JLA Classified

ARTISTS

Writers: J. M. DeMatteis, Keith Giffen
Penciller: Kevin Maguire
Inker: Joe Rubinstein
Colorist: David Baron
Letterer: Bob Lappan
Editor: Michael Carlin

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CHARACTERS & SETTINGS

heroes: Blue Beetle II, Booster Gold, Elongated Man, Fire, Mary Marvel, Power Girl, Warrior
villaines: Evil Booster Gold, Evil G'Nort, Evil Oberon

Setting: 21st-century New York, NY, USA

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ISSUE SUMMARY

Cover Description: Guy Gardner, beaten and bruised, is held in a submissive position by Mistress Marvel. (No Booster Gold.)

Brief Synopsis: The Super Buddies find themselves in an unfamiliar location with familiar faces.

Costume Worn: MARK XII armored power-suit

Issue Notes: Originally written and promoted in 2004 as the mini-series I Can't Believe It's Not the Justice League, this story was published in 2005 due to conflicting events occurring in the Identity Crisis mini-series. Events in this story must take place prior to Identity Crisis #1 for obvious reasons. Also, events of the Infinite Crisis mini-series have possibly erased some or all of the events in this issue from history.

This story has been reprinted in the following issue:
I Can't Believe It's Not The Justice League (2005)

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ISSUE ANNOTATIONS

Page 4, panel 4
ALTERNATE REALITY: Blue Beetle II, Booster Gold, Elongated Man, Fire, Guy Gardner, Mary Marvel, and Power Girl fittingly return to Earth from Hell by way of a subway entrance only to find a giant G'Nort rampaging through the city. Only, this Earth is not exactly the one they had left behind.

Page 12, panel 1
While the Super Buddies were out of town, their headquarters was replaced by the headquarters of the Power Posse, where Oberon guards the door and Sue Dibny dances topless.

Page 14, panel 8
Beetle, amnestic from falling debris courtesy of the giant G'nort, mistakes Oberon for Joe Besser. Joe Besser was a comedian of diminutive stature most prominently known as one of the Three Stooges.

Page 15, panel 1
After refusing to accept that he had been sent to Hell in the previous issue, Booster is the first of the Super Buddies to recognize that the team hasn't returned to their final destination. It will be several pages before Beetle spells out that the team has actually ended up...

Page 17, panel 5
SPOILER WARNING!: in a parallel universe where the good Super Buddies are replicated as the evil Power Posse. This world's Booster Gold is a hip-hop bartender, Sue Dibny and Tiffany (the alternate universe Ice) are topless dancers, Metamorpho and Oberon are bouncer. Fortunately, two-faced Maxwell Lord is very consistent with his familiar version, just a little more course and overweight. The Star Trek episode that Fire compares these events to is "Mirror, Mirror." Reveal

Page 18, panel 4
Alternate reality Booster punches Tiffany square in the face at evil Maxwell Lord's urging. This evil Booster, playing up to expectations, has a goatee, the true sign of an evil parallel universe doppelganger. He wears a sleeveless gold shirt with a blue star and a bandanna, not one of the armored suits that the "good" Booster Gold has worn over the years.

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ISSUE REVIEW

Boosterrific Review: Giffen and DeMatteis have found a new way to intensify the internal conflict of the Super Buddies by pitting them against alternate-reality versions of themselves. Luckily for us readers, these alternate-reality versions are warped enough to provide conflict, but similar enough to be side-splittingly funny.

Boosterrific Rating:

• Currently 5.0/5 Stars.

Average Fan Rating:

• Currently 5.0/5 Stars.

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