Review: JUSTICE LEAGUE #24
[Editor’s Note: This review may contain spoilers]
Writers: Scott Snyder, Jorge Jimenez
Artist: Jorge Jimenez
Colours: Alejandro Sanchez
Letters: Tom Napolitano
Reviewed By: Derek McNeil
Summary
Justice League #24: “The Sixth Dimension” chapter five! The League’s plan is in full swing, but one member of the team isn’t on board with their message and sides with the World Forger! Betrayed, there’s only one person who can turn the tide of this battle. Can Superman find the strength to escape his prison planet and save the Justice League, or is the League doomed to live out their days trapped in the Sixth Dimension?!
Positives
In Justice League #23 sets the League up to face their most formidable foe yet: Batman. The idea of one of the team turning traitor has been done before, but usually it’s an impostor or new member that does so. This time, it’s actually one of the major founding members.
Plus, as Morrison’s “Tower of Babel” storyline has established, Batman is the one member who has made a study of how to take down his teammates if possible. So, if Batman has indeed turned against the others, beating him would be a struggle, even without the new “Son Suit” the World Forger has given him. This promises to be one of the League’s biggest challenges ever.
I also find interesting, but quite fitting that the future Batman has weaponized the Mobius chair by making it into a Batsuit. Batman is very much like Marvel’s Iron Man in that his go-to move for increasing his power is to create a more powerful suit of armour. He did this to beat Superman in The Dark Knight Returns, he created the Hellbat armour to face threats like Darkseid, and now he has the Son Box armour, the most powerful suit yet.
The name “Son Box” is interesting, linking it to the Fourth World Mother Boxes introduced by Jack Kirby and the later variant Father Boxes. I likely won’t be long until we see a “Daughter Box” making an appearance in the DCU.
Positives Cont.
Snyder has spent a lot of time in past issues setting up the DCU cosmology and history to demonstrate how extremely high the stakes are in the League’s war with the Legion of Doom and Perpetua and her children.
However, Snyder seems to have now shifted his focus entirely to moving the plot forward, and this has improved the flow and enjoyability of the story. Less exposition and more action is always a good move.
By far, my favourite part is the flashback at the beginning of Justice League #23, where Superman spends a day with his son, Jon. Not only is any appearance of Superboy delightful, but it’s heartwarming to see Clark as a family man. Plus, we get to see Jon at his proper age, if only for a few pages.
I also got a chuckle from the touching yet humour exchange between the future Legion of Doom and their longtime foes. After both Sinestro and Cheetah have a moment of respect and reconciliation with their longtime foes, Grodd’s final words to his foe is, “Flash… I still hate you.”
Negatives
Although the idea of the League having to face off against Batman sounds like a fan’s dream, I find the very premise of Batman turning traitor impossible to swallow. I very much hope that Batman is playing along with the World Forger as part of a master plan.
It would be right in character for Batman to fake being a turncoat without informing any of his teammates. However, it would be a gross misinterpretation of the character for him to actually do so. I believe Snyder is too good a writer to have such a poor handle on Batman and that we will find he’s still on the side of the angels after all.
Verdict
Whether the League ends up fighting with or against Batman in the upcoming conflict, it still promises to be a defining conflict in the Justice League’s history. It is clear that the Justice League’s current adventures will play into the overarching Rebirth saga, which guarantees that every issue is a must-read story.
