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Mild Mannered Reviews - JLA Comics

Justice League Elite #2

Scheduled to arrive in stores: August 4, 2004

Cover date: October 2004

Writer: Joe Kelly
Penciller: Doug Mahnke
Inker: Tom Nguyen

"Candle in a Hurricane"

Reviewed by: John-Paul Zito

Sister Superior remains undercover in the guise of Slade in an effort to uncover the true mission statement of the Blood Brothers. On a mission to Changsha she meets the Blood Brother's newest ally, Wolfwood. They are in Changsha to assassinate a meta-terrorist. As it turns out the Blood Brothers are a long distant cousin of the CIA with goals in keeping with America's safety no matter the extreme measures they must take.

Meanwhile the rest of the JLE team prepares to back Sister Superior in the field. They suit up in black leather costumes and climb aboard a magic ferret conjured up by Manitou. As the JLE leave for their undercover mission Green Arrow remains behind with Manitou's wife where they get to know one another better.

Back in Changsha Wolfwood has grown suspicious of Sister Superior in disguise and attacks in his werewolf state...

To Be Continued...

Story - 4: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly...

First the good. Character interaction and exploration is up this issue. The conversations taking place between action beats are fantastic, they never come off as contrived or forced. Major Disaster is getting star treatment and there are some of the most intriguing set ups here. His confrontations with Al-Sheik and his blue collar approach to heroics is a great take on the reformed villain premise as opposed to the melodrama that usually surrounds such characters when they switch sides. I'm also curious to see where the Green Arrow/Dawn flirting is headed... Kelly started a similar subpolt in JLA with Dawn and Firestorm that never had the chance to materialize.

The Bad. The Blood Brother's are an offshoot of the CIA? Seems phoned in. I expected a little more from the high concepts promised in this book. I hope the Blood Brothers are only the prelude to a bigger villainous threat looming around the corner.

The Ugly. A giant magic Ferret?

Art - 4: A solid effort by Mahnke once again. A lot of talking heads and dialogue-heavy pages tripped up his usually kinetic feel. He breaks up the pacing nicely between the fight scenes and exposition moments though and that was enough to keep me interested.

Cover Art - 3: I like the stuff going on in the backgrounds. The four quarters of the page broken up works nicely, like a movie poster. I think something more dramatic could have been down with the Green Lantern quarter but it still works. What I don't like is Sister Superior breaking up the page with a word bubble. It takes away from the overall atmosphere the backgrounds produce.