All Star Comics: Only Legends Live Forever

Justice Society (collected editions)

by Paul Levitz, Gerry Conway, Wallace Wood (Illustrator)

The classic 1970s run of the Justice Society of America is now collected in a single volume from the pages of ALL-STAR COMICS #58-74, ADVENTURE COMICS #461-466 and DC SPECIAL #29! Witness the continuing adventures of the Flash, Green Lantern, Hawkman, Doctor Fate and Wildcat as they're joined by younger heroes Robin, Power Girl and Star-Spangled Kid to battle the Psycho-Pirate, the immortal Vandal Savage, the Injustice Society and more.

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels, Dc Comics, Comic Book

449 pages, Kindle Edition

First published September 27, 2011

Reviews

[Dimitris Papastergiou · Rating 2 out of 5]

+1 Star for the artwork.

It wasn't ok. It was bad and boring and meh.

This one, I don't know why I read it, maybe I was sold from the fact of the catchy cover, "we should put Bats in a coffin for the trade, that'll sell." Yeah well, IT DID. And it was bad.

I know I should have known what to expect from reading all the All Star Comics Archives and pretty much everything about JSA being silly (I'm nice about it) and pretty much the non-existent script with more repetition than the Spider-Man's origin in the movies.. BUT, since this was like Bats on the cover and Only Legends Live Forever title, I got sold and started reading...

Sorry but AGAIN, if you weren't kid when these stories were released back then, there's absolutely no reason to read them whatsoever, unless you wanna see how silly everything was written back then in comics and how repetitive everything is and how pretty much every single second every character says why they did what they did, what was the move they did 5 seconds ago, what their next move is going to be or describing what they're actually looking at, or describing the villain's move while the villain is explaining how they're doing it and all the while you're having a narrator explaining a bunch of other shit that's going to make you start popping pills by the end of it.

So.. to sum up, you're reading this for nostalgia if you were a kid on release date. If not do NOT read this. A Batman from another dimension dies in the most boring way ever. Boo-hoo. There. The End.

[Elducho · Rating 3 out of 5]

Simple, anticlimatic, with all the issues from a superhero comic of the 70's... but entertaining.

The best of it? Power Girl and The Huntress: they save the whole TPB.

