Justice League - Where to start?

[patrick89]

Hi everyone,

I'm new to the forums, name's Patrick and I'm looking to start reading the Justice League comics. Problem is, I know they've been around for ages, so I'm not sure if I'd be really really behind in the storyline?

Any recommendations? Where should I start? I'm new to the comic book world :)

[KJ_81]

If you want the current JLA, their run started between 1-2 years ago. The first arc is available collected called 'The Tornado's Path.'
That sets up the team, (there have been a few changes since, but this is the core group), and is consistent with current DCU events.
If you're after some eariler JLA material, I'd recommend Grant Morrison's run. It stars (mainly) the big 7 - Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern (Kyle Rayner), Flash, Martian Manhunter and Aquaman. It's out in trades, and nice hardcover collections are coming out in a few months. The size of the current trades varies greatly, Rock Of Ages is my personal favourite. This run was from the 90's.

[newscott]

I really like the Grant Morrison/Howard Porter relaunch of JLA. The trades are all out there, and it's a great read that spans close to 40 issues.

After that, I'd recomend reading Brad Meltzer and Rags Morales' "Identity Crisis" and Grant Morrison and Frank Quitely's "JLA: Earth-2".

[jesse_custer]

After you get caught up on the basic JLA history and status quo, pick up JLA: Year One for immense reading pleasure.

[dademan]

Or you could jump right in now. A new arc just started in issue 17. If you wanted to read the In-justice arc, pic up 13+ (thats what I did to get started)

[Miss Kitty Fantastico]

Yep, I'd say pick up the JLA Wedding Special and issues #13-15 of the current series - those comprise the Injustice League Unlimited arc, which is a full-throttle action-packed Challenge of the Superfriends throwdown, and a hell of a lot of good fun. Then go back and read the title from the start - the opening issues up to #12, by Brad Meltzer, aren't bad by any means, but they're a bit weird in terms of pacing and focus, and not the best start if you're coming in cold. If you've read the Unlimited arc (assuming you liked that, of course) you'll already be into the characters and team, and the Meltzer stuff will be an interesting read. Then just pick up #16 and #17, and follow along month by month - it's a bit scattered at the moment, with two writers working on different stories, but once McDuffie's on the title full-time I'm sure it'll fly.

[Bellis]

I personally think the current JLA title is really disappointing, particularly Brad Meltzer's run - highly recommended for those who can't stand action and love DC icons standing around shaking hands but apart from that, pretty poor. McDuffie's work hasn't exactly been stellar so far, either. But it's early days.

Recommended TPB's:
JLA: Year One (pretty self-explanatory as to what it's about, but very good with it)
Justice League: A New Beginning (the start of the Giffen "funny" league - highly entertaining superhero action but with jokes)
JLA: New World Order (Morrison's run begins with a bang)
JLA: Rock of Ages (the Injustice League and lots of epic, time-travelling, world-jumping insanity)
JLA: World War Three (more epic excellence, which is what JLA should be all about)
JLA: Tower of Babel (one of the very best JLA tales, with Ra's al Guhl)
JLA: Golden Perfect (Kelly's run begins with a terrific set of stories)
JLA: The Obsidian Age, Books 1 and 2 (sprawling, complex, but very rewarding and intense 12-part story, with two different kinds of League)
JLA: Earth 2 (if you've seen the 'A Better World' episode from the Justice League cartoon, this is the inspiration and damn good it is too)

[steve2275]

Yep, I'd say pick up the JLA Wedding Special and issues #13-15 of the current series - those comprise the Injustice League Unlimited arc, which is a full-throttle action-packed Challenge of the Superfriends throwdown, and a hell of a lot of good fun.
dont they(ijl)go into salvation run?

[muttley]

gud day! im also interested in reading JLA and was also wondering where to start.

im considering starting with tower of babel, will i be kind of lost, is it heavily influenced by the previous volumes because the whole sreies spans for an entirety of 19volumes!! my pockets would be cleaned out if i get them all :)

so which is a good place to start, good storlines and where should i end?

thanks in advance

[Bellis]

gud day! im also interested in reading JLA and was also wondering where to start.

im considering starting with tower of babel, will i be kind of lost, is it heavily influenced by the previous volumes because the whole sreies spans for an entirety of 19volumes!! my pockets would be cleaned out if i get them all :)

so which is a good place to start, good storlines and where should i end?

thanks in advance

I don't see anything wrong with Tower of Babel as your first JLA TPB - it probably helps if you know the characters and know what Ra's is like (his previous history with Batman, who Talia is, etc), but apart from that you shouldn't be lost. It's a classic story, well worth getting.

