JLA/JSA: Virtue and Vice (2003)

Outside the JLA Watchtower on the moon, Superman and Sentinel gaze upon the distant Earth from the frigid blackness of space-- placing the two Golden Age heroes on an equal standing for the only time ever. The Justice Society and their successors, the Justice League, have decided to reinstate an old tradition of the two teams fraternizing on a regular basis, breaking bread in fellowship. However, the twin figureheads of the respective teams maintain a watch, with the Manhunter from Mars breaking in telepathically to direct them toward unrest in Arusha, Tanzania. Detroit-era Leaguer Vixen was already on the scene, but she's backed up by two of the best to repel an assault on President Lex Luthor by Doctor Bedlam of the New Gods. The other combined heroes soon follow suit, with Martian Manhunter continuing to direct their activities.

At JSA Headquarters, J'Onn J'Onzz notes psychic interference that he experienced in East Africa. The heroes begin to get catty with one another. Hostilities erupt. The Martian Marvel begins to lose physical coherence from the constant psychic assault, and is more or less out of the story from there. Seven of the heroes' personalities are so severely warped that their compromise becomes obvious. On page 28, the reveal that they've become possessed by the The Seven Deadly Enemies of Man, archetypes of sin usually confined to the Rock of Eternity by the wizard Shazam. The general population of the globe is also acting irrationally. The tortured Sleuth from Outer Space warns that Luthor is a key factor in this, before being placed in a magical coma by Zatanna and other reinforcements. In an already crowded book, a lot of space is allotted to the second-stringers. Clearly going for a Morrisonian maximalist approach, there's so much going on with so many players in so many locations that it all becomes noisy bullet points instead of the intended spectacle.

Black Canary leads the confrontation of the President in the Oval Office. Along with everything else, the chess pieces carved in the likenesses of the heroes should have been a dead giveaway. Luthor is actually Despero, "Extraterrestrial dictator. One of the League's first adversaries." Mentally freezing the heroes in place, there's a truly tortured backstory involving a swift overview of Despero history, including his relatively recent final discorporation by the Earth Angel incarnation of Supergirl. His spirit ended up in whatever dimension the JSA villain Johnny Sorrow hails from, and their combined psychic power crossed dimensions to posses Dr. Bedlam on Apokolips. While Despero was being smuggled into Luthor, Sorrow was handling Shazam and freeing the Enemies. It goes on and on for pages, but at least in the end, Despero turns a U.S. flag into a cape to mirror that time he accidentally did the U.N. one similar. He did the thing! We love when they do the thing! I mean, I do here, but still. The least among them, Green Arrow, uses gas (not from chili) to free the heroes to escape, hunted by third eye blinded U.S. troops with orders to kill.

Eventually, the heroes trick the Gluttony-possessed Captain Marvel to call down his lighting, with Billy Batson exorcised of the Sin. That same lighting flows back to Shazam, reviving him so that he can recapture the other Deadly Enemies. The JLA, JSA, and reserves combine their might. Despero makes a great showing by surviving a quantum leaping Captain Atom, having the Rock of Eternity almost land on him, and then got a faceful of an unmasked Johnny Sorrow. He also slammed Superman and Captain Marvel's heads together at one point. A grateful Luthor was imposed upon to replace the destroyed old stone JSA headquarters with a shiny new one.

"Virtue and Vice" was by David S. Goyer & Geoff Johns and Carlos Pacheco & Jesus Merino. Technically, this book came out in 2002, after my retailing days, and once the bloom was well off the JLA rose-- about halfway through the Kelly/Mahnke run. The premiere hardcover cost $24.95, which in adjusted dollars would be $44.35, and was the equivalent of over 11 standard contemporaneous comics. If you want to split hairs, it was 96 pages of original content, roughly 4 & a third comics, while that same month's Green Arrow: The Archer's Quest reprinted six comics for five bucks less. All I know is that it felt egregious, and then it took nearly a year to come out on softcover for $17.95 ($31.20 in 2025.) My memory of this time period is really hazy, so I may have been between brick & mortars getting some pitiful barely-covers-sales-tax discount, stopping by once or twice a month, barely keeping a toe in the industry. I may have swallowed hard and bought the softcover new, but probably got it as a backlist later, and thoroughly resented it. I kept buying JLA and related projects until Infinite Crisis, but I only occasionally read it, and the strip-mining of that brand put me off. It took until Fanholes did a podcast on it for this year's inaugural #JSApril social media event that I finally sat down to read the thing nearly a quarter century late. In fact, I figured I might just harvest some extra eyes and do this post last week, but I thought it would be uncool to bite F@nholes' action, and also I'd be a Debbie Downer about it, besides.

The late Carlos Pacheco was a fantastic artist whose detailed work did not lend itself to long runs, and I mostly admired from afar since those runs were typically on books I didn't follow. For instance, he did four issues of The Flash that one year I tried hard to get into Mark Waid's run, and that's the longest streak I ever had buying Pacheco comics. I'd say his strongest influence was Alan Davis, but he had flashy Image qualities, including some particular anatomical quirks, that made him feel more modern. The Spanish scene vibes were also there, not that I could articulate exactly what that means practically. So, I enjoyed his stuff, and think he was particularly great on Fantastic Four... just not to the degree that he could get me to buy a book just for his art. I like looking at this book, and it makes me wish he'd had a proper run on JLA, but it doesn't overcome what a shallow and convoluted mess this story was. Likewise, this is one of the best renditions of Despero ever, his chief representation online for years afterward-- but probably not in my top five, personally. Kind of rubbery, not that menacing, and I'd swear Ordway inked him on one panel. I think Johns has love for him, and I preferred his second pass (with blessedly more Martian Manhunter) in one of the last JLA arcs. Besides J'Onn's lackluster use here, the Alien Atlas is maybe the character Pacheco has the worst handle on here. He won't commit to the beetle-brow, so his head is just lumpy like a potato. He's got a resting Grinch face, and the classic costume isn't rendered very flattering. Alan Davis has a much better take, including tweaking the suit to his style. I do really like Pacheco's Atom & Hawkman, but Wonder Woman's breast and thing are out of control. Goyer/Johns also give us one of the more obnoxious Plastic Man takes of the dire Ace Ventura period of his characterization, which is painful.