[Zack! Empire · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was pretty excited to read this collection because these stories are covered on one of my favorite podcast. I'm not really a single issue guy, and the idea of trying to track down all the various single issues they covered didn't appeal to me, so I was really glad to get this collection.
The biggest thing this book has going for it is that it takes place on Earth 2. The earth that most DC stories take place on is Earth 1. It all get's a bit confusing as you go into things like Earth 3, Earth S, and Earth X, so I won't try and explain it, but to say that since this book takes place on Earth 2, outside the regular continuity DC had at the time, the creators were free to tell stories you might not have seen otherwise.
For example, characters are allowed to age, so we get an older Clark Kent, who's become the editor of the Daily Star. We even get an older Bruce Wayne, who's become the new Police Commissioner of Gotham. Comic book characters are known for there ability to never grow old, so it was cool to see a world where the hero's have to move on as old age sets in. Along with growing old with also get something that I don't think we'd see a lot of in the regular DC universe: Heroes retiring. Mostly this only happens with the non-super powered characters, but Batman, Wildcat, and some other have to hang up there capes because time has just caught up with them. It gives an interesting contrast to the Earth One heroes who stay the same age forever.
The passage of time also brings about another interesting part of the book, namely, seeing the older more experienced members of the JSA butt heads with the youthful ambition of the younger members. It's something we can all relate to as we've seen it countless times before: the older members thinking they know what's best because they have been there, done that, and the younger members running head first into danger, cause, dammit, they know what they are doing! Nowhere was this more clear then with Wildcat and Power Girl. In the beginning they do not like each other, but as the book moves forward, they develop a trust only people put under fire together can have. I've always liked this part of the JSA: the hero's of yesterday teaching the ones of tomorrow.
The artwork in this book is amazing. Even though the book is in black and white, it doesn't really matter. You will hardly notice because the artist are so strong. The beginning of the book has both inking and penciling by Wally Wood, and it looks great. While I was reading it I just thought "Man I wish this guy did some more Superman stuff because it looks great!" Wally even draws something I think most artist forget about: Back ground details! Yeah, most artist will take the time to draw a couch, or a book case, but Wally fleshes them out with the details that make them feel real. Most of the other work in the book is done by Joe Staton. I really like his art as well. He has the kind of style that mixes both cartoonish and realistic. Just great for a superhero comic. You can also tell that he really loves drawing Power Girl!
There are some negatives about the book. Even though the book was put out in the 70's, which I would be consider the more serious bronze age of DC, there are still some silly silver age parts. In one early story the JSA is told that the world will end in 48 hours, so they wait a full 24 till they do something about. Later, when Doctor Fate is dying, the somehow use the Star Spangled Kids cosmic rod to help save him. Because everyone knows that concentrated energy from stars can keep a person alive! And the book has one of my least favorite superhero clichés: the Heroes complaining that they wish a villain would attack because they are bored. Ugh!
The villains of the book are also pretty forgettable. There's an origin of the JSA where they fight Nazi's that good (because seeing a Nazi getting punched is always good) and there is some build up to a confrontation between the JSA and the Gotham Police force lead by Bruce Wayne, but other then that the villains aren't that good. And it doesn't have much to do with me not knowing about classic JSA villains. People like Vandal Savage, and the Injustice Society show up, but they aren't fleshed out enough to make me care about them.
All and all this was a really nice collection. I considered giving this four stars, instead of three, but the thing that makes it a three star book is that I just can't see myself wanting to reread any of these stories.
I would say this book is for fans of bronze age DC, or JSA fans.

[ISMOTU · Rating 4 out of 5]

The bronze age revival of the Justice Society introduces Power Girl and the Huntress and brings the original super-team into the 1970's. Wally Wood and Joe Staton illutrated Paul Levitz's stories with their considerable (yet very distinctive) styles. Fun comics that played with the tensions between generations.

[Tom · Rating 3 out of 5]

This volume is a series of 1970s reprints of the adventures of the Justice Society, the 1940s superteam, most of whom disappeared before the 1950s and were replaced later in some cases by newer versions with the same superhero name. The old JLA/JSA team-ups had been popular, and allowed the creators to showcase numerous old time and long forgotten superheroes. These reprints basically feature a handful, with the occasional guest star, and focus on newcomers like Power Girl and the Huntress. The book gets a couple things right, like keeping Power Girl and the Earth-2 Superman at their Golden Age power levels (meaning no flying, just large jumps), and throwing out the rare difference between Earths 1 and 2, such as how on Earth-2, Quebec is an independent nation. On the downside is the character work, weak especially with the half-assed feminism espoused by Power Girl who early on seems mostly to think every man is out to compete with her, and out-of-nowhere generation gap talk between characters like Robin and Hawkman that only pops up when its convenient to the plot. Some of it really works, others only if you know things like why Mr. Terrific is dead after appearing in all of two or three panels. Joe Stanton's artwork is surprisingly good considering his more cartoonish style for his 90s Green Lantern work, and some story gems, like a team origin, last Batman story, and one where an unnamed member of Congress got the team to break-up (implied to be Joe McCarthy, but given the black-and-white artwork and the time of publication, it could also be Richard Nixon), the volume was fun but not one of the better Showcase volumes.

[Patrick Hudson · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Crisis on Infinite Earths broke my heart as I always loved the Earth 2 heroes. I read the All Star Squadron and Infinity Inc back in the day, but I hadn't read this 70s take on the old heroes before and was really curious about it.

