JUSTICE SOCIETY: 1979 STORIES

This weekend’s light-hearted, escapist superhero post from Balladeer’s Blog concludes the final adventures in the Justice Society’s revived series in the 1970s. 

ADVENTURE COMICS Vol 1 #461 (February 1979)

Title: Only Legends Live Forever 

Justice Society Roster: Dr. Fate, Wildcat, Power Girl, the original Robin, the original Flash, the original Green Lantern and the 2nd Huntress (daughter of Earth-Two’s Bruce Wayne and the late Selena Kyle)

Villain: The vengeful Bill Jensen

NOTE: The final stories of the revived Justice Society series are set in Adventure Comics now that All Star Comics was canceled with issue #74.

Synopsis: Bill Jensen, a corrupt former D.A. just released from prison, has been gifted with superpowers like the ability to shoot mystic energy blasts, conjure up unearthly fire, walk up walls, produce a force field and more. He refuses to reveal how he has gained these powers.

Jensen rampages through Gotham City, demanding that Batman, who sent him to prison, show himself so he can kill him. The Justice Society battles Jensen, who eventually climbs up Gotham Tower to continue fighting them.

The team is stalemated with the supervillain when, for the cliffhanger ending, the original Batman, who had retired long ago here on Earth-Two, arrives on the scene and presents himself, since he is the one Jensen wants to kill.

ADVENTURE COMICS Vol 1 #462 (April 1979)

Title: Only Legends Live Forever Part Two

Justice Society Roster: The original Batman, Wildcat, Dr. Fate, Power Girl, the 2nd Huntress, the original Robin, the original Flash and the original Green Lantern

Villain: The vengeful Bill Jensen

Synopsis: Batman saves the unconscious Flash, whom Jensen threw from the top of Gotham Tower and sets him safely on a ledge. Jensen continues fighting the other Justice Society members, while Batman makes his way to the top of the tower to join them all.   

Jensen overcomes the power of both Dr. Fate and Green Lantern, then he and Batman confront each other and exchange hostile words. Jensen’s hatred of Batman is so unhinged that he loses control of his powers, which burst out of control, killing both him and Batman.

Three days later, the late hero’s body is laid to rest in a grave next to his late wife Selena Kyle, the original Catwoman, after a memorial ceremony attended by various VIP’s and the other still-living Justice Society members.

For those obsessed with such details, the superhero mourners were the JSA members who saw action in this issue PLUS: the original Superman, the original Hawkman and original Hawkgirl, original Atom, Hourman, Mr. Terrific, Dr. Mid-Nite, original Sandman, original Wonder Woman (Diana Prince-TREVOR), the original Star Man, Johnny Thunder and the Star Spangled Kid.

        The original female Red Tornado is still presumed dead at this time but is secretly living under a new identity in the Witness Protection Program. The Spectre had relocated to Earth-One.

After Batman/ Bruce Wayne is buried, his daughter Helena (Huntress) and his former partner Robin discuss carrying on the Batman legacy. Huntress says “We can carry on his work — you as Robin, me as the Huntress — but the Batman is dead. Only legends live forever… not the men who make them.”

Dr. Fate casts a spell to ensure the world remembers Bruce Wayne and Batman as two separate people, thereby safeguarding Robin and Huntress’s secret identities, too. 

NOTE: So, Batman was killed by the dreaded villain … Bill Jensen. I would have slapped some sort of supervillain name on him, like Vendetta or the Revenger or even the Envoy, since he turns out to have been a cat’s paw used by the villain who fights the JSA in the very next issue.   

ADVENTURE COMICS Vol 1 #463 (June 1979)

Title: The Night of the Soul Thief

Justice Society Roster: Dr. Fate, Wildcat, Power Girl, the original Flash, original Green Lantern, original Robin and 2nd Huntress

Villain: Fredric Vaux, the Soul Thief

Synopsis: The Justice Society members have been searching wherever they can for leads to whoever bestowed superpowers upon Bill Jensen, Batman’s killer. The villain behind Jensen uses that as part of a trap to lure the JSA into his clutches.

That villain is Fredric Vaux, a powerful sorcerer known as the Soul Thief (at right). He is an agent of the Lords of Chaos, like the Justice Society’s earlier foe Zanadu. His elemental powers of mysticism enable him to take on our heroes.

The Soul Thief tries a new plan since his henchman Bill Jensen failed to kill more than just one JSA member. Vaux tries to sacrifice the lives of six more Justice Society heroes in a complicated ritual that will cause all superheroes on Earth-Two to be blotted out of existence.

This will leave no one powerful enough to stop Earth-Two’s supervillains, thus enabling the victory of the Lords of Chaos as the planet is plunged into anarchy.  The Justice Society defeats the Soul Thief, saving the world and avenging themselves on the villain who was ultimately behind the slaying of Batman. 

NOTE: In 1981 the Ultra-Humanite would launch the latest incarnation of the Injustice Society and try to carry out a scientific/ mystic version of the ritual to annihilate all superheroes on Earth-Two during that year’s Justice Society/ Justice League meeting.   