2022 Pop Culture Power Show Mongul Commission by Angel Medina

I've been a fan of Angel Medina since his run on Dreadstar with Peter David in the late '80s, and I first got to have a long chat with him at San Diego ComiCon in 2000 (which led to a misadventure at the 1970s Black Panther panel, but that's another story.) There was a long gap before again making his acquaintence, but he was a regular at a small show out of Stafford, Texas; that died and was reborn as "Pop Culture Con." I've seen him a couple times at those, one just last month, plus Fan Expo Chicago in 2023. Most times, I try to pick up something from him, because I'm still enthused about his art. I've mostly gotten away from Martian Manhunter related commissions, but Medina has a long history of working with Jim Starlin and his cosmic creations, particularly Adam Warlock & Thanos (via The Infinity Watch.) I've devoted a disproprtionate amount of space to Mongul the Merciless on this blog for a rather modest connection to Martian Manhunter, but he's one of my favorite DC villains. I only have one other piece of Mongul art, so I could justify another, especially from such an obviously appropriate creator!

Angel Medina Gallery

• 2023 Fan Expo Chicago JLA JAM Black Canary segment by Angel Medina
• Hellcat, Captain America, & Thanos

Amazing Heroes #156 (January 1st, 1989)

Amazing Heroes remains my all-time favorite industry magazine, despite (okay, partially because) being printed in comic book dimensions (while costing 3-4x as much as its subject averaged) and my only having bought a few editions while it was still being actively published. In fact, I've been actively working on an (economical) set for a while now, and my gaps continue to narrow. I have a lot of contempt toward Wizard specifically, because I saw the negative impact it had on the industry in real time, including its lowering of the overall discourse with hype and crass humor. But also, because I had a basis for comparison to much better magazines, including Comics Scene (even pricier for less content and way too much animation/media coverage, though still more value than the Wizard ilk.) A lot of it was just down to timing, since first generation comics fans were still active and vital at midlife, while the Boomer and Gen-X writing staff had collectively experienced all that North American comics had to offer up to that point. It was still possible to collectively know "everything" about what was available to their audience. Further, it spun out of The Comics Journal so that they could go full fart-sniffer about capital-A "art" releases. So you had a bunch of over-educated liberals getting out from under being brow-beaten by the Gary Groth crowd, but still took mainstream comics seriously enough for literary analysis, and the perspective of having read more ambitious and underground work. There's a reason why so many of its contributors went on to luminous careers of actually creating their own comics.

For instance, Don Rosa was essentially their version of Bob "The Answer Man" Rozakis with his column "Info Center," before succeeding Carl Barks as the Eisner-award winning chronicler of DuckTales. Because he knew his stuff and communicated it well, instead of taking cheap shots like drunk Tony Stark jokes at every opportunity to fill space between price guides. And again, that multi-generational knowledge base would allow for a segment explaining that the original "Manhunter from Mars" was Roh Kar, not J'onn J'onzz. This was a time before ready, widespread reprints, and there were no databases to access this type of obscure information. The oldest Overstreet I have is the 21st edition covering 1991-1992. There's a line under Batman #78 noting "Roh Kar, The Man Hunter from Mars story-the 1st lawman of Mars comes to Earth (green skinned.)" So if you could find that line in a 548-page book of tiny print, regarding a book that hadn't carried the J'onn J'onzz strip, you'd have the barest idea that there was a so-called "Golden Age Martian Manhunter." You could also score a mint copy for $300, which is less than a CGC 1.8 on eBay as I type this. They're asking $1,645 for a 6.0. The best time to invest really was thirty years ago.

Anyway, I learned about Roh Kar from U.S. Navy Commander Adam Benson on the DC Message Boards a quarter century or so ago, because I didn't have this particular issue of Amazing Heroes to educate me. But having read the actual story many times over at this point, what I'm most interested in was how they got that Silver Age Manhunter image in there. Presumably they photocopied a comic that they had a copy of (clearly not Batman #78,) since J'onn is clearly covered in Ben Day dots,) so I figure they then went around that figure with liquid paper to white out the background. This sort of thing got so much easier once the Showcase Presents came out. Anyway, it's nice that a relatively minor character like the Sleuth from Outer Space got any kind of attention in a forum like this, likely because at least one staffer was probably reading the original Batman stories that the Martian Marvel was backing-up.

Aquaman #1-2 (February-March, 2003)

I continue going through the pile of comics that I got solely for blogging purposes-- left unbagged and otherwise unfiled for decades, now finally getting written up and written off. I figured the first issue of a new series with a small Martian Manhunter cameo would be a good opportunity to get in and out, quick and easy. I knew that I had long ago covered JLA: Our Worlds At War, where Aquaman went missing and was assumed dead, so I at first thought this issue would pick up from there. Actually reading the issue, I was quickly reminded that no, Aquaman had actually come back in a lengthy JLA arc, and I dreaded having to start reading and covering that instead. Then I reminded myself-- no, this is the debut of a new series, and it damned well should get me up-to-speed and draw me in on its own.

