Review: Justice League United Vol. 2- The Infinitus Saga

Quick Summary

Pros: The main storyline is exciting and has plenty of action. Fans of the Legion of Super-Heroes will be happy to see them return.

Cons: The Legion’s introduction feels like too much, too soon. The Justice League United feels secondary in their own series. The story is very confusing to start out and is made even more confusing by changes in the plot.

Overall: Though this volume makes a valiant effort to accomplish a number of lofty goals, the end result is a book that fails to live up to the potential presented by its predecessor. In this collection, dozens of new superheroes are introduced, taking away time from the main cast and complicating an already complex plot. Then, the plot is shifted in ways that makes things even worse, which really sours the reading experience. Readers looking for a lackluster appearance of the Legion may find some entertainment here but other readers might be better off avoiding this one.

Story

While the first volume of Justice League United introduced readers to a unique and charming team, this volume casts all of that aside to tell an overly complex story that barely focuses on them. Instead, dozens of characters from the Legion of Super-Heroes take over the spotlight and leave little time for the fledgling team to continue their development. This dramatic change is accompanied by strange and sometimes erratic changes to character motivation and plot. All of this makes an already complex story, involving time travel, even harder to follow and makes for a poor reading experience. Overall, this is a messy introduction to the Legion of Super-Heroes and a lackluster continuation of the Justice League United’s adventures.

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The Infinitus Saga wastes little time in introducing the Legion of Super-Heroes and explaining their relevance to the story at hand. They have come to kill Ultra, who they believe will become a universe ending monster sometime in the future. The JLU refuses to accept this and Ultra is kidnapped by Byth before the ideological differences can fully be elaborated upon.

Though I typically would appreciate any attempt to integrate the Legion of Super-Heroes back into the regular DC Universe, the way it is attempted here simply does not work. Trying to reintroduce dozens of heroes into a book where team dynamics are just now being forged feels like too much, too soon. The JLU and Legion share the spotlight in a way that compliments neither party; the JLU’s development is sidelined and the Legion’s introduction is shorted. The end results hurts the collection as a whole and ruins the potential show back in Justice League Canada (Review).

In addition, balancing introductions with character development only seeks to further complicate an already intricate storyline. The Infinitus Saga involves time travel and destiny in a way that takes a moment to understand. On its own, this would be alright, but paired with everything else going on, it makes for an overly complex book.

This complexity is also enhanced by strange changes to character motivation and plot. In the previous volume, Byth’s plan was straightforward and made sense. Here, he is suddenly a time-traveling oracle who planned everything that has happened thus far. It completely changes his character in a way that disconnects this story from the previous one. The writing doesn’t even consistently reflect this change, as Byth sometimes claims to have invented the Ultra project and sometimes claims to have infiltrated it. This is another problem that would be small on its own but is significant when paired with everything else going on.

The collection also contains a Futures End tie-in which is, overall, pretty average. It gives the JLU a nice level of focus but is too short too really do anything too special.

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Art

For the most part, the artwork throughout The Infinitus Saga is pretty average. Penciler Neil Edwards presents the Justice League United and the Legion of Super-Heroes with a solid level of detail and accuracy. In addition, scenes taking place in space are laid out well and done in a way that makes sense to the eye.

However, a number of small visual errors exist throughout the entire collection. These errors include characters facing the wrong direction when addressing someone, speech bubbles going to the wrong person, and impossible costume changes. Though, individually, these would not be a big deal, together they give off a pretty negative impression.

Continuity

Justice League United Vol. 2: The Infinitus Saga continues the story from Justice League United Vol. 1: Justice League Canada (Review).

The story here is continued in Justice League United #11, which is not currently collected.

This volume also references and continues the stories from other comic books, detailed below:

• The villain uprising is mentioned. This happened in Forever Evil (Review).
• The “away-team” that the Legion of Super-Heroes references is the Legion Lost, whose story is explained in Legion Lost Vol. 1: Run From Tomorrow.
• This collection contains a tie-in to the Futures End event.