JSA TPB: Ghost Stories

This trade paperback collects JSA #82-87

This is an old but not unwelcome story device: Building a story around the origin story of a villain. The best-known example is probably Alan Moore's "The Killing Joke."

This time it's the origin story of the Golden Age Hawkman villain The Gentleman Ghost. OK, I'm game, to the best of my knowledge he's never had an origin story, but there's an inherent flaw in giving this particular character an origin story. His whole gimmick wasn't him being a ghost, invisible except for a top hat and a monocle, his gimmick was it was never established if he actually were a ghost, or just a human criminal who was a really good illusionist. Each of his stories would end with Hawkman and Hawgirl scratching their heads; there was enough evidence left behind to go either way.

In this story longtime JSA writer Paul Levitz settles it for once and for all (spoiler): He's a ghost. On one hand it expands on his backstory, on the other hand, it ruins the whole character!

I had a couple other niggling problems, the Gentleman Ghost was a Hawkman villain, yet Hawkman isn't in this story. And after it's determined he is a genuine ghost, someone mentions they should really get the Spectre, and that's just brushed off. You know who else would be helpful? Dr. Fate!

So it starts with Power Girl having returned to the JSA HQ from her "Infinite Crisis" encounter with the Golden Age Superman and Lois Lane with Lois' secret journal. Ma Hunkle reads it to her because it's written in the long forgotten secret code of shorthand (this is a good touch).  Levitz goes back to his own "How Joe McCarthy broke up the JSA" story where we see the Earth 2 Batman and Superman having encounters with the Gentleman Ghost while the JSA is in retirement. Now Earth 2 retroactively doesn't exist at this point, and there never was a Golden Age Superman and Batman, and it shouldn't even be happening. When Ma Hunkle brings up the fact that DC can't follow the rules of its own reboots, PG gets all condescending and tells her in effect, "You're old and confused, stop asking so many questions about DC's inability to stick to the rules of a reboot," and it's like she's speaking directly to me.

(also, for some reason, one of Green Lantern's eyes is green. I missed when this started, and it's never explained here. Also, in this particular reboot, Jade is dead but that really didn't bother me because no DC character stays dead long.)

The story then moves to the present day where the JSA members are being haunted by the ghosts of their own personal lives, in which we learn Alan Scott once accidentally killed a guy. So that's cool. The Gentleman Ghost shows up, attacks again and again then disappears.

Everything comes to a head at London Tower where we get two armies of ghosts and the JSA in battle.

If you look past my small complaints it's a lot of fun, with some great art by George Perez, Rags Morales and Jerry Ordway. Luke Ross draws the Gentleman Ghost old-time flashback sequences and it's like reading Classics Illustrated, and I mean that in a good way.