JSA Classified is a DC Comics book featuring the Justice Society of America that ran for 39 issues from 2005 to 2008. The book is broken up into storylines lasting from one to four issues featuring individual members of the team or their foes. It's a Spin-Off of JSA (1999).
The storylines in JSA Classified are:
- "Power Trip" (issues 1-4) written by Geoff Johns with art by Amanda Conner featuring Power Girl.
- "Honor Among Thieves" (issues 5-7) written by Jen Van Meter with art by Patrick Olliffe featuring the Injustice Society.
- "The Spear and the Dragon" (issues 8-9) written by Peter Tomasi with art by Don Kramer featuring The Flash and Wildcat.
- "The Fall and Rise of Vandal Savage" (issues 10-13) written by Stuart Moore with art by Paul Gulacy featuring Green Lantern.
- "Double or Nothing" (issues 14-16) written by Steve Englehart with art by Tom Derenick featuring Stargirl and Wildcat.
- "The Venom Connection" (issues 17-18) written by Tony Bedard with art by Scott McDaniel featuring Hourman.
- "Skin Trade" (issues 19-20) written by Scott Beatty with art by Rags Morales featuring Doctor Mid-Nite.
- "Best Served Cold" (issues 21-22) by Walt Simonson featuring Hawkman.
- "Nightfall" (issues 23-24) written by J.T. Krul with art by Alex Sanchez featuring Doctor Mid-Nite.
- "Johnny Mimic" (issue 25) written by Tony Bedard with art by Dennis Calero featuring Green Lantern.
- "Fight Game" (issues 26-27) written by Frank Tieri with art by Matt Haley featuring Wildcat.
- "Problem Solved" (issue 28) written by Fabian Nicieza with art by Steve Uy featuring Jakeem Thunder.
- "Mister Horrific" (issues 29-31) written by Arvid Nelson with art by Alex Sanchez featuring Mister Terrific.
- "Giving Thanks" (issues 32-33) written by Junior Thomas with art by Staz Johnson featuring Green Lantern.
- "60 Minutes" (issue 34) written by James Peaty with art by Freddie E. Williams featuring Hourman.
- "Forward Through the Past" (issues 35-37) written by B. Clay Moore with art by Ramon Perez featuring Wildcat.
- "Body and Soul" (issues 38-39) written by Mike W. Barr with art by Shawn Martinbrough featuring Wildcat.
Tropes in JSA Classified
open/close all folders
Power Trip
Honor Among Thieves
- Chronic Backstabbing Disorder: The original Ragdoll is portrayed as the kind of guy who will betray anyone for the slightest reason. Thus, nobody in Wizard's gang feels too broken up when Ragdoll is killed after stealing the Cosmic Key and trying to use it for himself, which has the added bonus of releasing Johnny Sorrow.
- Covers Always Lie: The covers for the first two parts depict the Rag Doll in his grittier Scary Stitches look depicted in James Robinson's Starman, Villains United and in Geoff Johns' runs of JSA (1999) and JSA: All Stars, but within the actual comic wears his classic Golden Age costume where he resembled an oversized rag doll with a Slasher Smile.
- Honor Among Thieves: The Injustice Society, or at least the core members of the Wizard, Icicle, Tigress, Solomon Grundy and Gentleman Ghost look out for each other and try not to incur unnecessary wrath or invite revenge by doing more harm than they need to to get the job done. Lex Luthor's Society has their own more harsh rules, ones that could keep Johnny Sorrow from being able to attack his teammates without repercussion since there are powerful enough people backing them up, which is part of why the Injustice Society is going so far out of their way to get in.
- Rewarded as a Traitor Deserves: The Injustice Society's plan hinges on the knowledge that Ragdoll has never not betrayed those he's working with. When he tries stealing the key for himself and ditching the Injustice Society it ends up killing him, allowing Johnny Sorrow to use Ragdoll's death and the key to escape his otherworldly prison.
- Stripped to the Bone: When he tries to use the Cosmic Key for himself, Rag Doll gets incinerated by its power and reduced to a skeleton.
