In reviews of Johns's current Teen Titans arc, I've confessed to being a sucker for dark futures and time travel. He's hitting upon some of the same ideas in this new arc on JSA, except that instead of going forward, he's going back, and that makes perfect sense, given the long history that the JSA has, built upon characters whose prime was in the 1940s. Johns uses a classic time-traveling JSA foe and a classic time-traveling JSA ally to construct a very interesting superhero plot, and he builds the whole thing around Stargirl, one of his most interesting creations from early in his comic-book career. The action sequence that unfolds in this issue is brutally real, almost a bit too dark for me but so affecting and so in tune with the internal struggle Stargirl is having with Atom Smasher that I can't help but applaud it, and this little meeting between the modern-day JSA and some of their inspirations is off to a really strong start.
One of the interesting bits of canon about the JSA is why they originally disbanded, something that I believe was originally developed by Roy Thomas (one of my readers corrects me that it was actually Paul Levitz), who did a lot of the foundational work bringing these golden age characters into a modern DCU context. Rather than being destroyed by their foes or even quietly retiring, the JSA ran up against the real-life threat of the HUAC in 1951, and so effective has this notion of communist paranoia destroying heroes become that it can be seen in most of the golden age analogues as well. Johns and Kramer do a pretty good job of recreating the frustration of their loyalties being questioned and the justifiable decision to give up in the face of that, and hanging Degaton's plan on this crucial moment is exactly the kind of thing that smart time traveling villains should be all about.
By far the neatest little "bit" of the issue, though, comes in Johns's revision of the story of Rip Hunter, Time Master. The notion that Hunter's job is to prevent villains from pulling a "kill them in their crib" maneuver is a unique and interesting take on the character, and the reveal of how he protects himself from that fate is another really nifty idea. Rip Hunter here feels not unlike the dour, fatalistic Kyle Reese of The Terminator, trying to save the past from a fate that they can't even really comprehend the horror of. The actual plot, splitting up to deal with individual heroes, is more of a stock superhero element, but the tone and style is more along the lines of science-fiction, and it's a nice mix.
While the heroes in general might not have the sense of dire fate that Rip Hunter seems to, one character (and the reader) gets to experience it first hand when Courtney's family is brutally gunned down by Degaton's goons. Johns and Kramer do an excellent job of conveying Courtney's healthy relationship with her family, how good and decent they all are, and then they introduce some bad guys to just brutally massacre them. It's a shocker, and Courtney's violent retaliation, while tears stream down her face, shows just how sudden and shocking this all is, as well as tying nicely into her own worries about what being a hero means and her overly judgmental view of what Atom Smasher did when confronted with similar tragedy. It is my hope (and my guess) that this will be further explored in this arc, and might lead to Atom Smasher again finding a place with a team.
One of the dangers of the time travel story is knowing that all the bad things can be erased and the world set right, which in the wrong hands can make this sort of thing feel without consequences. However, the brutality of what Courtney witnesses establishes that she'll never be the same even if the events are undone, and the linking of the Atom Smasher-Stargirl rift to this story of time travelling warfare ensures permanent consequences even if the heroes win. As always, JSA is an example of how to do classic superhero team storytelling without being stodgy, how to use continuity without being mired in it and how to blend strong character development with strong plot. 8/10
