All Star Comics Archives, Volume 4 by Gardner F. Fox

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This book collects four issues of All Star Comics from 1943 in Issues 15-18. This volume sees the Justice Society back off a bit from the war. While Americans were all for our War Efforts, they didn't want to hear about war in every book, movie, radio program, and certainly not every comic book. However, Issue 16 would be an exception to this.

Each issue told one over-arching story with the Justice Society together at the end and the beginning of the story while each hero had his own six page mini-adventure.

First off, Issue 15 has every member of the Justice Society so busy they can't attend the meeting but not too busy to send their secretary Wonder Woman their excuses. Wonder Woman's biggest role in this book is getting her and all the girlfriends of the heroes captures. (Wonder Woman couldn't take part in battles because she was only the secretary.) The story itself introduces a great supervillain for the Justice Society in Brain Wave. Still, his plot using mirror images does get a little old plus the nonsensical girlfriend plot weighs this down. Grade: B-

Issue 16 has the Justice Society taking on a series of Nazi spies trying to pit Americans against one another. It's a beautiful patriotic story. For those of us who admire the greatest generation's sense of unity and purpose, this is a gorgeous illustration of that, particularly the last couple pages. Grade: A-

Issue 17 marks the return of Brain Wave and this time he's shrunk the Justice Society. The story is better than the last time though there are a few sore points. It doesn't even make sense to shrink the Spectre given his powers, the Thunderbolt has to appear in all the stories to bail Johnny out. Grade: B+

Issue 18 sees the Justice Society battling King Bee who has turned men into human bug creatures with the powers of Insects. It's a fun concept and a b it educational too. Overall, a decent final story. Grade: B

The book has a warm and nostalgic introduction by James Robinson who wrote the modern day Starman revival. Overall, this is an enjoyable installment and a step up in quality from Volume 3 and a very enjoyable chapter in the career of the Justice Society.



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