As for other stuff, have a gander at the volumes I recommended up the page.

[patrick89]

thanks so much! you've all been really helpful. Now all I need to do is find my nearest comic book store :p

Looking forward to reading Justice League now, if only i had the money to buy all the issues and catch up completely!

EDIT: On that note, does anybody know of a good comic book store around Sydney? How would I go about finding one? I've done searches in the Yellow Pages and everything but nothing comes up...

[patrick89]

Also, can I ask, what is the difference between the Justice League graphic novels and the Justice League comics? (Probably a stupid question but I'm really new to comics and just want to make sure I understand everything)

[muttley]

As for other stuff, have a gander at the volumes I recommended up the page.

thanks! just one question... you've recommended new world order, rock of ages, ww3.....they're not really in consecutive order. im worried that if i did pick up NWO then RoA wouldn't i be missing something or even get lost? the same with when i jump to ww3??

[Raker616]

Start with JLA Year One, then get anything by Morrison or Waid from the last volume and unless you like slow uninteresting comics i'd skip the current JLA.

[muttley]

Start with JLA Year One

can anyone second that opinion cause i've been told by a friend that it isn't worth getting? thanks

[Bellis]

thanks! just one question... you've recommended new world order, rock of ages, ww3.....they're not really in consecutive order. im worried that if i did pick up NWO then RoA wouldn't i be missing something or even get lost? the same with when i jump to ww3??

Those are what I think are the best three storylines of Morrison's JLA run, but it's a pretty great run overall - well worth picking up in it's entirety if you feel so inclined. You would miss some details if you skipped the second, fourth and fifth volumes, yeah, and they're certainly good reading.

As for JLA: Year One being a good place to start...well, not really if it's the modern League you want to read. I'd honestly just start with New World Order. Justice League isn't really a multi-decade spanning saga, it has lots of different incarnations that you can jump on with to your leisure.

[DannyD]

I've just started to read Justice League and bought the JLA Hitman(Tommy Monaghan) 2 part comic, thought it was brilliant and would recommend you grab ahold of that as well.

[deant]

Hey guys. First post here ever.

To Patrick,
There are 2 comic shops in Sydney both near the Queen Victoria building. The first is called Kings Comics which is a really good one. It is located at
310 Pitt Street. Phone number is 02 92675615 for Aussies. www.kingscomics.com is the website. Its a great store. It has figures, comics, manga and heaps of stuff. Really fun to just look around.

The other one is called Comic Kingdom and I dont know the exact address of that one. But thats the name so i guess you could Google it or whatever.

Hope this helps. Happy hunting.

I just got into collecting DC comics. I love the Teen Titans show on Cartoon Network. Ive started collecting Robin and Nightwing and also collected the Ra's Al Ghul story arc over the Batman/Robin/Nightwing comics. Would like to get into the JLA stuff and all the stuff surrounding the Kingdom Come series. Can anyone recommend where to start with that?

[muttley]

Would like to get into the JLA stuff and all the stuff surrounding the Kingdom Come series. Can anyone recommend where to start with that?

Go grab a copy of Kingdom Come tradepaperback and start reading!...as for JLA, having read volumes 1-10 i'd say go get #1, #3, #6 and #7 those by far were the best for me(look at the previous posts they certainly know what they're saying :) )

i've been hearing a lot of badrap on the new JLA line, whats that all about?
and...
what are your thoughts on them?

i've been considering on picking the two volumes up( i think its tornados something and lightning saga respectively) anybody who thinks otherwise?

[brundlefly]

can anyone second that opinion cause i've been told by a friend that it isn't worth getting? thanks

I'll second that, as I really enjoyed Waid's JLA: Year One. And frankly I second everything that Bellis listed previously; that list is really the cream of the JLA crop, imo.


i've been hearing a lot of badrap on the new JLA line, whats that all about?
and...
what are your thoughts on them?

i've been considering on picking the two volumes up( i think its tornados something and lightning saga respectively) anybody who thinks otherwise?

