The Halls of Fate, Part One

[neuhallidae.insanejournal.com]

(yes, I know, bad pun, shut up)

Anyway.

After the events of Gaiman's Sandman, it's revealed in JSA Secret Files and Origins that Wesley Dodds, the man who fought crime under the name Sandman in the 40s, still retains the "gift" of prophetic dreams that he gained in his encounter with Morpheus. And so our story begins with a death, a murder, and a reincarnation.

Thirty two total pages from Secret Files, and JSA #1-4. So very not dialup friendly.

And from the end of the story...



The new Justice Society of America series begins, and we find out what Sandy's first dream from his inherited ability was.





The still-surviving former members of the JSA, and some newbies, gather for Dodds' graveside, where Jay Garrick gets a vision of the first Doctor Fate right before everything goes chaotic.







They're interrupted by a horde of zombies in ancient Egyptian clothing rising up out of the ground, and after beating them down, the costumed heroes discover that Fate's artifacts have disappeared. Scarab shows up, claiming to know what's going on, and everyone reconvenes at the old brownstone.





Everyone splits into three groups to go find the infants in question. Those who went to Tibet and Venice strike out, but the crew that went to Vancouver has better luck. Sort of.





After the prerequisite fight, Hourman identifies this new Hawk as Kendra Saunders, grand-niece of Shiera. And things go from awkward to very bad, very quickly.







After flattening the heroes who come to the rescue, Mordru goes to Fate's tower, where Scarab (unknowingly followed by Courtney Whitmore) has found Fate's artifacts.





Courtney interferes to protect the kid (which amuses the hell out of Mordru), and the rest of the arriving heroes are quickly dealt with. But during the decidedly-one-sided battle, she hears a voice out of the artifacts.











The new Fate and Mordru begin magically battling it out, warping the reality around them in the process, until...









After tending to the body of Scarab and looking after the other scattered heroes, Hector teleports them all back to the brownstone for explanations.



I love how he's so casual about the reincarnation thing, like it's freckles or blue eyes.





"...But just beginning."

Tune in next time for Part Two, in which Extant raises temporal hell and Hector finds out a big secret from Mordru.

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

liked the Dods information, DIDNT like the Hector is fate thing... not at all. Nice ending though, finally being with fury and daniel again

[jaybee3.insanejournal.com]

Thanks for posting this. The early (previous volume) JSA was great and see, this was the James Robinson (and David Goyer) that everybody loved (compare this to Cry for Justice or Snidely Whiplash Sam Lane). Wes Dodds to me had one of the best deaths of any super-hero. He went out, an old man, on his terms, helping to save a life and restore the world in balance. And he went to be with the love of his life. That's how you kill off a hero.

Too bad a lot of plot points were dropped here - Sandy got Wes's pre-cog powers (in addition to being made of carbon and functionally immortal) and Wes's money and put together and financed the new JSA and was the first chairman. And what did they do with him after that? Nada.

Hector was revived and the new Hawkgirl was his distant cousin who actually had the soul of his dead and beloved mother. What kind of interaction did Hector and Kendra have before he died? Nada.

Having Kent and Inza in the amulet, having the kind of family they never had when alive was a stroke of genius since it kept the Golden Age characters active, checking Nabu and mentoring Hector. Where are they now? Gone, I think (unless the new Kent Nelson is in contact with them).

Then there's the identity of Hector's new "birth mother" (I won't spoil it) who is still playing (at this very minute) a big role in the DCU and her giving birth hasn't really been brought up again (kinda like Power Girl's baby).

Like a said a great beginning. It's kinda of a shame that Geoff Johns and the other writers kept adding more and more cast members (yes, I'm looking at you Magog) so that the plot lines could never be picked up and expanded upon.

[volksjager.insanejournal.com]

I would like to second all your oments. I loved this group of JSA , it was fine will lots of potential... then they ekpt changing it . I was so PISSED !

[volksjager.insanejournal.com]

Thanks for posting this. Adios, Fate GTFO...

[icon_uk.insanejournal.com]

"I deny you the Scarabeus!"

Sorry, old UK childrens telefantasy reference, couldn't resist

[box_in_the_box.insanejournal.com]

As cool as his visuals are, and as much as a traditionalist like me loves seeing him on the JSA, Dr. Fate is an INCREDIBLY problematic character.

Dr. Strange can be similarly difficult, especially if you have a writer who's not willing or able to map out some relatively internally consistent rules for what "magical powers" actually MEAN, beyond just "deus ex machina get-out-of-jail-free card," but at least Dr. Strange has a character hook for readers to hang onto. By contrast, within the JSA title itself, Hector hall actually admitted to feeling like "an empty helmet." When the story's problem points are big enough that your own characters feel the need to comment on them, you're in serious trouble.

It's notable that the best writing of the Spectre, a likewise near-godlike Golden Age character, occurred under the pen of John Ostrander, who basically removed him from a superhero context and placed him in a series of situations in which MORE POWER was often the CAUSE of problems, WITHOUT providing any solutions.

