Justice League Dark #12

Is Dr. Mist on their side again? He's so temperamental.

Faust escaped with the map to the Books of Magic last issue. But Constantine got a look at the map before it happened. I expect the next few issues to be like those episodes of G.I. Joe when the Joes and Cobra were all running around trying to beat each other to the pieces of the deadly weather machine. Those were some exciting after school television watching sessions!

The first page of this issue goes over Dr. Mist's New 52 origin. His centuries old rivalry with Felix Faust is a thing of the past. Instead, he was merely a doctor in a war torn African country. When his wife was killed in the conflict, he turned to magic to try to bring her back. But nothing would work. And then Felix Faust approached him and told him of the Books of Magic. With Mist's reputation, he was able to infiltrate ARGUS and steal the key to open the tesseract to find the log which housed the frog who ate the Books of Magic at the bottom of some unknown interdimensional planescape.

Of course he had to betray the good guys and side with a right evil bastard to do this. Which seems like a bad decision since he's more than likely not going to get a chance at the Books if he's traveling with Faust. If he's just stuck with the others once they got the Tesseract, I'm sure John would have helped him out with his wife.

John noticed the Books were in Slaughter Swamp just outside of Gotham City. That's where Jonah Hex, Amadeus Arkham, and Tallulah Black were held captive by the Crime Bible Cult! It's also where Dr. Thirteen's Haunted Highwayman was living. But Zatanna tracks Faust and Mist's portal to find that they headed back to Peru. So Justice League Dark is going to split up! Basically that means one of them is going to get a chainsaw in the midsection, especially if two people in one of the groups ends up fucking in a sleeping bag. And that could happen to either team since Black Orchid heads off with John Constantine while Deadman heads off with Zatanna. I guess Deadman can't fuck anybody, sleeping bag or not. But Black Orchid hates Constantine so much that the chemistry is electric!

Meanwhile, Xanadu learns from Timothy Hunter how he gave up his magic.

Depending on who ends up with this magic, it could be really interesting or hardly worth mentioning. I hope Cheeks the Toy Wonder got the magic!

Waiting for Faust and Mist is a man working with them to recover the Books. He smokes like Constantine and has a dragon tattoo life Constantine. But he remains in the shadows and I have no clue who he might be. Unless he's somehow Constantine!

I remember in Hellblazer way back when, Constantine had sort of a sidekick. Really just a friend who did stuff with him and got into trouble. I don't remember his name or what happened to him (probably killed!) but what if he got Tim's magic and this is him? A new rival for John?

The mystery man sends Faust to deal with Xanadu in London while he waits with Mist for Zatanna and Deadman to arrive. Dr. Mist also informs the mystery man that Constantine controls the House of Mystery which brings up an interesting question. When they visited the House, Constantine said that he could return any of them to the House now that he brought them to it. Can he now call back Dr. Mist? What about Abnegezer, Rath, and Ghast?

Black Orchid and Constantine are currently traveling to Slaughter Swamp in the House of Mystery.

I knew Orchid was magical in nature. But I thought they were changing that up for The New 52. I guess not!

Black Orchid wonders why John doesn't try to get back together with Zatanna since they have a history. And John explains that probably won't happening seeing as how the death of her father, Zatarra, was his fault. Plus he lies about everything. And he's always involved with demons. And the apocalypse follows him around like a lost puppy.

Black Orchid and John arrive in Slaughter Swamp and begin to explore. It isn't long before they don't find what they're looking for. Instead, they find this guy:

And in Peru, Zatanna and Deadman meet up with the foresty version of this guy, Blackbriar Thorn!

Meanwhile, the mystery man is checking looking into some real estate. He's got an eye on the House of Secrets. Dr. Occult seems to be the current owner of the House of Secrets. So the mystery man negotiates a deal to secure the house from him.

Dr. Occult should have waited for a better offer.

Justice League Dark #12 Rating: +1 Ranking. Since Issue #13 won't be out until October, I would have liked for the mystery man to be revealed at the end of this one. I think it would have given more tension for the fans to see who the enemy was and then have to wait two months for any kind of resolution. Now the fans have to wait two months while they forget what was going on and then the reveal will happen and they'll scratch their heads and have to dig out this issue from the box to figure out why it was such a surprise. Anyway, I'm glad to see the House of Secrets! I hope the Houses fight!
Oh yeah. And someone didn't give the cover artist the notes that Dr. Mist betrayed the group and is no longer fighting for them. Plus, the whole living jungle thing didn't really happen. It sort of got a prologue and a hint that it was about to happen. But nothing so far.