Line #3 YMMV/JusticeSocietyOfAmerica


1	%%* BaseBreakingCharacter: While Stargirl is a generally well liked LegacyCharacter, there are some detractors who dislike her being based on Geoff Johns' dead sister and the fact that her stepbrother was generally overlooked by their dad in favor of her during the 2000s.
2	* BrokenBase:
3	** Heroes of the 1950's, or Heroes of Earth 2? At-the-time in the 1950's, they were just ''the'' heroes of the time, but then by the 60s and 70s they became Earth 2's heroes, which allowed the then-new ''Justice League of America'' to be the important super-team. After ''ComicBook/CrisisOnInfiniteEarths'' they became the predecessors of the Justice League, which brought with it an expansive history and lore that set them up as a RetiredBadass team of mentors and teachers, and during the 90s they began mentoring the legacies of their fallen teammates...until ''New 52'' sent them back to Earth 2 as part of their mandate that the DCU was only five years old. As such, there's a split between people who prefer the Silver Age / early Bronze Age era where they were an AU counterpart to the Justice League, and people who had grown used to their status as a historical team who mentor the next generation. The former often argue that their existence makes the Justice League less important, especially Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman as they're no longer preceding the JSA as they did in real life, while the latter ''likes'' that the JLA aren't the first team and feel they create an interesting backstory and history for the DCU.
4	** New 52 Earth 2 Alan Scott's homosexuality carrying over to the main continuity post-''Doomsday Clock/Death Metal''. While some fans accepted New 52 Alan being gay since he was effectively a completely different version of the character in a new continuity, Jim Lee's decision to make Alan Scott be gay in the main DC Universe post-''Death Metal/Doomsday Clock'' has created a great deal of complaints, because it doesn't mesh well with his pre-''Flashpoint'' history. Alan had longstanding, long-term relationships that went as far as marriage with both Rose Canton (Rose and Thorn) and Molly Mayne (the Harlequin), and had children with Rose. Also, in Bill Willingham, James Robinson, and Marc Guggenheim's ''Justice Society of America'' runs there was a running storyline that Alan Scott, who otherwise saw himself as generally liberal, had issues with having a gay son, causing him to avoid talking with Todd or have awkward silences while around him. Alan's Infinite Frontier-era status as an out gay man can be reconciled with the earlier stories through fan theories (he's actually bisexual, or his wives were TheBeard, or he was ArmouredClosetGay), but as of 2022 the actual comics haven't addressed the discrepancy. Even if canon does adopt one of these theories, it's definitely not what Willingham / Robinson / Guggenheim were going for, and for readers who liked Alan having that believable character flaw for an octogenarian character and/or that struggle for acceptance on Todd's part it feels unfortunate. On the other hand, there are some readers who like the main Earth's Alan being gay because they find the aforementioned theories and/or the LateComingOut trope compelling. But hey, at least [[YaoiFangirl some people]] are enjoying Alan's new history with [[DatingCatwoman Vladmir Sokov]].
5	** New 52 Earth 2. A decent idea that went to hell the second DC fired James Robinson and placed Creator/TomTaylor in charge of it or just plain wrong and a wholesale desecration of JSA lore.
6	** Black Adam. Some like how Geoff Johns continued fleshing Black Adam out after Jerry Ordway started him down the road to becoming an anti-hero while others complained of him being a spotlight hogging self-insert for Geoff, especially since with Adam Geoff could do all sorts of violent things (like killing villains) he would not be able to get away with having Captain Marvel doing it.
7	* CommonKnowledge: They're often referred to as a team of old guys, but from the 1990s onward most JSA members have been legacy characters.
8	* CompleteMonster: See [[Monster/TheDCU here]].
9	* EnsembleDarkhorse:
10	** Wildcat. Few readers of the forgotten character from the '40s would've expected a Batman ripoff to become a major part of the team, and one of only four Golden Agers left alive.
11	** Cyclone is quite popular, due to being an entertaining GenkiGirl with an endearing PseudoRomanticFriendship with Stargirl combined with also being a huge Woobie.
12	** The team in general, as despite the fact they've not had a starring role in any out-of-comics work until ''Series/Stargirl2020'' (which even there, doesn't use the early members, but rather their legacies), and haven't had a major role in the DCU since ''New 52'', have still maintained a cult fandom who adore their role in the DC Universe. They were also quietly a decent seller when they had an ongoing series in the 2000s period, so they had an audience.
