Justice League International #10 (1988)

This cover looks like somebody has just tossed a handful of their action figures across the room.

Don't look at Arisia's titties on that cover because those are underage titties, you pervert. At least I think they are. Maybe they became older after Crisis on Infinite Earths. Or younger? Anyway, I guess if you're around fourteen, you can look at her titties. Unless it's okay to look at her titties if you're twenty-eight, according to her explanation why Hal should be able to fuck her because her planet takes twice as long to orbit its star. But she's still a teenager by her cultural standards so, well . . . I don't know! Remember how Deathstroke fucked a teenager?! What was wrong with DC?! Or is wrong with them! Because remember how Batman fucks Batgirl in The Killing Joke movie?!

That's probably enough about Arisia's tits. At least they distracted me from her tentative or sarcastic "Oh yay" pose and her Sean Astin looks.

Since the last issue, a lot has happened over in the pages of Millennium. But I don't know what that was because I don't know where my Millennium comic books are. Whatever events took place, they brought the Justice League International to a small rock orbiting a strange pink and blue planet, the homeworld of the Manhunters! They're all old and new members of the highest tier (aside from the Hawkpeople. Why bring the Hawkpeople into space? Are aliens particularly vulnerable to medieval melee weapons?).

He's probably wondering how his head remains on fire in space.

Firestorm takes off on his own and Superman is all, "I'll get him back! I always have to do everything. Especially in space. I sure miss being on Earth when we get The Flash to do everything because it seems so quick to all of us although, relatively, he still has to live through all the shit we make him do. I bet it's all so tedious for his super fast mind! Ha ha! What a jerk!" But Captain Atom reminds Superman that he has to remain behind and do all of the work for the others. So Captain Atom flies off to hunt down Firestorm. Hawkman is all, "Hey! Remember how the old days were better?!" Martian Manhunter responds, "I hate you." No, no. That was me. I responded to Hawkman like that. Sorry.

Whatever happens with Captain Atom and Firestorm takes place in Firestorm #68 which I definitely never purchased because I hated the idea of a grown ass man living inside the head of some teenager. That's almost as creepy as Hal Jordan fucking underage aliens.

I guess J'onn dislikes Hawkman as much as I do. While he didn't say what I said he said, he probably thought, "Hawkman sucks. Why is he here? On a space mission? Idiot." I wouldn't have been surprised if there had been a thought bubble containing that sentiment with little bubbles linking it to everybody's heads, even Hawkwoman's.

I should probably warn new readers now that I'll be discussing Arisia's titties more than the actual plot. But when I do, remember that it's not actually me making the comments but a fourteen year old character I created for this review. He's a total horndog who loves fourteen year olds' boobies. Eventually, he'll grow into an old man who still loves them and frankly I find that disgusting. But he's supposed to be disgusting because I wrote him that way and didn't base him on personal experience.

Also, Arisia is a fictional character. Calm the fuck down.

Forget Arisia's boobies. The real star of this issue is Martian Manhunter's disdain for Hawkman.

Arisia asks Dr. Fate why they can't destroy all the Manhunters with a wave of their magic wand and I find the question rude and distasteful. Why can't she get rid of the Manhunters with a wave of her magic ring?! Yeah, because it doesn't work like that, right? I mean, unless the particular writer of the particular story feels the particular moment is particularly right for it. But at this time, it's not! Doctor Fate isn't as powerful as they used to be when they were a he. It probably had something to do with Crisis on Infinite Earths. Whenever I'm speculating on DC Comics history from the eighties, I always just assume Crisis was the cause.

When the Justice League heads to the surface of the Manhunter Homeworld, they discover everything is yellow, even the particulates in the air. That means, in 1988, the Green Lanterns were useless on this planet. "More useless than Doctor Fate," as it turns out. That's pretty fucking useless judging by Doctor Fate's monthly comic book sales.

Superman recognizes a man-made planet when he sees one and digs down beneath the surface and into the inner workings of the clockwork planet. J'onn and Arisia are all, "What style! What panache! Bravo!" But Hawkman is all:

To be fair to Hawkman (for once in my life), Mr. Rogers was pretty theatrical. I mean, he took off his cardigan and shoes when he got home only to put on a different cardigan and different shoes!

Martian Manhunter lays down the Manhunting logic once Superman realizes the planet is a clockwork: "The whole planet is a machine! It makes sense—a machine race would come from a machine world!" It's the Martian version of "I was just about to suggest that!"

It's a good thing Twitter didn't exist in '88 or the account "Arisia's Tits" would have tweeted out this great idea to thousands of supervillains (who follow her for her witty takes on breakfast foods and not her top-down angled pics while wearing low cut Green Lantern uniforms).

