Justice League #36

The secret is that it steals super powers from those with super powers and gives those super powers to people without super powers. So a whole lot of infected people are probably going to be seriously disappointed when they realize they can merely speak with fish.

I don't really know what the secret of the Amazo Virus is. But I have to figure it has something to do with Amazo's powers since it was named after him, right? That's the smart guess! The dumb guess would be to think it caused everybody to say that everything was "Amazing!" Actually, I think that virus is already loose on the world.

Last issue, the Amazo Virus was breached and Lex Luthor's warning computer said, "The infection begins now." Or something like that. That's a pretty dramatic warning to program into your security system. Instead of something like, "Risk of Infection now approaching 100%," or something more scientific, the computer simply acts like a stage production of "You're All About To Die" is just beginning.

This issue begins twenty-four hours after the Amazo Virus was set loose in Metropolis. Metropolis is mostly deserted except for a few sick looters. Biohazard Batman and Superman have been tasked with rounding up the infected and putting them in quarantine.

Symptoms of the Amazo Virus are random super powers. So it's like Bloodlines! Or the Terrigen Mist! Or any of the other various bombs, blasts, or airborne illnesses that have turned normal people into super heroes in the past.

Now that normal humans are receiving super powers, the Justice League and other super heroes feel threatened. So they have to quarantine everyone and figure out how to cure them of their super powers because you can't have just anybody gaining super powers. I mean, that's generally how it works. But you can't allow lots and lots and lots of people to gain super powers all at the same time. So the Justice League will probably tell them that they're going to die if they don't take the cure. You know, just so it doesn't seem like the Justice League is being petty and acting like selfish assholes.

Most of the rest of the Justice League have been infected and are dying. Batman seems to think finding Patient Zero is their best effort at curing the virus. Why? I don't know! Isn't that always the way? At least it gives Batman and Superman something to do. Lex Luthor (who, like Batman, was at the center of the exposure and is not infected) is taking care of the sick league members. Wonder Woman is hanging around with him casually threatening him to help her friends. She's immune to the virus because she's a demi-god.

Wait. If the virus wasn't airborne to begin with, did Patient Zero run up into the lab and snort it up his sinus cavity? Inject it into his veins? Dip his herpes-sores covered penis into it?

Maybe Patient Zero is Bizarro! I can see Bizarro doing one of those weird things to the disease. Maybe he ingested it all to try to save Metropolis but then it infected him and then mutated to be airborne. Then he flew around farting Amazo Virus into everybody's faces.

Turns out Neutron was trying to kill Lex Luthor for reasons that will be familiar to all comic book fans: somebody put out a generalized hit on Lex Luthor, payment going to the first super villain that succeeds. The next person in line is some guy named Bullet.

And then Superman and Batman find Patient Zero.

Jimmy? Jimmy Olsen?

Justice League #36 Rating: This is like the worst episode ever of House! A container full of a non-airborne virus is punctured which somehow infects one single person. Then while the virus is inside that single person, it just happens to mutate and become airborne! And from that one person, the contagion spreads across an entire city in less than 24 hours and has somehow moved on to other cities even though Lex and Bruce knew exactly what was happening immediately and got the authorities to stop all travel into and out of the city. So am I supposed to believe that Patient Zero (who I'm just going to assume was Jimmy Olsen) somehow got the virus into an open cut on his body while being nowhere near the breached container. Then he instantly became sick without knowing it and started coughing in everybody's faces? Obviously Patient One must be Lois Lane then because she's the only person that will talk to him. Maybe I just don't know what I'm talking about and it really all makes complete sense! It's not like I know anything about medicine except what I've seen in old reruns of Trapper John, MD. Oh, and House!