Rise And Fall

Justice League of America (vol. 2) #43

Issue Credits

Writer
James Robinson
Penciller
Mark Bagley
Inker
Rob Hunter and Norm Rapmund
Colourist
Pete Pantazis
Letterer
Rob Leigh
Assistant Editor
Rex Ogle
Associate Editor
Adam Schlagman
Editor
Eddie Berganza
Cover Penciller
Mark Bagley
Cover Inker
Rob Hunter
Cover Colourist
Pete Pantazis
Variant Cover Artist
Mike Mayhew
Variant Cover Colourist
Andy Troy

Synopsis "Rise And Fall All Along the Watchtower (Team History Part Three)"

Previously in JLA #41 and JLA #42 – a new Justice League has been pulled together by Donna Troy after the events of Cry For Justice and Blackest Night. Wounds are still raw and the new members have yet to decide on their commitment. Meanwhile, a new threat has emerged. A new group of super villains (Dr Impossible, Hunter, the Chair, Tender Mercy, and Neon Black) have stolen a series of unidentified devices. The devices, each found during the adventures of one or more noted superheroes, appear to be parts of a larger machine, but its true purpose remains unknown.

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Unused Mayhew spread from Rise and Fall Special

Can you believe that this amazing double-page spread by Mike Mayhew of Green Arrow addressing a crowd of heroes wasn’t used for Justice League: The Rise and Fall Special #1! I particularly like how he renders Gongorilla as a real gorilla and not just a furry-human. You can see the full thing on Mike Mayhew’s Comic Art Fans page along with several other pages and that great splash of Batman swooping on Razer.

Justice League: The Rise and Fall Special #1

I will admit that I was less that complementary about some aspects of Cry For Justice (see my review of the final issue for an example), but the series really seems to have grabbed people’s attention.  No matter what people think about the quality of the series, they all seem to agree that the denouement had a certain emotional satisfaction to it. It was a big shock ending to a big storyline. The repercussions of that ending are only now being played out. It all begins with a month-long four-part crossover/banner that runs across this  JLA: Rise and Fall Special, the launch of the “The Fall of Green Arrow” and “The Rise of Arsenal” storylines and then the next full issue of JLA.

Issue Credits

  • Writer: J.T. Krul
  • Pencils: Diogenes Neves, Mike Mayhew, Fabrizio Fiorentino
  • Inker: Mike Mayhew, Vicente Cifuentes and Ruy Jose
  • Colours: Nei Ruffino and Andy Troy
  • Letters: John J. Hill
  • Cover: Art Germ, variant cover: Mike Mayhew with Andy Troy
  • Editors: Adam Schlagman and Eddie Berganza

Synopsis

The issue opens with a recap of the events of Cry For Justice as told from the point-of-view of Green Arrow’(Oliver Queen, see the preview pages from the Source above). Ollie is focused on the hunt for one of Prometheus’s foot soldiers – a villain called the Electrocuitoneer – the one who actually placed the device the almost destroyed Star City. He intends to deal with the Electrocuitoneer in the same manner as he dealt with Prometheus, but he tries his best to hide that from Black Canary. In Central City, the Flash (Wally West) and Batman (Dick Grayson) round up the Razer, another of Prometheus’s foot soldiers, and compare their own fortunes to Roy Harper’s disability.

Green Lantern (Hal Jordan) and the other Flash (Barry Allen) contact the Shade to see if he knows anything more about Prometheus’s whereabouts. The Shade willingly leads them to Prometheus’ Crooked House where they discover Prometheus’s body with a green arrow stuck in it. Meanwhile Green Arrow and Black Canary have cornered the Electrocutioneer, but Canary is horrified when she has to stop Arrow murdering him. Everything comes out as Hal and Barry arrive to confront Ollie with Prometheus’s body. Green Arrow isn’t the least bit remorseful about killing Prometheus and he uses Prometheus’s Cosmic Key to teleport away before they can imprison him.

Commentary/Opinion

Green Arrow started out as little more than a clone of Batman (Arrowcave, Arrowcar, etc), but he has been reinvented twice. His fans tend to prefer one or other of the those two reinventions. The first 1970s reinvention came to a head in Denny O’Neil and Neal Adams “Hard-Travelling Heroes” story-arc in Green Lantern/Green Arrow. This is the Ollie with a social voice and a quasi-liberal attitude. The second reinvention was in the late-1980s by Mike Grell who turned Ollie into a Seattle based night-time hunter. He has killed in both incarnations, but it was an exceptional event in the first and more of a natural consequence of the second. The current Green Arrow revival started with Kevin Smith’s Green Arrow series which firmly embraced the full range of the characters history.

