Writer

Jeff Lemire

Layout

Mikel Janin

Finishes

Victor Drujiniu

Colourist

Ulises Arreola

Letterer

Rob Leigh

Assistant Editor

Katie Kubert

Editor

Brian Cunningham

Cover Artist

Ryan Sook

Deadman (in Blackbriar Thorn’s body)

Fe fi fo fum! I smell the blood of an Englishman! Or at least I will when I see Constantine again.

Previously: Col. Steve Trevor of A.R.G.U.S. recruited John Constantine and his “Justice League Dark” to free Doctor Mist from the clutches of the sorcerer Felix Faust. However, Faust and Mist were actually working for an unidentified mastermind who is seeking the Books of Magic. Faust’s capture and Mist’s betrayal allowed them to steal the map to the book’s location from A.R.G.U.S.’ Black Room. The mastermind then killed Doctor Occult and took control of the House of Secrets as Constantine’s group split-up to follow several potential leads.

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Billy Batson

Listen, Chester, that stuff might work like candy on six-year-olds, but you come any closer and I’ll knock out the last of your teeth.

Wizard

HMPP! Not only has the seeking spell brought me a child, but a rotten one at that!

This synopsis/analysis covers the first six chapters of the “Shazam” back-up feature — the five 10-12 page chapters from earlier issues of Justice League and the feature-length chapter in this issue.

Chapter 1 (12-pages)

From Justice League (vol. 2) #7 (May 2012):

Seven months ago: Doctor Sivana reviews footage of 37-people all recounting near identical cases of “mystical abduction”. Sivana has reached the limitations of science while trying to save his family and he believes that their only hope lies in magic. He also believes that these abductions are tied into the legend of Black Adam, a slave who was turned into a magical champion, but he vanished after saving his home country of Kahndaq from the Seven Sins.

Christmas in Philadelphia. Billy Batson is in a meeting with Victor and Rosa Vasquez, his potential foster parents, and his social worker Mrs Glover. They are a nice couple who already have a large family of foster children and have agreed to give Billy a new home. What they don’t know is that Billy has made a deal with Mrs Glover to play nice for this placement so that he and she will finally be out of each other’s way. She describes Billy as “the most unpleasant boy I’ve ever had the unpleasure of knowing”. It is a description that Billy believes and even embraces.

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Cast

Robin

Cameron Bowen

Iris West-Allen

Nicole Dubuc

Barry Allen/Flash

George Eads

Red Arrow

Crispin Freeman

Beast Boy

Logan Grove

Cheshire

Kelly Hu

Lian Nguyen-Harper

Kelly Hu

Computer

Stephanie Lemelin

Bart Allen/Impulse

Jason Marsden

Nightwing

Jesse McCartney

Jay Garrick/Flash

Geoff Pierson

Wally West/Kid Flash

Jason Spisak

Nathaniel Tryon/Neutron

James Arnold Taylor

Crew

Writer

Geoff Johns and Peter David

Artist

Gary Frank (Shazam chapters) and Ethan Van Sciver (Pandora/Question segment)

Colourist

Brad Anderson (Shazam chapters) and Hi-Fi (Pandora/Question segment)

Letterer

Nick J. Napolitano

Editor

Brian Cunningham

Director

Mel Zwyer

Music

Kristopher Carter, Michael McCuistion, and Lolita Ritmanis

Theme Music

Kristopher Carter, Michael McCuistion, and Lolita Ritmanis

Voice Direction

Jamie Thomason

Animation Timing Director

James Tim Walker

Storyboard

Kevin Altieri, Charles Drost III, Steve Gordon, Lauren Montgomery, and Olga Ulanova

Lead Character Design

Phil Bourassa

Character Design

Dusty Abell and Jerome K. Moore

Prop Design

Andy Chiang and Eugene Mattos

Animation Services

MOI Animation Inc

Animation Director

Yangho Ji

Producer

Brandon Vietti and Greg Weisman

Executive Producer

Sam Register

Cover Artist

Gary Frank

Cover Colourist

Brad Anderson

Variant Cover Penciller

Ivan Reis

Variant Cover Inker

Joe Prado

Variant Cover Colourist

Rod Reis

Robin

What’s a meta-gene?

Beast Boy

I never met a gene I didn’t like.

Nightwing

Now that was crash!

Impulse

For you maybe, but I’m totally feeling the mode.

In a future time, in a grey place the skies are filled with grey clouds and ash drifts down through the atmosphere. An older man in a prison suit and inhibitor collar watches as a green-eyed youth finishes work on a machine that “only seats one”.

