Justice League #21

His form on that Sleeper Hold is all wrong.

I guess it doesn't matter what the Justice League was up to last month since they're being preempted by Shazam. But what was he up to last month? Oh yeah! Getting killed by Black Adam!

Since this main story is usually the back-up feature and I usually keep my comments short on the back-up feature, I guess I'll keep this commentary really short!

First off, the Seven Deadly Sins are running rampant in Philadelphia. So what else is new?

The green guy must be lust because he has so many hands with which to masturbate.

How come only one of the Seven Deadly Sins is female? Gluttony is probably female as well. Lust might be female although it looks like Lust has a mustache. It's an interesting take on Lust to show him in a straight jacket as opposed to sucking off eighteen of his own twenty dicks. He's only sucking eighteen of them because the other two are penetrating two of his five vaginas. I'm pretty sure that's the classic way of illustrating Lust.

The Seven Deadly Sins are off to find the Bryer brother's father because they've been sent to find the most rotten soul in Philadelphia. And since that person needs to be somebody we already saw earlier in the story (okay, okay. It doesn't NEED to be but we all know how stories work, right?!), it's probably that dickbag. They leave Doctor Sivana behind, bloated and gassy from consuming too much magic.

Much more quickly than I expected (like the next page practically!), The Seven Deadly Sins enter into Bryer through his seven orifices and he becomes a monstrous, flaming devil with a pentagram burned onto his chest. I guess now he's going to trash the city by stealing, raping, beating, eating, and envying everything really, really slowly. And he'll be damn proud about his job!

Black Adam threatens to kill Freddy if Shazam doesn't release his power to Black Adam much the way Black Adam's nephew many, many years ago shared his power with Adam. It's the only way Shazam can save his family. Or is it? Being that he can share his power, seems pretty obvious what's going to happen next.

Oh! I thought he was going to just give up his power and go home.

Next up is the big fight scene where Pedro learns he can magically grow a beard and Mary learns she might need a bigger bra and Eugene learns the secret language of machines and Freddie learns he's Thor and Darla learns she has ADHD (unless she already knew that). I think that's everything they learn before Mary and Billy punch Black Adam into a probably famous Philadelphia landmark that I don't recognize.

Now that Billy has all of this firepower at his side, he tells them to go away while he takes care of Black Adam all by himself. The others decide to help evacuate everybody from the path of Mr. Bryer. But Mary decides to fight Bryer because she's the second most important Shazam there is!

Billy's fight with Black Adam leads them to the zoo because Tawny the Tiger needs a dose of Shazamamillin too.

I'm a bit disappointed that on the following page, Black Adam is merely being attacked by a gigantic, sparking tiger instead of a goofy cartoon cereal mascot with a cape.

Billy seems to have fucked up his spells after blasting Tawny and the entire Marvel Family begins to feel weaker. I knew his spell should have turned Tawny into a cartoon tiger! Now everybody is going to lose their powers and Bryer is going to raze Philadelphia and the rest of the world isn't even going to fucking notice a difference.

Billy realizes he can't beat Black Adam because Billy is too new to the magic game while Black Adam is a total dick. I don't know. Those two things seemed comparative enough for that sentence when I began it. Billy says the magic word and returns to his normal, childlike self just as, further off in the city, his brothers and sisters change back too. He then challenges Black Adam to a fair fight. In Billy's case, it doesn't bother me because what the fuck advantage does Billy have one way or the other. But usually when someone accuses somebody else of not fighting fair, it usually means that they want the fight to be unfair in their advantage. Nobody wants a level playing field. You're supposed to use every advantage you have. So when someone says, "Fight fair," what they're really saying is "Get rid of your advantage so that I can have the advantage!" Black Adam is almost smart enough to not fall for it but he's just too arrogant. Who wouldn't believe they can kick a young boy's ass even without magic? I'm pretty certain I could! Black Adam sees no way Billy could have the advantage in a "fair fight" so he says SHAZAM and reverts to normal.

Apparently Billy's winning advantage was youth.

Billy changes back and The Seven Deadly Sins are free to go on their own way now that Black Adam is dead and dusted. And everybody lives happily ever after because the school was destroyed in the fight. Everybody except Doctor Sivana who seems disappointed but I'm sure he'll get over it when he realizes he can become a super magical mad scientist and find a best friend in a worm.

Eee! Tess Ate Chai Tea's Believe It or Not!: I wrote the last sentence of the previous paragraph before reading this page. I didn't even think they'd introduce Mr. Mind in this story.

Justice League #21 Rating: +1 Ranking. It didn't have any Justice League in it but it was a good ending to the Shazam story. Especially the part about Shazam screwing up the spell on Tawny because that means to get the spell right, Tawny has to turn into a silly anthropomorphic talking tiger! So that's something to look forward to if you're a fan of whimsical shit in comic books. Where else does whimsical shit go best? Keith Giffen agrees with me: "Actually, do we really need another dire, depressing, grim comic book in a market already saturated with the like? C'mon. Lighten up. These books are supposed to be fun." That was about Larfleeze but it's what I keep saying! Let's have more silly, fun shit! Comic book reviewers need to stop wishing for "serious" and "edgy" and "arty" in their fucking comic books. All that gets you is dead superheroes. Let's all take a step away from the ledge and enjoy this shit. There are other ways to prove you are intelligent than by panning humorous stories because they didn't engage your super smart mental acumens and shits.

Anyway, Happy Shazam Is Over Day!