I’ve quite liked J.T. Krul’s writing on The Titans when he was dealing with run-up to and spin-off from Cry For Justice. This issue carries the Harper/Prometheus story forward from there and continues this trend of swinging Ollie back towards the Mike Grell Seattle hunter days. The Green Arrow: Year One series by Andy Diggle and Jock had been the most recognisable landmark in this progression, but its now been superseded by Cry For Justice. We’ll probably end up with a new solo Green Arrow title at the end of all this, but there is quite a way before the character is ready for that.

Krul does a good job trying to reconcile the various facets of Arrow’s personality. Without a focus or when left alone he’s a fairly liberal, if grouchy, superhero who collects the normal paraphernalia of the business without much regard as to why he wants or needs it (sidekick, secret identity, extended team, etc). However, give him a cause, a crusade, and the blinkers go on. He hunkers down, even his philosophy seems to harden, and becomes a nearly feral stalker. What does seems strange for me is how distant Green Arrow and Black Canary have become. It’s almost as if its been forgotten (by them more than anybody else) that they’re now meant to be a husband and wife and not just another crime fighting duo. I guess Canary fell in love with the superhero Arrow and not the stalker.

If anything this issue created more questions that it answered. Green Arrow has no guilt over Prometheus’ murder – and on this I’m with Barry, it was murder. He’s made the full switch into stalker mode and that means this arc can only get darker. Just a very minor point, and it may be nothing, but Prometheus’ Cosmic Key is a soul stealer. It’s meant to kill any user other than Prometheus. Logical deduction would be that if Green Arrow is using it then he must be Prometheus, just as Prometheus was disguised as Freddy Freeman during most of Cry For Justice. The detail about the missing Helmet, and we must remember the equally missing Ira Quimby, also hints at more story to come.

The art in this issue isn’t as jarring as it was in the final few issues of Cry, but I still wish that DC would use a single art team on a single book. Most of the time it isn’t so bad, the oddest part if the way the decor of Prometheus’ house changes between the first and later part of the book. I’m also not sure I like the first section so much, but I love the full page splash of Batman K.O.ing Razer.  I thought this was going to happen, but the differences between Barry and Wally’s costumes just haven’t sunk in for me yet. I keep seeing Barry and think he’s Wally.

While I generally liked this portrayal of Green Arrow I was more than a little bit more perplexed by the Shade’s antics. He helped Green Arrow kill Prometheus and then helped Green Lantern discover the body. He’s either just being deliberately causing trouble or he’s got his own agenda going on here. He’s one of the those characters that can easily sound odd, or slightly wrong, when not written by their definitive writer. Krul does an okay job, but the “you mortals” line sounded a bit stiff.

I think the biggest success of Justice League: Rise and Fall Special is that it has made me, as a reader, reconnect with Green Arrow. By getting to hear his internal monologue again, more of his reasoning, it instantly added a depth that had been missing in Cry For Justice.

Rise And Fall covers and writer podcast

Amid the fuss over the return of Justice League International there were announcements yesterday about the Rise and Fall event that spins out of Cry For Justice. We’d see some of the variant covers from March’s four linked books, but DC’s Source has now put out the full linked scene from artist Mike Mayhew.

Wordballoon’s John Siuntres talks to JT Krul, the Rise and Fall writer, is a 90 minute podcast. Krul describes how he got into comics and about working with his old-friend Geoff Johns on the Blackest Night: Titans mini-series. He also comments on how the drama of BN allows the writer to push character development forward. He talks extensively about the Rise and All event.

J.T. Krul interview @ Newsarama

Newsarama’s Vaneta Rogers has interviewed Green Arrow writer J.T. Krul about his upcoming Rise/Fall storyline, the one that spins our of Cry For Justice and Justice League. He comments upon his collaboration with James Robinson and the changes that Roy Harper and Oliver Queen will be facing.

Nrama: How does Roy differ from Green Arrow? Will those differences play a role in the story you’re telling?