Well... no. I mean, I got the basics. Atlantis had been drawn into something called "The Obsidian Age" with some bad juju. Aquaman had to re-sink Atlantis to save it in some unclear capacity, as well as the JLA. The Atlanteans had then decided that their former king had ruined everything and betrayed his people for his true friends, and therefore must die. DC's Atlanteans (or actually Poseidoneans, as Aquaman actually presides over a domed city-stated, not the full continent) have always been a murderous and superstitious lot, prone to attempting to kill little babies and young children over their having the wrong colored hair or eyes. Their turning to regicide is on-brand, including the involvement of Vulko, who is basically Aquaman's Alfred if Alfred substituted being openly catty with constant outright backstabbing. Aquaman being in any way associated with this lot makes him look worse.

Guided by Mera, Aquman's crazy ex-babymama (before her Geoff Johns glow-up,) the Atlanteans busted Aquaman's Justice League signal and harpoon hand. Through sorcery, they were able to all ocean life against Aquaman, rendering his telepathy useless. Certainly not against the *snort* barnacles that bound him to a surface rock until he died by desiccation. Around this turn of events, Aquman was seeing flashes of his past that would be obtuse to anyone not well versed in at minimum a half-dozen Peter David written comics from a decade earlier (across a volume, a mini-series, and an annual, no less.) There's no in-depth captions or editor's notes elaborating on any of this, just an aggressive indifference to any potential new readers no arriving directly from JLA. Most of the rest of the issue is Aquaman breaking loose of the barnacles, continuing to be driven away from the sea by the Atlanteans, and most unintentionally funny, being swarmed by crabs. At least, I think it was unintentionally, rather than a piss take. Don't get me wrong, if this were happening to Capt. Storm or some other normal human protagonist, it could be harrowing. In a super-hero comic, it turns Aquaman into a clownfish.

Near death, in Ireland of all places, Aquaman tosses his useless spearhand into a body of water, and it's caught by... The Lady of the Lake?!? Because King Arthur, see, like we haven't been down this road before. Never so incompetently, though, as I don't think they actually refer to Aquaman as "Arthur" until going full Arthurian. So the Lady of the Lake not only heals all of Aquman's wounds with the water of The Secret Sea (I guess,) but she also gives him a bracelet that allows Aquaman to form a... water hand? They make a point of saying he can make it solid enough to grab things and such, plus he eventually has visions in the palm of it, but nobody's impressed with a water hand, dude.

As for the cameo, the Manhunter from Mars caught a bit of Aquman in the "JLA neural net" during the Sea King's semi-failed telepathic call for help. J'Onn J'Onzz was flying around the general area, while also having a psychic exposition dump with Wonder Woman, Batman, and Superman... on page 20, way after the reader I either figured it out and stopped caring. And again, it's too vague to qualify as useful-- mostly just restating what we already knew instead of expanding upon it. Mostly, it just absolves the JLA's absence by stating that he wanted to deal with his (murderous) people on his own. By the time the Alien Atlas locates his teammate, Arthur is relating the Arthurian developments like we hadn't already read that part. This continued into the second issue, where J'Onn got some clothes and credit cards for Arthur, while they sniped at each other over who was the most stand-offish or least likely to stay with the Justice League. Aquaman then goes on alone on some meandering adventure involving captaining some old man's boat through a storm, using his water hand for magic CPR, fighting those Atlantean stormtroopers a little, and weathering a police investigation. Or something. I checked out four pages in, when the cameo stopped, but after another dumb dream sequence that alluded to stuff I didn't care about.

"Castaway" and "To Die by the Light of the Sea" were by Rick Veitch, Yvel Guichet, and Mark Propst. The writer seemed inclined toward Silver Age cheese, but lacked the chops of Silver Age revivalists like Morrison and Waid. The art was fine, but I had to actively remind myself that it wasn't by the same art team as did the JLA arc. The year that this lasted yielded few waves, but the book would pick steam in the second year under another Mahnke-indebted creative team and the premise of "Sub Diego."

Orion #13 (June, 2001)

Jack Kirby's greatest non-Marvel contribution to pop culture was providing the influence that formed the spine of George Lucas' Star Wars. DC Comics certainly knew that, because when Jedis became all the rage, they did their level best to foist the Fourth World Saga onto a largely disinterested public. As a member of Generation X, I'm well aware of The Force's pervasive presence, and my entry into The Source was Kenner's Super Powers Collection of action figures, whose Kirby-infused lore also absorbed the final seasons of the Super Friends Saturday Morning cartoon that I watched. It's main accomplishment was to set up Darkseid as one of DC's biggest super-villains, and if I didn't know him before, he's been inescapable ever since. I had figures of Darkseid and a Parademon, while my half-brother had Steppenwolf, DeSaad, and maybe Kalibak. I can't recall if either of us bothered with Orion or Mr. Miracle.

Even when I was generally disinterested in DC, John Byrne on Legends couldn't be missed, and Darkseid was there. He popped up in lots of stuff, so that even when I was only occasionally buying DC, the Lord of Apokolips found his way into my collection. By the mid '90s, I was hot and heavy with DC, so I felt obligated to at least try some Fourth World material, and that's exactly how it felt to read that stuff. Finally, I picked up an early proto-Essential/Showcase Presents black & white collection of New Gods, and finally found a way into Kirby's lore. I "got" Orion, at least, but I wasn't convinced that anyone else did. In most of his appearances, he was a hothead jerk with neither the charisma nor menace of, say, Namor the Sub-Mariner. Even favored creators like Jim Starlin came up short.