13	* FandomRivalry: With the Justice League, especially during the 1999 series run. As the Justice League's book became more and more detached and featuring bland and boring villains and stories that were written by a revolving door of writers each churning out a story written with intent for being released as a trade paperback, JSA featured stories with major and obscure classic DC villains from across the DC Universe and featured serialized storytelling and was heavily connected with many of the DC Universe crossovers and other titles featuring legacy versions of the Justice Society. To the point that many fans considered Justice Society to be the true flagship team book of the DC Universe in the 2000s.
14	* FriendlyFandoms:
15	** There's a ''very'' strong one between fans of the Justice Society and fans of ComicBook/WallyWest and his era of ''Franchise/TheFlash'', which actually makes a lot of sense even despite the fact Wally has never been a member. Firstly, both franchises celebrated the idea of LegacyCharacter heroes and SidekickGraduationsStick, and Wally was a contemporary of many of the JSA's younger gen. Secondly, both have character overlap thanks to Jay Garrick and Jesse Quick being prominent members of the JSA and major supporting characters of Wally, and though there's never been much interaction between them, Stargirl and Wally are both the hometown heroes of the same town, Blue Valley, Nebraska, and the few interactions they ‘’have’’ had generally cast Wally as a cool BigBrotherMentor. Thirdly, both were, for a while, written by Creator/GeoffJohns, so fans of his naturally read both. Fourthly, in a similar way to Stephanie Brown and Cassandra Cain's fandom overlap with Wally's, both were ''horribly'' screwed by the New 52, and were positioned as a key missing piece by the MythArc set up in ''ComicBook/DCRebirth''. The result, essentially, is that fans of Wally West tend to have a lot of affection for the JSA, while JSA fans tend to be on Wally's side when it comes to "Wally or Barry" debates.
16	** There is common ground between the JSA under Geoff Johns and Chris Claremont ''ComicBook/XMen'' run, due to the fact that both featured extensive use of subplots and serialized storytelling under a single author's voice along with a bit of a displeasure that after their respective auteur left the series, the series went downhill.
17	* GatewaySeries: ''Series/Stargirl2020'' has become this for some, as it was the first serious use of the Justice Society in ''years'' (and the first time the team had a starring role outside the comics), even if focused primarily on the younger, legacy generation. People who weren't super familiar with the Justice Society beforehand have since expressed interest in them, and in particular, Yolanda Montez and Beth Chapel (Wildcat II and Doctor Mid-Nite II, both of whom had been killed off years ago) got a bump in popularity.
18	* HarsherInHindsight: Doctor Fate and Alan Scott saying that the legacy of the Justice Society will never be forgotten... Enter the New 52, where the majority of the members don't exist and the Society itself doesn't, and thus has had no influence on the current generation of superheroes.
19	** Even more so with DC Rebirth and in particular the Flash and ''The Button'' storylines, where that becomes a plot point.
20	** This becomes a plot point in Doomsday Clock, where Doctor Manhattan explicitly kills Alan Scott before he became Green Lantern (and possibly other Justice Society members before they got their powers) purely to fuck with the world and make it DarkerAndEdgier to see how it would in turn affect Superman and how the world sees him and his fellow heroes.
21	* HoYay: There's the almost downright coy [[HeterosexualLifePartners bromance]] between the murderous ComicBook/BlackAdam and the (relatively) young and naive Atom-Smasher, who is twice convinced by Adam to abandon the JSA and fight at his side. It makes sense that Atom-Smasher chooses to wear a full-face mask like his godfather Al Pratt: he's hiding the goo-goo eyes he's making at Adam behind it.
22	* LesYay: Cyclone's obsession with best friend and teammate Stargirl frequently leads fans to this trope, but it's never mentioned in-series.
23	* MemeticMutation: Not much, but because of Alex Ross's...''suggestive'' depiction of Maxine's costume, lead to many making jokes about her apparent lack of underwear or commenting that she forgot it.
24	** AscendedMeme: Which was once noted in story, when a bunch of comments are made about her, from calling her a joke, insulting her former use of wearing a hat, and referring to her as the 'team mascot' or pet, one of the comments heard included 'Does she even wear underwear?' While sorta funny, combined with her face and the other comments, makes it just fuel to her woobieness.