Hawkman has another line of dialogue which means he pisses off yet another one of his group: Katma Tui. Hawkman is like the one conservative friend who hangs out with the liberal group who doesn't realize everybody despises him because of his shitty attitude and uncompassionate philosophy and the amount of times he laughs at people with disabilities. But everybody sort of likes having him hang around so they can be a little bit of a prick at times while still thinking, "At least I'm not as bad as Hawkman!"

There's not a trace of the Manhunters but G'nort shows up because the first rule of Giffen/DeMatteis Club is "G'nort rules." The second rule is "Guy Gardner must be a gigantic asshole." The third rule is "No rules parodying Fight Club." The first rule isn't a rule but it has the word "rules" in it so I think it still qualifies as a "rule."

Nowadays, people would respond to this panel with "Nice!" But I'm Gen X so I read it and think, "69 dude! *loads of guitar noises*".

Martian Manhunter asks, "Who is this mighty Green Lantern? I must get to know him and be polite and become friends with him!" But Hal Jordan is, and these are his exact words because he's a fucking asshole, "Idiot. The word you're looking for is idiot!" Fuck, dude. I can't believe I thought Hawkman was the prick on the team. I completely forgot about Hal.

Maybe it's assholes like Hal Jordan and Hawkman that people are thinking about when they say comics should return to the good old days. "Remember when heroes were also white male assholes? Oh, what a time to be alive!" Although that's pretty rich coming from me, a huge fan of Guy Gardner, the greatest white male asshole to ever white or male or asshole. I also loved Lobo, who was Latino.

This is like when you're playing a team game online with strangers and some toxic asshole, out of nowhere with no context and no justification, just begins blaming their team falling behind on one player. Everybody else, just happy they weren't singled out, decides to agree with the toxic guy, just to save their own skin. "Whew, at least Hal Jordan isn't calling me the yo-yo this mission! That fucking G'nort! What a yo-yo!"

Even Martian Manhunter becomes short-tempered with G'nort after listening to Hal's gossip. I hope G'nort saves the day and everybody has to wind up kissing his ring.

You know which ring I mean.

Doctor Fate detects an intelligence a few chambers away so the Justice League charge in only to find about five million Manhunters all jammed elbow to asshole into a great big yellow ballroom. Why are they there rather than spread out throughout the world? I guess because it's a diabolical trap? Or maybe the Justice League just happened to interrupt Manhunter prom.

I guess the Green Lantern rings still work underground and Hawkman just ran into a ghost with a boner.

Arisia isn't present because she's making some kind of distraction so the Justice League can get the jump on the Manhunters. It works and the Justice League destroy the Manhunters in about three pages. But Doctor Fate still senses an intelligence somewhere deeper in the complex! Time to find out what's behind it all! But first, some creepiness!

"Here I am—big as life and twice as cute and half your age!"

The Justice League find the Manhunter birthing chamber where the Highmaster, mother to all Manhunters, programs all the new baby Manhunters to commit evil and degenerate acts across the universe. Superman burns them all in their cribs before they can wake up. Is he a monster? Probably. I'm sure future Manhunters will grow up with some kind I am Legend myth about the evil man in red and blue who massacred a whole generation.

Even coming from an evil being, you never really want to have this accusation thrown your way.

Mother Highmaster Manhunter flees the world which is only being held together by her power. So now the entire thing is going to shake apart before the Justice League can escape. I bet those fuckers don't even try to find G'nort to warn him. Thankfully, Arisia's tits remember the poor guy.

The entire planet is yellow, Hal. You know that. You just want to see him dead, you jackass.

G'nort is nowhere to be found because he wasn't really important to the plot. Giffen and DeMatteis just wanted to make fun of him. Or maybe they just wanted to make Hal Jordan look bad as Hal Jordan disparaged the poor guy. Although I have to admit, any writer worth their salt would know to make Hal Jordan look like a cocky prick acting like the popular asshole in some John Hughes movie picking on the geeks and the nerds.

There's a back-up story hardly worth mentioning except to mention I'm not going to mention it.

This month we see letters from Chris Garcia of Satellite Beach, Florida, Steve Hockensmith, Leo Whitman of Gainesville, Florida, Donnie Matthews of Ararat, Virginia, Jody Hamby of Robbins, Tennessee, John Andrew Lay of Romulus, Michigan, and John Lim of Concord, California. Letterer Bob Lappan gets one compliment across the seven letters. Not too bad (for a letterer).

Justice League International #10 Rating: B. This was a pretty decent team interaction issue, possibly better than most of the others. Maybe that's because Booster Gold and Blue Beetle were left back on Earth, replaced by Arisia and Katma Tui and Superman and Hal Jordan and Hawkman and Hawkwoman. Not a silly asshole in the bunch! Also, for a story that I haven't been following, having no clue in which comic book box my Millennium books are stored, it wasn't too hard to follow! I mean, I guess it's not like Millennium was a complex story. Some aliens infiltrated Earth and were trying to take it over. Now the heroes have to kill their robot children and destroy their homeworld. Easy peasy! Great job, you monsters!