Of all the attempts to continue the Fourth World without Kirby, I figure mine and the consensus opinion of who came the closest was Walt Simonson's Orion. He'd arguably bettered Kirby on The Mighty Thor, though he admittedly had the whole of Norse mythology to fall back on, and was at the peak of his powers in the '80s. Like John Byrne, some of that luster had faded in the '90s, though Byrne still tapped Simonson to provide the covers to his year-plus attempt at reviving Jack Kirby's Fourth World. When Byrne moved on, Simonson was tapped for the next bid, and I was intrigued enough to give it a try for half a year. The story was about the will-enslaving Anti-Life Equation taking over people's minds in the American heartland. This built to what was presented as a climactic battle between father and son, with Darkseid seeming to perish under the blast of his own Omega Effect beams. Simonson was successful at drawing the characters with a divine Kirby bigness, and create a visual language for the New Gods' cosmic power through ornate and arcane displays. But it also embraced the decompressed storytelling trend that persists to this day, and I simply ran out of interest.

After I left, Orion was forced to take up his father's mantle as leader of a wasteland autocracy, and was manipulated down a dark path. He killed DeSaad, gained control of the Anti-Life Equation, and used it to conquer several worlds. As heel turns went, it was pretty benevolent, actually. Less so was Simonson's clear intent to keep his story New Gods-centric despite middling sales and the imposition of gimmicks. There were hot guest artists like Rob Liefeld and Jim Lee doing back-ups, and a particularly grating and incompetent two month tie-in with the Jokers Last Laugh crossover stunt. By 2001, JLA wasn't the juggernaut that it once was, but their prominence on the right cover was still enough to get my dollars.

Simonson had drawn a couple issues of John Byrne's run, and Byrne returned the favor on the two additional issues that I bought for the Justice League guest spot. I bought #14 assuming that things would pick up from their barely-there cameo in #13, but I was too generous and/or gullible. Orion had used the Anti-Life Equation on Captain (Shazam!) Marvel, who was sort of his herald to the JLA Watchtower base. The Big Red Cheese talked the League into listening to Orion's global broadcast of the Equation, the League's will ceased to be their own, but they still flew around performing good deeds, as usual. Orion just took the fighting aspect out of the... equation... for a hot minute. In his sole line, Martian Manhunter stated his intent to build a dam in China. Like he wouldn't have been up for that any other day?

Predictably, Darkseid turned up alive and the mastermind behind much of this, but also plotted Orion's demise to halt his threat. Orion lost the Anti-Life Equation, but otherwise got better. The book really meandered after that, seemingly marking time until cancellation. Two new villainesses introduced and mostly contained in this volume continued to plague Orion, helping to gouge his eyes out, but he got better across a narratively listless but illustratively compelling five-parter. A final oversized issue set all the pieces back to default. As you can probably tell, I'm glad I kept that money in my wallet.

"The Ordering of Earth!" was by Walter Simonson, John Byrne, and Terry Austin. It was nice to see the classic X-Men art team reunited, and the embellishment was a welcome change from Byrne's solo efforts, but say it with me-- Austin wasn't what he once was by that point.

Superman: The Man of Steel #92 (September, 1999)

In a "Fearful Symmetry" situation, this cross-title arc was dubbed "Secret Origins" by its writer, but marketing wanted to take advantage of a guaranteed sell logo, so all the covers call the arc "The One-Man JLA!" The absence of Superman is first noted by Martian Manhunter in Superman #147. The JLA were addressing a jail break at Stryker's Island Penitentiary in Metropolis, and an editors note causes confusion. Apparently, many of the villains were not up-to-date, tipping the hand that this was a month of inventory stories to cover the triangle-number, comics-by-committee crew of the Superman titles for a month. But also, most of the issue was already a fantasy about baby Kal-El having landed on Oa instead of Earth, and growing to become a Green Lantern Corpsman. The continuity nit-picking wasn't helpful. Manhunter telepathically detects Superman's mind somewhere in the depths of space, and calls for a team to seek him out. Steel and Green Lantern promptly volunteered, with Kyle Rayner pressing The Flash into service as well. Wonder Woman also wanted to come, but was denied by J'Onn J'Onzz, not wanting to leave Earth too short-handed of defenders. Aquaman was also left behind, but I felt a lot worse about Diana, because the artist rendered her in a gorgeous Frank Frazetta style.

The next couple of issues are pretty much a waste of time. Adventures of Superman #570 imagines Kal-El as a Rannian styled after Adam Strange. In Action Comics #757, Kal-El is a Thangarian that has displaced Katar Hol, and that's actually a more interesting spin than the overall "real" story. Across these two issues, the JLA search party travel through space and get attacked by a giant squid, multiple times. I final reveal is that they've been captured by the same aliens messing with Superman's memories, and are making the JLA replay the same corny adventure on repeat.

Finally, the Sleuth from Outer Space figures out the ruse, and mentally reaches out to "K'All L'Ell," who now thinks he's a Martian. The Manhunter eventually recovers Superman's psychic identity, and Kal-El suggests merging their minds to break free of the conditioning. This Supermanhunter frees the JLAers and the proper Man of Tomorrow, restoring Kal-El's psyche to his body. It turns out that their captor was himself from the conquered people of X'VyV'X. Rendered xenophobic by the invasion that propelled him into space, the X'VyV'X refugee tried to use a Kryptonian device to brainwash a champion to take back to X'VyV'X. Superman agrees to one more mind wipe to "become" a X'VyV'X Superman to repel the invaders without compromising their location or security. However, this selfless inspired X'VyV'X to trust again, and send the JLA to again recover Superman, who was grateful to have friends like these.

