Well the first arc of the new 52 Justice League ended more with a whimper than a scream. I was hoping that maybe the uninspired work that was present on the first six issues would disappear since Jim Lee and Scott Williams were taking a breather. It seems like everytime Lee has signed on to do a run of a DC book I have always been underwhelmed (sorry, I may be in the minority but both Batman and Superman runs were stale and kind of unimpressive to me for the most part) With Gene Ha on board for art, and Geoff Johns still scripting I was hoping for a shot in the arm for the book.

It was more like a shot to the head.

While nice to look at, the main story isn’t grabbing me like I hoped it would. Johns shows he has a lot of knowledge and love for the old DC universe, but thanks to his ruthless annihilation of the DCU with Flashpoint, that universe is no more. Now we get Superman in an ugly costume, younger looking more hip core characters and a sense of “what the hell is going on here” headscratching that is spreading thru the books like wildfire. This book continues to swing up and down in quality and the entertainment value is on life support.
There are a couple of good scenes here and there, and Cyborg gets a moment to shine, but over all the series continues it’s slide to oblivion.
The Shazam backup by Johns and Gary Frank was very good though. I don’t know how I am going to handle a “darker/gritier” Shazam in my future, but it was the only thing I was excited about after reading this book.