Tansy Rayner Roberts's Blog, page 19

Justice League International #15: G’nort & South (July 1988)

THE PACKAGING: Vol 3 of the JLI trade series

THE CREATIVE TEAM: Keith Giffen (Plot & Breakdowns), J.M. DeMatteis (Script), Steve Leialoha (Pencils), Al Gordon (Inks), Gene D’Angelo (Colors), Andy Helfer (Editor) featuring the New Gods created by Jack Kirby.

JUSTICE LEAGUE ROLL CALL: J’onn Jonzz, Captain Atom, Blue Beetle, Booster Gold, Mister Miracle, Rocket Red (Dmitri), Green Flame & Ice Maiden with Oberon and Max as civilian “support.” Still technically Green Lantern (Guy Gardner) but he’s barely in this one.

GUEST STARS: Manga Khan, L-Ron, Big Barda, G’nort & a blink & you’ll miss it cameo from Batman.

THE STORY: Lord Manga and his Cluster are ready to invade the Earth and force everyone to shop or die — until G’nort arrives from the depths of space and attacks. Thanks to the Cluster’s loss of cloaking ability (well done, G’nort!), the JLI see what’s going on and attack the Cluster as well.

Blue Beetle and the other JLdudes are all pretty skeptical about Green Flame and Ice Maiden’s usefulness, but the former Global Guardians aquit themselves excellently in battle, and Beetle actually apologises for misjudging them.

The JLI put up such a good fight against the Cluster that L-Ron runs the statistics and works out that the risks of sticking around have become distinctly unprofitable. Lord Manga promptly calls a retreat, and the Cluster move out… though they accidentally take a rather valuable Earth asset with them: Mister Miracle.

Big Barda, furious at the JLI losing her husband, armours up to get him back.

THE CHARACTERS: Bea and Tora finally get to show what they can do, in the face of some pretty sexist assumptions. Their teamwork is excellent, and they manage to surprise everyone. It’s nice to see them earning their stripes and finally getting to play with the others.

Blue Beetle is the biggest jerk to the women, so it’s really nice to see him apologising at the end — and that Ice Maiden doesn’t tell him that his behaviour was okay, just that she’s glad he admitted he was wrong. Ice is often characterised as a super nice pushover, so it’s always a pleasure to see her being written with a backbone & a sharp edge. Bea, meanwhile, returns the disrespect she receives from Beetle by renaming him Butthead which is quite reasonable.

I love that Scott’s response to Green Flame & Ice Maiden doing so well is to muse on how much the team needs the extra muscle of his wife, which is true and awesome… even if it’s his own “abduction” that leads to Barda finally dropping this whole retirement idea and strapping on her big girl armour again.

Captain Atom continues to be pointless in this team, serving only for J’onn to have someone to talk to. In retrospect it’s kind of hilarious that this function will eventually be taken over by an adorable robot. Get your own team, Cap.

Oh and much like Fire & Ice, G’nort does excellently in battle despite everyone’s lack of expectations of him.

THE COMEDY: Probably the funniest bit of the issue is at the end where we find out the reason Guy Gardner has been out of action is because he’s trying to convince Batman to come back… it is weird, though, that they’ve dragged the ‘kinda brain-damaged’ plot on for so long with Guy. Was the hyper macho version really so frustrating? Well, yes.

The issue isn’t really laugh out loud funny but I’m fine with that — the general comic tone is heavy on the sarcasm, less on the slapstick, which is much more to my taste than when they go full on sitcom.

THE ART: Leialoha’s excellent space battle skills make for a really dynamic issue with lots of space ships, colour, explosions and glowy fight scenes. I also quite like how he draws Barda, Green Flame & Ice Maiden – completely different to Maguire, but with a lot of focus on their cheerful, snarky personalities and not so much on their boobs.

THE KITCHEN SINK: Three women in the Justice League!!! Big Barda ready for action! Finally my comic has arrived!

PREVIOUSLY ON THE ONE TRUE JUSTICE LEAGUE:

Justice League The Story So Far

Justice League #1 (May 1987)

Justice League #2 (June 1987)

Justice League #3 (July 1987)

Justice League #4 (August 1987)

Justice League Annual #1 (1987)

Justice League #5 (September 1987)

Justice League #6 (October 1987)

Justice League International #7 (November 1987)

Justice League International #8 (December 1987)

Justice League International #9 (January 1988)

Justice League International #10 (February 1988)

Justice League International 11 (March 1988)

Justice League International 12 (April 1988)

Justice League International 13 & Suicide Squad 13 (May 1988)

Justice League International 14 (June 1988)

Sheep Might Fly: Dance, Princes, Dance Part 8

New episode of our new Castle Charming serial! Part 8 — Bluebells & Clover.

Finally some tragic backstory as the gang gathers around a fallen prince to share their stories and try to figure out what the fairy hell is going on around here.