The arc was by Tom Peyer, Tom Grindberg, and various inkers, plus covers by Walt Simonson. It was fine-- I generally enjoy Peyer scripts more, but this was a space-filler with Silver Age influences. Some back issues that I can now release into the wild.

2014 Houston Comicpalooza Crime Goliath Monster-Man Vulture Jam Sketch Detail by Johnny J. Segura III

I'd hoped to do a story post of some kind tonight, but I'm still juggling super-involved projects at work and in podcasting, so we'll fall back on another belated art post. I don't feel quite as bad about this one, because Johnny's one of my favorite and most frequested artists to commission, and I have gotten stuff from him since this decade-plus-old detail. Except now that I think about it, I don't think any of that material has been posted by me either, so hopefully he snapped a pic and put it in Snapchat or something. Is Snapchat still a thing? Was it in 2014, even? Speaking of oldies, here's a Monster-Man from a 1967 story that I brought up last week.

Johnny Segura 3rd

• Site
• 2012 Professor Arnold Hugo
• 2012 L'lex Xanadar
• 2013 Miss Martian
• 2013 B'rett
• Instagram

The Vile Menagerie: MONSTER-MAN

Alter Ego: Joe
Occupation: Henchman
Marital Status: Unknown
Known Relatives: Unknown
Group Affiliation: Vulture
Base of Operations: United States
First Appearance: House of Mystery #166 (April, 1967)
Height: Approx. 9'-10'
Eyes: Dark
Hair: Dirty Blond

History:
Once, Vulture developed a molecular-ray that could temporarily transform normal men into hulking man-monsters. The most highly visible subject was an agent simply called Joe, who used his new power to rip open an armored car with his bare hands. Mr. V sought to make the process permanent, and scientists at one of his international labs developed a cylinder that could potentially do the job. However, authorities were aware of the Monster-Man's crime spree and Vulture's plot, so they were on high alert to intercept the cylinder when it entered the United States. Mr. V paid the globe-trotting playboy Marco Xavier for the task, as he would be above suspicion. However, the real Marco Xavier was presumed deceased, and his identity assumed in recent months by the Manhunter from Mars.

The Sleuth from Outer Space raided the hideout where "Xavier" had taken the cylinder, but soon determined that this was but one safehouse, not the location where Vulture was keeping the ray. The Alien Atlas traded blows with Monster-Man for a bit, then feigned defeat in a bid to follow the Vulture agents back to their true headquarters. The plan was wrecked when the Manhunter's former partner Zook crashed the scene, and when his own powers faltered before Monster-Man, the Manhunter blew his ruse to save his other-dimensional pet. Just then the ray wore off, leaving Joe just another Vulture bum taking a concussion nap until the police arrived. Manhunter did eventually find the base, and destroyed the molecular-ray before any more Monster-Men could be produced.

Powers:
Monster-Man displayed incredible strength and durability, especially to Zook's deep freeze power. Yet, it wasn't seemingly in the same class as the Alien Atlas, who easily overcame Monster-Man when so inclined.

Weaknesses:
The Monster-Man is a limited time offer of undefined length, and will swiftly and spontaneously fade once its charge dissipates.

Quote: "I'll take care of this little monkey!"

Created by Jack Miller and Joe Certa

2014 Houston Comicpalooza The Manhunter Monster Vulture Jam Sketch Detail by Chris Foreman

Okay, we're back on "stuff I could have posted eleven years ago." At least I had the foresight to feature one of Chris Foreman's two jam contributions in the year that it was produced, even though that one remains unfinished, whereas this was one of the first that I managed to have completed... so I could sit on it in it's entirety for no good reason. Maybe I was going to run it some October for Halloween because villains or maybe I wanted to do encyclopedia entries for each subject? Motivation lost to time and inertia, I'm afraid. It's a shame too because, on pure technique, this was my favorite of the Foreman pieces I had commissioned (or otherwise posted from online finds.) I just like the energy of the '90s Image feathering.

Anyway, I dubbed this character one of "The Vulture Monsters" when I did a write-up that probably also served as Foreman's reference, but they never had a proper name. When Enrique “Quique” Alcatena drew them, I just referenced the story title "The Manhunter Monster!" I figured to do the same here, referencing the monster's sole comics appearance in House of Mystery #169 (September, 1967.) As you can tell, this image was incorporated into a preexisting collaboration, third in a series, and I expect to get them all online this year. In the meantime, here's some more places on this site and beyond to see his work...

Chris Foreman

• 2010 Martian Manhunter Sketch Card
• 2012 Kishana Lewis Comicpalooza Commission
• 2014 Officer Pat Brady Comicpalooza Jam Sketch Detail
• Instagram
• DeviantArt

Warner Bros Store DC Heroes Lithograph by Mike Deodato Jr.