[neuhallidae.insanejournal.com]

series of situations in which MORE POWER was often the CAUSE of problems, WITHOUT providing any solutions.

Which will also be happening in other posts of this series, especially the last one (don't tell anybody, shh!).

[zippthorn.insanejournal.com]

situations in which MORE POWER was often the CAUSE of problems, WITHOUT providing any solutions.

Aside from that last part, that's probably the best way to use characters with soooooooooooooooo much power. Then, they would have to reign themselves in as much as any opponents they face. Also, with even greater power, they should have even greater responsibilities. The best issues of Sandman, for instance, were of Dream simply administering to his realm.

[espanolbot.insanejournal.com]

Wesley! ^^

One of my favourite superheroes.

[magus_69.insanejournal.com]

*puts on geography cap*

The city of Vancouver is not located on Vancouver Island. They are in the same region, and were named after the same guy, but that is all. If Dawn Granger was found floating off the coast of Vancouver Island, then she would be in a hospital in one of the many communities there.

In other words: whoever wrote this Fails Geography Forever.

No, I won't put the relevant TV Tropes link. You're welcome.

[wizardru.insanejournal.com]

Since TV Tropes is one of the worst invented websites ever, Thank you.

[teekoness.insanejournal.com]

Actually it says "they found her off Vancouver Island" so maybe she was transferred?

[ashtoreth.insanejournal.com]

I've checked Wiki and it's ambiguous. It says Mordru was originally known as Wrynn. So he's the child of Lady Turquoise and Lord Topaz? (Don't tell me the whole story if it's sad, just curious for confirmation.)

[neuhallidae.insanejournal.com]

That's what Hector's told later in the comic, but he's told that by a couple of Mordru's henchmen disguised as people he needed to talk to, so whether it's true or not is left up in the air during this JSA run.

[sailorlibra.insanejournal.com]

Good God, what the hell is up with Wonder Woman's costume? I mean, that is Diana, right?

[neuhallidae.insanejournal.com]

No, that's her mother.

[foxhack.insanejournal.com]

I'm pretty sure that's supposed to be some sort of ceremonial garb.

[kingrockwell]

Loved the bit with Wesley, but if he's 86, how could Sandy be so young? Is he really in his sixties, but other factors alter his apparent age? Was Wesley already pretty old when he worked with Sandy? What's the story there?

Was it a part of that time pocket most of the JSA were stuck in for decades? Sandy was in it while Wesley wasn't?

[zippthorn.insanejournal.com]

Sandy be so young?

I believe that's because of Sandy's powers.

[neuhallidae.insanejournal.com]

Suspended animation. After Sandy was first accidentally altered into a sand monster when one of Wesley's inventions backfired, Wesley didn't want him to suffer, so he put him to sleep while hunting for a cure. As a result, when Sandy was mostly fixed, he was still a young man, while Wesley and the rest of the world had aged outside his little sleep chamber thing.

[kusonaga.insanejournal.com]

Thanks for posting this. This comic was actually my first interaction with Wesley Dodds. Really couldn't get a better death scene than that. Very awesome.

I, personally, was a big fan of Hector Hall as Fate, as soon as I started reading Hec's appearances in Inf, Inc. He really was perfect for the role because of his history. And I loved the cross-pollinating that was happening around this time. Hec became Fate, Hal Jordan became Spectre. They gloss over his Dreaming stuff here though, wherein he was Sandman.

[neuhallidae.insanejournal.com]

It'll be referenced somewhat more in depth in.... ::checks:: I think post #3.

[vignettelante.insanejournal.com]

Sandy seems like an interesting character; I'd like to see more of him. At least more than he got in JLU, which was a few seconds of being punched in the face by one of the Ultimen.

Also: "Golden Age" is an in-universe term now? did not know that.

[neuhallidae.insanejournal.com]

Sandy's absolutely fascinating. Unfortunately, it seems like the writers couldn't really decide what to do with him, since he was pretty well all over the goddamn place here and tended to get shoved off to the side unless they suddenly went "oh, hey, we can use him for something here." for a plot, then forgot about him again.

[jaybee3.insanejournal.com]

True. He's a guy raised in the 1940s and 50s (so with a different mentality than others his "age), was a Sand Monster for decades, has trouble sleeping because of his pre-cog abilities/curse, is technically made of carbon so is not really "human" anymore (and maybe immortal because of it), is rich thanks to inheriting from his aunt and from Wes and he re-started the modern JSA. He's the only "Golden Age" DC sidekick still in action, the DCU version of Bucky Barnes.

And yet we never see him do anything for years. What a waste.

[neuhallidae.insanejournal.com]

Seriously. He he barely gets squat to do in combat, and then when he finally gets to be badass, they cap it off by leaving him trapped under the earth for months of issues. As much as I loved him and Hector, they were seriously the biggest wastes of potential in the whole series.

[btravage.livejournal.com (from insanejournal.com)]

That Vertigo Scarab guy seems interesting, I wonder if anyone might have some scans from his series explaining what his deal was.