The Individual Moments Work; but the Big Picture Falls Flat

Justice League: Cry for Justice #2

Roll Call: Green Lantern (Hal), Green Arrow, Atom (Palmer), Congorilla, Starman (Mikaal), Shazam, Supergirl

Guest Stars: Flash (Jay Garrick), Jason Bard

Villains: mostly a heap of C and D listers, shown defeated.

The issue, titled “The Gathering” opens with Hal and Ollie on a rooftop in Gotham. There is some banter about a night in Gotham that apparently involved Hal, Lady Blackhawk, Huntress, and alcohol. This segues into a conversation about them both missing Batman, even though Hal admits to not having liked him. That scene ends with the obligatory shot of Batman (presumably Dick Grayson) passing by, mostly in silhouette, as Hal remarks “You’d have to be nuts to live here.”

We then cut to Blackhawk Island, where we see an unconscious Houngan on the beach and, in one of the hangars, Congorilla and Starman re-enact the age old comic cliche of heroes misunderstand what is going on and have a huge fight. They pretty much beat each other silly, slump to the floor, and finally talk it out, first about preferred drinks, then on to why they are there. They fly off in one of the old Blackhawk planes together.

We return to Gotham, where Hal and Ollie get a tip from Jason Bard, a private investigator long associated with the Bat-family, about a gathering of villains. Not the...