Greetings, Legions of the Unspoken! It is I, your loyal Symbifan, back with the first installment of my newest article just in time for my birthday! And what better way to celebrate than to share my passion with you, the readers, for the timeless DC classic Justice League: A Midsummer’s Nightmare?! No better way! So, without further ado….

Our tale begins with recent Green Lantern, Kyle Rayner, taking a break from writing/drawing a new page for his assigned comic book project. He seems to be having some difficulty deciding exactly which direction he wants to take with his story. And I mean, who can blame him with a lame character name like….Green Lantern?! Wait! Whaaaaaat?! (Sorry, Family Guy moment!) Anyway, he becomes discouraged and decides to go out for a cup of coffee. While his editor is blowing up his answering machine in his apartment, he meets up with a friendly neighbor lady and talks about his slump. They both enter the coffee shop, purchase their drinks, and say their goodbyes as she leaves for work. It’s a pretty typical day until she shoots off into the air and shapeshifts into a bird to join the hundreds of other flying people milling about their average work days! (Insert Twilight Zone music here!)

We then cut scene to The Daily Planet where reporter Clark Kent, sporting a stylish ponytail (What do ya want? It was the 90’s!), is currently enduring a lecture his from publisher, Perry White, about his work on a recent article about superpowered people (AKA “metahumans” to you Marvel mutant nuts). As Perry gets frustrated and storms off, Clark admits to a co-worker that he actually requests these types of stories, but when he attempts to write them, they seem less “real” to him.

At that moment, another co-worker enters with a gift for Perry, a paperweight. This is when Clark panics as the rock strikes a stunning resemblance to kryptonite! He quickly excuses himself and bolts though the office. As he make his escape, he hears several names spoken in other conversations that seem familiar to him. The readers know them to be the secret identities of some of DC’s other costumed adventurers. As he ponders what this means, we once again cut scene, this time to Wayne Manor.

This scene begins with Bruce Wayne reading the local newspaper and looking rather distressed. His assistant, Lucius Fox, senses his boss’s distress and exclaims that this must be due to the front page story about a bad business deal Wayne Enterprises was recently involved in. Wayne shows little interest in this and shows Lucius the back story about a recent horrific murder in the fair city of Gotham. (Big surprise, right?!) Bruce then orders his assistant to cut a check to make sure the survivor of the crime (A boy named Jason Todd! Cool huh?! I mean, huge fan of the Red Hood right here! There was this one time…..oh yeah, the article! Sorry! So embarrassing…..) want for nothing for the rest of his days. Lucius then remarks that Wayne can’t save everyone that has been a victim of a violent crime. To which Bruce replies in what I’m guessing is his dark and terrifying “Batman voice,” “Yes Lucius. I can.”

We are next transported to a scene of great danger and panic. A red-garbed figure streaks through an inferno at speeds so great that lightning follows him! As he runs, he thinks about how he is too late but doesn’t remember what for. He also thinks that there should be others with him. Who? He thinks he spies another in the flashing energy. He reaches out. This is when Wally West wakes up for school. Late again for class. What a slowpoke, he thinks.

I bet you “wonder” who’s next! (See what I did there? I just gave you a clue. Okay. Bad joke. Um….moving on.) We now find ourselves at the Themyscira School for Girls. The students are in the process of playing tug-of-war with a large rope, overseen by Headmistress Diana Prince. As the game begins, one girl pulls so hard that literally all of the other students are thrown as if the weighed no more collectively than a feather! Yes. They have a metahuman in their midst.

The girl, obviously frightened at the large mutated arm that has just replaced her average one, panics and smashes it through a tree! Diana, without thinking, flips through the air and blocks all of the girls from the onslaught of splinters with her bracelets! She then lassos the girl with the rope and forces her to calm down. Afterward, both headmistress and student both recover from the incident, utterly confused.