Previous episodes of Dance, Princes, Dance:

Part 1: Armour Up

Part 2: The ‘Team’ in Steam

Part 3: Look at My Shoes

Part 4: Satin and Roses

Part 5: Front Page Shoes

Part 6 – Let Nothing You Dismay

Part 7 – Old Soldiers

For more Castle Charming hijinks, check out the previous adventures of the Royals and the Hounds in Glass Slipper Scandal – podcast edition, or Glass Slipper Scandal – the ebook.

Thanks for listening to Sheep Might Fly. You can follow me on Twitter @tansyrr and @sheepmightfly, and Tumblr: tansyrr and sheepmightfly. Like my page on Facebook at TansyRRBooks.

Sheep Might Fly is a Patreon-supported project! Thanks to all my patrons who pledge between $1 and $20 a month to make this podcast happen. If you enjoy my work consider pledging your support to earn rewards, occasional glitter and my eternal gratitude.

Justice League International #14: Shop or Die (June 1988)

THE PACKAGING: Vol 3 of the Justice League International trade series, featuring some lovely new Maguire cover art and three whole female characters. Woot!

THE CREATIVE TEAM: Keith Giffen (Plot & Breakdowns), J.M. DeMatteis (Script), Steve Leialoha (Pencils), Al Gordon (Inks), Gene D’Angelo (Colors), Andy Helfer (Editor) featuring the New Gods created by Jack Kirby.

JUSTICE LEAGUE ROLL CALL: J’onn Jonzz, Captain Atom, Blue Beetle, Booster Gold, Mister Miracle, Rocket Red (Dmitri), Green Flame & Ice Maiden with Oberon and Max as civilian “support.”

GUEST STARS: Lord Manga/Manga Khan, L-Ron, Big Barda, G’nort

THE STORY: A mysterious spaceship approaches Earth…it’s Manga Khan! One of the most iconic and at the same time ridiculous JLI villains, he’s here to force the Earth to shop or die. At his side, trusty robot sidekick L-Ron, whose importance to this comic cannot be overstated.

Green Flame and Ice Maiden have got as far as Oberon in their quest for employment, but threatening him may not be the best strategic move to impress J’onn.

Somewhere in his distant sector of space, G’nort figures out the situation with surprising efficiency and zooms off to warn/save the Earth.

As Lord Manga’s sinister announcement interrupts the TV stations across the world, everyone reacts with a mixture of bemusement and concern, which is about right for a Manga Khan situation. As the Justice League rally to meet this new challenge, they find themselves short-handed and J’onn reluctantly include Green Flame and Ice Maiden in the mission.

THE CHARACTERS: Batman has quit, Black Canary has mysteriously gone AWOL and Guy Gardner appears on the cover but not in the story. Captain Atom is basically scenery. Oh and Max is still in a hospital bed. It’s as good an excuse as any to let some new blood into the team…

And not a moment too soon, given how much of this issue is given over to suburban frat bro bullshit, with Beetle and Booster making all kinds of creepy speculation about the relative hotness vs badassness of Scott’s wife Barda. Who by the way spends most of the issue in the kitchen “putting mayonnaise in the lasagna” while the boys watch a football game. Oh, JLI.

THE COMEDY: Despite the uncomfortable humour coming from the boys (be better, Blue Beetle) and the treatment of Barda, the comic is settling into a more consisten tone where the humour mostly comes from puncturing conventions of the genre. Manga himself is a clear example of this, a character designed to be a comedy villain who talks to himself and has a possibly unhealthy relationship with his robot sidekick.

THE ART: Guest artist Leialoha’s style is very different to Maguire’s but he is good at drawing action. His character designs blander in expression than we’re used to (especially the interchangable white dudes with different hair colours: Ted, Scott and Booster) but his G’nort is excellent and his epic space panels are pretty, well, epic. Leialoha’s design of Lord Manga and L-Ron in all their shiny metal goodness is a major addition to the JLI visual palette.

THE KITCHEN SINK: Wow, Booster and Beetle are so much skeevier than I remember. I knew I was going to wince about some of the portrayal of Fire, whose character is defined as 80% flirt to 20% shenanigans, but I had forgotten how much Barda is often treated as a throwaway 1950’s style bad housewife joke. Still, all that is going to change very soon, when she finally strides out of the kitchen… Still, Scott and Barda are sweet together, Green Flame and Ice Maiden finally have a foothold in the team and we have a Manga to battle, so it’s not all bad.

