BRONZE AGE MINUTE: Justice League of America #132

DC; July 1976
Cover by Ernie Chan [as Ernie Chua]

Title: “The Beasts Who Fought Like Men!”
Synopsis: Sound shenanigans by Sonar and Queen Bee have a tired Justice League on the defensive, fighting intelligent bees and beasts.

Writer: Gerry Conway
Penciler: Dick Dillin
Inker: Frank McLaughlin

Review: This is one of those comics that throws you, as the story inside has almost nothing to do with the cover. Instead of fighting spear-toting giraffes, the JLA battles some rather pedestrian supervillains, who are aided by semi-intelligent – but unarmed! – wildlife. This second half of this Gerry Conway two-parter is confusing: Half the League is lost then found off camera, Superman apparently remains missing, and it’s hard to tell which villain is really the story’s big bad. The art, by the trusted team of Dick Dillin and Frank McLaughlin, is exactly what you’d expect from any 1970s issue of JLA.

Grade: B-

Cool factor: Gorillas with guns!
Not-so-cool factor: Giraffes with spears! (But only on the cover.)

Character quotable: “My nucleo-sonic science has made me the world’s greatest villain – and soon it will make Modora the world’s greatest nation!” – Sonar (Greatest who? Greatest where?)

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