Mr. Miracle's funeral, Justice League America #40

[perletwo.insanejournal.com]

I had a request in an earlier JLI post I did for a page of Superman and Batman talking after Mr. Miracle's funeral. Naturally, I can't just do the one page, because the whole funeral is so awesome. Six pages of a 22-page comic, plus preview (plus a few non-comic images), not my scans.

So yeah, starts out with big fight with Despero, which J'onn ends...

Never let it be said that the JLI doesn't know how to behave itself at a funeral...





The requested post-funeral page, and its aftermath...





The issue ends with Orion visiting Scott's grave, and musing that he'll have to look up this Justice League. :-)

BTW, this seems as good a post as any to throw this out there. It didn't strike me back in the 80s because I hadn't seen the movie, but now that I've got both the first JLI trade and the Omen series box set, I'm wondering if deMatteis modeled his Max Lord on Sam Neill as the adult Damien Thorn? Check it out:

What say you, s_d? Do we have a match?

Comments

[foxhack.insanejournal.com]

That's really odd. Max Lord didn't look like that in the early issues.

[perletwo.insanejournal.com]

Sometimes he did, sometimes he didn't - check out this partial page from issue 2 of the Giffen/deMatteis run, then called justice league of america:

[foxhack.insanejournal.com]

Well, I won't deny the fact that his design is VERY inspired by Sam Neill, as posted here. I never noticed this until it was pointed out. :)

Edit:
In fact, going back and imagining Max as Sam Neill during his heel turn before the recent Crisis... makes him a teensy bit more badass. Sam Neill can act like a bastard if he wants to.

[perletwo.insanejournal.com]

He really can - around the same time I got the Omen box set, I got a copy off eBay of a weird little movie called Possession (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0082933/) he was in with Isabelle Adjani in which he goes homicidally mad, made the same year as Omen 3 - it was a good year for Sam Neill bastardly roles, I guess!

[jlroberson.insanejournal.com]

I always thought it was at least supposed to be Neill, and I'd guessed Damien. So good I'm not the only one to have thought that.

[thebat_man.insanejournal.com]

Sam Neill is definitely a dead ringer for Max. I didn't realize that. Great find.

[foxhack.insanejournal.com]

Oh, to the mods, I'd like to suggest a new tag: "Who does that character look like?", which should be used in cases like these, when a character looks a lot like a real person. :D

[schala_kid.insanejournal.com]

"You don't know me you never will"

And then they became BFF but it kind of sucks that even after Bruce warmed up to him and after all that they have gone through and after his "death" that Clark still thinks that Bruce doesn't like him ("he barely tolerated me" he says in JLofA #31 and Wonder Woman tells him otherwise).

Bruce has done a lot for Clark and he's one of the few people who he jokes with about things, I wonder why Clark thinks that? and I am pretty sure Bruce doesn't know he thinks that way either.

[schala_kid.insanejournal.com]

Also man oh man how many funerals have the League gone through with the suppose decease coming back! Also I just noticed Highfather hiding in the tree there.

And lol at Barda hitting Max.

[perletwo.insanejournal.com]

I figured that was probably Highfather. But what gives with the tiger-tail?

[foxhack.insanejournal.com]

...

That's his cane. Shadowed by the tree's leaves.

[perletwo.insanejournal.com]

...

...OK, now i see it. But I swear the way those leaves are stippled, I still get 'tiger tail' off it.

[schala_kid.insanejournal.com]

You're not the only one I had to do a triple take to get it in my head that it was a staff and not a tail.

[volksjager.insanejournal.com]

Yup. I was watching Riley Ace of spies about a month ago and couldn't believe how young Sam was.

[mysteryfan.insanejournal.com]

Agreed on the match.

Who wrote the post-funeral page? Do you know around what year? I am fascinated by the level of extreme Bat-Dickery towards Superman.

[perletwo.insanejournal.com]

The issue is July 1990, and the story credits are Keith Giffen and J.M. DeMatteis.

It may simply be that Bats, being our overcontrolling Bats, is blaming himself for Scott's "death" and the Big Blue Boy Scout, in his guileless way, is hitting on every guilty nerve pointing out that more of them could die and there's not a thing you can do about it, Brucie!.

[runespoor7.insanejournal.com]

more of them could die

And especially because you care about them, Brucie!

[superfan1.insanejournal.com]

Even though there is tension between them, it sweet how superman wants confines in batman about his concerned about the jl.

[faile_neume.insanejournal.com]

I can't work out who it is that leads Barda away after punching Max? Especially seeing as their hair colour seems to change.

[perletwo.insanejournal.com]

Hard to say for sure, but possibly Booster? His looks long in back like that.

[faile_neume.insanejournal.com]

He has what looks like brown hair initially though. I think it's the person that is standing on Barda's right when they are all around the coffin. And Booster is standing opposite her. I'm not really familiar with the League at this time so I don't know who it could be.

[bruinsfan.insanejournal.com]

I recall thinking at the time this was published that Hughes was definitely using Sam Neil as his photo reference to base Max on. Didn't really pick up on the resemblance when Kevin Maguire was doing the art earlier, though.

[thebat_man.insanejournal.com]

Thank you! I love this issue.

[thebat_man.insanejournal.com]

Another Justice League request: Justice League International #19 where Guy fights Lobo, Batman meets Lobo, Batman recruits Superman, Beetle and Booster tries to recruit Flash and Batman recruits Hawkman and Hawkwoman.