Meanwhile, in the boardroom of the Red Tide Tuna Company, (Anyone else think this company is in desperate need of a name change?!) the members of the board discuss their Vice President of Environmental Concerns, Arthur Curry. There’s a catty back and forth about how Arthur was only appointed his job and title to save the company from an inevitable lawsuit. It seems Arthur had lost a hand while working for the company.

While this juvenile exchange is taking place, Arthur’s chair is of course empty. He is still within his office. He knows how they feel about him. What a joke he is to them. While deep in thought, he looks out his office window and sees the large groups of environmental protesters. He thinks about how he, in actuality, belongs with them.

We now set our sights upon the red planet of the Milky Way Galaxy. That’s right, Mars. But it seems as if this barren and uninhabited wasteland is anything but as a Martian child is pictured running down the red dunes toward her mother. The child exclaims that she was told today in a learning ceremony that there may just be life on other planets. She then asks if such a thing could be possible and if her father believed this.

That’s when her father scoops her up in his arms with a smile and replies that he only believed in what he could see or touch but that it mattered little to him as long as these “aliens” never interfered with his happy life. (All I can say is, Martians need to invent a little something called….clothes! I mean, the red strap over the chest hardly hides anything! Have some shame, people!)

Meanwhile, we see a purple-haired, yet pixelated (You read that right. Pixelated! As if having purple hair isn’t enough!) man strolls right past what seems to be military guards in a presumably secret compound. He walks between the guards without notice and, in fact, right through the door as if he were a ghostly apparition! He descends the stairs beyond where a male in a helmet resembling a skull and tattered clothing sits. He is strapped to a high-tech chair in heavy restraints. The purple-haired man speaks with a smile to the prisoner about how the appearance of metahumans coming into their power is on the rise. He then asks what the strange captive has to say about this. The trapped man cries out in pain as if in reply.

We then rejoin reporter Clark Kent as he is finding cover during a metahuman battle in the center of Metropolis to record his thoughts into a handheld tape recorder. The carnage is truly epic as the two superpowered gangs tear up the city, putting countless civilians into harm’s way. While the battle reaches its height, a stray energy blast from one of the attackers hits the large golden globe above the Daily Planet building! As the landmark explodes into shrapnel, Clark has a flashback of another time. Of another life. He leaps into action, saving several civilians. The rubble narrowly misses them. An onlooker, seeking to save the hero, starts lifting a piece of the building’s wreckage. He finds no one because Clark has taken to the skies!

We then reenter the home of Bruce Wayne. As Bruce watches the news with obvious disgust, his parents enter the room! (Okay, DC! Now you’ve gone too far! That’s right, folks! The parents of Bruce Wayne are alive and well! Has the world gone utterly mad?! Has it?!! I’m sorry, but my mind is officially blown! Excuse me a moment while I take my meds…..)

(Okay. I’m back and feeling like my old Symbifan self. Continuing on….) His parents, completely unaware of Bruce’s shock, blather on and on about how he should give up his charity, travel the world, and basically enjoy his fortune. It’s then that his mother unknowingly snags her pearl necklace on the statue of a bat-like creature within the study. As she lifts her head, the necklace snaps and pearls fall everywhere. That’s when Bruce Wayne remembers and starts to wake up. He immediately starts looking for the secret entrance into the Bat Cave behind an old father clock. He finds nothing! He then turns and sees the awe-inspiring form of the Man of Steel hovering there in full costume! He tells Wayne to wake up. That he believes in him.

But before Bruce can say much in reply, a group of metahuman looters scale the gate to Wayne Manor, looking for an easy score! They picked the wrong mansion! Superman rushes out and easily dispatches of these young upstarts until one meta, in invisible form, tries to sneak up the Last Son of Krypton.

Before Superman can react however, a Batarang cracks the hoodlum in his see-through skull! The Batman has officially returned! (Time for a “World’s Finest” team-up, y’all!) The two speak seriously on the state of this nightmare of a world. It is decided that if they’re going to triumph this time, there going to need help.

End part one.