Justice League of America #5

They want you to think Catwoman is in this casket. But I bet Stargirl is!

When this comic book was announced, wasn't it supposed to be a big deal that David Finch was doing it? What did he last? Three issues? Not that I care. Fuck David Finch. He may have won some of you over with his "awesome art" but he hasn't fooled me! If you like to do the arts, Mr. Finch, do the fucking arts. Don't just spend all day making sure the women look good and then put some crosshatching and fish lips on the males and call it good. I'm pretty sure when you were doing The Dark Knight, Mr. Finch, the only part of your drawing you put any effort into was when drawing the White Rabbit. Then you slopped out a Bruce Wayne and an Alfred and a Commissioner Gordon until you could draw the White Rabbit's ass again.

I wonder when the White Rabbit will return? She was such an important part of that first Dark Knight story! Not as important, of course, as Deathstroke loaded up on Venom dropping out of the sky and onto the Batplane to punch Batman in the face for a bit before disappearing from the comic book forever. Jeez, that story was awful.

These humans need to stop being so disrespectful to B'dg. I can't wait until the humans meet a race of aliens whose shit looks exactly like homo-sapiens so that the aliens will keep referring to them as feces.

Baz and B'dg are touring Justice League of America Headquarters when Doctor Light's coin explodes. This causes the Green Lantern's energy to be sucked into Doctor Light's body. Just like in Catwoman #21, it's another person whose random superpower just happens to fit with the person's name! What are the odds that a doctor by the name of Light should suddenly have the power to manipulate light? It's crazy! It's such a crazy coincidence that it can hardly be called a coincidence at all! I see the Will of God in this! Or the Will of Geoff Johns, at the least. Or perhaps just stupid random chance at the very leastest.

I just stole that last paragraph from my Catwoman #21 commentary and changed it slightly. Exactly how I did reports in Junior High and exactly how Scott Lobdell plagiarizes his own scripts!

Over in the most opposite place in the world than ARGUS Headquarters, people are riding Space Mountain. But that has nothing to do with what's going on in THE MANOR which is the super secret headquarters of the super secret society of super secret super villains. Their pale purple leader wants Signalman and Copperhead to prepare Catwoman's corpse for delivery to Batman's Batcave. But Signalman is getting cold feet and, being Signalman, he knows that's a signal for being afraid to continue on the current path he's on. To be fair, most people get cold feet when they think of playing a prank on Batman and this prank is pretty messed up. But Copperhead tells him to HISSSS HISSSS HISSS HISSS. But before they can do as Copperhead suggests, Catwoman's blood begins roiling back into her head and her eyes glow red and she says, "I have heard enough."

What the hell? Is Catwoman really Metamorpho?!

Oh no. It's the shapechanger without a sense of humor.

I wonder if it's difficult to shapechange blood gushing out of a bullet wound to your head? J'onn had me fooled! Although now I feel a bit weird having masturbated to Catwoman being shot in the head last issue. I mean, gross. She was really a guy!

You know, I never promised I'd always make tasteful jokes! Besides, that joke passes muster because the butt of the joke are people who wouldn't have a problem sexualizing a woman being shot in the head but would completely freak out when they found out that the woman wasn't born with female genitalia! It's okay to make those people the butt of a joke on Tumblr, right? Can't we point out the stupidity of even that 0.00004% of the population? Or was I engaging in Fetish Shaming? Maybe I should just keep reading the story instead of pointing out that I'd fuck J'onn J'onzz no matter what shape he was currently in. Mostly because he'd have Oreos. I'll do anything for Oreos.

When and how Martian Manhunter and Catwoman made the switcheroo will be described in this month's back-up story, so don't think I'm just passing up the explanation for it.

And before I continue with the Justice League of America's assault on THE MANOR, I have to wonder why The Secret Society of Super Villains wants to destroy the Justice League? I guess they figure if the Justice League is out of the way, they'll be able to bully the world into doing whatever they want to do. But don't they realize that the Justice League is only composed of nine of Earth's heroes (maybe more or less if my calculator is broken)? They'd still have all the others to contend with? The Pale Purple Man believes that they'll get dozens of recruits based on their destruction of the Justice League, so maybe that's how they figure they'll deal with the other heroes. It just seems kind of stupid. Signalman was right to be worried about "kicking the hornet's nest." If I were a Super Villain, I'd just try to find a nice out of the way city in Canada and rob a bank or two and then go into hiding. I may have even already done that.

