Each Friday, we'll be letting a different DC.com writer share what they'll be reading over the weekend and why you might want to check it out. Here's this week's suggestion for a perfect Weekend Escape!
 

One of a superhero’s most important elements is their secret identity. Who they were before they became costumed avengers works to draw a distinct line between the villains they fight against and the people they’re trying to protect. However, maintaining a secret identity isn’t easy, often requiring great sacrifice on the hero’s part and occasionally a somewhat questionable relationship with the truth. What effect might maintaining such a secret have on the hero’s psyche? Such is the question pondered by a wonderfully imaginative 2001 JLA story by current Justice League writer Mark Waid and artists Bryan Hitch and Mike Miller. Let’s talk about JLA: Divided We Fall, a five-part saga that originally ran in issues #50-#54 and that can be read in full on DC UNIVERSE INFINITE.
 

THE PREMISE:

Our story begins in the immediate aftermath of one of the most infamous Justice League stories of all time, JLA: The Tower of Babel. In that story, the eco-super-terrorist Ra’s al Ghul steals Batman’s secret contingency plans against a Justice League gone rogue, inflicting them mercilessly on the world’s greatest heroes. Caught completely off-guard and barely surviving the attack, the JLA are furious with their teammate’s secrets and vote him out of the League.

Unfortunately, things would only go from bad to worse, as the idea of a partner in crimefighting keeping secrets begins to form cracks in the League’s teamwork, affecting them in the field. It’s during this tension that the unthinkable happens! Just as the League begin to confide in each other regarding their real identities, Superman, Batman, Green Lantern, Flash, Martian Manhunter and Plastic Man all find themselves split away from their civilian selves. Now, reporter Clark Kent, playboy Bruce Wayne, artist Kyle Rayner, husband Wally West, retired detective John Jones and reformed crook Eel O’Brian are all sidelined as their heroic selves dedicate themselves into transforming the Justice League into a machine of efficiency. Only Wonder Woman and Aquaman (who have no alter egos) remain unchanged, and it is up to them to detect the problems that arise in a Justice League that has lost the human factor in its superheroes.

Meanwhile, the alien phenomena that afflicted the League grows its reach across the planet, as various people get their subconscious “wishes” granted in horrifying ways. Suddenly, people go blind, city streets turn to chocolate and the dead rise to haunt their families. With most of the Justice League increasingly compromised, can Aquaman and Wonder Woman help restore their friends to their righteous selves before the planet is destroyed?
 

LET’S TALK TALENT:

When it comes to the Justice League, few writers have as reflexive a mastery of the team’s heroes as Mark Waid. Here he flexes his creative muscles with deft imagination. Ask yourself, what would DC’s heroes truly be like without their alter egos? Separate Bruce Wayne from Batman, and who do those two beings then become? Or artist Kyle Rayner, who without the Power Ring that grants him the ability to create anything his mind conjures up must return to the two-dimensional world of pencils and crayons. Or J’onn J’onzz, whose previous life as the last living Martian is now freed from the burden of his memories of the dead planet Mars. How might he be different when split into Manhunter and Man?

These are the compelling thought experiments Divided We Fall undertakes. Ably rendering this fantastic story is artwork by Bryan Hitch and Mike Miller. While Miller hits up the sense of confusion and displacement in the second chapter, Hitch brings a photo-realistic quality to the heroes’ civilian lives. Clark Kent, Wally West—they’re just people, and seeing how they’re depicted in Hitch’s grounded, unglamourous pencils drives home how not only we might perceive them in comparison to their super-powered alter egos, but how they see themselves, which is a key factor in the crux of the story.
 

A FEW REASONS TO READ:

• Reflecting on the heroes’ various identities naturally calls upon their history, and Waid is no stranger to DC deep cuts. One such example is the resurrection of a previously dead hero, granted through the alien’s wish-granting magic. It’s a huge dramatic pull that is sure to catch readers off guard.
   
• Although King Arthur and Princess Diana have no secret identities to speak of, seeing them reacting to not only their afflicted comrades, but the world-threatening situation at large serves as a great spotlight for them and how they individually react to crises. Waid has nothing but respect for these iconic characters, as their intellect is key to saving humanity more than just the makeup of their powers.

• Plastic Man is potentially the most fascinating hero in this storyline. As Eel O’Brian, he was a former thief and small-time hood. Separated from his heroic identity as Plastic Man, does O’Brian go back to being a criminal? Should he? Divided We Fall ponders plenty of these uneasy questions with uneasy answers that lie at the heart of justifying Plas’ spot on the team.
   

WHY IT’S WORTH YOUR TIME:

JLA: Divided We Fall is an intensely absorbing storyline that serves as a terrific conclusion to the previous arc that split the team apart. After losing trust in each other, the heroes begin to lose their sense of selves, putting them further and further away from the rock-solid collection of superheroes that the world needs for them to be at its most desperate hour. Waid, Miller and Hitch craft an action-packed epic, with thrills on scales both super and human. An essential storyline for fans of the Justice League of America, Divided We Fall comes highly recommended!
 

JLA: Divided We Fall by Mark Waid, Bryan Hitch and Mike Miller is available as a collection on DC UNIVERSE INFINITE.

Donovan Morgan Grant writes about comics, graphic novels and superhero history for DC.com. Follow him on X at @donoDMG1.

NOTE: The views and opinions expressed in this feature are solely those of Donovan Morgan Grant and do not necessarily reflect those of DC or Warner Bros. Discovery, nor should they be read as confirmation or denial of future DC plans.