Feb 28th – At Mount Justice, Nightwing finally finishes the translation of the Krolotean intel that Miss Martian and the Martian Manhunter acquired from Malina Island (“Alienated”). He tells Beast Boy and Robin that the Kroloteans were abducting humans as part of their search for a genetic factor they call a “meta-gene”. His explanation is cut short when the computer warns that it has detected an “unknown energy impulse”. A bright sphere of light appears and then fades to reveals a pod. Nightwing immediately tells the others to prepares for combat. The pod opens and the occupant, a boy dressed in white and red, jumps out showing “Ta Da!” It is the same boy and machine as from the grey place.

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Cast

Shelly Longshadow

Irene Bedard

Maurice Bodaway

Robert Beltran

Devastation

Diane Delano

Holling Longshadow

Michael Horse

Blue Beetle

Eric Lopez

Scarab

Eric Lopez

Icicle Jr.

Yuri Lowenthal

Nightwing

Jesse McCartney

Miss Martian

Danica McKellar

Bumblebee

Masasa Moyo

Tye Longshadow

Gregg Rainwater

Queen Bee

Marina Sirtis

Batgirl

Alyson Stoner

Psimon

Alan Tudyk

Wonder Girl

Mae Whitman

Crew

Writer

Brandon Vietti

Director

Doug Murphy

Music

Kristopher Carter, Michael McCuistion, and Lolita Ritmanis

Theme Music

Kristopher Carter, Michael McCuistion, and Lolita Ritmanis

Voice Direction

Jamie Thomason

Animation Timing Director

James Tim Walker

Storyboard

Jay Baker, Johnny Castuciano, Todd Demong, Doug Murphy, Jeff Snow, Hank Tucker, and Craig Wilson

Lead Character Design

Phil Bourassa

Character Design

Dusty Abell and Jerome K. Moore

Prop Design

Eugene Mattos

Animation Services

Lotto Animation Inc

Animation Director

Heechul Kang (supervising), Junsik Cho, Sinkwon Kim, and Jeha Yu

Producer

Brandon Vietti and Greg Weisman

Executive Producer

Sam Register

Wonder Girl

Wait! Why can’t I go in?

Bumblebee

Because you’re Wonder Girl honey. Not stealther girl.

Devastation

Do you really think you stand a chance blondy? I’ve gone toe-to-toe with the actual Wonder Woman!

Wonder Girl

Yeah, but you never trained with her!

Feb 18th. It is almost midnight when Tye Longshadow skateboards into the deserted El Paso Bus Depot. He telephones his best friend Jaime Reyes (alias the Blue Beetle), who is asleep at home amid the detritus of his attempted homework. Tye tells Jaime that he is done with letting Maurice (his mother’s boyfriend) push him around and that he is going to catch the last bus to Houston. Jaime asks Tye to wait until he gets there. Jaime’s Blue Beetle armour makes the journey to the Depot swift, but it is still not fast enough to prevent Tye getting jumped from behind. When Jaime arrives the clerk tells him that the Houston bus has gone. Jaime walks away unaware that Tye never made it onto the bus.

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Writer

Jeff Lemire

Penciller

Lee Garbett

Inker

Cam Smith, Jack Purcell, Scott Hanna, and Walden Wong

Colourist

Pete Pantazis

Letterer

Rob Leigh

Assistant Editor

Kate Kurbert

Editor

Brian Cunningham

Cover Artist

Ryan Sook

Nick Necro

I saw it in your face the first time I met you, John. You’re a survivor, a player, a bastard. That’s probably why I agreed to train you. I saw myself in you.

“Some time ago”, the English con-man and magician John Constantine turned his attention State-side after he had exhausted his avenues for study in Europe. The still relatively inexperienced Constantine breezed through security at JFK with a cheap trick and made his way directly to the Oblivion Bar, New York’s infamous magicians’ bar. There he hoped to find Nick Necro, a student of Zatara and Sargon, and now New York’s greatest mage. Constantine had wanted to study with him, but Necro and his girlfriend Zatanna (Zatara’s daughter and a performer at Oblivion) refused to entertain him. It was only when John saved them from an attack by a Cold Flame cultist that Nick begrudgingly allowed him to tag along.