Well, it's a mixed bag. It's great to see this early take on the idea of aging and legacy heroes. It introduces a number of classic characters, notably Huntress and Power Girl who added a welcome feminist touch to the rad world of old-time DC (in fairness, that's comic-book feminism which involves insisting on the respect of one's peers while dressing like a pin-up and generally being regarded as fiesty). I also enjoyed the subplot about Green Lantern's business failing because of all the time he spends heroing.

Putting aside the interests of the setting, this is pretty much standard super-hero fare. Today's dupers fan might find it a bit staid, but if you're interested in quirky corners of old school DC continuity then this is for you.

[Joe Stevens · Rating 2 out of 5]

A rare DNF for me. I tried to read this most evenings and I got to where I loathed my evenings. At some point just say no. It is component and totally boring. Early Batman had a fun detective vibe to it. Early Spiderman felt like a very extended coming of age story. This is a bunch of people I don't care about punching each other and constantly saving someone from death.
One amusing thing to me as that this super team was often going up against maybe two villains and the super team included Superman and Power Girl at points. Its like seeing the heavy weight champion of the world fighting a middle weight nobody and cheering for the champ. What's the point?
Spiderman was always the underdog and Batman had to do his detective thing and often got injured. They was at least some concept that they might lose. Here three or four superheroes against some puny villain?

[Glen · Rating 4 out of 5]

The JSA is one of Dc Comics' most popular, yet problematic properties. The fans really like the group, and their books always sell pretty well, but the Powers That Be at DC just can't stand them because they are old fashioned. So naturally, DC tries to sabotage their own property every chance they get. I guess selling comics isn't one of the company priorities.

Anyway, this book reprints the first comeback of the group, during the 1970s. Along with the old guard of Green Lantern, Hawkman, Wildcat, and the rest, newcomers Power Girl and The Star Spangled Kid join alongside a middle aged Robin. They take on menaces old and new, along with the middle aged blues.

Some of DC's best stuff in the 70s.

[tara bomp · Rating 2 out of 5]

1) Every comic wraps up too quickly, the villains often just suddenly lose and disappear and that's it. Some of them give very little room for the villains to spread their wings so it's kind of not great. I understand part of this is space constraints cause so many characters but ugh
2) Almost every single comic has a decent portion of time given to setting up the next comic, so you feel compelled to read, but there's never any sense of catharsis or conclusion because there's always SOMETHING else before they've even defeated any villain, it's weirdly exhausting to read.

Some of the writing and art is pretty good but ughhh

[Justin · Rating 4 out of 5]

* Bump from 3.5 stars *

This book collects stories from when the JSA returned in the pages of All-Star Comics and beyond. Here are classic JSAers like the Flash, Green Lantern, Wildcat, Dr. Fate and more...along with newer heroes like Power Girl, Huntress, and the Star-Spangled Kid. The stories are typically around 17 pages, which means most stories are two-parters. The art is pretty strong throughout, especially Wally Wood and Keith Giffen and Joe Staton - Staton's Huntress is great. The stories vary in appeal and heroes come and go throughout the book. Solid 70s super-hero comics.

[Little Timmy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Great reprint of the modern adventures of the Golden age JSA. Recommended

[Thomas · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is so much fun even if the characterization and plots are all over the place, this a very fun collection of bronze age comics. The art alone is so worth it: Wally Wood, Joe Staton, Rich Buckler.

[Ken · Rating 3 out of 5]

classic

Here are some classic tales of the JSA from the 70’s These tales are a little tame by today’s standards, but provide nice introductions to Power Girl and The Huntress-

[Adam Graham · Rating 3 out of 5]

The original run of the Justice Society of America ended with All Star Comics #57 in 1951. The JSA were retired with sales of Superhero comics lagging and a new group of heroes emerged in the late 1950s and early 1960s but with the brilliance of "The Flash of Two Worlds," it was established the Golden Age heroes existed on Earth Two while our Silver Age friends existed on Earth One and the old JSA got together with the Justice League of America every year and finally got their own title back with the return of All Star Comics.

