JLA: That Was Now, This Is Then

It’s an indication of how long I’ve been reading comic books that creators such as Roger Stern and John Byrne are considered old-timers in the business (and rightly so), while unless I stop and think about it, they seem like relative newcomers to me.

The new trade paperback JLA: THAT WAS NOW, THIS IS THEN, which reprints a five-issue story arc from the comic JLA CLASSIFIED, is definitely a little old-fashioned in its story (by Stern) and its art (by Byrne) – and that suits me just fine. It centers around some of the core characters in the DC Universe – Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, The Flash, Green Lantern, Green Arrow, Martian Manhunter, Aquaman, and Black Canary – battling in both the past and the present against a super-villain who’s new to me, the alien strongman called Titus. Because of the flashbacks involved in the story, we get to see old favorites Barry Allen and Hal Jordan in action as The Flash and Green Lantern, respectively. Call me a curmudgeon if you will, but I’ve never really warmed up to the newer incarnations of those characters, although I don’t mind Wally West being the current Flash all that much. This is a straightforward super-hero vs. super-villain battle story (what we used to call a slugfest in earlier days), and I thoroughly enjoyed it. As I’ve mentioned before, I’m a big fan of the classic Justice League of America, and if you are, too, I think there’s a good chance you’d like this yarn a lot.