25	* {{Moe}}: MotorMouth LegacyCharacter and theatre geek Cyclone.
26	* SugarWiki/MomentOfAwesome: The time Doc Mid-Nite's pet owl Hooty killed a bunch of Nazis while on a drug-fueled rampage (thanks to Hourman's Miraclo pill) when Doc Mid-Nite was down for the count.
27	* NeverLiveItDown: Similar to the MemeticMutation above, for one cover Alex Ross drew Citizen Steel in his FormFittingWardrobe (which is suppose to be like a second skin to him) [[https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/marvel_dc/images/d/de/Citizen_Steel.jpg very realistically]]. At least until ''Series/LegendsOfTomorrow'', Citizen Steel was largely known as the superhero whose penis you sort of knew the shape of.
28	* NewerThanTheyThink: Thanks to ‘’Series/Stargirl2020’’ being a GatewaySeries for JSA fans and popularising both Beth Chapel and the “[=HourNite=]” ship, newer fans and shippers of the two cried foul at the fact that the comics had killed off Beth and he’d gotten together with Jesse Quick, a blonde-haired blue-eyed white girl, claiming it was racist of DC to kill off a Woman-of-Color to break apart a mixed-race relationship just to pair them with a white girl. It’s somewhat lost on them that these events happened over a decade apart, and that Rick and Jesse’s relationship didn’t become romantic until 2006 (about thirteen years after Beth’s death), rather than a case of Rick moving on immediately, and all these events were written by completely different writers. Jesse and Rick ‘’had’’ been established as friends in 1992 (a year before Beth’s death), but nothing romantic was teased at the time, making the claim Jesse “replaced” Beth hold little water.
29	* OlderThanTheyThink: Some fans have occasionally expressed bafflement at how suddenly Rick and Jesse got together (they had some flirting moments before a time skip had them now HappilyMarried, without ever seeing them develop), as it feels that their implied history was a retcon. Jesse and Rick actually had their history established ''back in 1992'' when Jesse was first introduced, as their fathers were friends and Jesse's dad was actually paying for Rick's chemotherapy. They weren't in any kind of relationship, but they were shown to be childhood friends and she seemed to visit him regularly in the hospital, so they were close friends who just lost contact, making the StrangledByTheRedString aspects of their relationship much easier to believe.
30	* OneTrueThreesome:
31	** Hourman II and Liberty Belle II were very much in love, but both were also very touchy-feely with teammate Damage, and some lines could be read that they would be into a threesome relationship with Damage. Can cross into NoYay as both Rick and Jesse also firmly stated they saw him as a little brother figure (and Jesse and Damage had history together on the Titans with much the same dynamic).
32	** The same pair later got this with Icicle and Tigress (One True Foursome in that case), after their "double date". Jesse and Artemis both got LesYay and Rick and Cameron got HoYay, but also Jesse and Cameron had some heated moments and so did Artemis and Rick, so shipping all four together is ''entirely'' justified.
33	** Also the fact that Rick and Beth Chapel (Doctor Mid-Nite II) had been a couple meant that Quickhournite was a viable ship.
34	* RetroactiveRecognition: Non-acting example, but at the tail-end of the 2000s, the ''Justice Society of America'' got a new writer in Marc Guggenheim; at-the-time, he was just one of many writers in the industry without much notability outside the fact he killed Bart Allen (and even there, he was just the trigger man, ExecutiveMeddling had already decided to kill him long before he took over). In the 2010s, though, Guggenheim became ''infamous'' among DC fans for being the showrunner of ''Series/{{Arrow}}'', a tenure which saw him pen the show's descent into SeasonalRot and AdaptationDecay. Considering that his JSA run wasn't highly regarded already, it almost makes the reaction HilariousInHindsight.
35	* RescuedFromTheScrappyHeap: Bill Willingham said this was the goal with Mr. America III, to make something out of a character with so-far zero personality and no powers. He ended up just giving him explosive-tipped whips and a crush on the teenage Lightning (keep in mind that she's a contemporary of Stargirl, while he is likely ''much'' older than Atom Smasher, and the [=JSAers=] weren't too keen on ''that'' relationship. He left the book without doing anything else with him.