PREVIOUSLY ON THE ONE TRUE JUSTICE LEAGUE:

Justice League The Story So Far

Justice League #1 (May 1987)

Justice League #2 (June 1987)

Justice League #3 (July 1987)

Justice League #4 (August 1987)

Justice League Annual #1 (1987)

Justice League #5 (September 1987)

Justice League #6 (October 1987)

Justice League International #7 (November 1987)

Justice League International #8 (December 1987)

Justice League International #9 (January 1988)

Justice League International #10 (February 1988)

Justice League International 11 (March 1988)

Justice League International 12 (April 1988)

Justice League International 13 & Suicide Squad 13 (May 1988)

Problem Daughters Guest Post: Rivqa Rafael Interviews Nicolette Barischoff

Problem Daughters will amplify the voices of women who are sometimes excluded from mainstream feminism. It will be an anthology of beautiful, thoughtful, unconventional speculative fiction and poetry around the theme of intersectional feminism, with a specific focus on the lives and experiences of marginalised women, such as those who are of colour, QUILTBAG, disabled, sex workers, and all intersections of these.

In the lead-up to publication, Rivqa Rafael talks to her co-editor Nicolette Barischoff about disability, autonomy and community, and how they relate to feminism. Futurefire.net Publishing is fundraising for the project until 14 February.

Rivqa: The intersection you seem to focus on the most is that of disability and sex positivity. How do you think your experiences in that space will inform your editing of Problem Daughters ?  

Nicolette: I think I have always gravitated toward stories in which female protagonists have a strong sense of ownership of their bodies and their sexuality. Because sex positivity isn’t just about overturning the old gendered double standards. It’s about true bodily autonomy. It’s about recognizing the personhood of the person who’s having sex.

I have a disabled body. Disabled bodies have historically been treated as responsibilities (or, worse still, liabilities) of society. A disabled person is often unconsciously thought of as a special ward of society, whether they are legally a ward of the state or not. If they aren’t staunch protectors of their own independence, the able-bodied around them will (often unconsciously) begin to make their decisions for them. Their bodily autonomy is often overridden for the sake of expediency, or out of some vague, unchallenged notion that they are somehow less adult than the other adults in the room. And if disabled adults make decisions that others find inconvenient or alarming or strange, it’s quite easy for an able-bodied person to convince themselves they have both a right and a duty to step in.  This happens often enough with people that a disabled person knows and trusts, but it is equally likely to happen with utter strangers.

Like children, disabled people are often not thought to really belong to themselves. And so, like children, they are not thought to really be able to consent to sex.

But I also have a female body. And female bodies historically have been treated as commodities. Awarded to men who behave well, kept from men who behave badly, traded as a way of cementing friendships. Guarded in the same way that food or livestock is, from other tribes and other developing societies that might want to make similar use of her. Historically, a society’s need to control the exchange of sex and the birth of babies has meant that the bodily autonomy of women has been judged as an extravagance. A woman’s body belongs to society, in a sense, because it is seen as too valuable to belong to herself.

This can be a difficult mentality to shake, even for an avowed feminist living in a society with birth control, and universal citizenship and 50-50 marriage. Slut-shaming and body shaming come about usually because someone (of any gender, of any political affiliation) sees a woman doing something with her body that might bring down its “street value” (being naked in public, having sex too willingly or too often, not having sex often enough, not caring enough whether her body is judged to be physically attractive.) Behind almost every judgement of a woman’s body, or a woman’s sexual choices, there lies the ancient  paranoia that if she’s not compelled to behave in a certain way, the whole exchange rate of sex will break down.

So… there it is in a very overstuffed nutshell, my own relationship to my intersectionality. I believe (I hope) it will aid me in my search for good and important stories.

 

Is there anything in particular that you’re looking for in the submissions to the anthology?

I’d love to see stories set in non-Western societies, and societies with different family structures, cultures in which the understood role of women is very different than that of middle-class America or middle-class Western Europe. I’d also like to see stories of women who hold unusual or specialized roles in their society: holy women, courtesans, market queens, first wives, hunters, poets, spies, revolutionaries…. I want stories that speak to the choices that women – women who have lived very different lives than mine – must make.

It’s a speculative anthology, so of course I also want stories that bring me new, original theories of magic, and new ways of imagining the future. Though in my experience, the two tend to go hand in hand. The greater the variety of voices, the richer and stranger and more beautiful those mythic tales and far-flung futures tend to be.

And yes, I’d specifically like to get at least a couple submissions from authors who have experience in sex work.

 

Speculative fiction fandom likes to think of itself as a place for misfits, but often ends up excluding the very people who would most benefit from that type of space. How does this happen, and how can Problem Daughters help?

I think any time you attempt to set yourselves as a group over and against a great, big nebulous group of “others”, there’s a danger of becoming a sort of hot-house movement… you spend a lot of time defining yourselves as a counter-culture, with your own mythos, and your own narratives. We are Nerds. We love these things, we do not love those things. We believe these things, we do not believe those things. We all share these same experiences, and share the same understanding of these experiences. It comes from a natural desire to find your tribe, to claim space for People Like You.

