Justice Society of America #8: The Heart of the Story

Justice Society of America #8 picks up with Helena Wayne and the rest of the Justice Society of America and the Young Justice Society of America attempting to contact the villains who would make up the future version of the Justice Society of America that Helena saw murdered back at the beginning of the series. This issue focuses on the acquisition of the recently retconned Golden Age Red Lantern’s daughter, who has been causing trouble across the world. This issue has a lot of relevance when it comes to its sister series, Alan Scott: The Green Lantern, making it essential to pick up that series in order to fully understand the nuances within the issue.

Geoff Johns has been doing a lot of legwork in order to establish what he is referring to as, The New Golden Age. With this came the retconning of a lot of DC characters that were seemingly lost in time, as well retconned stories to explain their existence. This is where Tim Sheridan and Cian Tormey’s Alan Scott: The Green Lantern comes into play. This series seeks to tell a personal story about The Golden Age Green Lantern while also retconning The Red Lantern into existence. Because of the multifaceted complexities of that amazing and groundbreaking series, the events of Justice Society of America #8 come into full focus. That being said, this issue can be read without that context, however it makes a lot of the in-between dialogue between The Red Lantern’s daughter and Alan.

Because much of this issue revolves around Alan trying to recruit The Red Lantern’s daughter, Mikel Janin does a lot of legwork in order to sell the tone and nuance within the subtext. Janin provides so much detail within just the facial expressions as Alan is forced to reminisce on his past with Vladimir, The Red Lantern. This makes the conversation even that much more heartbreaking, especially when combined with the context from the sister series. While this issue doesn’t include a ton of action, the moments between the characters make it one of the best Justice Society of America thus far, with Janin being the star force behind it.

Colorist Jordie Bellaire does an extra special job with the colors here, especially when it comes to the tone and the shading. Even minor details like the lighting help capture the tone of the scene and are emblematic of the skills that Bellaire brings to the series.