36	** Jakeem Thunder, who debuted in cameo in Mark Waid's Flash and was formally introduced in Grant Morrison's JLA series, was a major ethnic scrappy in his first appearances and his main characteristic was gratuitous swearing. Geoff Johns incorporated him into JSA and rescued him from the EthnicScrappy cliches, fleshing him out and making him a young man who was pure of heart and courage, willing to risk his life to save the world from evil.
37	** Alex Ross tried this with Magog in "Thy Kingdom Come".
38	* StrangledByTheRedString: As noted on ''YMMV/TheFlash'' YMMV page, Jesse Quick/Liberty Belle and Hourman II's marriage happens after a time skip, which also covered their ''entire courtship''. They had a few ShipTease moments prior and were childhood friends, but they went from mutual attraction to HappilyMarried without ''any'' on-screen development. This is somewhat a Administrivia/TropesAreNotBad case though as many people ''liked'' their relationship as it made [[TheWoobie the previously quietly very sad]] Jesse much more upbeat and happy, and the two were a mutually protective BattleCouple who never had to play damsel for one-another.
39	* TheScrappy: Magog is hated by a lot, partially because he's a massive {{Jerkass}} who got a lot of time on screen. ''A lot'' of people also cite him [[KickTheDog hitting]] [[GenkiGirl Maxine]] [[TheWoobie 'Cyclone']] [[EnsembleDarkhorse Hunkel]] when she was flying overhead because 'she came at him from his blindspot.' Magog has also been accused of being a [[AuthorAvatar mouthpiece]] for writer Bill Willingham's right-wing views.
40	* {{Shipping}}: In the late 2000s many fans wanted to see Captain Marvel hook back up with Stargirl, even badgering the new writers of the book about it. It never came to pass, especially since Billy stopped being a JSA-related character a long time ago.
41	* TearJerker: Three particular incidents stand out--Jakeem Thunder begging the Thunderbolt to bring the dead Johnny Thunder back to life. Stargirl openly weeping over Atom Smasher's dead body (in the process, showing her true feelings for him). And Stargirl's reaction to finding out her hated birth father has died- she breaks down, unable to understand why she cares. "Because you're a wonderful daughter", her stepdad tells her.
42	** Captain Marvel breaking up with Stargirl was easily this especially her pleas for him to tell the JSA his real age and identity and subsequent break down in tears when he leaves.
43	* TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodCharacter: Several:
44	** After Sandman Mystery Theater fleshed out and redefined the Golden Age Sandman to great critical and commercial success, the character was summarily killed off in the opening story of the 1999 JSA series.
45	** Mike Dugan, especially after it was explicitly established that his dad, Stripsey, no longer loved his son and had not only denied allowing him to become a hero and attempted (but failed) to permanently exile his son from his life by sending him to a year round military school while he played house with his new wife, daughter, and stepdaughter. Right before ''Infinite Crisis'', the series was implying that Mike was going to turn villain after his father explicitly told him he didn't care how he feels and that he needed to "accept" being the unfavorite of the family. But the plot thread was never brought back up for the rest of the Pre-New 52 series.
46	* TheyWastedAPerfectlyGoodPlot:
47	** A storyline of Cyclone's childhood and the NoodleIncident regarding Red Tornado abducting her as a kid never came up.
48	** Mike Duggan being told that his father didn't love him anymore and had moved on with a new family/daughter and the implications he was only allowed in the house because he figured out that his father had tried to permanently exile him from his life via year round boarding school and escaped and the implication that he was going to become a super villain to avenge himself on Stargirl and Stripsey never got followed up on.
49	* TheWoobie:
50	** Stargirl's step-brother Mike, who appears simply so that Stargirl and his dad (STRIPE) can yell at him whenever he brings up how Stargirl stole his birthright to be the next Star Spangled Kid from him.
51	** Obsidian due to the childhood abuse he suffered and the fact that he ends up tortured/turned into an egg and unable to connect with his father, who claims to be a very tolerant progressive person but can't handle the idea of having a gay son.
52	** ComicBook/PowerGirl, what with her angst over her convoluted past and the revelation that she's not wanted on the newly reformed Earth-2 since the universe created a new Power Girl to replace her in that world.
53	** Lyta Hall, if you take into account her full past. All the shit she's been through, and then she finally gets her husband back, only for them both to be offed when Spectre goes berserk.

Context YMMV / JusticeSocietyOfAmerica