But it’s never been a good idea to think of spec fic that way. Speculative fiction is not a club house. It’s not a walled Bedlam where society dumps all its weirdos. It’s not the secret realm where like-minded Nerds Like Us can finally work their will… If it was, then every secondary world, or far-future civilization, or alternate history would look much the same. I think we can agree that’s not the case.

It’s far wiser and more accurate, I think, to view it as a kind of platonic thought-space. A great, big lovely void where we are all free to imagine the world as a very different place. A space where all our preconceived notions may be challenged. Where biology or physics, or government, or marriage, or love, or bravery, or family might take shapes we have never seen before.

I think Problem Daughters will add just a few more possible worlds to our lovely void. It will lay down its own challenges to our notions of what a feminist looks like, what a woman looks like, what roles in society a feminist woman may inhabit, and what choices exist for her to make.

 

If you could put this anthology in one public figure’s hands (with a guarantee that they’d read it), who would you choose?

Lena Dunham, Emma Watson, Tina Fey, Amy Poehler, Kate Winslet, and every other of the marvelously privileged women who attached their names to that open letter to Amnesty International. Without knowing anything at all about the lives of women practicing sex work (legally or otherwise) these notable mainstream feminists assumed they were entitled to have a say in these women’s sexual choices. I don’t think this was an entirely conscious assumption on any of their parts (most assumptions aren’t) but it demonstrates just how deeply ingrained our ideas about the commodity of women’s bodies truly are.  That so many of our society’s most admired women could sign away the bodily autonomy of other women without much thought, and even less information. Even as feminists, they defaulted to a mode of thinking that limited a woman’s personal freedoms to That Which is Good for Society.

But that’s what I think makes them all such brilliant candidates to receive this book. Privilege causes most of us to make decisions thoughtlessly and automatically. What truly defines us as people is how we react when presented with new information. I believe most of these women truly wish to be thoughtful, and to promote freedom and equality, but have had too limited a spectrum of experience to understand that not every woman shares their same ideals of what freedom looks like. Each of them could sorely use a glimpse into the daily lives of some of the women whose personhood they wish to curtail.  

 

Nicolette Barischoff was born with spastic cerebral palsy, which has only made her more awesome. Her fiction has appeared in Long Hidden, Accessing the Future, The Journal of Unlikely Academia, Podcastle, and Angels of the Meanwhile. She regularly writes about disability, feminism, sex- and body-positivity, and how all these fit together. She’s been on the front page of CBS New York, where they called her activism public pornography and suggested her face was a Public Order Crime.

 

Sheep Might Fly: Dance Princes Dance Part 7

New episode of our new Castle Charming serial! Part 7 — Old Soldiers.

It’s double acts all around: Kai and Ziggy finally catch a break in the mystery of the satin dance slippers, Sarge has a friend, and Dennis & Camilla make a terrible discovery. No hot chocolate was drunk in the telling of this story.

Previous episodes of Dance, Princes, Dance:

Part 1: Armour Up

Part 2: The ‘Team’ in Steam

Part 3: Look at My Shoes

Part 4: Satin and Roses

Part 5: Front Page Shoes

Part 6 – Let Nothing You Dismay

For more Castle Charming hijinks, check out the previous adventures of the Royals and the Hounds in Glass Slipper Scandal – podcast edition, or Glass Slipper Scandal – the ebook.

Thanks for listening to Sheep Might Fly. You can follow me on Twitter @tansyrr and @sheepmightfly, and Tumblr: tansyrr and sheepmightfly. Like my page on Facebook at TansyRRBooks.

Sheep Might Fly is a Patreon-supported project! Thanks to all my patrons who pledge between $1 and $20 a month to make this podcast happen. If you enjoy my work consider pledging your support to earn rewards, occasional glitter and my eternal gratitude.

Sheep Might Fly: Dance Princes, Dance Part 6

New episode of our new Castle Charming serial! Part 6 – Let Nothing You Dismay

Sorry that this slightly festive episode is late, but a combination of illness and a family trip for the holidays meant that uploading went from ‘vaguely feasible’ to ‘completely impossible.’ Hope you all ate, socialised and/or rested well this week, and that you are gearing up for the new year bringing us fewer unpleasant surprises. Now, have some belated tinsel attached to a podcast!

Welcome back to Castle Charming. Winter is upon us, which means the annual tournament of Rookery is underway, a game that pits Royals against Hounds. Meanwhile, fairies steal castle residents away each night, and persons unknown have run up a mysterious bill for far too many dancing shoes. When you live in a fairy tale kingdom, you have to expect to rescue the occasional prince — but for Kai, Dennis and Ziyi, it’s becoming a habit. Can the boys stop pining after each other long enough to step up as heroes?

Previous episodes of Dance, Princes, Dance:

Part 1: Armour Up

Part 2: The ‘Team’ in Steam

Part 3: Look at My Shoes

Part 4: Satin and Roses

Part 5: Front Page Shoes

For more Castle Charming hijinks, check out the previous adventures of the Royals and the Hounds in Glass Slipper Scandal – podcast edition, or Glass Slipper Scandal – the ebook.

