Black Vengeance, Part I of III
JSA #73
Cover Date: July 2005
Released: 11th May 2005
So obviously after coming off of one crisis I want to slam into the next one! But the plan has always been to look at either end of the Atlantis era and her rediscovering her Kryptonian origin (again). In fact you’d have to remember she’s meant to be Atlantean as most here seem to think that she one of the Kryptonian.
Previously in Countdown to Infinite Crisis poor old Ted Kord (Blue Beetle) was ignoreed by the entire DC Universe and found out Maxwell Lord (who founded the JLI, we’ll get to that soon) was actually a villain, fatally. Interesting in that story both Ted and Supes act like Power Girl is Kryptonian, and Superman mentions her powers have been getting a little wonky (Kara appears in a few panels but doesn’t do much but arrive and leave). And in the previous issue of JSA whilst traveling forward in time, they were in the WW2 era, she has a bit of a freak out with multiple images of Power Girl. Hence we begin to setup that something weird is happening to Power Girl.
Now to the comic we came here to talk about! There has been some discussion about how easy it actually is to pick up comics anywhere, and this is probably a good example, even without reading the previous issue it was easy for me to pick up from information given in the comic.
The JSA, Mister Terrific, Hawkgirl, Stargirl, Doctor Mid-nite, Hourman, Wildcat, Sand (Sandman), Sentinel (Alan Scott) and of course Power Girl, are discussing what to do with a recently returned Atom Smasher. Recently he assited Black Adam in liberating Kahndaq from it former dictator, through less than heroic means. Power Girl is on of the reasonable one here, saying that he should be given a second chance. After a back and forward about if he should come back, and in the end they decide to put it to a vote (which is an ancient JSA tradition).
And in a tradition going back to the All-Stars we have a second plot rumbling in the background. The Crimson Avenger, a straight up anti-hero complete with haunted guns, turns up to get revenge on a murdered woman. She interrupted in her revenge by the Spectre, who’s under the influence of Eclipso. This is, I believe, tied into the Day of Vengeance but it really doesn’t matter much here.
And because we’re not done with subplot we have Black Adam talking to Lex Luthor before meeting with something, something we don’t see this issue. And Billy Batson, Captain Marvel (or Shazam if you’re nasty) goes to meet the Wizard Shazam who lets him know about Eclipso plot and send him off to get help. We also see that Wizard has the Blue Beetles scarab and is being influence by Mordru, what this has to do with the plot I don’t know, but I guess we’ll find out sooner or later.
Our plot merge together as Black Adam comes and convinces Atom Smasher, with some good old fashioned emotional blackmail, to go help him in Kahndaq. Whilst the JSA, who were about to tell him there discussion, find he’s gone and Captain Marvel tell them, along with a Hawkman who’s just posing, tell them where he’s gone.
A lot of setup here, but I was never lost and could follow the plot fairly easily. Maybe it’s just because I came in at this era and remember much of the stuff going on at the time, but it just seems easy to follow along. The only downside is that the issue focuses on characters I don’t care as much about, though Power Girl does play her part here. But I’m interesting in seeing where everything goes with this…