Day of Judgment #1 (November 1999)

In the DC Universe, the phrase "Hell on Earth" is not thrown around lightly. Why? Because Hell is a real place in the DCU. And sometimes, Hell decides to come throw a party on Earth. And by "party", I mean invade and wreck stuff. In 1999, the DCU did get such an invasion, and it was not helped that one of their earliest heroes was corrupted and led the invasion. This is Day of Judgment #1!

The cover is a Matt Smith piece. It depicts a group of heroes in what looks like a plain pin-up. It's nothing special. I do like the detail of the Spectre's face being shadowed. Nice subtle bit of foreshadowing. I wish he was shown looming over the heroes. And of course, Batman is front and center because it wouldn't be a modern DC story starring a ton of heroes without having Batman all up in it.

"The Summoning"
Writer: Geoff Johns
Penciler: Matt Smith
Inker: Steve Mitchell
Colorist: James Sinclair
Letterer: Comicraft
Editor: Kevin Dooley
Executive Editor: Mike Carlin

The story begins in Hell. And naturally, since this is Hell, there's some torturing going on.

Hell really needs arcades.

Meet Asmodel. First appearing in JLA #7 (July 1997), he was once one of Heaven's Army. However, he grew fed up of his position, decided to pull a Lucifer and try to conquer Heaven. This led to his battling the Justice League, and as a punishment for his actions, the Prescence (Basically the DCU's version of the Judeo-Christian God) banished him to hell in the 1998 miniseries JLA: Paradise Lost. 

His torturer is a demon named Neron. First appearing in Manhunter #11 (October 1995), Neron is a fallen angel. He can be seen as a Satan analogue, and he was allied with Asmodel during the Paradise Lost affair. The demon decided to take a break from torturing the angel, saying he has other souls to buy. After all, he's not worried. Asmodel is totally not going anywhere, right?

Exactly. Asmodel is rescued by a certain famous DCU demon.

"There's no need to pout! I'm just hanging about!"

Yup, gone gone the form of man, it's the demon Etrigan. The demon rhymes with Asmodel, saying he can help Asmodel not only escape, but get revenge on Earth and Neron. How? Well, in the form of...the Spectre.

You may be familiar with the Spectre, if you've read my review of the first issue of his 1992 series here. Basically, the Spectre is an angel of vengeance who was bonded to the soul of a policeman named Jim Corrigan. But that's no longer the case. He's now without a host, thanks to Jim Corrigan moving on to heaven. As such he needs another soul to bond to. A soul that is touched by the Presence. And although the Presence denies him, Asmodel is one such soul. Asmodel is suspicious about this. Demons do not help out of the kindness of their hearts, even ones who have been known to hang around with superheroes like Etrigan. Etrigan does have reasons of his own, but he wants to help. Etrigan summons the Spectre.

"Whaddaya want! I was watching my stories!"

The Spectre, being a vengeful sort, angrily slices off Asmodel's wings. 

There's just angel blood and feathers everywhere now. Neron is not going to be happy about this because this was the janitor's day off, and he promised to keep the place clean.

Anyway, Etrigan wanted this to happen. And contrary to what you all think, it wasn't because of raging wing envy. You see, Etrigan said Merlin (yes, the Merlin of Arthurian legend) once claimed that the ashes of an angel's wings can bind a heavenly soul to just about anything. Yup, angel wing feathers are the supernatural equivalent of Gorilla Glue. He gets proven right as Asmodel ends up bonded to the Spectre.

"THIS WAS A BAD IDEA! THIS HURTS SO BAD!"

The Spectre bonded to an angry fallen angel with a raging power lust.

What's happening on Earth in the meantime, you may ask? Well, one Zatanna Zatara is finishing up a performance. A bartender named Eric asks her out on a date, but she turns him down, as she fears the dangers of his being involved with a superheroine. She senses the merging of the Spectre and Asmodel, and heads out. 

We next head to New Jersey. In particular, the Ostrander Mental Institute (Heh). A sudden storm has kicked up, and it's made one of the patients go nuts. That patient is one June Moone, aka the Enchantress. The wild magic the storm is kicking up causes her to transform into her Enchantress form.

