#sylvester pemberton

[halbarryislife]

Who could drive the curse out of this family? These people are glued to ruin. (in/sp.)

[evilhorse]

Doctor Fate will not live through the night!

(All-Star Comics #62)

[dcdreamblog]

Seeing you talk about the Crimson Avenger reminded me, what can you tell us about the Seven Soldiers of Victory? I’ve seen different article talk about different members and the number don’t always add up. I’ve seen something about a guy named the Spider, one article even says TNT and Dyna-Mite were members!

And sometimes there’s eight of them?

Oh you will regret this. I actually did my thesis on the 7 Soldiers (Specifically ABOUT the historical mysteries of their membership), you can see on the selfie they posted that I have a decal for them on my phone. This question is a big one. So let's cover what we know...

(Group Photo of the 7 Soldiers from the Squadron's '43 Yearbook. I have cut out the members on the left for rhetorical purposes) This is what I would call the 5 core, inarguable members of the 7 Soldiers.

Crimson Avenger: Lee Travis, newspaper publisher, the first mystery man (Fun fact, because of the drastic difference in costuming. It wasn't until after Travis' death that it was confirmed this Avenger and the original Avenger were the same person) Shining Knight: Sir Justin, displaced knight from the Arthurian era Vigilante: The rider of the purple sage. Frontier mystery man secretly country-western artist Greg Saunders Star-Spangled Kid and Stripesy: Industrial heir Sylvester Pemberton and his bodyguard/chauffeur Patrick Dugan. This is the easy part. Below is the hard part.

Two core team members weren't counted for unfortunately obvious reasons for the era...

(Crimson Avenger and Wing at a Squadron Function in 1942) Wing How, the Crimson Avenger's chauffeur and later confidante/sidekick. A Chinese immigrant to Travis' native New York

(Vigilante and Stuff riding down the streets of Independence, MI. 1940) Stuff, The Chinatown Kid. AKA Danny Leong. Another Chinese immigrant this time adopted by country western star Greg Saunders, secretly The Vigilante How and Leong, being Chinese "tag alongs" which was already a loaded trope by the 1940s were often treated more like accessories than real members of the team by media and the public. If you want to know the other 2 soldiers that were on the team when it was founded to lend it that name. Its those two. But it got more complicated than that. 2. The 7 Soldiers gained new members during the War but their name never changed

(TNT and Dyna-Mite at the DC Courthouse after receiving a medal from the city) TNT and Dyna-Mite, DC natives and perhaps the most personally popular superheroes who were not members of the Justice Society during the War years. Owing to their personal popularity in the nation's capital. WHEN they became members of the Soldiers is unknown but they were inducted by December of 1941 at the latest as they partcipated in the "Black Star" case It is unknown whether or not Dyna-Mite remained associated with the team after TNT's tragic death in the line of duty in early 1942. And then there's..him...

(The Spider, glimpsed on the edge of a billboard in his native St Louis) The Spider, AKA Thomas Hallaway. For fairly obvious reasons is no longer concerned part of the superhero community. He was, in fact, an unrepentant criminal who used the cover of a superhero persona as an alibi. It wasn't until post war that his treachery was discovered when he attempted to assassinate both Jay and Joan Garrick, losing his life in the attempt under mysterious circumstances. In the modern day it was discovered that The Spider himself was responsible for the 7 Soldiers' disappearance post war, having been in cahoots with perennial enemy The Iron Hand. The Soldiers were scattered through time and only recovered during one of the early cases of the Justice League, leading to the heroic sacrifice of Wing How to save the lives of his teammates When he became associated with the Soldiers is unknown and he is retroactively cast out from his membership in the Soldiers specifically and the All Star Squadron in general save for the most dry of historical perspectives. Conclusion: If you want me to answer who the "7 Soldiers" were. To me (noting that this is a personal opinion, not a historical fact). It's The Crimson Avenger, Wing, Vigilante, Stuff, Shining Knight, Star Spangled-Kid and Stripesy. With knowledge that TNT and Dyna-Mite were also members because what's in a name anyway? The Spider, by his own action has been stricken from any claim to any membership of any heroic organization.

[dailyjsa]

JSA Returns: Star-Spangled Comics #1 cover by Dave Johnson

[kryptonbabe]

Clark??? You don't go around saying things like that!!

