Justice League vol. 3: Hawkworld
Three volumes in and “Justice League” finally decides to dial things back a bit with its main story. Instead of the fate of the Earth (again), it’s all about Hawkgirl, Martian Manhunter, and Green Lantern John Stewart getting some answers about the secret history of the universe on Thanagar Prime. Getting said answers is going to involve going up against Empress Shayera Hol, her consort Katar “The Savage Hawkman” Hol, and breaking into the most secure vault in the galaxy. While their goal is crucial to the overarching story writers Scott Snyder and James Tynion IV are telling, the stakes are more personal and the scope is more focused which leads to a more engaging story overall. Especially when you have Steven Segovia nailing the Thanagarian scenery and action and Jim Cheung pitching in on a few pages each issue to show us what’s going on with Batman, Wonder Woman, Superman, and Starman back on Earth.
Cheung also illustrates a whole issue in this volume, the only one written solely by Snyder. It’s a bittersweet story where J’onn J’onzz tells Lex Luthor about their secret history on Earth while they avoid big Martian burrowing dragons in the present. The craziness and sentimentality of that story is balanced out by the one in the middle of this volume, “Multiversal Meltdown,” where the creators decide to go big again. It involves the League leading the efforts of many cosmic superheroes to repair the Source Wall, only for Luthor and Brainiac to show up and ruin everything. I get that what happens here is meant to be a REALLY BIG DEAL. It’s just that I only have the exclamations of the characters to go by on this. The character they’ve unleashed is nothing more than a big plot device right now.
Aside from that, the villain-centric stuff works really well in the Tynion-written “Legion of Doom” stories which bookend the volume. The second one features the All-New Brainiac/Luthor team-up and it’s a great example of how to make a villain’s actions engaging by showing how he actually struggles to achieve them. Giving Luthor’s dad a very tragic backstory doesn’t hurt either, but it can’t quite top the opening story where the Joker finds out what Luthor’s been planning and decides to teach him a lesson. While Guillem March delivers some wonderfully exaggerated art — especially when it comes to the Clown Prince of Crime — the story really got me because I fully expected it to go one way. Right up until it didn’t. Sure, the stories involving the League are the best they’ve been in this series, but “Hawkworld’s” opening and closing chapters really make a great case for embracing Doom.