While in modern day Superhero comics, no one needs much of an excuse to create a whole new Issue 1, despite a lapse of twenty-five years in All-Star Comics, the Justice Society's Adventures try to pick where they left off in All Star Comics #58 and continue on through Issue 74 before having a run as one of several features in Adventure Comics #461-466 and DC Special #29. Unfortunately, the JSA couldn't just go back.

There's a lot of interesting features in this book. It includes the first appearance of Powergirl, aging of Superman and Batman into middle age with Bruce Wayne (as Gotham City Police Commissioner) declaring war on the JSA in the best storyline of the book. DC Special #29 offers in untold JSA origin story with an absolutely stunning full page picture of Superman punching through a squadron of Nazi planes. Indeed, even when the storylines let you down (as they often do) the artwork remains very good throughout the entire book. We also have the Huntress taking a big role as a bit of a Batman surrogate for the new generation, and the Psycho-Pirate is a solid villain in several stories. Also being set on Earth 2 allowed DC to play around with the universe and kill off a famous hero who they never would in main continuity.

However, the book is one of the weaker Showcase Presents collections I've read. Due to success at Marvel with characters who bickered rather than being "Super Friends," many Superhero books were being written with heroes who didn't get along and weren't always the best people to be around. However, trying this tact on the first Superhero team from a company known for iconic role model heroes, it doesn't feel right and it's hard to like most of these characters. The Flash abandons his team in the midst of a battle, Powergirl begins as a hypersensitive 1970s Comic Book feminist who takes everything as a sexist slight and thinks that the less men who are on the team the better as there will be less men to compete with her. She does mellow out later on but it takes a while. Wildcat is constantly facing mortal injury. No one on this team is all that likable which makes the stories a challenge. This isn't help by a 17 page book length and a roster that just kept changing. You also do see the book blame the end of the Justice Society in the 1950s on the Red Scare (despite any real foundation in this story) which is certainly a lot better tale than "low post-war Circulation."

Overall, this book has some charms but it also has plenty of reminders of why the Justice Society's 1950s revival was so short lived.

[Kevin · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is my era of the Justice Society of America. I remember buying the issues in this collection off the newsstands back in the '70s, and I felt pretty much the same reading them today as I did then. I liked the old guard vs. the new theme (though they got rid of Robin fairly quickly -- more on him to come--though he came back from time to time). I still love Power Girl and how brash she was and how different she was from her Earth-One Supergirl counterpart. And the Huntress! The real one!

But let's talk about Robin for a minute. Gerry Conway's (and, later, Paul Levitz's) Robin is much younger than he should be. This is a character who started working with Batman in 1940 and, since the Earth-Two heroes aged normally (for the most part -- there was that absorption of time from Ian Karkull that Roy Thomas revealed in an All-Star Squadron annual in the mid-'80s that kept the JSAers younger looking), Dick Grayson/Robin should have been a man in his forties, but he's portrayed as a man in his late twenties or early thirties. A minor quibble in the midst of some great storytelling.

Writers Gerry Conway and Paul Levitz kept the story moving forward in (mostly) two-part stories with continuing subplots. It's almost like Levitz perfected here the storytelling method that he would use to great effect in the 1980s with the Legion of Super-Heroes.

Artists for these stories include an underrated Ric Estrada, who is inked by comics great Wally Wood, a young Keith Giffen, Joe Staton, Bob Layton, and Joe Giella. Good, solid artwork, though nothing flashy by modern (2020) standards.

A wonderful trip into a less complicated era and, for me, a nice piece of nostalgia. Highly recommended!

[Jason Luna · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really like the JSA, but this collection, not as much.

The JSA are really cool because they have a wide berth of superpowers and superheroes mixing together. Like Earth 2 Superman, Dr. Fate, Power Girl, Earth 2 Flash, etc. A bunch of really cool heroes all teaming up.

