Posted: 13 April 2018 at 11:41am | IP Logged | 7
|
post reply
|
|
ITEM: Every one of us - even Mr. Byrne and I and other fans of age - didn't live in an era when "society" might have had a far different connotation than it did in the 60s. I have been under the impression that the "great society" might have been a very popular phrase in 1940, and that was what sounded good with Justice Society.
After the fact, "Justice Society" is five syllables, where "Justice League" is three. Perhaps that's a factor as well.
ITEM: Justice League of America isn't really a fair subject for scrutiny, as it is obvious that it is an inheritor of the Justice Society of America. The word "league" might be subject to discussion; the phrase Justice <collective noun> of America was going to be. So... Justice Squad? Justice Force? Justice Union? League was probably as good as any, and I am nowhere near as smart as Julie Schwartz was.
And let's remember that Mike Gustovich tried Justice Machine in the 80s, but with no extension - a bit different take on the phrase.
ITEM: DC seemed to go for the descriptive, usually, where Marvel went for the bombastic - representative of their styles in the 60s, I think. And realistically, at the start, Marvel had the Fantastic Four, the Avengers, the X-Men, and the Howlin' Commandos. (Granted, FF was pretty descriptive as well.) On DCs side were a lot more; the big guns were the JLA, the Teen Titans, the Legion of Super-Heroes. But there were also the Challengers of the Unknown, the Sea Devils, the Doom Patrol (probably the least descriptive of DC's super team names), the Atomic Knights, etc. That seemed to be how the team names worked for about ten years.
Oh, and let us not forget Archie's Crusaders - a Marvel type sobriquet. And the Marvel Family, a DC-ish name.
ITEM: As the 70s came about, the trend seemed to continue. Marvel's bombast with the Champions, the Guardians of the Galaxy, the Defenders, the Invaders - again, mostly more exciting names than descriptive of the teams. I don't recall too many new DC teams through the 70s, actually.
ITEM: After that, teams seemed to get a touch more generic, a bit wider in application, and often associated to a "original" title - although that occurred mostly with the X-Men titles (X-Force, X-Factor, New Mutants, etc.) The Outsiders and Alpha Flight, for example, weren't quite the type of team name that either company had used. And in addition, some titles came and went so fast that it was hard to notice the names unless you were paying close attention.
Personally, I was interested in the team names as they associated to their members more than just the names. "Time to call in the Avengers" - exciting! "This looks like a job for... the Justice League of America." I heard that rumble through the valleys and over the peaks, and I got goosebumps. "Then it's up to the X-Men?" "As always, when there's a world to save." "Look! It's the Legion!"
In the end, I'm a sucker for a name that engenders something exciting and potent... so both the Avengers and the JLA were perfectly exciting to me.
|