- Villain Episode: While the rest of the book focuses on the heroes this tale is all about the Injustice Society, and how the core members will risk their lives and livelihoods to save one of their own even when there is nothing else in it for them.
- Witch with a Capital "B": The Wizard insults Nyssa by calling her a witch at the end of the arc.
The Spear and the Dragon
- And This Is for...: At the end of the arc, Steven uses his Eye Beams to kill the Dragon King after stating that it's for his parents the Dragon King forced him to kill using his powers.
- Self-Made Orphan: The arc begins with the Dragon King using the Spear of Destiny to make a boy named Steven kill his own parents.
The Fall and Rise of Vandal Savage
You too have had partners. Many of them, down the decades. Perhaps just as Smithy and Beauchamp led me down the path of destruction one of your deceased friends will do the same to you.
- Abusive Parents: A flashback shows Vandal Savage responding to his daughter Annabelle pointing out that he's cruel to the servants because he knows they're better than him by killing her cat in front of her.
- Kick the Dog: After luring Alan Scott to his lair, Vandal Savage's rant leads to him having the audacity to mock Alan Scott for the loved ones he was unable to save, especially twisting the knife by bringing up that his daughter Jade died during the events of Infinite Crisis.
- "Not So Different" Remark: Vandal Savage tries to compare himself to Alan Scott in that both men are fathers who had little involvement in their children's upbringing. Alan isn't having any of it.
- Race Lift: Jimmy Henton is depicted as African-American, in contrast to being Caucasian in Alan Scott's original debut in All-American Comics #16 as well as the retellings of Alan Scott's origins featured in Secret Origins Vol 2 #18 and Green Lantern Corps Quarterly #1
- Revenge Before Reason: As Savage's stockpile of bits of his kids and descendants to eat and store up his powers goes missing at the same time his immortality starts slipping and his mind. He becomes obsessed with ensuring that if he's about to die he's taking Alan Scott with him no matter what he has to do to kill him, even cutting his own remaining time short.
- Ship Tease: Alan Scott and Jimmy exchange what can be oh so easily taken as a flirtatious exchange while leaving their shared sleeper room aboard a train, right before Jimmy was killed in an explosion. This romantic relationship was eventually revealed to be canon, but hidden given the time period, following DC Rebirth bringing both characters back into continuity.
Double or Nothing
- Big "NO!": Amos Fortune screams "No" when he is defeated.
- Out-of-Clothes Experience: Gyspy and Vixen's disembodied consciouses are represented as nude astral forms.
- Third-Person Person: Amos Fortune refers to himself in third person near the end.
The Venom Connection
- Arc Welding: It's revealed in this story that Venom, the drug that gave Bane superhuman strength, is actually a derivative of Miraclo, the drug that gave the original Hourman Rex Tyler and his son Rick their powers.
- Parental Sexuality Squick: Rick Tyler's internal narration has him remark that he'd visit his parents more often after bringing his father Rex back from the dead, but is deterred by the likelihood that he'd walk in on them while they're making love.Rick: I'd visit more often, but, well...they're making up for lost time.
Rex: I have the strawberries and whipped cree-eam...
Wendi: And I have something for you.
Rick: Yep, there are some sights a son should never walk in on...
Skin Trade
In rare cases the alcohol/opiate mix has left certain patients blissfully oblivious to pain, but fully awake during the procedure. Better that he surrenders fully to sleep. Elective or unplanned and unwilling, surgery is an experience best left unseen by the patient.
- An Arm and a Leg: The organ theft group stole Grogamesh's arms. Later, Dolores loses one of her own arms when she tries to use the power she's stolen from Icemaiden to attack Mid-Nite and freezes her own limb off.
- Back-Alley Doctor: Dolores is running a very illegal medical clinic for the ultra-wealthy where they can get plastic surgery and buy meta-human parts and have them implanted.
- Bio-Augmentation: The rich and connected can get meta-human organs transplanted through Dolores's clinic.
- Body Horror: The arc is all about people having body parts forcibly stolen by a doctor who goes out of his way to keep them alive due to his twisted interpretation of the Hippocratic Oath. This means STAR Labs is trying to keep victims alive after they've been in some cases skinned alive and in other case had their heart removed.
