JSA # 71

JSA #71
"JSA/JSA, Chapter IV: Past Mistakes"
Cover Date: May 2005
Writer: Geoff Johns
Artist: Don Kramer

Previously...

Per Degaton, a time-traveling Nazi, has decided to try and go back in time to fuck with JSA, since they keep thwarting his plans to change history so that the Nazis win. For whatever reason, he decides the best way to accomplish this is to head back to the early 50s and dick around with the past versions of the JSA. A bunch of the present-day members of the team get wind of this and head back in time to help out, and...well, that's about it, so far.

Plot
  
The Golden Age Atom is about to break into the Golden Age Hawkman's house for reasons too boring and meaningless to get into here. Atom Smasher, his future godson, steps in and they get into a fight. After a while, they stop fighting and start talking, and decide to help round up both version of the JSA to fight Degaton.

Still in 1951 the present-day Mr. Terrific has gotten himself captured by the Ku Klux Klan, which leads to him beating up them all up. Then he meets the past-Mr. Terrific who was in the area. The past-Mr. Terrific remembers the last time the two of them teamed up, which kind of encapsulates the problem of this story right, come to think of it. I mean, most of these guys have already hung out with their namesakes at some point, often for several decades.

Per Degaton finally appears in the story to torture the past Hourman for a while by wiping out his friends and family from ever having existed. But then the current Hourman, the past Hourman's son, shows up to rescue his dad. They both escape.

Stargirl and Starman also team up, with Stargirl trying to get Starman past his guilt of having help build the atomic bomb, which takes her exactly one page because if a teenage girl from the future tells you it's going to be okay, who are you to argue? This subplot is also notable for being a retread of the last few issues of James Robinson's Starman run.

Oh, and Sandman and past-Sandman, and the Johnny Thunders of two eras also come together to team up. Because most dudes reading comic books really want their comics filled with page after page of maudlin emotional conversations, especially if they're mostly retreads of earlier issues!

Both versions of the JSA convene to realize that while they want to stop Per Degaton, none of them actually know how to do that. The Hourmen bust in to announce that Degaton to assassinate the president of the United States! To Be Continued!

Commentary

I can remember a time when seeing the name 'Johns' emblazoned on the front of a comic didn't fill me with a sense of dread. And, in fact, I'm pretty sure it's comics like this one are what soured me on this one.


I guess, from a comparative standpoint, this really isn't so bad, the writing is decent and the art is good enough, but still, when 75% of a comic is about characters having stupid little sentimental moments, you kind of wonder...

Let's take the Atom and Atom-Smasher conversation, which is the centerpiece of this issue. The Atom is helping a bunch of goons arrest Hawkman for some nebulous reasoning that has to do with the Red Scare. But then the Atom decides he can't go through with it. It's a story of redemption. That is supposed to be a mirror of Atom-Smasher, who is currently on the outs with the JSA because he...murdered a few guys. In Atom-Smasher's defense, you can't help an anti-hero conquer a country without killing a few enemy soldiers. So, you've got some doubling there, but it's rather clumsy, and it's between two characters that no one has ever cared about, despite the two having been in existence for a combined eighty years at this point.

Still, the real problem here is if you were a kid in 2005, you just spent $2.50 on a comic that has roughly four times more heart-to-heart talks than fights, and that must have...wait, I bought this comic, and I basically have the emotional maturity of a kid, let me try and channel my past self:

2011 Dynamo: Past me, I have come from the future with an important question?
2005 Dynamo: Wait, you're from the future! Did the Cubs win the World Series?
2011 D: Fuck, they don't even win a playoff game,  but that's not why I'm here, I need to know, what was your reaction to JSA #71?
2005 D: The one with all of the talking? Why didn't anyone fight anyone? Why does Geoff Johns insist on making Stargirl a Mary Sue? Why? Answer me that, Future-Dynamo! Answer me now!

Damage Stars: ****
(It gets an extra star for obliquely mentioning the actual Damage in the story)