Krul: I’ve touched on this a bit already, but in terms for the Rise of Arsenal and the Fall of Green Arrow, it really is about how they react and respond to the events in Cry for Justice. And absolutely, you’re going to see how those differences cause friction between the two.

[...]

James [Robinson] is up north now, but we’ve still been able to talk a lot about what’s going on with Green Arrow and the rest of the JLA. I was even lucky enough to attend a DC summit to discuss all the plans being put into motion for our books. It was a tremendous opportunity and a great way for the stories to get even better by allowing us time to come together.

[...]

Nrama: How big of a role will other JLA characters play? Can you share any of the specific characters who will be an important to the story?

Krul: Early on, the JLA will play an important role in both stories, and those closest to Ollie and Roy will have big moments throughout the story. For Ollie that means his best friend – Hal Jordan. And for Roy, that means his old friend Dick Grayson, another former sidekick who is adjusting to a new role – Batman.

Lots of JLA news quotes harking forward to 2010

In these last few days before Christmas there have been a few quotes about the Justice League and what 2010 has in store for them. Dan Didio addresses a number of JLA topics while speaking with Newsarama,  the JLA movie producer has commented on WB’s evolving strategy, and Mattel has announced that their JLU line will continue.

Justice League Mortal

The most widely discussed/re-tweeted story has been from Dan Lin, the producer of the in-stasis Justice League Mortal. Lin is also the producer of the current Sherlock Holmes film and Collider.com has had a running seven-part interview within him. During that interview Steve Weintraub for Collider asked Lim about JL Mortal.

Collider: You’re listed [as producer] also for Justice League Mortal.

Dan Lin: It’s the dream project.

Collider: Right, that’s why I’m sort of saving it. It’s like the punch at the end.

Dan Lin: Yeah. I mean it’s… I’ll say it’s the reason I started my company. You know, I thought that was the ultimate project. I was a fan-boy for me to work with all those characters together on a team and kind of the themes of that movie. That’s my dream. It’s on-hold right now as DC sorts out its strategy but as you’ve talked to Alan Horn and Jeff Robinov it seems like they’re building to Justice League instead of going with the team movie first and doing individual movies after that.

Collider: [...] are there certain superhero movies that you are interested in bringing to the screen….because I know they did a whole shakeup at Warner Brothers with people letting go of projects and other people coming onboard.

Dan Lin: Right. The only one right now as you probably know, they’re unveiling their DC strategy in January so you’ll hear more about that and they’ll speak about that in the new year. The only other one besides Justice League that I’m working on is the Suicide Squad.

This specific strategy shake-up had been mentioned by Charles Rovin, a director who had been linked with a potential Flash film. However, this is the first time that we’ve got a date for the announcement of the results.

The 1980s Justice League

Over at Newsarama Dan Didio, DC executive editor, is holding an end of year twenty-questions session. In the third installment, it was suggested that the 1980s JLA wasn’t doing to well out of the current DC Universe.

There is a lot of dicussion about if the 1980s Justice League had a target on their backs. I’m happy to tell you Bifford [the questioner] that the 80s JLA group is going to be back, and be back with a vengeance in 2010.

No clue about what that means, but the reference to a “target on their backs” makes it implicit that he’s talking about the Booster Gold and Blue Beetle Justice League. Over at Blog @ Newsarama Russ runs a bit of a conspiracy theory about this quote and DCU recent events.

Roy Harper's Injury in Cry for Justice.

In the same round of questions Didio was asked “what makes the maiming of red arrow significant when has friends who are capable of replacing his arm?” To which the answer was,

I really want to be very clear about this, this story is not just about replacing it with a cybernetic arm, if that is how the story turns out. And this is one of those cases where I want to remind people to read the story as it develops. There is so much emotion depth that is going on here. Roy is an archer first and foremost. To [..] lose his arm, his ability to do what he does best, is what really leaves the emotional scar on him, not the idea that he can replace it simply, but more importantly that he’s lost a part of himself, the part of him he considered the most valuable, that helped define him as a person. That’s what we’re going see develop.

Roy’s arc in the Justice League has been about stepping into the role of Red Arrow, in succeeding to his father’s place in the Justice League. He was already knock-backed by his break up with Kendra so this really does look like the lowest ebb for Roy – maybe even lower than his old drug habit.

The Price of the Justice League comic book

In the final round of questions Dan Didio was asked directly how DC could justify raising the price of JLA when the sales had declined.

