I’ve been perusing the latest DC Comics solicitations (May 2009), and the unfinished cover to Justice League of America #33 caught my attention…
Notice anything familiar?
Two things I’ve gathered from this:
1. The JLA seem to go down WAY too easy, no matter who they battle.
2. It never hurts to assign an A-list talent to do your covers if your superhero team is a pretty big deal.
February 18th, 2009 at 6:02 pm
Funny, I had almost the same when I first saw the latest cover. “Again?” I thought. It struck me as very unoriginal for starters (5 similarly themed covers in 33 issues), then I pondered how often the team gets taken down, at least on the covers (don’t read the title regularly, so wouldn’t know if it truly reflects the contents). Doesn’t make the best and mightiest of the DCU look all that tough.
-r-
February 18th, 2009 at 6:03 pm
sorry, that should have read “I had almost the same thought when I first saw the latest cover.
-r-
February 18th, 2009 at 7:56 pm
the JLA are the sleepiest heroes ever!
February 18th, 2009 at 7:59 pm
I don’t know, the old “whole team lying defeated and unconscious” is as much a classic cover type as “peita ripoff” or “two teams coming at each other from either side”; it’s just such a standard that it doesn’t really bother me, especially in terms of such silly reasoning as “making the team look weak” or whatever.
February 18th, 2009 at 8:21 pm
To be fair, the #21 cover is Carlos Pacheco, and the “villains winning” idea fit in pretty thematically with Final Crisis, which it was preluding.
The rest are just lazy.
February 18th, 2009 at 9:14 pm
dudes, this type of cover has been going on for years. there’s a bunch of them even in the JLA’s ’90s reboot run.
February 18th, 2009 at 10:53 pm
There’s an old Legion issue with Mordru on the cover that looks just like this.
February 19th, 2009 at 7:38 am
Ed Benes is a particular offender lately. His trademark over the past few years has been the generic pinup or female bodies draped across the floor.
Which is a shame because his interiors can be good when he takes the time. He seems to get artist’s block on a monthly. Compare his interiors on the Meltzer JLA issues to what he’s done since McDuffie took over. Much lazier and far less exciting to look at.
February 19th, 2009 at 9:26 am
Thanks for that link, grifter! Reliving all of those old covers made me remember some awesome stories.
February 19th, 2009 at 10:01 am
Someone (Jim Shooter?) pointed out YEARS ago that on DC covers, the heroes are usually shown defeated (or in, er, repose). Marvel, not so much, at least back in the day.
February 20th, 2009 at 9:50 am
I’ve been saying it for years… For supposedly being the Big Guy of the DCU, Superman gets his ass beaten down more than any other hero. Often at the hands of (seemingly) inferior opponents, including other heroes (even Muhammad Ali). Or he’s stripped of his powers way too often and Kal-El apparently doesn’t know how to defend himself when that happens (how many times as Luthor beaten him up?). It’s why, while I love the character in theory, I rarely enjoy Superman books in their execution. Didn’t Krypto have to bail him out recently, while battling Atlas? Come on…
Oh, and it was the same thing in the animated Timm-verse shows too. I got really happy, in the final episode of JLU when Supes finally unleashed everything he had when he punched Darkseid. Cool moment, but it was ruined when Darkseid got back and proceeded to clobber Supes yet again, leaving it to LUTHOR to save the day? Sheesh…