Justice League Adventures #20 (August 2003)

I can't say I'm any bit a comics expert. Mostly I find myself confused by comic narratives. And superheroes generally leave me cold. It's just an art form that, like Shakespearean theater, my brain simply doesn't access well.

Maybe it's because growing up, I was rarely exposed to decent comics. For the most part, any comics I came into contact with were as inane, insipid, and crudely drawn as this issue of Justice League Adventures.

Now perhaps the Justice League means something to the fanboys, who might excuse the childishness of this series. And granted, this is probably not the best way to gain entrée to the JLA world … after all, it is clearly a tie-in with the kids' cartoon show of the same name, as opposed to a "real" comic.

Whatever the case, all I could gather was it's a bunch of wise-cracking superheroes who, despite their differences, work together to combat lame one-off villains.

The villain in this issue is the Psycho-Pirate, a former psychologist whose grief at the death of wife and son led him to steal an ancient mask that allows him to control other people's emotions.

So he controls the emotions of a crowd of innocents, chaos ensues, the Justice League shows up and cracks wise. The Psycho-Pirate almost gets the upper hand by controlling the superheroes' emotions but they turn the tables and force him to confront his own emotions.

The book ends with the Psycho-Pirate in Arkham Asylum, and the Justice League on a camping trip to sort out their feelings.

My feelings are clear enough: Fuckety fuck fuck.

Review by Crimedog