Like many, I found Metzler's JLA run too slowly-paced/decompressed (it seemed like just when Tornado's Path finally picked up steam that it also abruptly ended. Maybe it'll read better in the trade). Same with the Lightning Saga. I get that Metzler was going for characterization and mining the deep history of the League (and I enjoyed his work on Identity Crisis), but I think his JLA suffered from a lack of story momentum. By contrast, I found McDuffie's initial JLA run way too lightweight and Superfriends-y, almost akin to a Saturday morning cartoon ("BWA HA HA! We've captured the Justice League! Guard the prisoners, Dr. Light! WHAA..they've escaped?!?") And his followup was something or other about the Tangent universe characters, which I thought was a big snoozer. But that's just my opinion and, again, Metzler's JLA may read better when collected in TPB form, so your experience may differ.

[Shellhead]

can anyone second that opinion cause i've been told by a friend that it isn't worth getting? thanks

JLA: Year One is pretty good. The artwork isn't great, but it isn't bad either. The storytelling is very good. Waid manages to deliver a mixture of unrestrained silver age imagination with more modern character-driven stories. There is a decent overall plotline, with shorter story arcs within that plotline. The action near the end is on an epic scale, and there are also some nice funny scenes and even a touching moment or two. The only problem with JLA: Year One is that it expanded upon a retcon from Crisis on Infinite Earths, but that retcon was retconned more recently with Infinite Crisis. Otherwise, it holds up as a very good story.

[Raker616]

JLA Year One is still in continuity btw.

[deant]

Hey all.
Bought a copy of Kingdom Come and it was friggin sweet. Made me think of a DC version of Civil War, only better. But yeah. Bought a KC Superman shirt today as well. The red in the logo is foil/shiny.

[Shellhead]

JLA Year One is still in continuity btw.

Except replace Black Canary with Wonder Woman.

[Raker616]

Actually you just add Wonder Woman and keep Black Canary.

[Superbeast]

can anyone second that opinion cause i've been told by a friend that it isn't worth getting? thanks

Your friend apparently doesn't know quality. Hell, most of the covers are worth the price of the issues alone.

Morrison's run was brilliant. He made me appreciate Superman as more than just the Big Blue Boy Scout.

[Will.S]

dont they(ijl)go into salvation run?
Yes they did. I think I saw most if not all of them there so that's where they are in current continuity pre-Final Crisis.

I personally think the current JLA title is really disappointing, particularly Brad Meltzer's run - highly recommended for those who can't stand action and love DC icons standing around shaking hands but apart from that, pretty poor. McDuffie's work hasn't exactly been stellar so far, either. But it's early days.

Recommended TPB's:
JLA: Year One (pretty self-explanatory as to what it's about, but very good with it)
Justice League: A New Beginning (the start of the Giffen "funny" league - highly entertaining superhero action but with jokes)
JLA: New World Order (Morrison's run begins with a bang)
JLA: Rock of Ages (the Injustice League and lots of epic, time-travelling, world-jumping insanity)
JLA: World War Three (more epic excellence, which is what JLA should be all about)
JLA: Tower of Babel (one of the very best JLA tales, with Ra's al Guhl)
JLA: Golden Perfect (Kelly's run begins with a terrific set of stories)
JLA: The Obsidian Age, Books 1 and 2 (sprawling, complex, but very rewarding and intense 12-part story, with two different kinds of League)
JLA: Earth 2 (if you've seen the 'A Better World' episode from the Justice League cartoon, this is the inspiration and damn good it is too)
I haven't read the JLA: Year One, New Beginning, or JLA: Earth 2 but I can definitely vouch for the rest of that. Morrison's JLA is probably the best it's gonna get and Waid comes up with a killer follow up that I thought was on par with Morrison's stuff.

Joe Kelly's JLA I also found to be very good but it's very different and unorthodox with some of his own characters mixed in. Also be prepared to see some insane power displays on Joe Kelly's run (as well as Morrison's). A word of advice to those who intend to buy the trades of the Morrison JLA, don't buy them yet.

