Welcome to the First Issue Bin, where I — Ethan Kaye — randomly grab one of this week's comics that’s just starting up and give you the details on whether it should get added to your collection … or remain on the comic shop shelf.
Justice League Red #1
Writer: Saladin Ahmed
Artist: Clayton Henry
Color Artist: Arif Prianto
Letterer: Lucas Gattoni, Ryan Christy
Editor: Kathleen Wisneski
What did I just read?
Justice League Red stands out for being a comic where nothing is clearly spoken and nothing important happens. It seems to be composed of about 60% foreshadowing, 30% fighting, and 10% characters who all have been better written in other books. I'm floored at how weak this issue was, considering how much of a streak DC has been on lately.
I can break down the plot for you, but in doing so I reveal nothing more than what writer Saladin Ahmed put on the page. Justice League robot Red Tornado gets panicky about potential futures he's put together through algorithms. He secretly enlists Simon Baz Green Lantern and Power Girl to help him stop these disasters. They go to a planet, beat up a robot, discover that it's not a world-ending robot like Red Tornado told them (it's made for growing food), and then on the last page Black Adam — who has been watching them somehow — says he is there and will do something soon.
Other than some weak scenes where we get to peek in on Simon Baz and Power Girl as they're called by Red Tornado, nothing else happens.
Nothing.
There's some padded dialogue around "I can't involve the other Justice League in this" and "You saw the predictive algorithms, how could they be wrong?" but ultimately, the story is an uninteresting dud. And I like Ahmed's writing. I loved Abbott, and Miles Morales, and his current Wolverine run. But I don't think it's a book that has much to say, other than "go there and fight".
Fights aren't interesting in themselves. There needs to be a lot around them to justify the panel real estate. "This robot is going to be a problem later, break it," is such a bad, overly simplistic justification that Baz and Power Girl should have questioned it immediately instead of going off to wreck some planet's robot without talking to them about it first. It's a weird first-strike thing that leaves a bad taste in my mouth.
Red Tornado is only an interesting DC character in that he's more or less Marvel's The Vision, except he fucks up more and people have to fix his problems. Whereas Marvel had Tom King writing the definitive Vision series, Red Tornado seems to get by on being very serious but also being boring and also, like I said, fucking up and getting ripped apart. He's the DC hero most likely to end a battle in a crate back home. There is no reason to keep resurrecting this jinx.
The cover of the book promises Deadman, Cyborg, and Red Canary in future issues, but I'm fearful that they're going to be written as blankly as everyone else and just serve as action figures in a bigger "clack them together to make them fight" sandbox. I really like Red Canary, I think she's one of the cooler underused characters to spin out of DC's infinite crossovers, so I'm praying she doesn't get forever associated with this team, the way that an incredible villain like Catman is only trotted out for Secret Six books.
To go from the highs of Leah Williams's Power Girl series to Justice League Red does a disservice to a phenomenal book that no one wanted to end. Brilliant characterization, new friends and enemies, a new status quo for Power Girl, it was a great book that DC put out that flew under the radar but had nothing but heart behind it. Now I'm wondering if Justice League Red even has a pulse.
A book with little plot can get by on crisp dialogue. A book with weak dialogue can get by on incredibly engaging art. A book with mediocre art can get by on a dynamic story. Justice League Red offers no legs on this three-legged stool.
Red Canary: 0/5
Dialogue: 0/5
Plot: 0/5
Black Adam: Why
Red Tornado: Stop
Verdict: Generic superhero team-up does no favors to the creators or the characters. I'm disappointed I spent money on this.
