DCU Comic Book Reviews

JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA #33

Welcome to Sundown Town, Chapter 6: Metathesiophobia

July 2009

Written by Dwayne McDuffie

Pencils by Rags Morales

Inks by John Dell

Cover by Ed Benes

Synopsis

Dr. Light finds herself sinking into the darkness created by the Shadow Thief and Starbreaker.  At Van Kull Prison, Zatanna attempts to cast a spell to locate Dr. Light.  It doesn’t work.  John Stewart, however, has an idea.  The team tracks down Hardware.  Meanwhile, Dr. Light emerges from the darkness in the Himalayas.  She searches for Starbreaker.  Meanwhile, Hardware locates Dr. Light and the team follows.  When they get there, Anansi contacts Vixen to provide help in the form of Paladin, a Batman-analogue from another dimension.  The team then searches for Dr. Light, but instead finds members of the Shadow Cabinet, beaten and unconscious.  Then, Firestorm finds Dr. Light.  And finds Icon fighting Starbreaker.  Icon, however, is having little success.  Starbreaker just killed Dharma, the one holding the universe together.

Review by Binkley (e-mail)

Almost from the beginning, McDuffie’s run has been marred by bigger events in the DC universe, forcing him to re-write and re-plot based on things happening in other stories.  I have always felt that if McDuffie were given a chance to write the book without interference, or without having to deal with the fallout of yet another crossover, we would be in for a treat.  this is the second issue in a row that McDuffie is on his own.  Well, to be honest, it doesn’t quite work.  This time, however, I think only McDuffie has himself to blame.  The biggest problem is the appearance of Anansi, a plot point that forces McDuffie to recap what happened in the story that Anansi first appeared.  I am not quite sure why McDuffie felt the need to add Anansi into the story, although I suspect it was just so he could get Batman into the story.  Whatever the reason, it felt a little forced and didn’t quite click.  As such, I think it took away from the ending, where we are supposed to see the Shadow Cabinet decimated, Icon fighting a losing battle, and Dharma dead.  Instead, those final pages get squeezed, all of occurring in pages that don’t get the impact across the way it should.  It detracts from the issue, which was chugging along rather nicely up to that point.  I liked the issue, up to that one point.  I especially liked the sequence with Hardware, it was a great way to introduce him a little bit more to the readers (although what is the deal with John Stewart’s bullying; that is not like him).  But, like most of McDuffie’s issues, it gets sidetracked by something else.  This time, McDuffie is the one to blame. 

Has it been established before that Zatanna needed to prepare spells?  I thought she could pretty much cast anything she wanted, provided she knew how to speak it backwards.  I suppose one could argue she would need to learn how to say a certain phrase backwards (it can’t be easy), but you would think after awhile she would have a certain knack for knowing what certain things sound like (personally, I know how to say “race car” backwards).  Anyway, it just seems a little weird for Zatanna to claim she needs to “prepare.” 

Metathesiophobia is the fear of change.  It is certainly not something you can say about DC or about the characters in this book. 

I am guessing that the cover was drawn before the decision was made to jettison Superman from the team.  Otherwise, why is he there?  For that reason, what about Black Canary, who is also on the cover, but not in the issue. 

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