- Bizarre Alien Biology: Loose Cannon managed to stumble to STAR Labs for medical attention without his heart before collapsing.
- Deadly Doctor: Dr. Mid-Nite, as per usual, uses his medical knowledge to his advantage in fights. Allowing him to defeat Roulette's much stronger bodyguard.
- Eye Scream: The group that's been stealing parts from metahumans cut out Argus's eyes, then tries to do the same to Mid-Nite with a lovely panel of their doctor lowering a scalpel less than an inch from his unseeing eyes as they're held open.
- Flaying Alive: Sigrid Nansen a.k.a. Icemaiden was abducted and skinned alive at the order of Dolores Winters because the latter wanted Sigrid's skin transplanted onto her body.
- Full-Frontal Assault: Peregrine, due to suffering phantom pain from the removal of her wings, lashes out on the medics tending to her while naked before Dr. Mid-Nite sedates her.
- Mad Doctor: Dolores Winters' mind was saved when the Ulta-Humanite stole her body by his assistant who was in "love" with the actress. The assistant is now helping Dolores run a twisted meta-human body part selling ring for the wealthy.
- Organ Theft: Dolores Winters harvests super-powered body parts to sell to wealthy patrons in the black market. The gruesome part is that the heroes whose body parts were stolen are often left alive after the procedure and basically crippled.
- Plot Hole: Dolores Winters had Icemaiden skinned alive because she wanted "alabaster skin". Icemaiden's skin has always been blue.
- Strapped to an Operating Table: Dolores Winters has Dr. Mid-Nite strapped down and his eyes forced open in order for her pet doctor to extract them for sale to clients wanting meta-human parts.
Best Served Cold
- De-power: The arc ends with Blackfire stripped of her powers.
- Engineered Public Confession: Hawkman and Hawkwoman end up recording Blackfire's confession that she's been Playing Both Sides in the Rann-Thanagar War.
Nightfall
- Actually Not a Vampire: The serial killer Mid-Nite is tracking has fangs, drinks his victim's blood, only operates at night and claims to be a vampire. When Mid-Nite captures him he proves not to be a vampire after all, but is instead a meta-human suffering from a strange disease and delusions.
- Arbitrary Skepticism: In "Nightfall" Mid-Nite, who regularly fights a plant zombie named Solomon Grundy and lives in a world where there's at least one actual vampire acting as a hero, refuses to believe that the fanged serial killer with no heat signature whose been running around biting people and draining their blood could possibly be a vampire.
- Magic Versus Science: For some odd reason, despite living in a world were magic is definitely real Mid-Nite and Mr. Terrific double down on the concept of logic vs. superstition on this case.
- Sham Supernatural: Dr. Mid-Nite is trying to track down a serial killer who seems to be a vampire and goes to a nightclub which caters to people playing at being vampires. He does actually find the killer there and the killer turns out to be a sick metahuman who'd convinced himself he was a vampire.
- Wife-Basher Basher: Mid-Nite starts out the arc by sneaking up on an abusive husband who has taken his daughter and bleeding wife hostage at gunpoint and knocking him out.
Johnny Mimic
"Baloney. The top brass in Washington never had clean hands. Just ask the survivors of Dresden or Hiroshima. It was Mystery Men like you who stood for something better, even the hoodlums looked up to Green Lantern. You were the super-man before there was a Superman! The world only seemed to make sense back then because guys like you set the standard! And now you're gonna let this Father Time putz drag you down to his level?"
— Jonathan Waddill
- The Bus Came Back: Johnny Mimic's last (and first) appearance was way back in Comic Cavalcade #22 in 1943.
- Reformed Criminal: Johnny Mimic was a small time supervillain back in the day, who made a deal with Alan Scott after being defeated by the Green Lantern and has kept his nose clean for decades since. He's pissed when Green Lantern shows up asking for help in defiance of their deal, and even more pissed to learn that the US government threatening him and his wife made Green Lantern do so instead of finding a way around them.
