Like a lot of people my age or close to it, I was a big fan of the Grease movie when it came out in 1978. A year or two later I was at home when it was playing on broadcast TV (ABC I think, but I can’t swear to it). One scene stuck out in a way it didn’t in the movie, when Rizzo (Stockard Channing), Danny (John Travolta) and Kenickie (Jeff Conaway) are standing around snarking at each other with lines including “Going home to beat your meat?” and “Sloppy seconds aren’t my style.”
The network, it turns out, had reservations about using some of that dialogue. Okay, any of that dialogue. It was a minute-and-a-half of the three characters glaring at each other, one after the other, in response to insults that in the edited version, nobody had said. Very weird. Which brings me to Justice League of America #31, “Crisis of Confidence,” by the late Dwayne McDuffie and Shane Davis and how reading it last week gave me the same feeling.
I was delighted when McDuffie took over the series from Brad Meltzer with #13. I was less happy when all his stories turned out to be tied in to ongoing or upcoming Big Events. His first story arc involving Luthor gathering a team of villains led into Salvation Run, a later story set things up for Final Crisis, another one for Blackest Night. I kept reading but it really dragged down the book; McDuffie vented in the series by writing a story where Vixen’s patron Anansi begins rewriting the League’s history against their will. #31 convinced me to throw in the towel (I didn’t get it — that’s what the DC app is for).
The book is supposed to be a tense drama where Black Canary, the current team leader, discovers the League is falling apart around her. Batman’s dead, J’Onn’s dead (both Final Crisis). Green Lantern’s founding a new Justice League (Cry for Justice, one in a long series of “Why can’t he write anything as good as Starman again?” books by James Robinson). Superman’s off on New Krypton. Roy Harper, going by Red Arrow is walking out because he and Hawkgirl broke up
Showing how bad Anansi’s meddling became, Kendra was slated to die in Final Crisis but Geoff Johns blocked that so he could kill her in Blackest Night. McDuffie got word of the change and had to rewrite Roy’s mourning scene.
The thing is, all these tragedies and dramatic decisions happened in other books, giving this issue, like I said, the feeling of that highly edited Grease scene. Sure, I skimmed over Final Crisis and I know Cry for Justice existed. Even so, reading this issue 16 years later and seeing everything change off-stage in the month between #30 and #31 is jarring. Batman’s dead, Superman’s gone, Red Arrow’s leaving, Black Lightning’s leaving … McDuffie does the best he can with the material but it’s impossible to care. Even harder due to everything we’re told is so epic and groundbreaking turning into a big nothingburger — Batman returned. J’Onn returned. I’m not sure whatever new team GL wanted to create ever happened or lasted long, but I’m completely sure it didn’t matter.
This is a problem I’ve had before when I read big-event tie-in stories. I’m currently rereading Phil Jimenez’ excellent Wonder Woman run but tge last couple of issues were part of Our Worlds at War and again, it’s hard to care about a lot of what’s happening—hell, when I read Our Worlds at War as it was happening I didn’t care. If I read Event + Tie-Ins things make more sense — I did that for War of the Gods when I was rereading the George Perez run — but in most cases I’m not going to bother (Final Crisis was tedious the first time around).
Big events keep selling books, I guess, but they sure don’t age well.
Art by Davis, Wonder Woman cover by Perez.