Superman Homepage

Mild Mannered Reviews - JLA Comics

JLA #56

Scheduled to arrive in stores: August 1, 2001

Cover date: September 2001

Writer: Mark Waid
Penciller: Mike S. Miller
Inker: Dave Meikis

"The Harvest"

Reviewed by: John-Paul Zito (ZitoMan11@aol.com)

Over on the west coast a raging forest fire just stops dead in its tracks. Superman floats above the ash and soot left behind. He didn't stop the fire. Who, or what did? When Kal takes a closer look at the particles in the air he finds a new alien particle attaching itself to oxygen making it impossible to start combustion.

Meanwhile over in Russia, Wonder Woman, Flash and Plastic Man are doing all they can to stop a mind controlled mob from attacking Green Lantern. GL has erected a giant force field to protect his team mates and the people of the city from a nearby nuclear explosion (See JLA #55). Suddenly whoever has control of the towns people who are trying to attack GL take control of GL himself. In a nanosecond Kyle fires a green energy bolt at Wonder Woman who is preoccupied. Flash catches a glimpse of this and heads out into the crowd to find those responsible for the mind control. When he does he tosses the responsible party in the path of GL's blast. The pair of mentalists responsible teleport away.

Soon Batman contacts Plastic Man to inform him that the JLA is now under submissive attack by the White Martians. Batman goes incommunicado and heads out to follow a lead on the White Martians out in Phoenix.

Superman then informs the rest of the team about the particle in the air around the world that is preventing combustion. As it turns out the particle is spreading and planes around the country are falling from the skies because their combustion engines are failing. Superman has employed the help of FireStorm to correct the problem on a molecular level.

Batman then manages to find the base of operations for the White Martian attack. Apparently the White Martians are kidnaping and stealing the brains of all of earth's latent Telepath's. Batman is soon found out and attacked by the White Martians. J'onn Jonzz comes to his rescue and helps Batman escape but J'onn is not so lucky.

The rest of the JLA has gathered near a peculiar machine. The machine is the one of many that is producing the particle that is making combustion impossible. As Superman lays out the game plan for the rest of his team he tells them "Watch your back." Big Blue should take his own advice.

Story - 3: Almost a four. But Batman's pursuit of the White Martians is too easy. He strings together a bunch of coincidental clues and knows that the Martians are hiding out in a skyscraper in Phoenix... too easy. Then when Batman is discovered he lights up a mini-torch to keep the enemy at bay. BUT why would the White Martians deprive the world of combustion and not think to do the same thing to their headquarters?

Art - 4: I really really like Miller. Every panel has a dynamic urgency about it. He's got great pacing and this is just another well done book for him to add to his list. I just think he should have drawn J'onn in his Martian form... for effect.

Cover Art - 4: Well drawn and it displays J'onn's guilt over his role in accidentally freeing the White Martians. I think it would have been cooler to do a cover showing J'onn tied up and drooling like he is in the book, but that doesn't take away from how well drawn it is.

Other recent reviews: