It would be natural and unfair to compare Justice by Jim Krueger and Alex Ross to the comic book series I reviewed a couple days ago. The Infinity Gauntlet was published in 1991, Justice in published in 2007. The scope of each project was likely different from the start. Twelve large issues for Thanos’s story may not have been possible had it been proposed.
But the two series offer roughly similar stories. The end of the world is at hand and a wide host of characters jump forward to move the story in their own direction, at least half of them I didn’t know. This set of twelve issues touches good, moving themes that are often left in draft in other series or touched so briefly as to be unnoticeable.
Justice appears to be a story of DC Comics’ Justice League of America moving from a loosely coordinated group of confederates to a band of actual friends. It begins with the world in nuclear holocaust, each hero failing to save a city or region as another destructive wave crashes over them. A few of them say, “I was too late. But I’m never too late.”
This is just a dream, however, that the world’s supervillains all experience together. They come to believe the world will end soon and their nemeses in the Justice League will be powerless to stop it. So they band together to save humanity, while taking measures to profit personally. Captain Cold and Poison Ivy turn a desert into an oasis. Scarecrow offers miracle cures to young people with crippling diseases. When the time is right, Luthor, Black Manta, and others announce to the world their generosity and intent to raise up new, floating cities to welcome the downtrodden and raise up a newly emboldened human race to seek new horizons, to soar to new heights, etc. etc.
The world is amazed at this turn of events, but willing to go along with what appears to be a good thing. The Justice League of America is nowhere to seen, so they don’t appear to have a problem with it or maybe, the cynics say, they can’t profit by it.
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