I've been saving this one for a rainy day/few months/whenever I could find more details on it. I think I stumbled upon it at an auction site, and swiftly downloaded the jpeg, but can't find it again. The best information I could Google was on a 2015 Legion of Super Bloggers post about a different DC Universe art print that made the rounds in the late '90s, which I'm confident was by Dan Jurgens and Jerry Ordway. As a side bit of business, they offered a tiny scan from a WB Store catalog and a larger black & white version of the Deodato print with their http branded over it. Given the featured line-ups, both pieces were probably produced in the late '90s, but maybe offered in the early 2000s? The Jurgens/Ordway one is very post-Zero Hour, which makes sense because they're the art team on that mini-series, and for all I know it was a spread within the book (but I'm probably confusing it with a more packed but also more pedestrian scene where the extended cast all show up in Metropolis.) J'Onn J'Onzz is also in that one, and just (lower) left of center, but also only a head peek out over Connor Hawke. It's a total cheat not to have the Alien Atlas a full head taller, with exposed Martian Man-boobs/cape/etc. It's also dull as dishwater, which is why I was in no rush to cover it here.

I was always a bigger Mike Deodato Jr. fan than I was for either of the other print's artists, having appreciated how his Wizard-certified hot Image-style supercharged my favorite run of the Wonder Woman title. I mean, he also kind of ruined that title by turning it into a bad girl t&a book, but his earlier issues were much more story-dense. But more importantly at the time, Deodato finally got fans to take the Amazing Amazon seriously as a contender at DC Comics, rather than the annoying little sister that only had a title to lock in merchandising rights. It was sometime around this period tht DC finally bought all of the rights off the Marston Estate and began promoting the concept of a DC Trinity with their whole chest, and I felt that Deodato played a role in that. Plus, I was simply excited by his Chromium Age style, and bought a bunch of lousy Caliber Comics reprints of his old Brazilian work (in a much different art style) with hacked out new covers (plus "his" Thor run, which was probably more a product of the Deodato Studio.)

The hierarchy of power in the DC Universe is more status quo in the Deodato piece, with a huge Batman & Superman trailed by a considerably smaller Wonder Woman, though she is catching up. Instead of accursed Zauriel (so very Post-Zero Hour,) this one has the short-lived gestalt Hawkman with large wings spread right behind Diana. I adore the Atom sliding down the Batline. There's still a tiny pre-angel armor Zauriel deep in the background, plus a No Man's Land Batgirl and mix of Titans that leans hard into 1999 specifically. I'm tempted to call it on this blog post, but will hold back in hopes of future confirmation.

I got to the WB Store whenever I could in this period, and figure I'd have bought this if I'd seen it. That said, stuff giclée were crazy expensive, and I didn't have a vehicle for most of this period, so my access was limited. Still, there's a full body Deodato Sleuth from Outer Space dead center on this image, so I think I'd have at least remembered seeing it before. If you have more information, please leave a comment, and I'd also maybe be interested if you're selling one (but not at a crazy giclée price?)

2016 N'or Cott Houston Comicpalooza Commission by Tommy Duy Nguyen

I was trying to deduce why I sat on this peachy piece for a bit shy of a decade, besides my usual being a certified idiot. At first I figured that it was too good a piece to throw out cold, so maybe I was waiting on a spotlight month, or it got pushed out by a series of jam piece sections? The best conclusion I could come to is that, like Rick Hoberg's Armek, I was squirreling it away for a second volume of Who's Who in Martian Manhunter that I'll certainly never get around to. That's a shame, because he was a promising comic artist who would have probably appreciated what little exposure this sad little blog of mine could have offered. He even gave me a free Stranger Things print as a thank you for getting two pieces from him that year. Oh yeah, at least I did something right and posted his Michael Biehn as Corporal Dwayne Hicks Space City Comic Con Commission in a timely fashion for the 30th Anniversary of Aliens, which also turned out freakin' sweet! Anyway, I really dig this take on N'or Cott, who maybe cleared the low bar of being J'Onn's greatest any of the 1970s, with the only competition being his partner in war crime R'es Eda or I guess The Thythen. Of the three, I certainly wish N'or Cott had more life in him, especially as rendered by Tommy Nguyen (and of course, Michael Netzer!)

Tommy Duy Nguyen

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2015 The Cobra-Beast Space City Comic Con Jam Sketch Detail by Mark Nasso

As I work through the bottleneck of my comic art commissions, some of these lengthy deferrals make zero sense to me, this one being a prime example. I had an encyclopedia entry for The Cobra-Beast written in 2014, a year before I got this art, using that entry's image as the artist's reference. Speaking of, I've gotten a bunch of stuff from Mark Nasso, so he's not one of those unattributable creators that I can't track down. Even though I couldn't find it tonight, I'm confident I have a scanned jpeg of this portion somewhere, it's on an unpublished draft life of un-posted art, and I started drafting this post on 9/27/2018. Finally, while there are still contributions to this jam that do fall under some of these categories, this was one of the first such large scale collaborations that was finished years ago, so I've had plenty of time to track down the details. I guess my sorry excuse is that the pencil parts didn't 100% photocopy? Gah-- I suck.

So here's a new scan taken directly from the original art (though I did leave the bag on it.) I used to see Mark at most local comic shows, but even before COVID, Houston cons started to stink so bad that it was easy to stop going. On the rare instances when I reaffirm that bias personally, I haven't seen him around. But a lot of the guys I used to get pieces from have drifted away. Probably sitting on their stuff for a decade doesn't help.

Mark Nasso

• 2012 Fernus the Burning Space City Con Commission by Mark Nasso
• 2013 Korge, the Last Angry God Commission by Mark Nasso
• 2019 Dawn of the Dead John Amplas as Rico Comicpalooza Commission by Mark Nasso

2018 Houston Comicpalooza Miss Martian commission by Eva “Rexevabonita” Bonita

My appetite for reading corporate comics, much less blogging about their intellectual property, is at a lifetime low. I've made no secret about the fact that one of the main reasons I'm still posting on a semi-regular basis is to "keep the seat warm" for when I try to get all the art commissions I've been hoarding for a decade out onto the internets. I feel guilt about this, and I'm sure at this point, a lot of the less experienced artist of that time would rather not have their awkward early stuff out there now that the exposure won't do them any good. Again, I'm sorry, but I'm sure at least some of them will look back fondly on pieces that I was and remain happy with.

