Justice League of America: The Silver Age Omnibus Vol. 1

Justice League of America: The Silver Age #Omnibus 1

by Gardner Francis Fox

A massive hardcover collecting JLA's earliest adventures from 1960-1964.

A new printing of the hardcover collecting JLA's first 20 adventures in a single volume spanning 1960-1964.

Genres: Comics, Dc Comics, Graphic Novels, Science Fiction

896 pages, hardcover

First published April 22, 2014

About the author

Gardner Francis Cooper Fox was an American writer known best for creating numerous comic book characters for DC Comics. Comic book historians estimate that he wrote more than 4,000 comics stories, including 1,500 for DC Comics.
Fox is known as the co-creator of DC Comics heroes the Flash, Hawkman, Doctor Fate and the original Sandman, and was the writer who first teamed those and other heroes as the Justice Society of America. Fox introduced the concept of the Multiverse to DC Comics in the 1961 story "Flash of Two Worlds!"

Pseudonyms: Gardner F. Fox, Jefferson Cooper, Bart Sommers, Paul Dean, Ray Gardner, Lynna Cooper, Rod Gray, Larry Dean, Robert Starr, Don Blake, Ed Blake, Warner Blake, Michael Blake, Tex Blane, Willis Blane, Ed Carlisle, Edgar Weston, Tex Slade, Eddie Duane, Simon Majors, James Kendricks, Troy Conway, Kevin Matthews, Glen Chase

Reviews

[Blindzider · Rating 2 out of 5]

Well it's taken me months to get through this. I grew up reading Marvel, and while I was excited at the prospect of reading these early adventures, it became a chore, primarily because of the writing style of the time period. I've read plenty of early Marvel in present times and while that suffers from some of the same issues, it just reads a little bit better, in my humble opinion.

There's always some joy seeing the original, early stories and the most notable are the concepts of Earth-One, Two (evil JLA) and Three (JSA) containing different versions of heroes/villains. This idea culminates in a three part epic which closes out this omnibus. I can imagine the thrill of seeing these concepts back when they originally appeared, probably for the first time ever in comics.

Unfortunately, most of the other stories are one-offs and nearly all the same pattern: the story is broken into three parts, one part introducing the villain, one part for the heroes to pair up and fail at stopping the bad guys, and a third for the JLA to figure out how to come together and win. That repetitive storytelling, plus excessive expositional dialogue and captions (and I thought Claremont was difficult) makes for very slow and monotonous reading. I had to read one issue, put the book down for days, come back and read one more, then walk away again. Sometimes I was unable to finish a single issue in one sitting.

Fox's writing contains a lot of imagination and I do like the use of science to help fuel the problems and solutions in many of the stories. It's not for the faint of heart though as there are many aspects that seem foolish by the modern, more "fleshed-out" versions of the characters. Poor Martian Manhunter gets stuck using "super breath" all the time, Aquaman never does much more than talk to fish and is hampered by his need to be in water every hour. Many times powers are stretched to the limits of believability simply to move the plot along. Snapper Carl's inclusion to stories seems nothing more than to have a connection for teenagers.

Much of this may be sacrilege, given the high status of the JLA as DC's super team (who I do enjoy reading, Morrison's JLA is what got my started), and many of the foundations of the DCU (and even superhero comics) were born in these pages. A must read simply to know the history of the team, but it's a difficult to read when you didn't "grow up" with these stories and have nostalgia to get you through it.

[Michael Emond · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'll start this review by saying "five stars for comic geeks like me who grew up loving the Justice league and silver age of comics". In comparison to the art and story-telling of (some) of today's comics it isn't a true comparison. But at the time this was one of the most fun comics a kid could buy. All the DC stars in one place written by the in comparable Gardner Fox with solid art by Mike Sekowsky. These were fun stories of the World's greatest heroes. Nothing deep, no character development, but fun little sci-fi capers. Fox was brilliant at coming up with inventive plots that involved all the members of the Justice League. Sekowsky, although not a name many would think of as a top artist of the time, was perfectly suited for this comic. So this omnibus was a treat for someone who grew up collecting this as my first series. In terms of silver age collected editions this was on the top of my list - along with the Lee and Ditko Spider-man. Highlights include - the first teaming of the Justice League and Justice Society of Earth 2 and the origin story of the JLA.

Okay, I do have to point out some of the flaws even though I truly do love the collection. Gardner did get a tad repetitive with storylines at times. Even though he thought up new ways to showcase the JLA he had this concept of "heroes have a winning factor" that was some "force" that allowed the JLA to always win. It was an odd idea and especially odd when the Earth Three team of the Crime Syndicate of America always wins on their Earth, just because it is their Earth. The other HUGE irritation was the decision to create Snapper Carr as the Teen-age sidekick of the JLA. Not only is it an absurd excuse to include a teenager (I am sure the Editors thought it would appeal to young readers - it doesn't) Snapper's ridiculous "hip" rhyming slang did not age well at all. The stories flow much better when he isn't being shoehorned into the stories. As memory serves me, he eventually just faded from being included and there was actually a Denny O'Neil story later on when a bitter Snapper Carr returns to get revenge for being ignored by the JLA - *roll eyes*. Okay - those are my nit picks but I still love the omnibus despite them :).

[Paul · Rating 5 out of 5]

Classic beginnings, I loved this, yes the stories are a bit simplistic but highly entertaining. Great start.

[Steve Joyce · Rating 4 out of 5]

Loved reading again the Brave and Bold stories, the origin issue (#9), the introduction of new members and especially the JSA crossovers.

I had kind of forgotten how essentially repetitious many of the plots were. A page or two of something or the other happening to The Flash, then the same to Aquaman, then Martian Manhunter, Wonder Woman, etc. etc. Then a final chapter where they solve the case. Back in the day, I was for these self-contained tales as opposed to Marvel's continued stories (mainly because they didn't drive me to the poor house!). These days, they strike me as a bit lacking.

However, lacking or not, these comics are burned into my consciousness! I'll never be 10 years old again but rereading them comes close!

[Bryan Miller · Rating 3 out of 5]

This bad boy took me all year to read! Mostly read for nostalgia. I knew going in that these tales would be predictably silly but fun. I mostly really enjoyed them, though some of the body altering and mixed up identity stuff (as well as the familiar tropes of GL's weakness to yellow or MM's weakness to fire showing up conveniently a bit too often) got a bit old. Looking forward to seeing the stories mature a bit more as I work my way up through time and hit the next Volume in the coming year! :)

[Steven · Rating 3 out of 5]

A gigantic omnibus collection (900 pages or so) compiling the first appearances of the JLA from The Brave and The Bold and the first few years of their team book. It's sometimes rough sledding, as Sekowsky's artwork is quite clunky (and chunky) and occasionally bizarre, and Gardner Fox's stories are generally written to a very narrow formula and, despite Fox's background in writing SF, pretty much insane from a scientific standpoint.

That said, they are rather fun to read, especially when the Earth 2 crossovers start, though best taken in small doses rather than trying to blow through the whole megillah at once.

[Asante · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was really entertaining and I completely loved all of the stories