ADVENTURE COMICS Vol 1 #464 (August 1979)

Title: To Everything There is a Season

Villains: Miscellaneous thugs

Synopsis: One night Robin, Power Girl and Huntress go out for a pleasant meal and a movie since Robin will be heading back to his diplomatic duties the next day. The trio try to get Wildcat to come with them, but he politely declines.   

As the evening goes on, Wildcat ponders his own future and the way that Batman’s death and his own recent hospitalizations from injuries sustained in battle have altered his perspective on it all. Eventually he takes a walk around the old neighborhood where he trained as a boxer and fought crime during his early years as Wildcat.   

After renewing his acquaintance with some of the neighborhood figures and visiting his old gym, Wildcat winds up fighting and defeating some armed robbers with the help of a young black man named Charles Bullock.

NOTE: Under Wildcat’s tutelage, Charles Bullock becomes the first black superhero in the Batman “family” and uses the nom de guerre Blackwing plus a costume that lets him fly/glide. 

Bullock confides in Wildcat that he longs to become a crimefighter like Batman. The older hero ends his contemplations and, prompted by his age and deteriorating health, Wildcat retires from the Justice Society and from superheroing.

Instead, he will – under his secret identity of former boxer Ted Knight – work in the old neighborhood gym, covertly training Charles to become a superhero while also training and mentoring at-risk youth in that neighborhood through athletics.   

ADVENTURE COMICS Vol 1 #465 (October 1979)

Title: Countdown to Disaster

Justice Society Roster: Dr. Fate, Power Girl, Mr. Terrific, the original Flash, original Green Lantern and original Hawkman plus the 2nd Huntress

Synopsis: A capsule containing a biological warfare agent gets stolen and will be released into the atmosphere in Gotham City unless it is found. The unidentified culprits want 3 million dollars or they will release the contents.

The Justice Society is called in and has four hours to find and neutralize the capsule before millions will be killed around the world.

The team concentrates all their efforts, with Hawkman even mentally commanding birds to look for the item. Our heroes fight their way through fakers who were bluffing when they demanded the 3 million dollars – they don’t really have the capsule.

From there it’s on through drug pusher Trader Tom and his superiors in a drug ring. Naturally, the capsule is found before it releases its contents.

Mr. Terrific reminds his teammates that it is time for another meeting with Earth-One’s Justice League.

JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA Vol 1 #171 and 172 (October and November 1979)

Titles: Crisis Above Earth-One and I Accuse 

Justice Society Roster: Mr. Terrific, the 2nd Huntress, Dr. Fate, Power Girl, the original Flash, original Green Lantern and original Hawkman    

Villain: Spirit King

Synopsis: This was the 1979 two-part story of the Justice Society and Justice League regular meeting, this year held in the JLA Satellite above Earth-One. The festivities are interrupted by the murder of Mr. Terrific after the power on the JLA satellite goes out temporarily.

Amid an investigation by the surviving superheroes, the murderer of Mr. Terrific (at right) is eventually flushed out.

It turns out to be Spirit King, an old Flash supervillain from Earth-Two.

NOTE: Mr. Terrific stayed dead for decades, believe it or not, while in the meantime assorted other people tried to take up his superhero mantle over the years.  

ADVENTURE COMICS Vol 1 #466 (December 1979)

Title: The Defeat of the Justice Society

Justice Society Roster: Power Girl, the 2nd Huntress, Dr. Mid-Nite, the original Black Canary, original Flash, original Atom, original Green Lantern, original Hawkman and original Wonder Woman   

Villains: Eliminations, Inc. 

Synopsis: In 1979, the Huntress tells Power Girl a story her father had often told her. It involves what caused the Justice Society to disband in mid 1951 and remain defunct for several years.

NOTE: This is an original story but it is presented as if it’s a flashback. It’s also the end of the Justice Society’s revived series. 

The flashback story is set in 1951 sometime after the JSA defeated the supervillain called the Key. Eliminations, Inc. a paramilitary army of agents from foreign nations (below right) constructed a very advanced satellite and launched it into orbit. The Justice Society were lured there and found it to be a death-trap designed to kill them.

Our heroes survived and destroyed Eliminations, Inc.’s satellite, but were dragged before a Senate committee regarding unresolved questions about the entire affair. Amid the latest anti-Communist mania the heroes were suspected of foreign entanglements and of lying because, in those pre-Sputnik years, the Senate refused to believe that another country could have constructed such a satellite without superhero cooperation.

The Senate lays down demands on how the Justice Society members can conduct themselves from then on. Our heroes quit the team rather than operate under government control.

And this wrapped up the saga of the Justice Society when it still had something close to a consistent continuity and timeline. In the years ahead DC would retcon Earth-Two out of existence during its Crisis on Infinite Earths storyline and from there would spread even more confusion around with retcon after retcon ever since. 

FOR MY REVIEW OF THE ORIGINAL BATMAN’s 1939-1940 ADVENTURES CLICK HERE.

JUSTICE SOCIETY AND JUSTICE LEAGUE CROSSOVERS 1963-1969 HERE.

THE JUSTICE SOCIETY’S WORLD WAR TWO-ERA STORIES HERE.

FOR CANADA’S 1940s SUPERHEROES CLICK HERE.

OTHER DC SUPERHEROES OF THE 1940s HERE.