DC Round-Up: The JLU gets its hands dirty in JUSTICE LEAGUE RED #1

THIS WEEK: The Justice League Unlimited adds a covert ops team in Justice League Red #1.

Note: the review below may contain spoilers. If you want a quick, spoiler-free buy/pass recommendation on the comics in question, check out the bottom of the article for our final verdict.

Justice League Red #1

Writer: Saladin Ahmed
Artist: Clayton Henry
Colorist: Arif Prianto
Letterers: Lucas Gattoni & Ryan Christy
Cover Artists: Clayton Henry & Matt Herms

One of the strongest parts about the current DC All In initiative has been how the publisher has established Justice League Unlimited as a tentpole series while using ancillary titles to build out the overall status quo. Books like Challengers of the Unknown, Justice League: The Atom Project, and The Question: All Along the Watchtower have all utilized the JLU setting and setup while telling stories that both stand alone and build on the goings-on in the rest of the DCU. This week DC debuts another similar title, Justice League Red, which brings a group of disparate heroes together to carry out ‘black ops’ missions organized by the League’s resident Watchtower AI, Red Tornado.

Justice League Red marks writer Saladin Ahmed’s first series work for DC, and Ahmed gets the series off to a strong start. The roster for the new team features six characters, but Ahmed focuses this first issue on just three of them: Red Tornado (naturally), Power Girl, and Green Lantern Simon Baz. Paige and Simon get the most opportunity to interact, and they’re an unexpected, entertaining pairing. Both members of larger families of heroes but far from their marquee stars, they each bring something of an outsider’s perspective to things, questioning what Reddy has pulled them together for and why it’s been done in secret. They also complement each other well on their first mission, and their reaction to the the end-of-issue reveal felt completely natural.

The issue’s visuals come from artists Clayton Henry and Arif Prianto, a team that has worked in just about every corner of the DCU, and they bring their typical excellent work to this issue. Henry’s linework is sharp as ever, with expressive characters and clean storytelling throughout. There’s a fair amount of exposition in this issue and Henry renders the dialogue-heavy sequences expertly, with interesting imagery illuminating the stakes of what the heroes are facing. The design of the threat they encounter during the issue’s main action sequence is equal parts terrifying and ridiculous, and it strikes a unique tone for the issue’s back half. Prianto’s colors complement Henry’s linework wonderfully, with bright, evocative colors that give the whole issue an instantly iconic feel. The coloring on a holographic Red Tornado is also quite striking, shades of red giving the image a very different texture than that of the physical heroes. It’s a great effect pulled off quite nicely. The work of letterers Lucas Gattoni and Ryan Christy enhances the visuals well, with specialized speech and narrative balloons for Reddy and a really fun font choice for the issue’s main threat.

Justice League Red #1 is just about everything you could want from a first issue: solid characterization, a self-contained story, and compelling mysteries to propel the narrative forward. It’s an issue that already feels both right at home amongst the rest of the mainline DCU books and also pleasantly distinct from the other JLU-ancillary titles. Ahmed, Henry, Prianto, and co. are executing at a very high level here, and the themes their exploring – and the characters they’re using to do so – are sure to have readers hooked from the jump. This is, simply put, an extremely solid, well-done comic.

Final Verdict: BUY.

Round-Up

• Detective Comics #1100 is an extra-sized issue featuring a quartet of stories, beginning with an incredible 20-page silent story from the current Detective team of Tom Taylor and Mikel Janín in which Batman helps reunite a deaf child with his dog. Masterful visual storytelling from Janín. The rest of the stories, from the teams of Mariko Tamaki and Amancay Nahuelpan, Greg Rucka and Alvaro Martinez Bueno, and Dan Watters and Bill Sienkiewicz, are equally strong, highlighting different aspects of the Dark Knight (and, in Tamaki and Nahuelpan’s case, Bruce Wayne). A great, entertaining package.

• Batman & Robin: Year One #10 is the best issue yet of Mark Waid and Chris Samnee’s exploration of the dynamic duo’s early days. The twist at the end of last month’s issue has flipped the series completely on its head, and this issue picks up on that perfectly, throwing unexpected curveballs at Batman and Robin throughout. I can’t believe there’s only two issues of this perfect, perfect series left.

• Speaking of best issues yet, Superman Unlimited #4 from Dan Slott, Lucas Meyer, and Rafael Albuquerque is a really fun one-and-done story that uses the status quo of the series in a clever way. Superman in Gotham is always a good time, and this time he’s facing one of the more out-there threats the city has to offer, and it works great. Plus, there’s lots of great Jimmy Olsen material in this issue, which makes me happy.

• And over in the Absolute universe, Absolute Flash #6 finds Jeff Lemire and Nick Robles exploring this world’s Rogues, and giving Colonel Rudy West some much-needed depth. After a strong first issue this series has felt a little slow at times, but in looking backward this week’s issue picks up the pace on the present, and I’m excited to see where it goes from here.

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