Thanks for listening to Sheep Might Fly. You can follow me on Twitter @tansyrr and @sheepmightfly, and Tumblr: tansyrr and sheepmightfly. Like my page on Facebook at TansyRRBooks.

Sheep Might Fly is a Patreon-supported project! Thanks to all my patrons who pledge between $1 and $20 a month to make this podcast happen. If you enjoy my work consider pledging your support to earn rewards, occasional glitter and my eternal gratitude.

Justice League International #13 & Suicide Squad #13 May 1988

THE PACKAGING: Still Justice League International Vol 2, which includes the Suicide Squad issue in its collection

JLI CREATIVE TEAM: Keith Giffen (Plot & Breakdowns), J.M. DeMatteis (Script), Kevin Maguire (Pencils), Al Gordon (Inks), Gene D’Angelo (Colors), Andy Helfer & Robert Greenberger (Editors)

SUICIDE SQUAD CREATIVE TEAM: John Ostrander (Script), Luke McDonnell (Pencils), Bob Lewis (Inks), Carl Gafford (Colors), Todd Klein (Letters)

CROSSOVER ALERT: This is a clear old school two part crossover, in which the first part is demonstrably JLI featuring Suicide Squad, and the second part is Suicide Squad featuring JLI. It makes for some awkward transitions and a few out of character moments, but gets the job done and is the first of many interactions between these teams.

JUSTICE LEAGUE ROLL CALL: J’onn J’onnz the Martian Manhunter, Batman, Black Canary, Green Lantern (Guy Gardner), Blue Beetle (Ted Kord), Booster Gold, Mister Miracle (Scott Free), Captain Atom, Rocket Red (Dmitri Pushkin), with Maxwell Lord & Oberon as civilian support.

SUICIDE SQUAD ROLL CALL: Amanda Waller, Rick Flag Jr, Nightshade, Captain Boomerang, Deadshot, Nemesis, Lashina, some other peeps.

THE STORY: Amanda Waller, leader of the covert team known as Suicide Squad, gets word that one of her agents, Nemesis, is stuck in a Russian prison after a mission went wrong. The team wants to go and get him back, but they don’t have the jurisdiction, and given the potential diplomatic disaster of invading Russia, Amanda suggests to the President that the JLI should do it instead.

Batman is all for the mission, even though it does mean infiltrating Russia AGAIN with Guy Gardner. The rest of the League are mystified about why Bats is so keen to perform this particular search and rescue. They’re even more mystified when they come face to face with a second American team in Russia — the Suicide Squad themselves, a loose assortment of former heroes and villains toting military gear and grim facial expressions.

The teams fight who gets to perform the rescue, and Batman continues to not explain anything. The tensions between J’onn and Batman ratchet up until — once the mission is complete — Batman finally announces that he is quitting.

THE CHARACTERS: There are some great moments here, though not all the characters get name-checked, so I’m pretty lost on the Suicide Squad side of things. Of particular note were Vixen and J’onn getting some closure after the destruction of Justice League Detroit, and Captain Atom coming face to face with his girlfriend Nightshade, the two of them going so far as to fake a fight that turns into a ticklefest/possible foreplay.

I really liked Duchess/Lashina — she isn’t named here and I had no idea who she was, but apparently she’s another of Granny Goodness’ rejects which explains why she is mighty and awesome. I do love those Female Furies!

The showdown between Batman and J’onn has been brewing for some time, ever since Batman stepped down from the position of leader but didn’t actually leave the team… unfortunately, when it comes, it’s in the Suicide Squad half of the story, and Batman comes off as far more irrational and shouty than is in character even for JLI.

To at least partly make up for this, Batman does get some nice scenes with Black Canary in the JLI half of the story. I also like that there’s a sense that Oberon is starting to integrate with the rest of the team, even though there’s no real reason for him to be hanging around headquarters.

We get some serious scenes with Dmitri, who has legit concerns about the team’s presence in Russia — it’s nice to see his political awareness and experience coming to the fore considering that he’s usually portrayed as a lovable comic relief bruiser. His arguing with Batman was very nicely done — I appreciate that our new Rocket Red questions whether they’re doing the right thing in staging a prison break to rescue a dude called NEMESIS.

Perhaps the most important character development here is the implied history between Maxwell Lord and the Wall — they feel like old friends who don’t entirely trust each other, which is beautifully conveyed in their few short scenes together. Having them know each other from way back gives the impression that both of them have been a part of the DC universe for a long time, rather than being almost-equally recent creations.