It took a minute to sort through which social media the artist formerly signing as “rexevabonita” was still active on, but I got a list together at the footer if you'd like to peruse her contemporary work. She had more of a manga feel, which she leaned into, away from the regular comic shows into the anime ones. Being an old super-hero dude, that translated to me into M'gann M'orzz, the most manga of Martians in Manhunter's sphere. Also, she might have picked the Young Justice cartoon character out of a stack of reference options. Look, I was old then, and my memory isn't going to sharpen +7 years.

Another reason why I sat on a lot of this art is because I used to have to resize the originals on Xerox machines at Kinkos/FedEx Express, then scan the often lousy reproductions at home. This piece did not fare well under that process, as a full color work on textured board with subtle elements. Thankfully, I now have an 11x17" bed to directly scan on, and it really brings out what an appealing piece this is. I especially dig the white-out tracing of the skirt and the smirk! Glad you finally get to see it, too! I also got her to do Batman at the same show...

Eva Bonita

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Manhunter from Mars #161 (December, 1977)

Nearly a decade into the intermittent and irregular groupings of cosmic criminals from multiple planets aligned against the Alien Atlas, the various players remained informal, unnamed, and disconnected. That changed in the post-Star Wars landscape of comics catering to the science-fantasy audience. Among other things in George Lucas' blockbuster vision, editorial saw "a wretched hive of scum and villainy" and said to themselves, "we can do that, too." Reviving the "Secret Six" formula of the original gathering of space rogues with the largest collection of interstellar scoundrels to that date, to serve as a sort of Secret Society of Supervillains for the rocket ship set. And thus was finally born "The Solar Syndicate!"

A mysterious coordinator once again gathered alien crooks from across the solar system for a grand scheme, beginning on Earth with the Terran Tobias Manning enlisting the forces of Solo of Neptunia, for a trip to Mercury to remove of Venus Girdle from Queen Celerita. Next, Ghurkos of Phobos and Thas Bakkus of Deimos were sent to convince the ruling council of Titan that they had been tricked into believing all Earthlings were super-powered, bringing Kral with them to demonstrate human frailty. Meanwhile, Lord Uvo of Uranus reached out to Shrudlu of Pluto with the trajectory of a rocket carrying the subdued Moon-Beast using information stolen from Challengers Mountain.

These major moves did not go unnoticed, as Jovian Security Officers reached out to Roh Kar, Last Lawman of Mars, from his lonely post orbiting his dead homeworld. They had observed Jovian Metal Creatures departing their world under the guidance of the Crimson Centipede of his own Red Planet. Just as Roh Kar had relayed the message to J'Onn J'Onzz, he was assailed by The Face-Hunter from Saturn. Recognizing the expanded scope of these sol system sinisters, the Manhunter from Mars enlisted the aid of Saturnian Lawmen on his way from new Mars to old to investigate. However, their craft was ambushed, with only the Sleuth from Outer Space escaping with his life to the Earth's moon.

There, he uncovered the assembled Solar Syndicate, working under the direction of the Venusian Mister Mind in a bid to recreate the Solar-Brain and conquer the entire Milky Way Galaxy. Cut off from his friends and allies, the Martian Marvel manages to thwart the Syndicate's initial bid, but his sabotage of the cosmic forces summoned for the Solar-Brain has the unintended side effect of blasting J'Onn J'Onzz across space and time... to the year 2070! As proof of the longevity of this Solar Syndicate, one Manhunter would join another, Starker, as well as Ultra, the Multi-Alien, to face a future incarnation led by Doctor Dynamo and including his old foe B'enn B'urnzz!

Despite being groomed to take over from Jack Kirby through an Adventure Comics serial, Mike Nasser was already overcommitted on Challengers of the Unknown, Legion of Super-Heroes, and a Black Canary serial. Despite missing out on the conclusion of that trial strip, Nasser did return to the character for a string of covers to help The Manhunter From Mars ride out the DC Implosion as a newly christened monthly.

Credits
Script: David V. Reed
Pencils: Juan Ortiz
Inks: John Calnan
Cover: Mike Nasser
Price: $0.35 USD
Pages: 36
Indicia frequency: Monthly
Indicia Publisher: DC Comics Inc.
Editing: Tony Isabella

CBR's 2025 “The Best Martian Manhunter Storylines, Ranked” by Maxwell Pishny

My first real engagement with the internet was on a WebTV that my best friend Illegal Machine and his brother had gotten, and one of the first things I did with them was search for Wonder Woman and Martian Manhunter content. A year or so later, I got a WebTV of my own. Inspired mostly by fatigue from repeating the same Martian Manhunter information constantly on the DC Message Boards, usually on versus threads, I started building my first Martian Manhunter fan pages. I think it was the third or fourth such page on Web 1.0, and the skeleton of the Angelfire one is still out there. Mac introduced me to Comic Book Resources around this same time period, via Steven Grant's Master of the Obvious opinion column. It became a daily haunt for me-- my primary source of comics news and workday distraction. It was where the world was introduced to Gail Simone, and a rare space where I could indulge in my lettering nerdiness with Augie De Blieck. There are plenty of blog posts here where I made a mountain out of a molehill over some minor nitpick of a Brian Cronin piece or what have you.