Is this The Joker's Daughter mentioned in that stupid Channel 52 that I really shouldn't be reading because it's full of spoilers? Also, I probably shouldn't put any of my thoughts or speculations into the form of a question because invariably some reader thinks I really want to know the answer before I learn the answer by reading the fucking comic book the way you're meant to learn the fucking Goddamn fucking answer. There's a reason I don't read solicits or Comic Book News Blogs or even follow any Tumblr Blogs that are heavily about comic books. Here's a good hint to posting in Disqus: If you want to speculate on things based on the comics that are out, please! Go ahead! If you want to tell me who the character is at the end of Batman Loves Superman #1 because you saw it on DC's website or read it in a solicit, hold your tongue. You're not allowed to speculate once you know through other means.

I know doing this comic book blog is going to cause me to get spoilers from DC fans who are just trying to engage and enjoy the comics as well. I'm not really pissed but I thought I would put it out there as to how I'm reading The New 52 and how I'd like people to respect that aspect of it. What good is reading my stupid speculations if I already know what's going to happen, right? No fun for anybody. Although now that I state it so soundly, I have a feeling I'm going to get people dropping a lot of fucking spoilers just to be jerks funny.

Please don't.

Oh yeah, back to that panel up there! Who's moving THE MANOR? I have no idea. The best I can come up with, and believe me, it isn't any good, is Bolt! Because he teleports! I'm sure it's a magical guy though. Like Doctor Magic. Or Mister Spells. Or Madame Zeroni.

The Shaggy Man is still having trouble with Hawkman but you know Hawkman is about to lose when he asks the stupidest question that is always asked by the current loser of a fight.

"That's the worst you can dish out?"

Is it arrogance that makes them ask that? Because the answer is almost always, "Nope. Got some more here for you." In this case, The Shaggy Man gets some back-up from Ivo's Aquaman, Flash, Cyborg, and Green Lantern robots. But then Stargirl finally shows her soon-to-be-dead face and disables the robots with one swing of her Cosmic Staff. Although for some reason, Hawkman doesn't ask her to disable The Shaggy Man as well. He wants to just keep fighting it, I guess.

The New 52 Shaggy Man must not be as powerful as the Preboot Shaggy Man.

As you can see, Professor Ivo gets taken down by Green Arrow because that's pretty much the only guy in THE MANOR that can be taken out by arrows. Star Girl frees the rest of the gang and then I suddenly know how Star Girl dies! Amanda Waller kills her for disobeying orders!

Fighting in the other room, Catwoman knocks the hat off of the Pale Purple Leader and he's developed male pattern baldness, so it might not be The Joker's Daughter. But he uses an electric joy buzzer to shock the hell out of Catwoman so maybe it is because that's kind of a joke! Although it might also be The Puzzler because his name is a secret and my Who's Who lists The Puzzler's alias as Unknown! J'onn tries to read him as Green Arrow finds out how THE MANOR shifts locales and Stargirl tries to bring down The Shaggy Man. See it all for yourself!

It's a White Martian! Or someone from another Earth, maybe.

The Pale Purple Leader activates Chronos and THE MANOR freezes in time as the Earth rotates under it. And moves through space away from it! I guess that part doesn't happen though for some reason. Only people with a Magic Coin travel with the house, so The Secret Society of Super Villains escape. And nobody seems to be dead to be shoved in the coffin on the cover! Maybe I was right! Amanda Waller IS going to kill Stargirl!

Also, as THE MANOR phases away, The Pale Purple Leader says, "It was good to see you again, J'onn." So yeah. He's maybe a White Martian or he has ties to Stormwatch which I doubt because Stormwatch is all Magentafied right now.

The JLA rescue Chronos who was apparently an agent of ARGUS trying to locate Booster Gold. And they capture Professor Ivo. But Amanda Waller still wants to disband the team. I bet she wants her team filled with heroes whose comic books sell well!

Oh yeah! I forgot Puzzler was an ARGUS Agent! Whoops!

Oh no! Trinity War time!

The issue ends with nobody dying. But Doctor Light is all, "Help me! Oh my God! What happened to my penis?!"

The back-up issue is about Martian Manhunter heading to Earth to get revenge on the creature that killed the Martians with his infected thoughts. It's name is Thoth. Martian Manhunter kills it and it's spirit wanders off to find another body to infect. I guess it found a Pale Purple Man who is obsessed with proving himself to The Joker.

Justice League of America #5 Rating: No change. The cover shows a coffin and nobody dies. Was it supposed to be symbolic of the death of the Justice League of America which Amanda pretended to want to end? Or is it foreshadowing Stargirl's death in Trinity of Sin: Pandora #1? I don't even think Stargirl is going to die! I think it's going to be Steve Trevor.