"With great power comes a great bod!"

Problem is, Moone's Enchantress persona tends to get a bit...drunk on magical power and when that happens, she goes bad. It's why they called her the "Switcheroo-Witcheroo" back in the day. She busts out, only to encounter the Kyle Rayner Green Lantern. Over in Hell, the Asmodel Spectre gets in Neron's face, saying that he will get control of the place, freezing Neron. He rampages through Hell, causing it to literally freeze over.

Back on Earth, Enchantress engages Rayner in battle, her dialogue implying that she is unaware of the events of Emerald Twilight and Final Night, as she not only doesn't recognize Kyle, but she also still thinks Hal Jordan is the Green Lantern. Kyle demands to know what she's up to, but the Enchantress points out she's not the perpetrator here. She wishes she was, but she's not. The two witness Etrigan and Hell's hordes burst out of the ground. Well, I guess the office party is cancelled. A shame. 

In Boston, Zatanna meets up with a rather obscure DC character: Doctor Occult.

"Zatanna, this had better be good. I'm busy tombstone-gazing."

Fun fact, he was created by the same guys who created Superman: Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster.

She next goes to pick up Deadman in St. Louis. At the JLA Watchtower on the Moon, the Justice League girds for battle, calling in all reserves as well. 

The Justice Society battle Solomon Grundy in Blue Valley. Members of the Quintessence find themselves unable to enter Earth thanks to Asmodel. Zatanna grabs Sebastian Faust (the... more heroic-leaning son of JLA villain Felix Faust) in Detroit, and Madame Xanadu in Greenwich Village. The Phantom Stranger also arrives, saying he's gathered some others as well. 

The heroes try to fight the demonic invasion, but they're not doing so hot. They should call the X-Men. They've dealt with this kind of thing before.

Asmodel is confronted by the JLA's angelic member Zauriel...and he just gets his wings turned to stone. The Enchantress decides it's time to hit the ol' dusty trail, much to Kyle Rayner's fury. Alan Scott, aka the Sentinel (Yeah, at this time, DC was pushing the whole "Kyle Rayner is the Last Green Lantern" gimmick, forcing creatives to have Alan, the original GL, go by Sentinel) tells him to just let her go. Asmodel is the bigger problem right now. He also laments about letting the Spectre be released without another soul to bind him to in JLA #31.

The heroes try to take Asmodel on, but now that he has the power of the Spectre at his command, it's naturally ineffective. Asmodel does some pretty horrifying stuff to the heroes. He turns Superman into salt. Argent and Wildcat's eyes are turned into fly larva. Kyle Rayner is turned into wood. Asmodel gloats over this, saying that nothing can stop him from wrecking heaven now...until another group makes themselves known. 

Zatanna. Madame Xanadu. Sebastian Faust. Alan Scott. The Phantom Stranger. Ragman. Raven of the Teen Titans. Meet the Sentinels of Magic. And they are going to make Asmodel's day a very rough one.

I enjoyed this issue. We got a big bad set up, we got some action, and Geoff Johns's love of the DCU really shines. I love  Matt Smith's art bring a nice bit of moodiness to the story, especially with the usage of shadows in the Hell scenes. He also seems to be channeling his inner Mike Mignola for it. I do think it was forced to hold back on the horror a bit, but otherwise that, the art is really good. 

If you want to read this comic for yourself, I recommend tracking down the 2013 trade paperback Day of Judgment. Thanks for reading this blog entry!

The Spectre #1 (December 1992)

The Spectre. The DC Universe's resident Angel of Vengeance. Created by Jerry Siegel (yes, the same Jerry Siegel who co-created Superman) and Bernard Baily, the character first appeared in More Fun Comics #52 (February 1940).

Who is the Spectre? Well, the Spectre was a fallen angel named Aztar who had participated in Lucifer's rebellion against heaven, but ended up regretting it and repented. As part of his penance, he would serve as an embodiment of God's anger. But he needed a human spirit to guide him. Enter James "Jim" Corrigan. A police officer who was murdered by criminals. They stuffed him into a barrel of cement and tossed him into a body of water. His spirit would be chosen to guide Aztar, and they would work together as The Spectre for years.