And of course, J’onn J’onnz is finally stepping up to be a real leader, even if he only manages to do so after Batman has dragged them into yet another Russian catastrophe…

THE COMEDY: Ostrander tries to match the DeMatteis banter style and comes up short — his issue is heavy on mismatched characters shouting at each other and very light on the wit. The JLI issue is pretty good, with the best humour coming from the scenes with Oberon and Amanda Waller — De Matteis clearly loves writing her, so it’s not surprising that she will return.

THE ART: Maguire draws the Suicide Squad much better than McDonnell draws the JLI! I love his Amanda Waller, who is so large and imposing that she is practically square. McDonnell’s men are weirdly unattractive, but I like how he draws the women on his team with distinctly different body types: athletic and realistically muscled. Vixen, who is dressed as usual in an alarmingly revealing outfit, has respectful and powerful stances rather than cracking out the porn star poses, which is a good sign in an artist. But oh, his man faces are so ugly. Sigh.

THE KITCHEN SINK: Batman quitting is a major moment for this title, so it’s weird that it happens in an issue of a crossover that many readers might not have got hold of? The story is definitely one troublesome quest to Russia too many, which is such an obvious point that the characters fall over themselves to lampshade it. Still, we’re about to have some important transitions in this comic, so why not highlight that by doing an anti-teamup? I guess?

BONUS CHARACTER HISTORY: Amanda Waller & Suicide Squad

You might have noticed that Suicide Squad is on the same numbering system as JLI. While there was a previous iteration of the comic’s concept in the Silver Age, this late 80’s Suicide Squad was shaped by the Legends event and debuted as its own title shortly afterwards, exactly like Justice League International.

Created by John Ostrander, the pitch is that the Suicide Squad (AKA Task Force X) is a secret government team sent into impossible and difficult situations. Their ensemble is made up of slightly redeemed super-villains as well as former ‘hero’ characters like Vixen who had fallen from grace. Amanda Waller is the director who balances political machinations with just plain shouting at people until they do what she says. Captain Boomerang, Deadshot, Bronze Tiger and other more obscure characters from DC’s history were given a home here, and rose to prominence in this book, with Rick Flag Jr as their mentally unstable leader.

Suicide Squad aimed for a ‘realistic’ tone with its military (rather than superhero) outfit, looking at the consequences of military action, including psych evaluations and other HR support systems. The title drew attention for featuring appearances by real life political figures like Reagan and Gorbachev… though as we’ve seen in the early issues of the JLI, they weren’t the only comic doing this in the late 80’s.

If you wondered why Batman is especially weird around the Squad in this crossover, it’s because he had already had a run-in with them and Amanda Waller only 3 issues earlier, and backed off when his secret identity was threatened.

Suicide Squad is notable for introducing the computer support character of Oracle, later revealed to be a new secret identity for Barbara Gordon, the wheelchair-using former Batgirl who had been shot and paralysed by the Joker in The Killing Joke. The long game that the writers of Suicide Squad played with Oracle allowed Barbara Gordon to be snuck back into the DC Universe under the nose of the management team that had okayed her erasure as a superhero; the Oracle identity would define Barbara’s character for nearly 2 decades, until the results of her injury were rewritten during the New 52 reboot of 2011.

BONUS BONUS CHARACTER HISTORY: Nightshade

Eve Eden (Nightshade) is another of those Charlton Comics refugees, who had a near miss with the original Watchmen pitch before being absorbed into the post-Crisis DC Universe. While it’s assumed that Silk Spectre is partly based on her, that character owes a lot more to Black Canary; it has been argued that Nightshade is actually a visual model for Silhouette, the doomed vigilante seen only in Watchmen flashbacks.

Nightshade was a Captain Atom love interest who eventually spun out into her own stories. In this post-Crisis DC Universe, she was rebranded as a super-spy with many of her past Captain Atom adventures retconned to be with secret agent King Faraday instead. Nightshade and Captain Atom’s romance was revived despite them featuring in different team books, which kept them apart. Being in separate team books is totally the “my girlfriend lives in Canada” of superhero relationship issues.

Nightshade’s powers are shadow-based, and were eventually revealed as being of mystical origins: Eve’s mother was the Queen of the Land of Nightshades, and her father was an Incubus.

PREVIOUSLY ON THE ONE TRUE JUSTICE LEAGUE:

Justice League The Story So Far

Justice League #1 (May 1987)

Justice League #2 (June 1987)

Justice League #3 (July 1987)

Justice League #4 (August 1987)

Justice League Annual #1 (1987)

Justice League #5 (September 1987)

Justice League #6 (October 1987)

Justice League International #7 (November 1987)

Justice League International #8 (December 1987)

Justice League International #9 (January 1988)

Justice League International #10 (February 1988)

Justice League International 11 (March 1988)

Justice League International 12 (April 1988)

Dance, Princes, Dance: Part 5, Front Page Shoes

New episode of our new Castle Charming serial! Part 5 – Front Page Shoes

Welcome back to Castle Charming. Winter is upon us, which means the annual tournament of Rookery is underway, a game that pits Royals against Hounds. Meanwhile, fairies steal castle residents away each night, and persons unknown have run up a mysterious bill for far too many dancing shoes. When you live in a fairy tale kingdom, you have to expect to rescue the occasional prince — but for Kai, Dennis and Ziyi, it’s becoming a habit. Can the boys stop pining after each other long enough to step up as heroes?