But the stories seem a little flat. I think in part because the opposition is a little underdeveloped. There is an element of danger, mystical spirits assaulting the world, bad guys with time machines, etc. But it doesn't help that the stories tend to resolve themselves pretty quickly, and the characters don't really change over time.

It's an awkward mix of strife and quick resolution, making the world seem flat. And characters aren't allowed to really be emotionally true to themselves. A lot of group talking scenes, making fighting all about bad guys and stuff (With the aforementioned quick endings). Also, limited recurring villains of actual interest.

I wish they would've explored core protagonists, like Dr. Fate and Power Girl and the Huntress, and showed their inner thinking, instead of the mobilized army they seem to be going for.

An interesting book for fans of the JSA, but a flawed one 4/5

[Bob Wolniak · Rating 3 out of 5]

This short-lived series most notably introduced the characters Power Girl and Huntress and revived the Golden Age JSA. When I was a little kid, I was a big Dr. Fate fan. So I was excited about reading this so many years later, at least initially. It's always good to see more Wally Wood art, and Joe Staton was more than adequate. But it was merely...ok. The on-again, off-again tension between characters from different eras wasn't developed very well (especially in short backup features for Adventure Comics), and I feel the JSA storylines became much stronger with continuity and interesting character development with All-Star Squadron and other revivals later on. The death of Earth-Two Batman (the cover teaser) was kind of anti-climactic for me.

[PJ Ebbrell · Rating 3 out of 5]

I bought the originals at the time, when I could find the issues, ah the joys of news-stand distribution. Part of the new wave at DC before the implosion hit. JSA always seemed a better team than JLA, not sure why, perhaps they were a more earth bound team? Still today find them more interesting than the new boys of the JLA.

The first half is a joy with some great work by Wally Wood and early Keith Giffen, unfortunately, with the introduction of Joe Stanton and Paul Levitz's scripts go off the boil, most notably when JSA is wrapped into Adventure comic.

[Sean Brennan · Rating 4 out of 5]

This volume was surprisingly good, Paul Levitz alongside Mike Grell were at this time the only writers at DC who were trying to move their comics away from the juvenile nonsense that categorised DC. Combining old heroes such as Doctor Fate, Flash et al with a number of youngsters such as Power Girl and The Huntress, this was a major step forward. Sutton's artwork was adequate to the task, but the star of the mag was undoubtably Levitz, who introduced multiple plot lines and trying to bring out the actual identities of the Heroes into the script.

[Greg Trosclair · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of my favorite teams during one of my favorite eras of the book. I can overlook mediocre Joe Staton artwork for the wonderful JSA stories presented here as well as the introductions of Power Girl and the Huntress to DCs ranks of heroes. It was also the last art from Wally Wood. His art will always be a favorite of mine and it was still very solid here at the end of his career.

Read this a second time and it is a wonderful collection. from the aforementioned art to Paul Levitz writing this is a classic. This book could fit in today and almost not miss a beat.

[Keith Davis · Rating 3 out of 5]

This JSA collection from the late 1970's features some fairly pedestrian stories by Gerry Conway and Paul Levitz which are livened up by art from Wally Wood and Joe Staton. Nobody could draw a superheroic jaw line like Joe Staton. Features the first appearances of Power Girl and Huntress. Worth the 20 dollar price for the scene where Superman smashes the Nazi bomber over Washington DC.

[Alan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Enjoyed this collection of 1970s stories from Earth-2. More detail here: http://eyesandearsblog.blogspot.com/2...

[Nico Meyering · Rating 4 out of 5]

The main issue against this volume is that all of Levitz's characters either sound alike or sound like hokey stereotypes.

[Kenny · Rating 4 out of 5]

Two words: Wally Wood!

[Greg D'Avis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Favorites of mine from childhood - still loads of fun.