Guest article by Fletcher “Syrg” Arnett

JSA: The Unholy Three
Written by: Dan Jolley & Tony Harris
Art by: Tony Harris, Ray Snyder, JD Mettler
Focuses on: Every damn hero they could think to cram into it (so, the JSA and change)
Self-contained/Multiple books: Multiple books (is a sequel)
Published in: 2003
Central premise: The Bat, The Clock, and The Super-Man, Clark Kent, have to track down a pair of Soviet KGB agents gone rogue looking for a weapon called “The Trigger”.
Martian Manhunter Out of Fucking Nowhere? Nope.

This is draft number one two three four of this article. Rereading The Unholy Three, I realized something: the first issue is really good (in fact, it contains a scene that my brain had thought was the end of Liberty File), and works even better on a second reading. The second is where all my dislike came from. Let’s get into it and hopefully this isn’t going to lead to me scrapping the whole damn thing again…

We come in on an abandoned theater, where a man is being tortured for information. The place is Berlin, the year is 1948. A second gentleman enters…

…and we’re off.

Meanwhile, in Gotham City, Bruce “The Bat” Wayne is writing in his journal again. He hasn’t felt the need to since the war ended, but his recent activities leave him with few people to talk to, as he begins trying to clean up the eternally-strange streets of Gotham.

This one isn’t nearly as egregious as later examples, but this is where we get the start of Unholy Three shoving in every reference it can to other DC characters. Look at that, we’ve got three villains in passing in one dialogue bubble.

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