[Pauses] Price increase is only the answer when we improve quality and quantity. We’ve been saying this a lot over the last couple of months, especially with so many people being price sensitive at the moment, but I wanted to reiterate it with this question. A 3.99 price point is something that is on books that have greater than the standard number of pages and will continue to be so. We will continue to hold the 2.99 price point as much as possible, but if we feel that the story warrants extra pages then unfortunately the price will increase with that, but hopefully you will get the feeling of value in that book.

With Justice League: so much that is going on with Justice League, with the fall of Green Arrow and the rise of Arsenal Justice League, will be playing prominently into that storyline. A lot of focus is on the team and how its being built there is a lot of focus on JLA throughout 2010.

Mattel JLU figures to continue in 2010

Miraculously Mattel’s of Justice League Unlimited figures are still running – over three years after the cartoon itself finished. On their Facebook Blog Mattel confirmed that the line will be continuing at Target,

JLU is going to continue in Spring 2010 at Target stores. We’ll have some new figures to reveal at Toy Fair in NY at out collector event on Feb. 14th. Stay tuned!

[...]

And as stated above, JLU will still be at Target stores in 2010. We have some great singles, 3 packs and 6 packs in store including many more fan demanded character, a return to Apokolips and a few out of the blue surprises we think JLU fans are going to love!

Superhero Times has the full quote.

JLA Solicitations for March 2010

March 2010 appears to be Green Arrow and the JLA month with four-linked issues that spin-out of Cry For Justice and the events there-in. We’ve already covered their announcement, but DC has now released the solicitation details for those issues. It kicks off on March 10th with the Rise and Fall Special by James Robinson and J.T. Krul. Krul then follows that with Green Arrow #31 the following week (March 17th) and the start of the Justice League: The Rise of Arsenal the week after that (March 24th). Then at the end of the month James Robinson wraps up his first JLA arc and deals the implications of The Rise and Fall from the League’s side. Each of the four issues has a 1-in-25 variant cover created by Justice League: The Rise and Fall Special #1 artist Mike Mayhew.

Spoilers below…

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Krul to bridge Cry For Justice and JLA

J.T. Krul, current writer ot the Titans and Titans/Teen Titans Blackest Night chapters, has been recruited by DC Comics to write a special Justice League: The Rise and Fall issue (drawn by Matt Mayhew) that bridges the gap between Cry For Justice and the post-Blackest Night issues of Justice League of America. As announced by the DC Source blog,

What happens when a hero has a fateful decision to make? And how can another hero rebuild his world after a life-altering tragedy?

Both ideas are explored in two special books hitting in March, both written by J.T. Krul: JUSTICE LEAGUE: THE RISE AND FALL #1, which bridges the gap between JUSTICE LEAGUE: CRY FOR JUSTICE, JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA  and the upcoming JUSTICE LEAGUE: THE RISE OF ARSENAL four-issue mini-series. Concurrently, readers of the ongoing GREEN ARROW series will deal with the fallout in a storyline titled “The Fall of Green Arrow,” starting with issue #31.

Readers of Cry For Justice will know what event has happened to Green Arrow and Red Arrow, but I won’t spoil it here.

Krul talked to IGN about his new assignment and how it fits into the bigger picture:

IGN Comics: The one-shot is called Justice League: The Rise and Fall. There’s a lot going on with the Justice League property between Cry for Justice and James Robinson’s run on the regular JLA ongoing. Where and how exactly will your one-shot fit in regards to Robinson’s two JLA projects? Is there interplay between the three at all?

Krul: It will play directly into everything because James is involved in all of this as well. As we’re working on it, we may have other writers do certain portions of it so it’s more of a collective issue, if you will. But absolutely it will play into everything, because as you’ve seen in Cry for Justice, the whole story has been about this ethical rift between members of the Justice League on the tactics they take. “Are we a proactive team or a reactive team?” We’re taking those elements, and then the rest of the series amps it up and does kind of create this ripple effect that will be felt throughout the one-shot and into the Green Arrow and Arsenal stories.

As well as the single Rise and Fall issue, Krul will also be writing a mini-series called Justice League: The Rise of Arsenal and a Green Arrow arc called the Fall of Green Arrow that expand on the particular topics surround Roy Harper and Oliver Queen.