Justice League #40 (DC)

writer: Geoff Johns

artist: Kevin Maguire, Phil Jimenez, Dan Jurgens, Jerry Ordway, Scott Kolins, Jason Fabok, Jim Lee

A lot of this issue, the prologue to "Darkseid War," recaps DC history, from Jack Kirby's New Gods saga to Crisis On Infinite Earths to Zero Hour to Infinite Crisis to Flashpoint to the opening arc of Justice League itself.  And it completely works.  Narrating is Metron, Kirby's famous New God observer who has long best been known for sitting in his Moebius chair.

And what's that, you say?  He's addressing some as Moebius in that panel?  Why, yes he is.  And that, folks, is Geoff Johns making yet another genius leap of imagination.

The subject of Metron's address is more commonly identified as the Anti-Monitor, the big bad from Crisis On Infinite Earths.  And so here's Geoff Johns finally having Anti-Monitor being something other than...the reverse of a Monitor.  And it absolutely makes sense.

Among the recap material is the famous truce between Apokolips and New Genesis when Metron convinces Highfather and Darkseid to swap sons.  Darkseid's son Orion, who goes to live with Highfather, has gotten a lot of mileage over the years.  Johns prefers to spend this brief moment with Scot Free, otherwise known as Mister Miracle.  Johns writes Scot as a scared little boy, petrified of what awaits him on Apokolips (of course he would be!).  Based on this sequence, I absolutely want Johns to write a larger Mister Miracle story at some point, even if it's got to be in backup stories like he did with Shazam.  This has got to happen.

And there are further tricks up his sleeve, because by the end of the issue we meet "Darkseid's daughter" all over again.  This is a character who's been teased throughout the New 52, a sort of second stab at the Pandora phenomenon.  I haven't read it yet myself, but I hear that she gets more time in Free Comic Book Day's Divergence.

I've tried to be a champion of Justice League throughout its run, but this may be the best time yet to be reading it...