Cronin's one of the only old guard still left at the modern CBR, which congratulations, has finally overtaken Cord Blood Registry as top search result for those three letters. I'm not sure how, besides paying Google to game it, because I don't know anyone who still goes there. After founder Jonah Weiland sold out to Valnet and deuced in 2016, there was a sharp and steady decline. I don't think any of the old columnists are around anymore, and they don't seem to have found any replacements. There's just this constant churn of press releases, clickbait, and listicles. I'm not entirely above that sort of thing, which is how I tolerated Newsarama for a while after I dropped CBR. It's specifically that CBR is an obvious content mill, farming engagement through know-nothing nobodies and maybe ChatBots? It's such cynical, no-effort crap that it's not even worth passing across most people's eyes.

In answer to what I'd assumed would be a rhetorical question, I guess Mac still gets over to CBR from time to time, because he sent me the subject article with the demand that I preemptively "CHILL." I've been known to go H.A.M. on this sort of thing, and I do wonder if that's had a chilling effect on Martian Manhunter media coverage. If so, and I've had any hand in keeping this sort of piece from getting drafted, I feel like I've done a good job. This kid's only been with CBR since November, filling two pages worth of top 10 lists and only the most basic takes. His "About Me" page is longer than some of his articles, and he insists on "over two decades obsessed with all things superheroes and comic books," which from his profile picture suggests improbable in-utero consumption. He's currently working on reading every Batman comic... since 1986, which hits different when your contemporaries did that in real time.

Some of you are probably thinking, "aww man, Frank, why do you have to be so mean? Why take personal shots? Why do you have to make your bad day somebody else's?" To which I would humbly reply, shut your piehole. You want some of what he's getting? But also-- it's a top 4 list. The bare minimum is a top 5 list, and I will not accept shrinkflation in my @#$%^%# listicles as anything but a sign of contempt for a subject that I'm notably sensitive about. I could do a top 5 Elongated Man list off the top of my head, and I could give a rat's patootie about Ralph Dibny. Identity Crisis, 52, that European mini-series with the Parobeck art, the first appearance, and the one where he marries Sue. I haven't even read most of those-- I just rattled off the first things that came to mind without research. This article's writer can't do that, because he doesn't have the age and experience, which if fine. I hope he's getting paid with more than exposure to type "best Martian Manhunter stories" into a search bar and crib something together out of the results, with maybe a personal preference thrown in for flavor.

If you're not a total schmuck, just to cover your bases, you at least pick an origin story. The lowest hanging fruit would be "The Strange Experiment of Dr. Erdel" from 'Tec #225, but you could just as easily go with the Secret Origins retcon, or the 1998 Martian Manhunter #0. He went with Martian Manhunter: Identity, the 2019 12-issue maxi-series. Maybe he's right? I only got a few issues into it, realized that it wasn't for me, and bailed. I'm old now, so I don't have to force the latest tedious retcon on myself. You can tell me if I'm missing out there. Yes, you have permission to speak now.

That was the #3 spot, of four. In the final quarter was 1996's JLA: New World Order, which launched the blockbuster Morrison/Porter run. It's one of the great Justice League stories, which launched my favorite period in the book's history, and DC's biggest franchise of the '90s. J'Onn J'Onzz is barely in that story. Spoiler-- it's secretly about Martians, and so as not to tip his hand, Morrison sidelines the Manhunter for most of the arc. Waid & Hitch did an arc about these same characters a few years later that does foreground J'Onn, but that didn't make the cut, and the Midsummer's Nightmare mini-series that immediately preceded JLA was what made me a fan of the character. So close-- still a bitter failure for this list.

The #2 slot went to Starlin & Mignola's Cosmic Odyssey, which has some really memorable moments with Martian Manhunter and Green Lantern John Stewart. It's a 226 page, four part prestige format mini-series from 1988. I think the Johns may have speaking parts on about a dozen pages. They're in the penultimate positions of a 9 character line-up on the cover, flanked by Bug and Orion. I guarantee you the kid's Batman reading project has gotten to 1988, and he though J'Onn was cool in this, and that's why he cobbled together this top 4 list. Too bad he hasn't gotten to the actual Martian Manhunter mini-series with an actual Martian Manhunter story from that same year, or if I'm being perfectly honest, his much better appearances in Justice League International from the same period. You could have said "Moving Day" and no one would have said "boo" back.

His top pick out of all the Martian Manhunter stories was the "Revelations" arc from the 2000 Ostrander/Mandrake series. I had serious misgivings about that book, despite affection for the same creative team's Grimjack work, with a paper trail going back to the aforementioned DC Comics Message Boards that the kid may have perused while in the womb. No? Yeah, that's probably best. Anyway, despite my grievances, I know a lot of people who hold that run in high regard. Generally speaking, I think that they prefer "Son of Mars" and "Rings of Saturn," the two arcs DC bothered to collect into trade-- initially for intentional audiences, and decades later domestically. "Revelations" does have its fans, particularly the JLI Choco homage with Doug Mahnke art, but I don't know any that actually prefer it to the real JLI stories.

So that's it. The kid did about 1300 words for CBR, and I gave back about 1200 in reply. I hope it was worth it to him, because it sure wasn't for me, and I won't be linking to help him panhandle. Nobody ever gave me a dime for this toil, but I still have enough personal integrity to give you more than the top four Snapper Carr stories (the debut Starro story, the one where he betrays the team to Joker, any two stories from Peyer/Morales Hourman, and if that doesn't satisfy, the Blasters Special?)