Extreme Justice

History

Extreme Crimes Call for Extreme Justice...

... so DC's house ads would have you believe. The early 1990s in the comics industry was characterized by a tremendous upswing following the success of Image Comics. Launched in 1991 by the industry's hottest artists (note: not writers), Image quickly became the leader to catch. Not only were people buying comics in record numbers—up to millions of copies per book—but investors took note and began propping other independent publishers.

To compete, the entire industry changed to capitalize on the "Image style." This style was epitomized by the phenomenal success of Rob Liefeld (X-Force, Youngblood), Todd McFarlane (Spider-Man, Spawn) and Jim Lee (WildC.A.T.S), whose characters were brash and the artwork was often overworked, exaggerated and "skritchy."

By the time major publishers caught up, this upward trend had begun to collapse. Critical success evaded the "celebrity creators," many of whom could not publish on a regular schedule.

And you'd better believe it... these changes found their way into the Justice League as well. Prior to the creation of Extreme Justice, the main title, Justice League America made subtle changes to reflect signs of the times. In issue #80, Booster Gold was retooled with an all-new ridiculously bulky armor. The character line-up changed as well, to include resident bad boy Guy Gardner, and another '90s flash-in-the-pan, the Ray.

  

One of the JLA's writers at this time, Dan Vado, cites a definite edict from DC's editorial staff to do more sensational stories. This led to the development of a major cross-over event among the three Justice League titles (including the International and Task Force books). The seven-part "Judgment Day" arc culminated in the death of a popular character, Ice, and the fracturing of the teams.

Extreme sodas, Xtreme sports, extreme nachos ... Extreme Justice.

The team never called itself "Extreme Justice," it was merely the title of the book. When Captain Atom challenged Wonder Woman's leadership and formed his own splinter group, the team did little to establish a new identity. As the Blue Beetle said in the first issue "We're the Justice League... We've got as much right to the name as anyone." And they were off!

My decision to write the profile was odd indeed. I never liked this book, because of it's "Image-style" art. But in retrospect, I have to admit that my impression excluded the better aspects of Dan Vado's writing. Though his character choices were limited to B-listers or worse, he managed to assemble a really fantastic mix of characters. He squeezed in the requisite Superman and Wonder Woman analogs (with an edge), included the popular Blue and Gold pair, and brought back Ronnie Raymond as Firestorm.

A read through the letter columns quickly reveals fans' cheers and jeers. Readers liked the new outlook, the move away from '80s humor, the art, use of character histories, and Firestorm, Firestorm, Firestorm. Naturally, its detractors cited many of the same things. The most common complaint was Marc Campos' art style. The book's demise was not helped by the high turnover in creative teams. In under two years, the title had three writers/artist teams and two editors. On the up side? Some great covers by Steve Lightle, Howard Porter and Chris Batista.

Looking back, I'm confused by DC's decision to re-launch a third JLA title at a time when neither Superman nor Batman could not be used to anchor any of the books. Sure, the Justice League is an ensemble book, but history proves that its success is linked to the inclusion of DC's top-selling characters. Extreme Justice was canceled so soon (with issue #18) ... I wonder how far in advance the editors knew about the relaunch of Grant Morrison's "big guns" JLA.

Interview with Writer Dan Vado

29 July 2008

Dan Vado was the original writer of Extreme Justice. He preceded this book with a tenure on Justice League America (#78-91). Dan was kind enough to enlighten me about the origins of this team and the somewhat odd circumstances (JLA-wise) under which it was created...

Q: In retrospect, it seems the timing of your run on Justice League America couldn't have been worse. You had to tell JLA stories with only ONE of the "big seven" anchors (Wonder Woman).
DV: Yeah, I found the whole process kind of limiting, with edicts about being "commercial" and for the need to keep big characters out of the mix. My theory was that the JLA should be more of a state of mind than a group where you carried a membership card. You might have people who lived in the satellite or whatever, but then in a BIG crisis everyone gets called in, kind of like a super-hero national guard. My original ending to the "Judgment Day" involved Superman searching his ship and discovering two Kryptonians, who would then help him but die in the process. It would be implied that the Overmaster was the one who destroyed Krypton.

When they shifted me to Extreme Justice I suggested using Bruce Wayne (at that time, with a broken back) fund the group. They didn't think the they could ever get that past the Batman group.

Q: You began writing Justice League America in 1993 with issue #78, after the death of Superman. It seems from the beginning, your stories were crafted to lead towards the "Judgment Day" story arc, and the JLA's split ...
Dan Vado: Was it really THAT long ago? When I took the JLA job I had a story involving a god-like Galactus character called the Overmaster (my goal at the time was to find little used bits of continuity from different JLA periods and develop stories for them). This was independent of "Judgment Day." When the Justice League editors decided they wanted a big cross-over event for the book they figured they could use the foundation I laid as a jumping-off point for the cross-over. I had not done much other than put in little bits of foreshadowing, (Justice League America #79, 83) so the whole thing was kind of a blank canvas at that point.

Q: How did you come onto the JLA book and what role did you play in the development of the "Judgment Day" cross-over?
DV: I had written a couple of Superman Annuals from the year before for that year's Annuals' cross-over event. One of them involved some of the Justice League characters. I think the editors read that and, needing a writer, offered me the JLA book. Once "Judgment Day" became a cross-over thing all of the writers, artists and editors of the various books had input on the development of the story and how the characters they has should be involved in it. My main involvement was to share the ideas I had for my own big story and the research I had done. On the whole, though, it was a group effort.

