The ‘Trinity War’ kicks off in massive fashion this month.
Written by Geoff Johns
Art by Ivan Reis, Joe Prado, Oclair Albert and Rob Reis
Purchase issue #22 and the rest of The New 52 JL @ Comixology.
Beware of spoilers!The ‘Trinity War’ has arrived! Covering eleven issues of Justice League, Justice Leave of America, Justice League Dark, Constantine, Trinity of Sin: Pandora and Trinity of Sin: The Phantom Stranger the story focusses on all out war between the three leagues.
The plans were laid at the beginning of The New 52 with Pandora appearing in all the issue #1s and many of the stories and over arching plot points across all series have led up to this confrontation.
Issue #22 of Justice League is by no means a brief, simple introduction to the premise. The plot focuses on the A-list JL reacting to the newly discovered Shazam’s decision to fly Black Adam’s ashes to Kahndaq and from there snowballs in to the beginning of an all out battle for supremacy.
Geoff Johns has long been hailed a hero to the DC Universe having worked his way to Chief Creative Officer whilst writing for DC TV shows Smallvile and most recently Arrow whilst also being the principal writer of the DC Universe Online video game.
Here he shows off the reasons he has become so successful by pulling together story strings from all across the DC Universe to create a story that leaves no character untouched. By the end of the issue all of the major players have been introduced and there’s a clear understanding that this conflict is unstoppable.
The only thing missing here is Justice League Dark whose characters, despite being lauded as major players in the conflict, are strangely absent from this story.
As for the rest of the main cast… most are given a moment to take centre stage and make sure that their voices are heard. The biggest problem with this kind of cross-title event is multiple writers can take over characters depending on which title you are reading but Johns knows those voices better than anybody else. This event will be introducing more casual readers to certain characters within the DC Universe so it’s only right that they be handled well.
The artwork is here is A+ material ranging from dark and hopeless glimpses of a post-war future to an amazing splash page of Superman completely losing it in a way that Man of Steel fans will find a de ja vu. I found it a neat little throw in that when Shazam makes an appearance the artwork adjusts itself slightly to match the visuals of his back-up story that has accompanied so many recent JL issues.
If you aren’t already reading Justice League then I highly recommend that now is the time to start!
9/10