We are so used to blaming Barry for altering timelines and messing up the space-time continuum and Superman is such a polite person that we often ignore that he tried to mess with the past a hundred times already

From All-star Comics #64 (1977)

[bi4bihankking]

Okay DC fandom I have one request:

Someone make this and tell me if it's Actually Bad

Also this one

[theflashzoom]

Infinity Inc Summer Swimsuits Cards

Hope all of you have a good summer holidays.

[infinityinc4ever]

This is one of my favorite JSA images. Huntress looks great!

[comicgeekscomicgeek]

Were Jesse and Sandy members of Infinity, Inc. now? That’s pretty cool actually.

[thrakaboom]

Look at Sly's snatched waist and flirty thigh highs.

Skyman has been dead for 36 slutty, slutty years

[hawkzeyes]

does literally everyone know about this top secret meeting this is the third interruption???

Infinity Inc #1 (1984-)

[halbarryislife]

did you mean: manipulate, mansplain, malewife

[google / template by @cal-kestis]

[evilhorse]

All-Star Comics #58

[dcdreamblog]

I did study on superhero legacies and the starman one is probably second only to the hawkman one.

Excluding its own members it also incorporates the star-spangled kids, gimmick girls, stripesies, phantom ladies and manhunters through genetics or passing down the torch.

What are your opinions on legacies that intertwine with each other?

Boy-oh-boy are you NOT kiddin'

(An unofficial "Star Family Tree" I found online)

Keep in mind, this is just the family tree that we KNOW of! There's still some secret IDs on this list and it doesn't cover anyone who isn't publically a superhero or something of that kind so there's almost certainly massive branches missing here.

Not sure why you would ask my "opinion" on what is, ultimately, people's private lives. If it works for them, it works for them. It is not my job to comment on who is doing what with whom when the door is locked and the spandex is off. Now, if you want me to wonder why family trees like this one might HAPPEN in this business, I think its obvious. Same reason firefighters tend to marry firefighters. Not only are superheroes most likely to be around other superheroes a lot of the time, when you get to the point in life where you are relying on people, trusting them to have your back when things get darkest, having to give up your control to someone else. One can only imagine the kind of bonds that creates.

Superheroes often live short lives, and the also often come from broken families. It's only nature that when they find that feeling of comfort in one another that they follow it as far as it will go.

[dailyjsa]

Leading Comics #2

Writer: Bill Finger

Artist: Mort Meskin

Inker: Mort Meskin

[kryptonbabe]

The absence of the superego psychological structure in JSA bronze age comics, an observation

One thing that makes reading the JSA revival run from 1976 such an interesting experience is just how much of their inner thoughts they are willing to share with each other. The members of this team will express the most intense feelings of despair, anger and every other emotion without thinking twice, it makes for a very intense reading experience. These people are on the edge and they will let you know about their intrusive thoughts, deep feelings and desires, the drama is always through the roof, and I didn't even include Power Girl's exchanges with Superman and Wildcat (I'm saving these for another post)

In Freudian psychology we have:

(...) the id is the impulsive part of your personality that is driven by pleasure and repulsed by pain, the superego is the judgmental and morally correct part of your personality, and the ego is the conscious part of your personality that mediates between the id and the superego and makes decisions.

And I can only think of the challenge the JSA team of this time would present for these definitions, because they seem unburdened by the superego aspect of their mind, just saying what their id demands, particularly when it comes to sharing their feelings. And that is not to say these characters don't have interesting inner lives, it's just that they're very transparent about their feelings and it's absolutely appealing to witness such a dynamic

This particular style of writing reminds me of what Chris Claremont was also doing with the Uncanny X-Men at Marvel (All-Star Comics revival and Claremont's X-Men were published only 6 months apart), which might just be an example of how the writing trends of superhero comic books were changing with the times. The difference is: the X-men heroes were younger and less experienced while the JSA characters are jaded, they share a common history of decades with each other and their foes, this leaves a lot of room for drama and conflict (not to put these books against each other they're just different and I love both). Honestly I'm a melodrama fan, I have an appreciation for this soap opera style of comic book narrative and I'm glad there's so much good material to get into. There's a reason why the JSA characters are still popular to this day

From All-Star Comics (1976 revival), collected in Only legends live forever TPB (2019). Written by: Gerry Conway & Paul Levitz. Art by Keith Giffen & Wally Wood