Justice League #19

Writer: Bryan Hitch

Artist: Fernando Pasarin

Colourist: Brad Anderson

Publisher: DC Comics

Bryan Hitch concludes the best arc of the series so far. Not to say that it was consistently good, but it had some fun moments and teased the future of Rebirth, no matter how unsubtle these teases were.

The revelation that Molly was playing the League from the beginning felt a bit predictable to me. We knew so little about the character that a heel turn would make perfect sense, and Hitch did it. His stories don't offer much in terms of story and character. There's not much here aside from dialogue between the characters concerning their current situation. There's no heart, there's no soul, and there's no purpose to the stories. I feel like editorial asks Hitch to end his stories in a certain way and he completely messes up the actual story in order to get to these moments. Even so, the ending didn't offer much aside from a tease, which is something that we already knew.

The art at DC can falter from time to time due to the twice monthly schedule, but this arc had a consistent artist in Fernando Pasarin. While I have a problem with the way he draws faces, and I think his art is a little ink-heavy, his art was epic. There was a lot of nice detail and his designs were cool.

Molly's plan made little sense to me. If Tempus, the Timeless leader, wants Earth to exist out of time in order to keep the rest of the universe safe, then why would Molly want to completely obliterate superheroes? Tempus' plan feels a little more nice and doesn't involve copious amounts of bloodshed, so Molly is simply overreacting, making her extremely annoying.

Hitch ends the best arc of the series so far with a fizzle of an ending, and not much else. There are some Rebirth teases here and there, but they offer nothing new that we don't know. A major plus was that the art was consistent across the arc, which is something DC should strive for when it comes to the rest of their series. What this book needs is a new writer, plain and simple.