July 2000
Geof Jones, writer; Dick Giordano, artist; Tom McCraw, colors; Jamison, seps; Kurt Hathaway, letters; Tony Bedard, assoc. ed.; Dan Raspler, editor.
This book is one of a limited series released in July as part of what DC calls its "fifth week event." The series is supposed to capture the look and spirit of the Silver Age comics. Whether it succeeds or not, I'll leave to those who have read the entire series. I bought only this issue because it featured Blackhawk (sort of). The story is like a Silver Age story in that it nearly stands alone. There is a situation set up in other books in which Silver Age super-villains have banded together against Earth's super-heroes. In "The Seven Soldiers of Victory" they have stopped at the planet Rann (scene of Adam Strange's adventures) on their way back from collecting interstellar devices they need for the big battle. Deadman gathers together six other second-tier super-heroes to journey to Rann to stop them. They are Adam Strange (obviously), Mento, Shining Knight, Metamorpho, Batgirl, and (our reason for talking about this) Blackhawk.
I loved Giordano's artwork, especially the cover. It recreated the style and feel of a Silver Age book perfectly. Unfortunately, the story didn't make a lot of sense. The heroes seemed to be gathered at random and there was nothing about their powers or characters that was especially needed to combat this group of villains. This was especially true of Blackhawk. The only thing he contributes to the story is the aircraft used to transport the heroes to Adam Strange's Zeta-beam. Once on Rann, any two-fisted fighter could have done what he did, and there are countless DC heroes who could have been more effective. What really bothered me about this appearance of Blackhawk, however, is that it used Chaykin's Prohaska, i.e. the drunken, vulgar, womanizing loner. There is no hint that there are more Blackhawks or that Blackhawk is the leader of a team. Here he is a minor member of someone else's team. It is a complete waste of time, as far as Blackhawk goes, but I suppose it was useful to DC to keep their copyright valid.
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