’ve seen a scorpion robot and the Cricketron being created by the scientists back in Week 23. The end of this section of Revelation indicates four angels will be unleashed on man from the river Euphrates. The Four Horsemen Project is coming soon, and my guess still is Darkseid is behind this.
We now return you to your regularly scheduled review…
We also discover through the exchange that Will’s dark side is slipping out as Veronica finds a watch he has lifted from one of his fellow mad scientist.
A holiday dinner wouldn’t be complete with out an outburst from one of the guests – or in the case of Chung Zhu, an uninvited guest. The overlord of Oolong Island isn’t too pleased with people calling him Egg Fu behind his back.
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Will and Dr. Cale return to the table, and Egg Fu… I mean, Chung Zhu, begins to question him on the Plutonium Man project. If you are just joining us, at one point (Metal Men #2) Will built a line of robots that attacked humanity instead of helping them. They were Aluminum, Barium, Calcium, Zirconium, Sodium, and Plutonium. Ah… now we see why Ridge-Ferris was so interested in kicking the towns people off their land last issue and why they needed the plutonium so bad.
Before Chung Zhu can unleash his fury on Will’s lack of progress, Dr. Cale comes forward and announces to everyone that it is his pills that are keeping him in check and preventing him from going just as bonkers as everyone else. Of course we knew this from previous issues, and knew this card was going to be pulled.
With the cat out of the bag, Will is dragged off to let the change begin.
The Good
- Old heroes never die, they just keep getting better
- Cold ptero-turkey breast sandwiches
The Bad
- I didn’t see a kids table at the Oolong Island Thanksgiving feast, so there must be other scientists too busy to come to the table to eat.
- Only two days were covered this week
Like most holidays, the week seems to be too short, and such is the case with Week 29. Some minor revelations were made regarding the Everyman project, but other than that, not much happened.
I did enjoy the pacing of the story, but with three days gone, part of me wishes the writers had time to at least give us a page or at least a few panels of what was going on elsewhere. We haven’t seen much of Supernova lately have we? And what of Ralph’s journeys, and the plight of our space heroes? A little something extra would have been a great way to allow readers enjoy their holiday weekend and do more research into the story that is unfolding in the bases of 52.
Perhaps everyone in the DCU (the characters, not the writers or artists) was too stuffed from eating turkey to get out and do much this week, so like a closed JSA, I have to close this review with a 2.5 Star rating. Nothing against the issue, it just wasn’t the wiz-bang, action packed issues we’ve had before. And no, 52 backwards is not a hint…it is just a coincidence… or is it?
Parting Shot