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Cast

Wolf

Dee Bradley Baker

Jeremiah

Dee Bradley Baker

Sportsmaster

Nick Chinlund

Whisper A'Daire

Grey Delisle

Red Arrow

Crispin Freeman

Jim Harper

Crispin Freeman

Partner

Kevin Grevioux

Cheshire

Kelly Hu

Artemis Crock

Stephanie Lemelin

Blue Beetle

Eric Lopez

Scarab

Eric Lopez

La'gaan

Yuri Lowenthal

Black Canary

Vanessa Marshall

Nightwing

Jesse McCartney

Superboy

Nolan North

Bruno Mannheim

Kevin Michael Richardson

Mal Duncan

Kevin Michael Richardson

Wally West

Jason Spisak

Adam Strange

Michael Trucco

Green Arrow

Alan Tudyk

Crew

Writer

Greg Weisman

Director

Tim Divar

Music

Kristopher Carter, Michael McCuistion, and Lolita Ritmanis

Theme Music

Kristopher Carter, Michael McCuistion, and Lolita Ritmanis

Voice Direction

Jamie Thomason

Animation Timing Director

James Tim Walker

Storyboard

Tim Eldred, Matt Peters, and Owen Sullivan

Lead Character Design

Phil Bourassa

Character Design

Dusty Abell and Jerome K. Moore

Prop Design

Eugene Mattos

Animation Services

MOI Animation Inc

Animation Director

Seung Man Heo

Producer

Brandon Vietti and Greg Weisman

Executive Producer

Sam Register

Appellaxian Golem

Where is the stillness of wood, of stone, of crystal, of metal? All this noise, all this life in pain.

Previously in Season 1: Unknown to anybody at the time, the Light had secretly kidnapped Speedy (alias Roy Harper, Green Arrow’s original sidekick) and replaced him with a Cadmus clone. The Light’s programming refused to let the clone, now calling himself Red Arrow, settle for anything less than membership of the full Justice League. He angrily rejected membership of the League’s covert operations squad and refused to trust Green Arrow’s new sidekick Artemis. Red Arrow’s programming eventually forced him to betray the League to Vandal Savage, but his contemporaries in the covert squad managed to foil those plans. Red Arrow then swore to dedicate himself to rescuing the original Roy Harper.

Feb 13th – In Washington DC, an arrow trips a thief fleeing from an electrical store sending his stolen cash sliding across the side-walk. The arrow then releases a gas which knocks out the hapless criminal. The grateful store-owner runs outside and congratulates the archer who fired the arrow. It is Red Arrow, but he appears unshaven and his hair is unkempt. The archer returns the money, but he pockets of bundle of notes without the store-owner noticing. Green Arrow who is watching through binoculars from a nearby rooftop. He radios his allies that “I’ve found him. It’s worse than we thought.”

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Writer

Geoff Johns and Dan Didio

Artist

Jason Fabok

Colourist

Jeromy Cox

Letterer

Travis Lanham

Associate Editor

Brian Smith

Editor

Mike Marts

Cover Artist

Jason Fabok

Guy Gardner

I might be green but I’m not that green.

Booster Gold

What’s that supposed to mean?

Guy Gardner

It means I know you’re lying.

Booster Gold

And how do you know that?

Guy Gardner

Because you’re talking.

Previously: Justice League International (JLI) was created by the United Nations as a superhero team who, unlike the secretive and independent Justice League, were answerable to politicians and did not have secret identities. However, the UN severed their ties with the JLI after they were targeted by a North American anarchist group and several members were hospitalised. Booster Gold and his team swore to soldier on, but their numbers are reduced and their future remains uncertain.

Aki Mukassa, a Central African warlord, is holding UN weapons inspectors hostage in his compound while he demands political recognition. Booster Gold is monitoring the situation from the JLI’s new headquarters and tells Guy Gardner’s squad that the real Justice League will be there to back them up soon. Gardner doesn’t believe him and the situation on the ground in Africa forces him to immediately intercede. OMAC, Godvia, August General, and Gardner deal with Mukassa’s soldiers while Batwing grabs the warlord. However, Mukassa blows himself up rather than accept capture. Batwing remains behind in Africa to investigate Mukassa’s ties to the League of Assassins while Booster orders the rest of the team to return to Washington.

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Cast

G. Gordon Godfrey

Tim Curry

Vandal Savage

Miguel Ferrer

Bibbo Bibbowski

Miguel Ferrer

Batman

Bruce Greenwood

Eduardo Dorado Sr.

