Black Hammer/Justice League: Hammer of Justice
Written by Jeff Lemire
Art by Michael Walsh
Lettering by Nate Piekos
Published by Dark Horse Comics / DC
‘Rama Rating: 9 out of 10
Crossovers are usually fun reads, especially when they’re characters from different companies. Seeing the reporters of The Daily Planet mingle with J. Jonah Jameson and the newsroom at The Daily Bugle is a thrill – it’s part of the magic of comic books where the imagination drives these kinds of what-ifs made reality (at least when the suits and lawyers don’t get in the way.).
But at the end of the day, the characters go back to their respective worlds, and regardless of the marketing, everything will very much be the same again. And that’s part of the central conflict of Jeff Lemire and Dean Ormston’s Black Hammer – nothing ever changes. His cast of characters have been trapped on a farm for 10 years, booted from their world and isolated on a farm where they have to hide from those around them. They were heroes, aliens, robots, and space cases in their own adventures, but now they are farmers, and to them, it feels like that’s all that they’ll ever be. They’re trapped in this new existence – that is, until they get a chance to exchange places with the Justice League, where the ultimate superhero farmer Superman gets to embrace his agricultural roots while Batman dives into the mysteries of the farm. Swapping worlds, writer Jeff Lemire and artist Michael Walsh get to explore these characters with reactions that define who they are.
Black Hammer/Justice League: Hammer of Justice is a comic book for our times, since the core of it is isolation. Looking back on Lemire’s work on his series, that’s what it’s been about this whole time, as his cast essentially has been forced into a quarantine situation. And because of their differences, they find themselves isolated from the world outside but also isolated from each other. They so much want to break that isolation, to be able to experience the world that they know, to once again touch the people that they love but they can’t do it. It’s no virus or government that’s keeping them that way, but it’s no less representative of what we are all going through in April 2020.
Michael Walsh frames this as a different kind of Black Hammer story. His art is chunkier than Black Hammer mainstays Dean Ormstron and Dave Stewart – even beyond its mainstream guest stars, his artwork right away puts this story on a separate path than the regular Black Hammer series or even its spinoffs. Walsh’s work and coloring provide a dreaminess to this book, shading it with a purplish tone that differentiates it from anything the Black Hammer or Justice League crews have ever been in before. So maybe instead of calling this a crossover, this should be more of a melding of the moody farm setting and the boisterous mightiest heroes of the DCU. Walsh brings out the humanity of these characters, particularly the trapped Justice Leaguers. Confined, they struggle the same way that Lemire’s characters do in the main series.
With Walsh setting this as something different, Lemire gives his characters the chance to do something we haven’t seen them do that much before – they get to be superheroes. With members of the Justice League trapped on the farm, Abraham, Gail, Barbalien and Madame Dragonfly gets to cross over into the DCU and, as superheroes are wont to do, they fight the left-behind Justice Leaguers Aquaman, Martian Manhunter and Hawkgirl. The story comes down in many ways to that hoary device of mistaken identities and general DC-rogue malfeasance. The motivations of this series’ antagonist, once he is revealed, aren’t really all that clear, but that’s hardly even the point here. Lemire and Walsh are taking these characters, particularly Lemire’s Black Hammer cast, and testing them on a moral level. It’s almost a nature versus nurture exploration, as the farm becomes some kind of proving ground for the mettle of its heroes.
This story reminds us that even the best of us respond to isolation on an individual and personal level. And it’s different for each of us – by recasting Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Cyborg, and the Flash as the characters trapped on the farm, we can see that we’re not alone in our struggles reacting to our new normal. These characters are used to being gods among men, and now they are farmers, trapped away from everything and everyone that they knew and loved. Some of the characters embrace the situation as best as they can, while others struggle against it or, at worst, succumb to the darkness inherent in the isolation, shutting down in the face of being alone. But these men and women who have the power to move worlds still struggle under the superhuman weight of loneliness.
This is what Lemire has been writing about since the start of Black Hammer, but now we can see it in a different light as we’re experiencing our own versions of the Black Hammer farm in real life. In one way or another, everyone struggles with the idea of being alone. Lemire and Walsh may have the framework of a superhero crossover to work with here, but the enemy isn’t some imp or costumed baddy or even each other. The enemy is ourselves, and how we react to our troubles. And they remind us that the best of ourselves can face these struggles – that we’re not alone as long as we fight together, sacrifice together and succeed together.
The ending of Black Hammer/Justice League: Hammer of Justice is both optimistic and cynical for the future. It all depends on what we remember about these trying times that we’re going through. Do we accept the changes, learn from them, and try to come out of it better than we went in? Or do we refuse to allow our lives to be disrupted, acting like nothing ever happened? As the two casts of characters go their separate ways at the end of this book, that’s what Lemire and Walsh leave us thinking about. The end doesn’t promise a brighter tomorrow, but it does suggest that one is possible with some effort. There are dark forces still at work, as Lemire and Walsh leave a door slightly open for another crossover, but that tomorrow isn’t guaranteed. Our heroes at the end are in the nearly identical space as they were at the beginning of the story, but Lemire and Walsh ask us to think about just what has changed for these people, and what will they do from here? Will they change because of what they have experienced, or will they go back to acting the ways that they always have?