JLA Wildcats NM Grant Morrison 1st print DC / Wildstorm Crossover

Description

JLA WildC.A.T.S. TP
Published Sep 1997 by DC/Image

Can the JLA and the WildC.A.T.s stop Epoch, the Lord of Time, from Annihilating 2 universes? Find out in this 64-page tale! Script by Grant Morrison, pencils by Val Semeiks, inks by Kevin Conrad & Ray Kryssing. Cover by Semeiks & Conrad.

Roll call!
JLA – Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Flash, Green Lantern.
WildC.A.T.s – Majestic, Grifter, Zealot, Void, Maul.

Cover price $5.95.

The plot’s fairly straightforward: after chasing Epoch – the self-proclaimed ‘Lord of Time’ – up and down the timestream, the League end up in the Wildstorm Universe. After the obligatory fight between the League and the Wildcats, they decide to band together to halt the threat of Epoch. Fairly simple, yes? Agreed. Ah, but the execution…that’s where the beauty lies. Compared to regular JLA – which was a heady enough trip already – this is 100 % uncut, Grade A insert-narcotic-of-choice-here. Yeah, that good.

A crossover between the titular super-teams from DC Comics and Image Comics (and yes, I know the WildC.A.T.S were later folded into the DC universe, but they weren’t in 1997).

The Justice League confront the time-travelling supervillain Epoch but are unable to prevent him from doing untold damage to the timeline. Attempting to return to their own time, they accidentally find themselves in an alternate universe where they have to form an alliance with some of that world’s superheroes to save both of their timelines.

Now, I had never read a WildC.A.T.S story before this and the 90s were notorious for dodgy ill-thought-out crossovers, so I wasn’t expecting a great deal from this book.
Perhaps those low expectations are why I actually found myself quite enjoying it in the end. Or perhaps it’s because Morrison strikes the balance between the crossing-over characters perfectly, with their interactions feeling organic and not just like fan-service. In fact my favourite moment of the book is the (inevitable) initial fight between the titular heroes where Grifter, seeing the Batman in action, decides to quietly sit the fight out until the two teams reconcile.

Epoch is a better villain than he initially seems too. He starts off as a run-of-the-mill one-off villain spouting megalomaniacal rubbish but across the book begins to evolve into an ever more powerful and, frankly, weirder foe. By the end he’s so weird that I could easily imagine him being pulled from the pages of ‘Doom Patrol’ rather than those of the JLA.

Basically, a far better crossover story than it has any right to be.

Near mint, 1st print.