Being one of DC's oldest characters, he understandably has a very long history. He was one of the members of the first superhero team: The Justice Society of America. He would be revived with the rest of the JSA in the 1960s. The 1970s saw him get some stories in Adventure Comics by  writer Michael Fleicher and artist Jim Aparo that would be seen as controversial for the gruesome punishments the Ghostly Guardian would hand out to criminals.

In 1986, there was a series planned for the Spectre, to be written by Steve Gerber and drawn by Gene Colan. However, Gerber missed the deadline because he was visiting the set of Howard the Duck's cinematic debut, which was on its last day of shooting. As a result, DC cancelled it. He would get a self-titled series under the pen of Doug Moench, which lasted 31 issues. This series recast Jim Corrigan as an occult-leaning private detective.

This comic I'll be looking at is the first issue of his 1992 series, which was written by John Ostrander and featured art by Tom Mandrake. It was his third solo series. Ostrander was a good fit for the Spectre, as he was a former theology student. During his run, he would put the Wrath of God in complex moral situations and also re-examined James Corrigan, the man bound to the angel.

And I figured...hey, it's October, Halloween is coming up, what better time for the Spirit of Vengeance to get spotlighted here on this little blog? Let's take a look at The Spectre #1!

The cover is pretty awesome. A Tom Mandrake piece, you got the Spectre standing in front of a pile of skeletons, and behind him there's more skeletons forming a giant skull. It's awesome and creepy. Perfect for a Spectre cover. I love it! Evidently, I heard this cover had a "glow-in-the-dark" gimmick. That's really neat. I can imagine how it would look in the dark, the Spectre's body glowing like that. So creepy.

"Crimes of Violence"
Writer: John Ostrander
Artist: Tom Mandrake
Inker: Tom Mandrake
Colorist: Digital Chameleon
Letterer: Todd Klein
Editor: Dan Raspler
Executive Editor: Jenette Khan

The story begins with Jim Corrigan walking towards a hospital.

In a nice nod, it's known as the "Siegel-Baily General Hospitals". Get it? Because Jerry Siegel and Bernard Baily created the Spectre, as I said earlier. He's looking for a man, a man named Louis Snipe. And said Mr. Snipe happens to be a patient at this very hospital.

In the hospital ward Mr. Snipe is staying at, we meet a nice woman named Amy Beitermann. She's a social worker who is helping another patient with some forms. She closes the curtain around Snipe's bed, giving the sleeping old man something resembling privacy. A voice wakes him up, and the Spectre appears over the old man.

Jim Corrigan used to bust him...before his death fifty years earlier. Yeah, this was from 1992. They shoved him a barrel of cement and tossed him into the river. Evidently, they felt cement shoes were cliché. Corrigan wants Snipe to remember this. Corrigan is a tired man. For fifty years, he's confronted evil, and...the world has only seemed to get worse. More evil acts, more kinds of evil acts. He is convinced Snipe may know, and wants answers. However, Amy Beitermann finds Corrigan, so he decides to leave.

Beitermann introduces herself, saying she overheard him, and offers to help him out. Corrigan turns it down, saying his problem is beyond therapy. She notes that he's the way she likes 'em: cute and weird. She then spots him out on the street, wondering how he got down there so fast. She witnesses a drive-by. Corrigan is hit, but the bullets seem to not only pass through him, but he vanishes in green smoke.

The shooters drive away, only to encounter the Spectre peeking out of the street. They drive into his mouth, and end up...in space.

Criminals! In Spaaaaaaaace! However, the shooters wake up, thinking it was just a dream...or was it?

Yup, they got grafted to the Spectre's fingers. The embodiment of God's Wrath lecture them about how they brought death with no remorse. Their weapons and drugs brought pain, and it does not bother them. So, he's going to give them some of his own idea of karmic retribution. The Spectre creates a syringe and injects himself in the arm, causing the shooters to burn alive. They ended up in their overturned car...yeah, it's weird. The Spectre seems to get into a bit of a funk about it.

