This weekend’s light-hearted and escapist superhero post from Balladeer’s Blog will look at DC’s team-ups between their Golden Age superheroes – the Justice Society – and their Silver Age superheroes – the Justice League.
JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA Vol 1 #21 (August 1963)
Title: Crisis on Earth-One
Justice Society Lineup: Hourman, Dr. Fate, Hawkman (original), Flash (original), the Atom (original), Green Lantern (original) and the 2nd Black Canary (daughter of the original)
Justice League Lineup: Green Arrow, Martian Manhunter, the 2nd Aquaman, the 2nd Batman, the 2nd Superman, the 2nd Wonder Woman, the 2nd Atom, the 2nd Flash and the 2nd Green Lantern
Villains: Crime Champions (The Wizard, Icicle, the Fiddler, Chronos, Dr. Alchemy and Felix Faust)
NOTE: For people who are not really into comic book history, I’ll mention that the “Crisis” referred to here was a forerunner of so many other DC stories that start with the word Crisis. In the late 1950s DC wanted to reinvent many of their late 1930s to early 1950s superheroes.
The company’s method of adapting more “up to date” versions of their Golden Age heroes without losing the copyrights on those figures was to state that the original versions of all their old heroes came from an alternate Earth, designated Earth-Two. The Earth with the newer heroes was called Earth-One, since they were the newer, CURRENT versions.
Previously, DC had established this notion in the pages of Flash #123 (September 1961), when the new Flash, Barry Allen, first met his Golden Age counterpart, Jay Garrick. Now both “Justice” teams, the older Society and the newer League, were meeting for the very first time. Continue reading →