As much as we love Geoff Johns, Dale Eaglesham, and JSA; we all gotta admit it’s great to finally see this storyline ending. After it took, what felt like 5 years to write, we can finally sit back and remember the good old days of JSA. I must admit that my reviews/comments for this collected issues always stated that this arc moved at a very slow pace and it was very frustrating. I guess what comes with being a comic fan is to be so impatient that even one slow issue in an arc will send us to a frenzy. But let’s not forget friends that not only did this story take 16 regular issues to complete, but you also gotta add 3 one-shots to the mix as well. It certainly feels epic and I dont mind when a story is almost 2 years long.

But as I mentioned earlier, this draaaaaaggggggssss on and on and on. There is so much going on here that it took Johns forever to complete. Now all the stuff with Gog is great, that’s the stuff I like. Him just standing there looking all creepy, or turning people into trees; that’s all gold. But the stuff with Power-Girl and Earth 2….ugh….just, man that felt really unnessicary to write. Maybe it’s just cause I am not a Power Girl fan but I just didnt care where that storyline was going. Plus you gotta add in the fact of the multiverse with this as well; it just becomes a clusterfuck. Back to the real story at hand though; I love every minute of it. Whether again it’s Gog doing whatever, to the JSA members clashing, to anything Starman related I like. It might move at a sloth’s pace but Johns makes the plot interesting to move on. Plus let’s not forget the best ending you’ll see in a comic this year, but more on that when I get to the art.

There is also the 3 one-shots collected in here. One is the ‘Kingdom Come’ Superman written and drawn by Alex Ross. That’s all gravy, art is perfect and Ross is a compatent enough writer to make the story interesting. The next is a ‘Magog’ origin (per say) by Tomasi. It was okay….I think the problem is that it would’ve been better to tell the origin for this guy when he was actually introduced. Cause to be honest, Magog didnt really have that big of an impact in the long run. Finally we got ‘The Kingdom’ by Geoff Johns….which is just another issue of JSA. I agree with Ron and Josh on this; as this was an argument on the podcast so long ago, there was no reason not to make this a regular issue. Considering how long the plot was moving anyways, making it one more issue wouldnt have made any difference. But it’s still a good one-shot, or regular issue.

The art for the main story was very….well….medicore at points. You know why? Cause Jerry ‘I need to retire’ Ordway was on task to do the Earth-2 parts of the story. Mixing his art with Eaglesham just doesnt work; their anatomies for characters are different and they use different inkers so the pages look incosistent around the board. But the stuff with Eaglesham is great to look at and I wish he could’ve sticked with the final arc of Johns in JSA….and not with Ordway. But let’s not forget the man, the myth, the legend: Alex Ross. Probably some of the best work he’s ever done in his career. Yes he whores himself out a bit with covers…but all is forgiven once we get to the final sequence of this story. Conor explained it so much in his POTW review for #22; but him doing a retrospective of Kingdom Come and then going into the future of those characters….I literally shed a tear when we got to the final, and (should be) iconic last panel. Fantastic work by Ross.

So after 10 years, 1000 issues, and a huge plotline later….this arc is over. It’s a little weird to be honest cause ever since I got back into comics, Geoff Johns have always been there on JSA. It’s gonna be a different world out there when he finishes his run on the title. But we still have a pretty good story here collected in four volumes. It does drag at some points, and the art is a bit meh at times….But Johns did a fantastic job finishing the legacy of the ‘Kingdom Come’ universe and give a whole reason why the JSA should exist in the first place.