Monday, January 21, 2008

Justice League of America #69 - Feb. 1969

sgA history-making issue, as a member of the Justice League actually resigns!

The Story: "A Matter of Menace!" by Denny O'Neil, Dick Dillin, and Sid Greene. The issue opens with a one-page wordless sequence, with a note being tossed out a window that says "Green Arrow is holding me captive and is going to kill me!" What?!?

But before we can follow that, we meet up with Diana Prince, who shows up at the Secret Sanctuary to inform her fellow members that since he has lost her superpowers(in Wonder Woman #178) that she is resigning from the Justice League! The JLAers deny her resignation but put her on a leave of absence. Nice fellas, those Justice Leaguers.

Anyway, it turns out someone is trying to frame Green Arrow for a murder. The JLA investigate, and it turns out the dead man is a supervillain, the Tattooed Man! Then a mysterious man tells Batman and Flash to meet him at the Planetarium if they want to know whose behind all this. They show up, expecting an ambush, yet someone gets the drop on them anyway thanks to a raygun.

Turns out the guy behind all this is the villianous Headmaster, who first fought the JLA way back in issue #28("The Case of the Forbidden Super-Powers!"), who reveals he didn't actually kill the Tattooed Man, just merely put him in suspended animation.

Three of Headmaster's goons dress up as the JLA, and go on a crime spree. Luckily the Atom helps the other members escape(but jamming a bad guy's gun by sticking himself in there, preventing the firing pin from going off!) and they apprehend the faux-heroes, the Tattooed Man, and the Headmaster.

Roll Call: Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Flash, Green Arrow, Atom

Notable Moments: The opening page, featuring the mysterious letter, turns out to be a red herring--the note was written by kids playing "Justice League." Weird!

The sequence featuring founding member Wonder Woman resigning takes place in all of one page:
sg
...and yet big JLA history was made--for the first time a member left the team, which would start happening with more frequency as the book went on.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

The last panel shown proves that the "Superman marries Wonder Woman" idea has indeed floated in the ether of comics for decades.

But really, was there any romantic inclinations ever displayed by those two before this? Other than Supes being the most powerful male hero, and WW being the most powerful female that wasn't blood-related? I dont' recall ever seeing anything that would make Flash think this.

That's a great cover. It has Infantino's layout skills all over it.

Chris

Anonymous said...

Hmm, that seems like a pretty great story, especially for the time period.

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