Judge not, lest ye be judged #7 October 21, 2019 – Posted in: Books – Tags: ,

Justice

by Nikos Michalopoulos

Justice is a twelve-issue limited series published by DC from August 2005 to June 2007. Writers are Alex Ross & Jim Krueger, with project managers the Alex Ross & Doug Braithwaite.

This elseworlds story begins when all the DC super-villains simultaneously see in a nightmare that the world's heroes are failing, which leads to the destruction of the world, and they decide to stop it at all costs. Even if it means killing all the heroes

To begin with, Justice's case is extremely interesting. Ross & Krueger pose the question “When was the last time the world's heroes did something meaningful for humanity?Why don't they do something about the biggest problems like hunger, wars, poverty, etc., even though they have the power to do it? To this call it seems, at first glance, how the super-villains respond to their desperation because of the vision they saw.

As for the design, there isn't much that can express how good it is. Realistic, detailed and epic designs characterize the entire story, just what one would expect from Alex Ross, designer and writer of the famous Kingdom Come.

Additionally, it's worth noting how difficult it is for a writer to work with and balance a large cast of characters. But to say that the Justice has many characters would be an understatement… the story contains most of the DC characters of that era! On the one hand, for this reason alone, the authors deserve congratulations. On the other hand, that's where the story's problems begin.

In particular, when the cast of characters is so large, besides the reader sometimes trying to recall what happened to character x, the flow of the story can break. For example, a battle between Wonder Woman and Cheetah lasted two chapters, yet lasted one night. But at the same time, another group of heroes discussed, completed a research, flew into space and traveled the world. That is, it is clear that the flow is lost at several points, due to the large number of events that occur, which makes time-management almost impossible.

Additionally, Ross & Krueger decided (rightly) to use several of the more obscure B and/or C tier heroes. Although this did not have any negative impact on the characterization of the most famous heroes or the time devoted to them, other problems arose: a) The book is very difficult for new readers to approach, b) Many of them did not do anything of substance, just they were there to remind us that they exist.

The biggest problem that arises, however, is the last act, in which everyone gathers together for the final battles. Just because there are so many characters on one page, the designs start to get blurry. The panels get smaller and many times you can't understand what exactly is happening, the boxes with thoughts multiply and in general a chaos prevails. Also, an extremely epic and original story ends in a clichéd showdown between good guys and bad guys, which makes me wonder if the ending was somewhat rushed. This does not mean, however, that the previous acts are degraded in any way.

Overall, the Justice is an epic story with a very interesting and original plot and fantastic design. Even though her finale is pretty weak, it doesn't negate all of her other strengths. We emphasize, however, that new readers will have difficulty following it, due to the large roster of characters. If the following heroes don't tell you anything, a little research will be necessary: Metal Men, Mary Marvel, Doom Patrol, The Phantom Stranger, Zatanna, Red Tornado, Martian Manhunter, Toyman, Captain Marvel.