Previous episodes of Dance, Princes, Dance:

Part 1: Armour Up

Part 2: The ‘Team’ in Steam

Part 3: Look at My Shoes

Part 4: Satin and Roses

For more Castle Charming hijinks, check out the previous adventures of the Royals and the Hounds in Glass Slipper Scandal – podcast edition, or Glass Slipper Scandal – the ebook.

Thanks for listening to Sheep Might Fly. You can follow me on Twitter @tansyrr and @sheepmightfly, and Tumblr: tansyrr and sheepmightfly. Like my page on Facebook at TansyRRBooks.

Sheep Might Fly is a Patreon-supported project! Thanks to all my patrons who pledge between $1 and $20 a month to make this podcast happen. If you enjoy my work consider pledging your support to earn rewards and my eternal gratitude.

Justice League International #12: Who Is Maxwell Lord?

THE PACKAGING: Still JLI Volume 2

THE CREATIVE TEAM: Keith Giffen (Plot & Breakdowns), J.M. DeMatteis (Script), Kevin Maguire (Pencils), Al Gordon (Inks), Gene D’Angelo (Colors), Andy Helfer & Robert Greenberger (Editors)

JUSTICE LEAGUE ROLL CALL: J’onn J’onnz the Martian Manhunter, Batman, Black Canary, Green Lantern (Guy Gardner), Blue Beetle (Ted Kord), Booster Gold, Mister Miracle (Scott Free), Captain Atom, Rocket Red (Dmitri Pushkin), with Maxwell Lord & Oberon as civilian support

GUEST STARS: Dr Mist, Tuatara, Metron and INTRODUCING Ice Maiden & Green Flame.

THE STORY: The Justice League face off against Metron, with their usual blend of violence and disrespectful snarkery — which freaks Mister Miracle out, as he considers Metron a god. Turns out that Metron is hunting for a rogue information retrieval unit… but what does any of this have to do with Maxwell Lord’s cyber stalker/imaginary friend?

Back in the ruined remains of his office, Max argues and struggles with the big bad computer who has been pulling his puppet strings since the beginning… he’s clearly starting to fray at the edges, and completely loses it when he discovers the corpse of his assistant/would-be assassin. The mystery of his magically disappearing bullet wound is explained too, as his special AI friend refers to ‘repairing’ him. Is Max actually a Maxbot?

We finally get the exposition and backstory of this most mysterious of Maxes: how he, a young and ambitious executive, became telepathically linked to Metron’s Information Retrieval Unit gone rogue — and how, under this influence, he rose in wealth and power, which culminated in his manipulative acquisition of the Justice League.

Since being drilled with Manhunter bullets, the real Max (or possibly some alternate version of him with half a conscience) has been rebelling against his AI master. He rises up to destroy the evil computer… and then collapses as his “repaired” bullet wounds return with a vengeance…

The next day, Mister Miracle and Oberon discuss how they all found Max (Metron ditched them once he could no longer sense his rogue unit) and saved his life just in time… and that they now all know his story, because J’onn scanned him and had a brief glitch in his ethics concerning privacy issues. Oberon assumes that now they know Max’s story and how he manipulated everyone, they’re going to chuck him out of the JLI, but J’onn has decided he is worthy of another chance.

Meanwhile, in the Dome that is the (former) headquarters for the (now defunct) Global Guardians, Green Flame and Ice Maiden make their JLI debut! Beatriz Da Costa and Tora Olafsdotter receive their final payout from the team, leaving them just short of broke. Bea comes up with a cunning plan to convince the United Nations that they are exactly what Justice League International needs. They are so not wrong. Ladies! Super ladies! MORE THAN ONE GIRL IN THE JUSTICE LEAGUE!

Bea and Tora are my favourite and my best. We’re going to see a lot more of them soon…

THE CHARACTERS: This one’s the Max Show, which is probably overdue considering that he’s one of this book’s original characters, and the mystery of what he’s been up to has been lurking for a long time. I find it fascinating that it’s established here (very early in his run as a DC character) that he is capable of murder, and only didn’t commit it during his origin story because his victim had an accidental fall first.

We also get some new insights into Scott Free and his history, with he and Oberon serving as the heart of the team in the coda at the end… this is going to be an ongoing role for them!

