Ages of the Justice League

Joseph J. Darowski teaches English at Brigham Young University and has published on comic book superheroes such as the X-Men, Wonder Woman, and Superman as well as on television series such as Chuck and Frasier.

“goes into extensive detail about the individual characters starting from their origins and their transition and evolution through the decades...makes for fascinating reading”—Collectors’ Corner; “These essays provide an insightful and entertaining exploration of how a superhero team, spearheaded by America’s most iconic pop culture creations, reflects, and sometimes critiques, American attitudes toward justice, morality and the use of power.”—Randy Duncan, director of Henderson State University’s Comics Studies program, co-author of The Power of Comics; “Joseph J. Darowski’s The Ages of the Justice League: Essays on America’s Greatest Superheroes in Changing Times is an exceptional study that is highly informative, critically brilliant, and fun to read. It cements his already outstanding reputation as one of the foremost comics scholars in America.”—Gary Hoppenstand, Michigan State University.

• Table of ContentsPrefaceThe Brave and Bold Beginning of the Silver Age Superteam(John Darowski) A League of Orphans and Single Parents: Making a Family in an Era of Father Knows Best (Louie Dean ­Valencia-García)18The Caged Bird Sings: The Justice League of America and the Domestic Containment of Black Canary (Thomas C. Donaldson)Social Justice and Silver Age Superheroes (W.C. Bamberger) Relevance in Wonderland: The Mixed Success of Gardner Fox’sMessage Comic Books (Gene Phillips) A Crisis of Infinite Dearth: Winning Vietnam via the ­Never-Ending War on ­Earth-X (Peter W. Lee) The Benefits of Doubts: Steve Englehart’s Radical TakeTradition (Jason Sacks) The ­Not-So-Golden Age: Gender, Race and NostalgiaAll-Star Squadron 1981–1987 (Ruth ­McClelland-Nugent)Gritty Levity: The Giffen/DeMatteis Era of the Justice League (Charles Henebry)“I’m Batman! Bwah ha ha!” Comedy in the Grim ’n’ GrittyEighties (Brian Cogan) Lacking Leadership: The Justice League Europe’s Placethe DC Universe (Fernando Gabriel Pagnoni Berns and Leonardo Acosta Lando)Extreme Transitions: Trends and Trepidations from 1992 to 1996 (D.R. Hammontree)What We’ve Got Here Is Failure to Communicate: Trust,Technology and Fear in “The Tower of Babel” (Nicole Freim)“Whether we fear we do too much—or not enough”: JLA/Avengers and the ­Cross-Universe Causes of Conflict (Joseph J. Darowski)Madwomen: Sexism as Nostalgia, or Feminism in The New Frontier (Jennifer ­Swartz-Levine)Absolute Secrets Kept Absolutely: Public Memory and Forgetting in Identity Crisis (Daniel J. ­O’Rourke)The Good, the Bad and the Reboot: Justice League in the New (Cathy Leogrande)About the ContributorsIndex