JLA #44 / by MELINDA Schmidbauer

Another good cover!  I really like Wally Tortolini!   Although he really didn't intend to be a villain.  Let's see if I can remember all the weapons he has...

Tuning Fork Gun from Sonar

Star Helmet Helmet from Brainstorm

Crowbar (of Crowbar?)

Sword of Cavalier

Power Stone of Black Rock

So Wally has won all these items, but doesn't know how to use them.  He starts playing around, and knocks a whole in his apartment wall.  He wants to get away before the cops come to arrest him, but walks right into the arms of ...  who?  Not the cops, not the FBI.  Someone wants the dirt Wally dug up on the JLA, and wants it bad.  Wally meets a cadre of "men in black" who will stop at nothing to get Wally's notebook. 

Wally is ready to surrender, when he figures out these aren't the cops.  He is going to go down fighting.  The news media starts reporting on the incident, saying that it is, in fact, a group of supervillains attacking, based on the weapons being used.  The villains, watching from "The Dark Side" bar, get angry.  They go to confront Wally.  The "men in black," seeing that there is more attention on them than they want, leave.  Wally "gives" the stuff back to the villains, just in time for the JLA to show up and capture them.  Poor villains.  Not really their fault this time.   Wally gets away again, but realizes that the notebook could cause problems, so he gives it to J'onn.  J'onn and Max decide it needs to be burned!  Burned and the ashes obliterated.  

A few things I really liked in this issue:

 -- Star Trek references (Wally seems to think he is Captain Kirk.)

-- Wally thinking he should give up journalism to write comics.

-- All the "Bwahhahaha"

-- Spit takes in comics!

-- L-Ron!  Even a bit part.  Is L-Ron going to take the place of Oberon?

-- Never give your kid a weird name (Mortimer, Bito...)

-- "I can hurl starbolts!  I can move objects!  I...I forgot to turn it on."

-- The Cavalier looks a lot like Inigo Montoya.   

And, really, Fire has the WORST taste in clothing.  Good thing for her she doesn't really need a superhero costume anymore.