I am so delighted to see Bea and Tora, I can’t even tell you. 12 issues was a LONG time to wait for them. Their characters aren’t fully formed here but you can already see that Bea is the sassy, cheeky one, and Tora is just so darned nice. (In retrospect, this costume for Tora makes absolutely no sense as we will later know her as a super modest, conservative sort of person, but flying in skimpy swimsuits is a default status for all female superheroes — her later costume design is going to be revolutionary for the genre)

THE COMEDY: Not as much humour in this one considering it’s like 80% Maxngst, so thank goodness for the cute Fire and Ice scene. Their best friend routine overtly acknowledges that Green Flame is Lucy to Ice Maiden’s Ethel, and while those references were super old fashioned even in the late 80’s, it’s not out of place considering that we have a lot of Three Stooges and Laurel & Hardy references to look forward to in the Blue & Gold dynamic.

Classic comedy. It’s an influence.

THE ART: This issue holds up pretty well considering that it’s wall to wall men in suits and computer banks shouting at each other. The flashbank murder-spelunking sequence is very dynamic in its use of dark and shadow.

But I’m still shaking my head at Bea and Tora’s costumes. How on earth did Bea convince Tora to wear that awful thing, all shoulder pads and plunging neckline?

At least our 2 new female characters have completely different hairstyles! That’s progress, right?

THE KITCHEN SINK: Excited though I am to see Bea and Tora, they’re not properly here yet and won’t be for a few issues – there’s still a Suicide Squad crossover to get through and we won’t see them joining up officially until the issues to be found in Volume 3 of the Justice League International collected trades. Still. Squee!

BONUS CHARACTER HISTORY:

Green Fury/Green Flame (Beatriz Da Costa)

This flying, green-haired, fire-snarfing (seriously, it comes out her nose) Brazilian superhero was an early member of the Global Guardians, first in the Super Friends cartoon tie-in comic and then in Infinity Inc, an Earth 2-based title focusing on the teen sons & daughters of the Justice Society.

Green Fury’s powers were mystical in nature, allowing her to project images/hallucinations as well as changing her costumes at will. She was revealed in Super Friends to be the president of the Brazilian branch of Wayne Enterprises.

Her post-Crisis origin presented her as a former model and showgirl who became a secret agent in Brazil, and gained the ability to project fire through her mouth after an explosion/industrial accident. (The secret agent part would be largely ignored for her JLI run, but would be hugely significant to how her character was written afterwards, in an attempt to de-ditz her for millennial readers)

During her time on Global Guardians, Bea changed her superhero identity to Green Flame — I don’t know this for certain but I’m assuming that this is due to a continuity glitch rather than a deliberate choice. Her powers would change again (more than once) during her time on Justice League International, and she is best known by the super identity she takes up later: Fire.

BONUS BONUS CHARACTER HISTORY:

Ice Maiden (Tora Olafsdotter)

This issue is Tora’s first appearance, though that wasn’t intentional — Ice Maiden had, like Green Flame, appeared previously as a member of the Global Guardians in issues of Infinity Inc, notably the Crisis of Infinite Earths storyline, as well as the out-of-continuity Super Friends cartoon tie-in.

When Giffen & DeMatteis brought Green Flame and Ice Maiden into JLI, they believed that Ice Maiden’s real name/back story had never been established, so they felt free to create their own: as we will learn, Tora is a daughter of Norwegian Ice-people, and her father Olaf is considered both a king and a god, making her a princess and an ice goddess.

However, they had missed a Who’s Who feature which gave her the name Sigrid Nansen!

The contradiction between the two versions of the character was later retconned to establish that they were two separate heroes: Sigrid Nansen was the original Icemaiden (featuring blue skin and pointy ears), who quit the Global Guardians after they discovered the existence of Tora, whose powers were far more impressive. Sigrid would later return in a different iteration of the League, to work through her sense of inferiority as compared to the beloved Tora, who later rebranded herself as Ice to Bea’s Fire.

The partnership and friendship between Bea and Tora is as iconic and integral to this era of the League as the Blue & Gold comedy duo that is Blue Beetle and Booster Gold; both pairings also have significant followings as slash couples.

Sheep Might Fly: Dance, Princes, Dance Part 4

New episode of our new Castle Charming serial! Part 4: Satin and Roses

Welcome back to Castle Charming. Winter is upon us, which means the annual tournament of Rookery is underway, a game that pits Royals against Hounds. Meanwhile, fairies steal castle residents away each night, and persons unknown have run up a mysterious bill for far too many dancing shoes. When you live in a fairy tale kingdom, you have to expect to rescue the occasional prince — but for Kai, Dennis and Ziyi, it’s becoming a habit. Can the boys stop pining after each other long enough to step up as heroes?

Previous episodes of Dance, Princes, Dance:

Part 1: Armour Up

Part 2: The ‘Team’ in Steam

Part 3: Look at My Shoes

For more Castle Charming hijinks, check out the previous adventures of the Royals and the Hounds in Glass Slipper Scandal – podcast edition, or Glass Slipper Scandal – the ebook.

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