I believe DC is releasing Absolute versions of the run or hardcovers along those lines so wait for those since they are sure to have better quality paper and perhaps some enhanced features on the art production.

[Bored at 3:00AM]

Morrison & Quitely's JLA Earth 2 is one of their best stories together. On par with All Star Superman in my mind. The Lex Luthor in this is fantastic.

[Laughing Mask]

I personally think the current JLA title is really disappointing, particularly Brad Meltzer's run - highly recommended for those who can't stand action and love DC icons standing around shaking hands but apart from that, pretty poor. McDuffie's work hasn't exactly been stellar so far, either. But it's early days.

Recommended TPB's:
JLA: Year One (pretty self-explanatory as to what it's about, but very good with it)
Justice League: A New Beginning (the start of the Giffen "funny" league - highly entertaining superhero action but with jokes)
JLA: New World Order (Morrison's run begins with a bang)
JLA: Rock of Ages (the Injustice League and lots of epic, time-travelling, world-jumping insanity)
JLA: World War Three (more epic excellence, which is what JLA should be all about)
JLA: Tower of Babel (one of the very best JLA tales, with Ra's al Guhl)
JLA: Golden Perfect (Kelly's run begins with a terrific set of stories)
JLA: The Obsidian Age, Books 1 and 2 (sprawling, complex, but very rewarding and intense 12-part story, with two different kinds of League)
JLA: Earth 2 (if you've seen the 'A Better World' episode from the Justice League cartoon, this is the inspiration and damn good it is too)

and after all this give the new JLA a look

[muttley]

just read JLA:year one and i thought it was amazing!

its way better than the JLA run i've read previously, imo best justice league story byfar! a good balance of character, action, plot and suspense i really liked it.

i'd like to read more...

is there any book that is kinda like this one?
is there any continuation after this story?

[Shellhead]

just read JLA:year one and i thought it was amazing!

its way better than the JLA run i've read previously, imo best justice league story byfar! a good balance of character, action, plot and suspense i really liked it.

i'd like to read more...

is there any book that is kinda like this one?
is there any continuation after this story?

They never did a JLA: Year Two. However, you can get more JLA action with a similar silver age style with the Justice 12-issue mini-series that wrapped up last year. The Alex Ross artwork is great and the story is interesting.

After that, look into getting those JLA trades... anything written by Grant Morrison, especially that JLA: Earth Three. The Waid trades are almost as good. Avoid the Byrne/Claremont one like poison.

[Shellhead]

This isn't about JLA but Ive slacked on my Flash comic buying and I didnt pic up the comic that came right after the Death of Bart Allen. The comic is called ALL Flash #1 i think.

Does anyone no what happened?

Bart posted in the wrong thread at CBR, so his rogues gallery all ganged up and killed him to death.

[Will.S]

Here's the Deluxe edition for those wondering:

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/61CkpFhVXbL._SS500_.jpg

[muttley]

Here's the Deluxe edition for those wondering:

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/61CkpFhVXbL._SS500_.jpg

in my personal opinion, JLA(morrison porter dell) which i read before year one is nothing compared to the latter. i mean it is a fun action-packed read but year one is a well-planned out and in-depth characterization and storytelling leading me to wonder if there are any other books like this out there?

[Will.S]

in my personal opinion, JLA(morrison porter dell) which i read before year one is nothing compared to the latter. i mean it is a fun action-packed read but year one is a well-planned out and in-depth characterization and storytelling leading me to wonder if there are any other books like this out there?
Again, never read Year One (although I plan to) but I think Morrison's JLA got better, more epic, and crazier as it went on although he did hit the ground running with the initial arc.

[Zero Hunter]

Again, never read Year One (although I plan to) but I think Morrison's JLA got better, more epic, and crazier as it went on although he did hit the ground running with the initial arc.

I have the opposite opinion on Morrisons run. I think he started out great, and kept that going for the first year and a half of his run. But by the time he got towards the begining of the 3rd year he was starting to run out of gas, and by the time he ended his run it was junk. His World War 3 story stand as the worst of the worst.

First 27 issues of Morrison - Outstanding
Last 14 issues of Morrison - Not good at all