Bruce Greenwood

Partner

Kevin Grevioux

Beast Boy

Logan Grove

Aquaman

Phil LaMarr

Catherine Cobert

Stephanie Lemelin

Blue Beetle

Eric Lopez

Lagoon Boy

Yuri Lowenthal

Nightwing

Jesse McCartney

Miss Martian

Danica McKellar

Bumblebee

Masasa Moyo

Superboy

Nolan North

Superman

Nolan North

Aqualad

Khary Payton

Black Manta

Khary Payton

Wonder Woman

Maggie Q

Green Lantern

Kevin Michael Richardson

Martian Manhunter

Kevin Michael Richardson

Adam Strange

Michael Trucco

Captain Atom

Michael T. Weiss

Wonder Girl

Mae Whitman

Crew

Writer

Kevin Hopps

Director

Mel Zwyer

Music

Kristopher Carter, Michael McCuistion, and Lolita Ritmanis

Theme Music

Kristopher Carter, Michael McCuistion, and Lolita Ritmanis

Voice Direction

Jamie Thomason

Animation Timing Director

James Tim Walker

Storyboard

Kevin Altieri, Charles Drost III, and Steven Gordon

Lead Character Design

Phil Bourassa

Character Design

Dusty Abell and Jerome K. Moore

Prop Design

Eugene Mattos

Animation Services

Lotto Animation Inc.

Animation Director

Heechul Kang (supervising), Junsik Cho, Sangjoon Lee, and Myeonghwan Park

Producer

Brandon Vietti and Greg Weisman

Executive Producer

Sam Register

Wonder Woman

A little less fan girl and a little more Wonder Girl!

Aqualad

All will suffer if Black Manta demands it. Blood is thicker than sea water!

Previously: It has been revealed that a group of gremlin like aliens called Kroloteans have covertly infiltrated Earth using stolen zeta-beam technology from the planet Rann. A joint operation between the Team and the Justice League destroyed the Krolotean’s zeta-beam platforms on Earth (“Happy New Year”) while the Team’s Zeta Squad (Superboy, Miss Martian, and Beast Boy) travelled to Rann with Adam Strange and destroyed the Kroloteans capabilities there. However, Zeta Squad discovered that Earthlings are shunned in Rann’s corner of space following an incident on the planet Rimbor involving six mind-controlled Justice Leaguers (“Earthlings”).

Jan 5th – Metropolis, diner owner Bibbo is watching G. Gordon Godfrey on TV as the pundit rants about the time it has taken for the Justice League to distribute scanners capable of finding Kroloteans masquerading as abducted humans. Bibbo only turns away from the TV when a boy and a girl walk into the diner. He gasp when he sees the boy and dives into the kitchen. They run after him, revealing that they are actually Bumblebee and the Blue Beetle. Bibbo from the diner — who actually a Krolotean imposter — runs straight into a punch from the real Bibbo (who was freed in “Happy New Year”). The imp bails from his disguise and into a rocket sled hidden in a sewer tunnel. The back draft singes the heroes and masks the alien’s escape. It finds safe refuge on-board Black Manta’s Manta Flyer which is parked in Metropolis harbour.

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Writer

Geoff Johns

Penciller

Jim Lee

Artist

Ivan Reis (pgs 29-30), Joe Prado (pgs 29-30), and David Finch (pgs 31-33)

Inker

Scott Williams, Sandra Hope, Jonathan Glapion, Mark Irwin, Matt Banning, Rob Hunter, Joe Weems, Alex Garner, and Trevor Scott

Colourist

Alex Sinclair, Gabe Eltaeb, Tony Avina, Sonia Oback, and Pete Pantazis

Letterer

Pat Brosseau

Assistant Editor

Katie Kubert

Editor

Brian Cunningham

Cover Penciller

Jim Lee

Cover Inker

Scott Williams

Cover Colourist

Alex Sinclair

Variant Cover Penciller

Jim Lee

Variant Cover Inker

Scott Williams

Variant Cover Colourist

Alex Sinclair

Superman

I still have to keep secrets from everybody. So how close I am to anyone is debatable.

Wonder Woman

We’re not like Zeus, but we’re not like them, either.

Superman

We’re not like anyone.

Main story “Rescue From Within” (29-pages)

Previously: David Graves wrote the definitive account of the Justice League’s origin, but he radically changed his opinion of them after his family died of a disease he believed was left over from the League’s battle with Darkseid. Graves formed an alliance with the Asuras of Mount Sumeru to bring vengeance against the League and to prove that they were not the gods he had originally heralded them as. He stripped bare the tensions within the League after he kidnapped Steve Trevor, their government liaison and Wonder Woman’s ex-lover. Batman’s deductions eventually brought the League to Mount Sumeru where Graves originally gained his powers. Wonder Woman was met by Trevor’s ghost who told her that she was too late to save him.

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