- Remember the New Guy?: An interesting example with Johnny Mimic. He is based on a Golden Age villain named Joe Mimic who fought the Golden Age Green Lantern in Comic Cavalcade #22 (1943), but was solely a one-time villain. When reintroduced in 2007, he was suddenly treated as having been a long-time recurring foe of Green Lantern and the JSA with a long history with Lantern in particular.
- Tele-Frag: The unfortunate S.H.A.D.E. scientist who tried to steal an H-Dial by moving forward in time to a point when he thought the lab would be empty loses a leg when Johnny Mimic taps into the echo of his plan, and mindset and moves a chair to sit right where his leg is about to rematerialize.
- Took a Level in Badass: Mimic was originally just a copycat criminal, but here he has ESP abilities that allow him to analyze crime scene and figure out a criminal's mindset.
- What the Hell, Hero?: Jonathan Waddill (Johnny Mimic) is pissed when Green Lantern shows up at his house to ask him to use his powers despite their decades long agreement. He's even more pissed to learn it's because a government official is going to come in and take Johnny by force, even threatening Johnny's wife, if he doesn't agree.
Fight Game
- Fat Bastard: Joe the Slob is overweight and runs gambling houses where bets are placed on whether the superheroes or the supervillains win in their fights.
- Grave-Marking Scene: Wildcat finally goes to see his father's grave and try to let go of his resentment of the man for killing his mother in a car accident and abandoning him to escape his gambling debts.
- Race Lift: Sportsmaster II was introduced in Manhunter #17 (1989) as an African-American named Victor Gover, who went on to briefly join the Suicide Squad. Wildcat fights a white, blond-haired Sportsmaster here, whose real name is still given as Victor Gover.
- Villainous Glutton: Joe the Slob is constantly eating food and complains that it is cruel and unusual punishment when he is momentarily kept from binging during his incarceration.
- You Have Failed Me: Desaad vaporizes Joe the Slob as punishment for letting him down.
Problem Solved
- Taking Advantage of Generosity: A woman whose life was saved gets pissed when Jakeem recovers a teddy bear for one of her child neighbors from their destroyed apartment building, ranting about how the heroes aren't really helping since they're leaving behind a destroyed building. This upsets Jakeem so he sets up a wishing booth to use his Thunderbolt's powers to help people. He's quickly inundated with a massive crowd of people requesting he do everything for them even if it's something they could easily do themselves to the point that the Thunderbolt revolts and refuses to assist him.
Mister Horrific
- Brain in a Jar: A Nazi brain in a jar directing a Nazi plot from a moon base.
- He Knows Too Much: Senator Wilhoite is fatally shot to keep her from squealing on Senator Enfield's dark secrets.
- Nazi Moon Base: The disembodied brain of Heinrich Himmler threatens the world with his moon-based railgun.
- Space Base: The villains have a base on the far side of the moon.
Giving Thanks
- Christmas Episode: Alan, Jay and Ted attend a parade, which is crashed by Solomon Grundy and Vandal Savage, and then attend the JSA's annual Christmas get together.
- Twisted Christmas: Alan's daughter returns from the dead for Christmas, as a tortured soul under Vandal Savage's imperfect control whose mere existence is draining the life from Alan and a child so she has to sacrifice herself to save a little girl.
- Why Won't You Die?: During his fight with Solomon Grundy, Alan Scott demands to know why the undead brute keeps coming back every time he's killed.
60 Minutes
- Hulk Speak: Curly speaks in third person and isn't that articulate.
- Legacy Character: The villain the Separatist turns out to be a man named Sterling Fry who has become the second Time Commander, the original Time Commander John Starr being Fry's mentor, friend and "so much more".
Forward Through the Past
- Retraux Flashback: The flashbacks to Ted Grant when he was in his prime and effortlessly beat the crooks he faces as Wildcat are deliberately done in a style invoking older comics.
Body and Soul
- Covers Always Lie: The covers make it look like the story consists of Wildcat fighting a clone of himself, but what really happens is that he battles athletes who have been given his skills.
- Embarrassing Hospital Gown: When Alan Scott helps Ted Grant recover, Ted complains about the draft left from his hospital gown.