Amy runs out, curious and confused. She notes that an old friend has arrived.

Meet Inspector Nate Kane, policeman. No relation to Kate Kane, so don't ask him. She asks him about a Jim Corrigan, thinking that he may have had a dad or grandfather who was a cop. Kane recalls there was a detective named Corrigan, who had left the force and became a private detective, specializing in the occult. This is a nod to his previous solo series. She wonders if he's still in business, but Kane has no idea.

Elsewhere in town, a pair of men are leaving an office building after working late. One of the men, a young up-and-comer named Danny Trofft, buys some flowers and heads to an apartment. Young Mr. Trofft has a date tonight. However, his date seems to think his name is Eddie. How odd. She takes his flowers and puts them in a vase. She tells him there's something he needs to know. However, he assures her that he knows everything he needs to know about her...while coming at her with a knife.

I'm guessing he was adopted, and his birth name was Bateman. That night, The Spectre visits Snipe, wanting to know why they are the way they are. Corrigan was a ruthless, violent cop back when he was alive. Why? The Spectre intends to find out...by going into Snipe's soul.

He finds himself inside a twisted city, the way Snipe remembers it. He also discovers that he's Jim Corrigan again. He then gets ambushed by Snipe. Corrigan finds himself in a familiar pickle.

Corrigan finds himself reliving his death, but he wondering why Snipe is here. After all, Snipe was just some informant, a snitch. He wasn't even there when he was killed. However, Snipe has a secret: He was the reason Corrigan was killed. He gave the cop a tip that led to his death by cement barrel. Corrigan wants answers. He knew Snipe's family. They were good, decent, God-fearing people...except for him. Why?

Snipe then goes into a rant about how being good gets you nowhere in life, how his father got fired when he couldn't work anymore, how they were poor despite all of it, his brother dying in the war (presumably WWII),and he starts ranting about how rich kids were able to get out of fighting. Basically, Snipe has become a nihilist. He believes nothing matters, and there is no point in doing good or caring about others. There's also no Heaven or Hell, as far as he is concerned. You just get suckered in the end. So, best to sucker everyone you can. However, Corrigan does disagree with him on one thing.

The Spectre tells Snipe that the afterlife does exist, and he will face justice. However, Snipe is quick to remind the Spectre that this is his soul, and as such, it's his turf. He tries to shoot at the Spectre, but it's no good. Keep in mind, Jim Corrigan is already dead. Not one to give up or learn from anything, Snipe keeps on shooting. Spectre points out that this "city" is burning. His body is dying, and his soul is nothing but a black hole. The Angel of Vengeance shows this by forming a pair of his own guns, and shooting a hole in Snipe. The hole sucks the man inside, Snipe realizing the Spectre was right. He's sucked into the hole, screaming to be filled. The Spectre is nearly caught in it, but manages to escape.

He flees Snipe's now dead body. He had always suspected Snipe's role in his death, and he wanted to be sure. The story ends with James Corrigan lamenting that even though all his killers are now dead, he is still not at rest.

This issue was pretty awesome. It was neat seeing Jim Corrigan's origin explored a bit more. I also liked the twist of Corrigan not finding any rest or freedom after Snipe dies. Helps foreshadow the general theme of the series. Things are going to get murky. I also liked the serial killer plotline setting up, and the nod at his previous status quo. Gives us an ongoing threat for the Spectre, and helps us feel like the transition is more natural. Tom Mandrake's art is so perfect for the Spectre. It gives that creepy, moody vibe that is a good fit for the character and the darker tone of his stories. I also liked the comic's use of panel shapes and placement to indicate mood and motion in places.

All in all, I recommend this comic. If you want to read it for yourself, I recommend picking up the 2014 trade paperback The Spectre Vol. 1: Crimes and Judgements. It's a great read for Halloween. Next time, we keep the Halloween spirit going with Spider-Man as two of his supporting cast make their way through the Inferno...