Q: Were you involved in the decision to kill Ice?
DV: Yes, we all were. I think I may have been the one to pitch her being killed, might have been [JLA Editor] Marc Waid, I don't really recall. I was in full support of it though because I felt that Ice dying would add weight to the gravity of the story. We could have knocked off a character that nobody cared about, but then what would be the point? Would you even be asking about "Judgment Day" today if we hadn't? [Ed. note: Marc Waid did indeed make the call.]

Q: There was a lot of cross-over stuff happening between titles during that time. Did that affect your ability to tell stories you'd rather have written?

DV: Yes and no. I had always had in mind that the JLA should be about big things, when I grew up reading comics (DC Comics in particular) there was only one JLA and everyone was in it. They had a giant satellite and looked down on the earth like overlords. That was the JLA I wanted to write and get to. As a writer, I cut my creative teeth doing my own thing, so having to work with other writers and editors, not getting to end a story I started, or having to pick something up in the middle, it was all kind of foreign to me.

It goes with the territory, though, and this is less a criticism of the way DC works and more of an admission that I was perhaps not suited to doing that kind of comics work.

Q: Can you tell me anything about the creation or "offshooting" of Extreme Justice? Was this a book you pitched to DC, or did they approach you with the concept?
DV: No, I had nothing to do with the creation of Extreme Justice, nor did I ask to write the title. After "Judgment Day" the Justice League books were revamped and the creative teams were juggled around. They moved me to Extreme Justice.

Q: Were you asked to make this book one that would compete with the crazy Image-style books of its time?
DV: I can't speak for the idea around the creation of Extreme Justice, but one might assume that competing popular Image Comics books was the driving idea. What I was told was that they wanted Extreme Justice to be about big villains, big heroes and the end of the world every issue. It needed to be hyper and, of course, EXTREME!!!

Q: You wrote Extreme Justice for only a short time. Why did you leave?

DV: There was a change of editors right after the book launched and I did not see eye to eye with the new guy. [Ed. NOTE: Brian Augustyn was succeeded by his assistant, Ruben Diaz.] He started pushing me to put the Wonder Twins into the thing and some other crap and I had no patience for it. The editors at the time also had a habit of changing things in my story and dialog without even giving me the courtesy of a warning. There were several times when I picked up comics I had written and noticed changes in the dialog.

For example, right after I got the JLA job and finished two issues, I got a call from the Green Lantern editor informing me that the Guy Gardner who had appeared in those two issues was not the REAL Guy Gardner, but a clone. He then told me that the two comics had been adjusted to reflect this already and then proceeded to inform me how I should be handling the character.

Of course, once the books got published people jumped all over me for not knowing how to write Guy Gardner, so I took a lot of creative heat for something I had nothing to do with.

Anyway, had I known that quitting that book would mean the end of my writing career at DC (and, pretty much everywhere but my own company) I might not have done it. Archie Goodwin, who was my first editor there and someone whom I considered a friend, warned me not to quit. Maybe I should have listened.

Q: You never did write the Wonder Twins, did you? They seem to have debuted after your departure. Do you think their introduction was an attempt to boost sales?
DV: No, I did not write them.

Q: Was it your idea to put Firestorm through the leukemia?
DV: I am pretty certain that bringing back Firestorm was my idea; I was fully in favor of it. It might have even been my idea to do the cancer storyline. It was ironic to cure the Nuclear Man with nuclear medicine.

Q: Were you and penciller Marc Campos both left at the same time. Were you a package team on the title?
DV: We were not. I liked Marc's work, and speaking as a publisher I think he was someone who could have been so much more than he was. The work that was printed was really kind of rough, but I saw his pencils and I know this guy had a ton of potential and maybe what he needed was to be left alone to explore his own talent rather than being asked to draw like a bunch of Image comics. (I do not know if that was the case, but it seemed that way to me). [Ed. NOTE: Campos was indeed encouraged to draw a certain way.]

I hope he kept working on his craft. As a publisher I review a lot of art and I really did feel like he had potential.

About Penciller Marc Campos

Extreme Justice's original penciller, Marc Campos of Brazil, moved with Dan Vado, from the Justice League America book. Many fans criticized Extreme Justice for its ... extreme artwork. In an interview at Toon Zone, Campos confessed:

I did Darkstars, Justice League of America, Extreme Justice, Guy Gardner – Warrior, and Blood Pack for DC and I found it odd. I didn’t like the end result. I don’t like my drawings when I try to be more of a "realist." I’m sure that my realist style is almost insignificant.

And on his true aspirations:

I would love to have a chance to write and also to draw a story with one of these characters. Actually I never considered myself an artist, I started to draw because I liked to write stories, I loved animation and movies and I was a fan of comics.

Campos, who still lives in Brazil, has gone on to a successful career on many other projects. These days he is often employed by DC as an inker for (fellow Brazilian) Ivan Reis.

Membership

 

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Extreme Justice Chronology

What follows are events specific to Captain Atom's so-called "Extreme Justice" team only.

Continue reading this JLA's adventures here...