Justice League Red Puts A New Twist on a Classic Avengers Trope

One of the most underrated Justice League members of all time is forming his own team, and he's using an old Avengers tactic to do it.

Justice League Red #1 (by Saladin Ahmed, Clayton Henry, Arif Prianto, Lucas Gattoni, and Ryan Christy) finds Simon Baz, aka the Green Lantern, busy putting out roaring fires on the outskirts of Detroit, only to receive an unexpected notification unlike any he has ever seen before. Originally believing it to be a phone call, Baz soon discovers that the buzzing in his pocket is coming from none other than his own Justice League ID Card. As it turns out, this is a secret signal being sent by the League's own Red Tornado, and the Green Lantern isn't the only one to receive the same call.

Red Tornado Assembles a New Team in Justice League Red #1

• Written by SALADIN AHMED
• Art by CLAYTON HENRY
• Colors by ARIF PRIANTO
• Letters by LUCAS GATTONI & RYAN CHRISTY
• Main cover art by CLAYTON HENRY & MATT HERMS
• Variant covers by CARMINE DI GIANDOMENICO and CHRISTIAN WARD

Though the Justice League has its own high-tech ID cards, they are far from the first comic book super team to popularize the idea. Back in 1977's Marvel Team-Up #60 by Chris Claremont and John Byrne, the Avengers Identicard made its debut. Apart from serving as a normal form of identification, the Avengers Identicard also provides a means of tracking and communicating with various team members across the universe. This has made them into a valuable resource for Earth's Mightiest Heroes, not to mention a tool that other super teams could easily adopt for themselves.

The cybernetic hero known as Red Tornado was first seen back in 1968's Justice League of America #64 by Gardner Fox and Dick Dillin. Created by the villainous T.O. Morrow, Red Tornado believed itself to be the original Red Tornado, Ma Hunkel, a former ally of the Justice Society of America. Although this Red Tornado did unwittingly defeat the JSA of Earth-Two, he also teamed up with the Justice League of Earth-One to not just undo his previous actions, but to bring his creator to justice and embark upon his own career as a hero. In the years since, Red Tornado has been reimagined numerous times, yet has always maintained his genuinely heroic bent and compassionate, if often cold, demeanor.

The official solicit synopsis for Justice League Red #1 reads, "The Justice League has a new spec-ops team so covert, the founders can't know it exists. And its leader is the only hero who could keep JLR off its radar... because he is the radar. Red Tornado is the heart and mind of the Watchtower — watching, projecting into the future, and his projections point to apocalypse as a direct result of the concentrated power of the JLU. When your Justice League ID card lights up red, Reddy needs you. For the fate of humanity, and for yourself, because you don't want to find out what Red can do with what he knows about you."

Justice League Red #1 is available now from DC Comics.

Created by Malcolm Wheeler-Nicholson