Justice League of America #11

Writer: Steve Orlando

Artist: Neil Edwards

Inker: Sandu Florea

Colourist: Hi-Fi

Letterer: Clayton Cowles

This is the last filler issues of the series, or at least the last one until the Ray Palmer arc is over. Yes, the Ray Palmer/Microverse storyline begins in the next issue, and that's the most notable thing I got out of this issue.

Nei Edwards' art was quite nice. He did an issue of Suicide Squad and I didn't like his art there, but his art here was coloured by Hi-Fi and it has a nice, clean look to it that's a lot more appealing. Edwards tends to overexaggerate his characters' expression but he was quite subdued here. Characters were more expressive in a subtler way. It's definitely the best art the series has had since Ivan Reis took a break. We'll be admiring Reis' art in two weeks, though!

I had much of the same problems I had with the previous issue. The Kingbutcher is an incredibly dumb and undeveloped character, the conflict between some members of the JLA is so incredibly forced that I cringed when this clash eventually took place.

I mentioned that this was a filler issue previously, when in fact all ten previous issues of this series have indeed been filler. Ryan Choi has demonstrated no interest at all in trying to find Ray Palmer until this issue. This issue in particular is so badly paced and plotted that you can see where the filler starts and ends. The fight with the Kingbutcher takes up such a small amount of page space that I couldn't even take the threat these characters were facing seriously.

I understand that DC or Steve Orlando wanted Ivan Reis to draw the Ray Palmer arc, but to have each arc in between the first and next one be small, dumb two-parter stories diminishes the quality of storytelling; couple this with Orlando's genuinely bad storytelling and dialogue, and you get the worst book DC is putting out.

I wouldn't even say to get excited about the next arc because of Orlando's involvement. I hope I'm very wrong and it ends up being a blast, but this entire series has been disappointing nonsense. Neil Edwards' art is so great, however, and is worth checking out.