Justice League: No Justice

At the end of most Marvel events is a series of epilogues setting up the next big event.  DC got into doing that kind of thing with “Metal” which set the stage for this miniseries, which in turn set up the three current “Justice League” titles.  While I understand the need to keep the momentum going from one big event to the next, I do expect the main story of each event to be a satisfying one before it gets down to the business of setting up the next one.  That’s where “No Justice” fails big time.

You’d think that something as big as the fracturing of the Source Wall, which establishes the physical limits of the DCU, would be enough for one event.  It only gets a few pages at the beginning before the story shifts to the real threat: Brainiac has invaded Earth and he’s here for our superheroes (and a few good villains).  That’s because the breaking of the Source Wall summoned four great titans of Entropy, Wisdom, Wonder, and Mystery back from the farthest reaches of space to see whose energy has become dominant in the time they’ve been away.

These titans have settled on one planet to decide this question, and in the miniseries’ most surprising move that planet isn’t Earth.  It’s Colu, Brainiac’s homeworld. But don’t worry, Brainiac has made arrangements so that if Colu is destroyed by the titans, Earth will be next on their menu.  So it’s up to a group that includes Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Cyborg, Flash, Martian Manhunter, Starfire, Lobo, Lex Luthor, Sinestro, Starro, Harley Quinn, and at least a dozen more characters on top of that to find some way to stop this threat and save Colu while working with Brainiac.  At least, that’s the plan until Amanda Waller decides that she’s tired of always being one step behind these superhumans and their crises and deploys her own plan to get ahead.

“No Justice” is a four-issue miniseries.  If your first thought after hearing that is, “How are they supposed to handle having that large of a cast with such a limited space?” then you’d be on to the biggest problem with this event.  Despite being co-written by three of DC’s highest-profile writers — Scott Snyder, James Tynion IV, and Joshua Williamson — they’re not really able to handle such a large cast effectively. By that I mean there’s no real character stakes here beyond “Saving the World(s)” and nothing resembling a character arc for any of its cast.  All of the dialogue is boiled down to its most expository form with lots of magic-y, science-y macguffin-ery jibber-jabber constituting the majority of the conversations in this volume.

Considering the writers involved, it’s not surprising that at least a few entertaining moments managed to slip out over the course of these four issues.  This new version of Starro and his anarchic sensibilities have their moments, as do Lobo and his over-the-top violent sensibilities. Most interesting was Amanda Waller’s plan at the start which is meant to jump-start the drama.  I would’ve liked to have seen more done with her plan, but it doesn’t really go anywhere by the time this is all over.

The story itself is no great shakes either as it involves the main cast being split into four groups to try and disrupt special giant trees attuned to the energy of each titan on Colu.  Without any sense of character or any invention in how this problem is tackled, which is done either by fighting or the power of belief, the whole event feels like empty calories. Lots of giant spectacle with no emotional connection to keep you involved.  Not helping matters either is how the story keeps cutting away in the middle to Amanda Waller and Green Arrow on Earth as they do narrative grunt work to set up the big finale.

At least the spectacle is nice to look at.  Mostly. The majority of “No Justice” is drawn by Francis Manapul, who does the first and fourth issues and part of the second.  He does his best to imbue the story with an epic scale and to make the expositionary parts less interminable and generally succeeds.  We get some impressive visuals once the story shifts course to Colu and Manapul jazzes up the exposition with some interesting layouts.  As for the rest of the miniseries, Marcus To pitches in on issues two and three, while Riley Rossmo handles the parts of issue three that To doesn’t.  To manages some good consistency with Manapul’s style while Rossmo… Look, he’s got his own distinct style that works well on a street-level book like “Batman” or a creator-owned series where he’s free to be as weird as he wants.  In “No Justice,” Rossmo tries to contort his style into something that’s more conventionally mainstream and the results are honestly pretty ugly.

The last few pages of this miniseries work to set up not only the three current “Justice League” titles, but a new Black Lightning-led “Outsiders” team, Green Arrow being given what sounds like a kill switch for the League, and Luthor ominously portending bad things for the future.  Does any of this interest me? After the main story that preceded these pages of setup failed to captivate me I can safely say that I’m still only interested in the main “Justice League” series. Which I was before I read “No Justice” since Scott Snyder is writing it while the likes of Manapul, Jim Cheung, Jorge Jimenez, and Doug Mahnke will be providing the art.  If this miniseries succeeded in anything, it was in convincing me that the other “Justice League” titles and the overall direction of the DC Universe aren’t worth paying that much attention to.